Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Temple is on fire. But it is worse than that. It is worse because the Temple is burning and that is not the worst thing happening.

It’s like the Force itself is on fire, too. When Ti reaches for it, she chokes on death, like smoke. Billowing, growing thicker, more acrid. It smells like burning bodies, and she cannot tell if the smell is coming from the Temple, or the Force, or both.

But she has no time to find out because the Temple is on fire and the Force is burning and behind her are the eight bright lights of seven younglings and their creche-master. The children are tired and, too young to comprehend what is happening, numb. Nala Tahl, carrying one of her youngest charges, is hanging on by a thread. She understands too well what the choking smoke in the Force is; why the lights of the Temple grow dimmer and colder and the fire in the Force blazes hotter, scalding those reaching for it.

Shaak Ti does not reach for it, she cannot feel its pain and still focus. She reaches deep into herself and pushes on, guiding the young creche-master and the stumbling children down a deceptively quiet hallway. Dust stirs at their movements in the formerly unused passage winding behind the Temple walls. The Temple has many passages, some more secret than others, that were rarely or no longer used. Shaak Ti doesn’t expect it to save them, they cannot stay in the passage with the Temple on fire.

Nala crumples to her knees with a cry at the back of the silent group. Shaak reacts before she thinks, pulling the younglings behind her with a surge of the burning Force, ignoring the burning pain lancing up her spine and into her head at the touch. She looks for the lasers shining in the air that cut the other woman down but the passage behind her is empty. Empty of the familiar, safe, deadly, white armored men killing her people.

Nala staggers to her feet, her face barely visible in the faint light of the passage, but Shaak Ti can sense the girl is crying, her pain only feeding the terrible searing of the Force.

“My… master…” Nala Tahl chokes out, scooping up the child she’d dropped as she fell with trembling arms. She settles the whimpering Nautolan’s head against her shoulder automatically as the young one flails her underdeveloped limbs helplessly.

Shaak understands. The young knight felt her former master die, whatever was left of their padawan bond being torn apart too suddenly and remorselessly, as though someone had yanked out her old padawan braid by the roots. But she cannot give Nala time to mourn, cannot stop to mourn herself. Everyone is dying, everyone is dead, but they are not dead yet and that comes with a responsibility to do their best not to die.

With a silent motion for the younglings to follow behind her, Shakk Ti hurries down the passage, leading the group again. Nala follows at the back, and if she is holding the youngling just a bit too tightly and her comforting shushing is interspersed by sobs, it does not slow the desperate group.

Shaak Ti finds the door she has been looking for. She had not known before where it was, only where she’d heard it should be, but it is unmistakable in the blue shadows of the silent passage. Black metal crusted in delicate twisting frost is set into a large, arcing doorway and opens at a touch from Shaak’s hand and a breath of the screaming Force.

A rush of moving air spreads into the still hallway, rustling Shaak’s thick robes. Behind the imposing togruta master several of the younglings shiver.

“It’s too cold,” a little twilek yelps as Shaak Ti moves into the dark opening, staring with wide eyes at the black passage beyond.

Ti turns back and picks up the youngling, tucking her under her outer robes.

“Then we must keep moving quickly,” she replies gently, and calmly. It is tempting to reach for the burning of the Force to combat the cold of the centuries-undisturbed hall leading through the depths of the Temple, but Shaak knows the Darkness there would only kill her quicker.

“Come,” still carrying the youngling, she sets off again, slowing her long strides a moment later for the stumbling, struggling children behind her. At a nudge of the Force, the door closes behind them extinguishing what little gray light the other passage had offered.

Several of the children gasp and Shaak stops at their untempered spikes of fear.

“I’m sorry little ones,” she forces herself to say softly, calmly though she feels the searing need to keep moving, away from the burning and the screaming death in the Temple. “We must close the door,” her voice echoes strangely in the hall, as though it is entirely made of metal not aged stone, and is smaller than she saw by the dim light of the Temple passage. “But you have learned to feel the Force even in the darkness have you not? Can you feel me, young ones?” she does not want them reaching into the Force but she broadcasts herself into it, allowing them to feel her presence around them as they clumsily open themselves up to it. “Simply follow the feel of me. The Force and I will guide you and all will be well.”

She feels their understanding in the Force, how several of them latch on to her Force presence as they might cling to her skirts. In the creche, such clinging would be discouraged, but Shaak does not brush away their pressing presences swirling with untempered emotion, confusion, and roiling fear at what they can feel of the Force, instead, she begins walking again. They follow behind her meekly. Silent but she can sense many of them still trembling from both fear and the cold.

They continue down, shuffling and invisible like ghosts in the freezing dark, surrounded by a profound and deepening silence broken only by occasional sniffling.

The younglings begin to tire, their pace slowing further, but Shaak knows she can not let them stop. When the youngling she is holding starts to doze off, Shaak puts her down and makes her walk despite some teary protests, picking up the child she senses is the most tired and carrying him.

Then the pitch-dark hall, which had been sloping downward, levels suddenly. Shaak stumbles slightly and her soft boots hit the flat floor with a clang as it changes from stone to metal.

“Stop,” she tells the exhausted younglings quietly. Putting the young boy she’s been carrying down, she steps forward, hand stretching out before her until she feels a rusting metal grate. A moment later she realizes she can see it; a black crisscrossing of lines against a barely lighter gray. They have reached one of the old Coruscant waterways, nearly as old as the Temple itself, now used most often by smugglers or converted into speeder-train routes.

“Stand back,” her voice sounds harsh against the cold silence they’ve walked in for so long. With a hiss her lightsaber ignites, blazing green, blinding in its sudden brilliance. Several of the nearest younglings stumble back. The little nautolan Nala holds buries her head in the creche-master’s shoulder, aquatic eyes unable to adjust quickly to the surge of light.

Shaak Ti cuts through the grate with a few deft strokes, leaving orange ends glowing cherry red in the darker blackness after she deactivates the ‘saber. One of the younglings whimpers at the loss of the vibrant light, but none of them say a word. Too cold and too tired, Shaak guesses as she waits for the molten edges to cool before letting the children near it.

After a few moments, Shaak ducks through the opening, carefully lowering her towering montrals to avoid brushing the still-hot metal. One by one she carefully lifts the children through the hole. Some of them are trembling from within throughout their whole bodies and the others are limp as she carries them and stand silently after she sets them down.

She pushes her concerns away. The Temple is burning, the Jedi are dying, the children are freezing, but they are alive and all she can do right now is try to keep them that way. She must keep them that way.

Shaak takes the nautolan girl, still more tadpole than humanoid at four years old, to allow Nala to slip through the now nearly invisible gap, then hands her back and cautiously takes the lead again.

The barely gray darkness around the little group hides the features of the waterway. Shaak draws back after a searing brush of the Force and reaches out with her other senses. She smells no water but can tell from the bouncing sounds of the group’s breathing that there is some sort of channel falling off to her right, probably where the water once flowed.

She can hear the echoes reverberating far ahead and, stretching out her left arm, can feel the pockmarked and rusted metal of the wall they have just come through.

As long as they stay close to the wall, they will not have to worry about the dropoff of the channel.

“Keep a hand on the wall and follow me,” she instructs the little ones gently, hearing several of the children catch their breaths as they grope for the wall.

Once all the children have stopped shuffling in the darkness trying to find the guiding wall, Shaak Ti continues. “You can all still feel me in the Force? Good. Follow the feeling of me.”

She does not need to reach out and touch the wall beside her, she can feel its unwavering, straight stillness, so folds her hands behind her and strides forward. Behind her, the stumbling children and tiring creche master, still carrying the young nautolan, hurry along as well, trying to ignore the pressing, featureless black and focus on the Jedi Master’s calm guidance.

The sounds were much the same as they had been before. Shuffling steps, stumbling and quiet, an occasional break in the monotonous noise as someone staggers or trips. Sniffling from cold, tiredness, and fear with the occasional whimper, both sounds get more frequent as time passes in the dark. The breathing behind her becomes louder, too, working its way up to panting from several of the young ones. The sounds echo less in the larger space, and Shaak has to strain her senses, listening intently to the noises reverberating in her montrals to get a sense of the surrounding space.

The smells had changed, she notices. The first hall had been dusty, smelling of dry, crumbled age. The second had been strangely clean, cold, and metallic. Now the smells of Coruscant’s underworld met them, faint, but growing stronger as the waterway rose, sloping gently upward; grease, rust, the sickening sweetness of rot, and the overpowering bitterness of decay.

They simply kept moving.

The little twilek girl stumbles and, exhausted, falls to her knees unable to regain her balance. She scrambles up but does not move forward. Just barely, General Ti could hear the sniffles of her silent crying and sense her trembling form.

Her heart aches for the youngling as she silently halts the group. She is exhausted and cold, can see nothing in the dark, and feels too much from the Force. She is confused, and scared and is trying so very hard not to cry.

Shaak’s heart aches to pick the girl up and comfort her, but she knows she cannot. Nala’s knees are almost buckling now that they have stopped; the human woman’s full-grown strength is worn out from carrying the nautolan child who cannot walk. Shaak sweeps past the silent weary children and the crying little girl to scoop the nautolan girl out of Nala’s arms. She rests her hand on the twilek’s shoulder just long enough the feel her trembling breath slow, before moving back to the head of the group.

A humanoid boy with a kindly nudge of the Force takes the twilke girl’s hand and the group starts moving again. They are slow, but they are moving.

They continue to grow slower.

Though the dark world around them does not change, Shaak can somehow feel the nearness of dawn. Above, the black of the sky will be giving away to the barest hints of gray.

If she lingers on the thought she can see it from years of memories of returning to the Temple from a mission so late it was early. Seeing the spires black against the soft gray, pinpricked by windows of light, high above and untouched by the incessant light of the city below. She would be thinking about going to bed, pulling down all the curtains in her quarters so that the sun would not wake her, making a cup of rich, bitter cocoa, curling up on her couch, and falling asleep before drinking half of it. She would have woken to find that Plo had come in and covered her with a blanket without her noticing; he was the only one who could ever sneak up on her.

The smoke will be hiding the spires from the early gray light, so Shaak Ti does not linger on the thought.

The child in her arms grows heavy as the group’s pace grows ever slower.

Finally, the echoes of space around the numb, stumbling group bring back the fuzzy outline of something cut into the wall, slanting upwards, undulating instead of flat. Stairs, Shaak recognizes, they have found stairs.

She stops the group again and they stand panting in the darkness. She cannot let them rest for too long, though, she knows. They will cool and stiffen, making it harder to keep moving. Once everyone has just about caught their breaths, she speaks.

“There are stairs to my left, we must get up out of here. Follow me carefully.”

They start moving again despite trembling breaths, aching muscles, and still-burning lungs. The stairs are metal and clang at every step. There is no quiet way to climb them in the air stinking of rust with the flaking metal skin of the handrail rough under their fingertips.

Soon calves are burning and lungs are scraping roughly with each breath. The stairs will very quickly be too much for them, Shaak knows. She can feel it in the trembling muscles and shaking hands of the children behind her. The younglings have truly reached their limit now, soon they will simply sit down and go no further. She and Nala cannot carry all of them.

Then the little one in her arms pipes up sleepily.

“The light. ‘See the light?”

Shaak Ti does not freeze because they must keep moving, but something like frozen glass drops in her stomach and shatters. She reaches out with the screaming, crying Force, trying to feel the child’s warmth, ready to pour her own waning strength into making the girl’s heart continue beating. But the girl is still warm. Her breaths are even and her heart beats steadily. She is not succumbing to the cold and slipping away.

A moment later Shaak sees it too, her straining predator’s eyes picking up what the girl’s ocean dweller's vision has already detected, gray light filtering into the darkness. Up ahead, somewhere, is a light. It cannot be daylight, it is still too early for that and they are still far too deep in Coruscant’s underlevels to see it anyway. It is white and manufactured, but the sight of it gives the group new strength as they move toward its source and all the children realize it’s there.

Three flights of steps up and the group stands panting before a simple, hinged metal door. Around its edges white brilliance seeps to meet light-starved eyes and glint on dirty faces. In basic script barely discernible in the near blackness around them are painted the words “DLTS Track 74.8 Maintenance Tunnel 23” and beneath that “Authorized Personnel Only”.

The door is predictably locked. The younglings back up as Shaak Ti unlocks it with a deft cut of her searing blade, cradling the nautolan girl against her chest, then kicks it open. For a moment, all anyone can see is white, the light overwhelming their darkness-attuned senses, sending flashes of pain along the wires of their optical nerves. The nautolan buries her sensitive eyes in Shaak’s shoulder with a whimper.

General Ti blinks rapidly, feeling her pupils retract and adjust. Then the new area comes into focus. In truth, it is not all that brightly lit. Evenly spaced rings of white lights encircle the metal tube they are standing in, with about 25-30 ft between each ring shedding just enough light to see by, but not much more. The limping, blinking group moves out onto a narrow raised walkway parallel to the anti-grav tracks in the bottom of the tube, fingers and toes tingling with the sudden warmth generated by the track’s anti-gravity field. They have found an underground train track, and, bless the Force, Shaak sees a maintenance lift fifteen feet to the left across the tracks.

All they have to do is get there.

Nala Tahl looks up at her with tired eyes as Shaak Ti hands her the nautolan child back.

“We must cross,” the master explains shortly.

She tugs at the screaming Force, gritting her teeth and it churns like crushed gravel through veins, scraping and grinding. A graceful leap carries her across the tracks, swishing her skirts as she straightens and faces the little group across the gap.

Closing her eyes against the howling flames in the Force, Shaak reaches out a hand, gathering the whipping energy around the little twilek girl. Space and reality shift as the girl slowly rises in the air. A moment later another presence presses into the moving pulsing Force, Nala cutting herself on razor-sharp icicles of loss as she joins with Shaak Ti, wrapping her energy around the girl and pulling her through open air across the tracks.

The girl settles gently on the other platform beside Shaak, staggering then sinking to her knees as gravity suddenly reapplies itself, almost as though angry at being defied.

Blinking away rising tears as a scorching breath of the Force lashes out at her, Shaak wraps her will around the next child, pulling him through thin air to her side.

Then the next, and the next.

At one point, the humanoid boy tries to join the effort, pushing through the lapping flames and icy spikes to pull at the next child, soft, pale hand extended in concentration. With a gentle nudge, Shaak pushes him out of communion with the Force even as another scathing lash of pain burns in her mind and heart. His connection to the Force is so strong and so pure, but he is too young to handle this cutting, bleeding fire.

Finally, she levitates the nautolan girl back into her arms as Nala breathes in a shaky breath and, supported by the Force, flies across the gap and lands trembling.

The group shuffles across the chalky duracrete to the lift door. There is an electro-lock on its operating pad. Shaak lays a red hand on it and pushes the clawing Force into its mechanisms, flowing in energy through it until she feels it relent and call the lift.

Nala has already withdrawn from the Force and Shaak too releases her tight grasp. The pain of her constant companion will only cloud her senses where she usually relies on it more heavily than sight. It has been many years since Shaak has been out of deep communion with the Force; without its constant humming in the background, its living presence in all things reaching eagerly to greet her as its child no matter where she wandered in the whole galaxy. As she has grown older, her connection only deepened.

Now she feels like a youngling herself as she ushers the children into the lift, everyone crowding in and blinking in the brightness of the lights set in the ceiling of the small space. General Ti leans against the corrugated metal wall of the lift and ignores the empty hole in her chest, the sudden stillness in the back of her mind. She must save the younglings and Nala, even without the Force.

The lift begins to rise.

It is quiet inside as breaths even and exhausted younglings begin to drift off, leaning against the walls of the lift and their creche-master. The nautolan girl in her arms slips into sleep, her steady heartbeat echoing up Shaak Ti’s lekku and into her montrals, a deep, comforting rhythm. The near-human boy and the twilek girl fall asleep leaning against each other, his silvery white hair glistening against her reddish purple skin in the white light of the lift.

It is only now, in the cool quiet of the lift, that Shaak realizes that she smells like smoke. She swallows back rising bile in her throat and ignores the heavy, sickening scent of it just as she ignores the ever-screaming Force.

The rise, according to her rough internal clock, lasts around half an hour, enough time for even Nala to drift off and jerk awake several times. Long enough for them to have risen nearly to the top layers of Coruscant, probably at the bases of the rising skyscrapers that glimmer silver and pierce the sky like knives.

The lift stops with a hissing jolt that shakes all the dozing younglings awake, several with panicked gasps and a wincing surge of fear in the Force before Nala and Shaak brush it away and wrap the children in comfort. The door slides open with a soft whir on the opposite side than they’d entered, revealing a plastoid and plastisteel hall, much newer than the tunnels they’d left behind below. The building is obviously in use but currently closed, as they usher the children out of the lift. Recessed overnight lights dimly shine along the walls and floors, the occasional cleaning droid whirring by without the slightest reaction to the presence of the fugitive Jedi. They pass several closed doors, marked by painted labels in both basic and huttsese as offices or various maintenance departments.

Whatever level they are on, they are not high enough to be in the zones where everyone is expected to speak Basic as dictated by the preferences of Republic high society, Shaak notes as she leads the group, following exit signs and the faint directions she allows herself to carefully skim off the Force. They need to get out of the building before the day starts and the employees will be arriving in droves.

They come to a door with the word “exit” in basic and Huttsese flashing yellow and red. Nala reaches for the handle, but Shaak snatches her wrist before the flagging human woman can touch it. Nala had never been in the war trying to take a fortified building, so she had not realized the significance of the red-painted metal pieces on the hinges; not without a warning from the Force, which she did not have.

“Open it like that and an alarm will go off,” The Jedi Master replies to her younger counterpart’s questioning look. “Allow me.”

She passes the nautolan girl to the creche master, then once again withdraws her ‘saber, igniting it and using its light to closer examine the doorframe.

Her experienced eyes follow the nearly invisible wire along the edges of the old-fashioned door to the little red box perched above it. Making full use of her Togrutan height, Shaak Ti reaches up to the box and unclips the wire with a deft twist.

“Now we may go,” she gathers up the nautolan crechling once more. Nala scoops up the tired twilek girl as Shaak pushes the door open.

At first, the world outside of the building does not look all that different from the inside. The metal floors are grimier and occasionally rise or fall in ramps and steps. The metal walls vary in material and color as building connects to building and are occasionally pierced through with glowing windows or closed doors. The metal roofs vary as well and are decorated with bright neon or holo signs advertising a variety of items - including several that make Shaak grateful that the children are too tired to look anywhere but their feet - and strips of white lights bright enough to let them see the world around them. Whatever level they are on, it is apparently too low for sunlight or even open skies.

Eventually, the streets become a little busier, rough passers-by slipping up and down the street and appearing or disappearing out of and into shadowy side alleys. Through her exhaustion, Shakk Ti wraps her presence around her group, projecting a simple see-me-not command into the shrieking, wailing Force, surrounding them all with a slight cloud of anonymity. No one seems to notice them as they work their way down a wider thoroughfare with brightly lit shops and loud music playing despite the early hour, along with the lingering scent of alcohol and deathsticks drifting from every shadowed corner.

Too tired to think where to go, Shaak and her group are swept up in a sudden surge of people moving up a wide ramp in the street, rising to the first open-sky level, where glimpses of the starless blackness surrounding Coruscant can be caught between over-hanging rooftops, sky-bridges, and the already snarled speeder-lanes. The bustle and crowd grow immediately. A little togruta boy squeals as he tiredly drifts a little too far from the group and is nearly run over by a hurrying Frenk.

With both physical and Force nudges, Shaak Ti guides the stumbling group out of the crushing crowd and into the still safety of a dead-ended alley that stinks of refuse and yet more stale alcohol.

It is only then that she notices that Nala is trembling violently. The twilek she is carrying squirms out of the creche-master’s unresisting arms and hurries to cling to Shaak’s dress as Nala’s muscles spasm and her limply hanging hands twitch.

“Knight Tahl,” Shaak Ti lowers the nautolan child to be supported by her creche-mates and crosses to the unresponsive woman. Nala stares straight ahead, not seeming to see Shaak or the children or the rusted wall in front of her, simply continuing to shake.

“Is she prone to visions?” the Jedi Master turns to the little Jedi. “Has this happened before?”

“‘T’s not visions,” the silver-haired boy speaks up carefully, hugging the smaller Togrutan boy who had almost gotten run over with one arm. “It's her son. She feels his hurt.”

Shaak does not ask “Son?” despite her confusion. She pushes her questions away to focus on the more relevant information, letting everything else fall aside into the burning Force. Nala had some sort of Force bond with her son that allowed her to feel his pain. If he was a Temple child then… well, she is probably feeling her son’s death.

Almost as soon as Shaak has come to that conclusion, Nala crumples silently to the ground, her body simply folding up and falling to the grimy floor. She lays for a moment completely still, hands pressed to her stomach. General Ti drops to her knees beside her fellow Jedi and reaches out into the clawing, screaming Force to feel Nala’s pain.

Something cold wraps around Nala’s soul; a broken bond made of youth and hope threaded through freezing horror. The coldness moves slowly and silently in the Force, like oil lapping and sticking to Shaak’s soul as she wades into it reaching for the insensate creche-master before the woman is lost completely in the Force.

Nala gasps as Shaak’s presence wraps around her’s, insulating her from the creeping, sticky cold in the heart of the Force. Only then does Shaak realize that Nala hasn’t been breathing. A trembling hand wraps tightly around Shaak’s supporting arm, Nala digging her fingernails into the older Jedi’s flesh as her eyes fly open and she begins breathing again.

“Skywalker,” she hisses like it a curse.

Shaak Ti does not spare a moment to wonder about that either.

“Can you stand?” she asks the young woman, sensing the sniffling, shuffling crechelings behind her, frightened by the collapse of their caretaker.

Nala’s other hand clutches Shaak’s shoulder, wild green eyes staring into Shaak’s, squeezing hard enough that it hurts more than the nails still digging into her other arm.

“How… how could he?” the shaking woman demands halfway between a sob and a scream.

“Nala, focus, can you stand?” the Jedi Master asks again, pushing away questions and suspicions until a better time to deal with them. The sticky coldness in the otherwise screaming, burning Force is still around them, not breaking up or falling away from her soul in furious and disrupted eddies like the rest of the pain. This is something worse and more permanent than the Force burning with the deaths of its children and Shaak does not understand what it could be.

“Nala,” Shaak begins again, then there is another voice in the alley.

“Generla Ti?”

Heart in her throat and thundering in her montrals, Shaak Ti whirls, her sudden fear pouring into the force like gasoline onto a fire, the flames of its pain leaping into her soul, pressing into her body like blows.

A speeder is stopped at the mouth of the alley; a young boy in an oversized Senate uniform is at the control, staring at Shaak, Nala, and the younglings with wide eyes. Halfway out of the speeder, watching her hesitantly is a familiar face. Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan, perhaps the only politician Obi-Wan Kenobi had ever told her he trusted without reservation.

The dark man looks over the Jedi master, the still prone and trembling creche master, and the wide-eyed, exhausted children with a sharp glance. Then he finishes climbing out of the speeder and holds out both arms to Shaak.

“I can hide you,” he says simply and without hesitation. “You must get off the streets. The clones are hunting down Jedi all over Coruscant.” He glances back at the child piloting his speeder, then back to Shaak. “Will you come with me?”

Still supporting her fellow Jedi and reaching the ends of her own strength, Shaak Ti simply nods, praying to the bleeding Force that she is right to trust Bail Organa.

Chapter Text

Bail Organa’s day had been going well. He wasn’t going to say good because a good day required Breha’s presence, but it had been very productive, and - with a bit of optimism - it had gone well.

For the first time, the group they were now calling the Delegation had gathered face-to-face after nearly three months of hearsay, networking, and private comm calls. Frankly, Bail had been both pleasantly surprised at how many senators and representatives had shown up and at the same time, disappointed that more had not.

Still, it was a good start. The fact that nearly 2,000 planets representing close to 700 systems were unhappy with the Chancellor’s growing emergency powers now that the end of the war was in sight, dawning just over the horizon, was truly quite encouraging. Despite Padme’s best efforts, the number would not have been nearly this high during any other time in the past 3 years.

It was the kidnapping of Chancellor Palpatine that had done it, Bail knew as he strode down a silver-inlaid, purple-carpeted senate hall. With Palpatine out of play, however briefly before Kenobi and Skywalker’s dashing rescue, the otherwise reluctant senators were forced to come to terms with the fact that the senate quite literally couldn’t operate without his presence. Palpatine had siphoned away so much of their power with emergency act after emergency act that, with him missing, the Senate was effectively powerless. 

After that harsh lesson, even some of the Chancellor’s allies had agreed to the necessity of curbing Palpatine’s senate powers. Many of those were, however, Bail considered sourly as he entered his office, overly optimistic about the Chancellor giving these powers up without a struggle. Bail knew enough about plotting from the shadows to know just how purposeful Palpatine’s amassment of power had been. After the war started, it certainly hadn’t taken him long at all to see the opportunity and play it for all it was worth.

But the Delegation - he reminded himself as he settled down at his desk with a foul mood wrapped around his shoulders like a scarf - the Delegation was a significant step in the right direction. He shrugged away a little of that lingering bitterness.

Then Breha’s comm seal flickered to life, painted blue in the air by his personal holo-projector, and the rest of his mood disappeared like clouds before the sun. Maybe today would be a good day after all.

With a press of the button on the underside of his desk, he dimmed the windows behind him overlooking the snarled hover-lanes spread over the glittering city-scape of Coruscant like tangled knitting and activated a lower-than-human-hearing frequency that would scramble the Senate security devices that were standard in all Senator’s offices. 

It was not a subtle way to scramble them, meaning that the Coruscant Guard would be well aware that he was jamming the security features, but Bail and Commander Thire had come to an understanding about that some time ago; scrambling could not last for more than an hour per day and there was an emergency button to alert the Guard if there was trouble, just in case.

Bail knew that, despite this agreement, it still annoyed Commander Thire that he did it so often, but sometimes a man needed to be able to talk privately with his wife without having to worry about the fact that the Chancellor had also been granted access to all the Senate security feeds in his extensive emergency powers.

Bail couldn’t help but smile softly as Breha appeared. Her hair was down, he noticed first, meaning she was quite done with Queenly appearances for the day. It fell in thick, liquid waves of dark, rich brown - like Bail’s favorite caf with the perfect touch of sweetener and dash of cream - across almond-gold shoulders bare except for the thin straps of the blue velvet shift draped across her perfect form. Auburn eyes fading to gold at the edges caught his, crinkling at the corners with amusement as her pink lips twitched into the sly smile only Bail’s admiration could coax out of her. 

Breha Organa, Bail already knew, was well aware that all her husband could think about at the moment was how much he wanted to run his hands through her hair. On those all too rare occasions that they were together on Alderaan, she always let him help her take her down and brush it out after finishing her appearances for the day. As he ran his hands through the liquid silkiness of it, they would talk about everything - the annoyances of their respective positions, where their long-planned but not-yet-achieved vacation should be, the plans for the next planetary holiday, what they would name their child if they could ever have one, the most efficient way to assassinate certain annoying Alderaanian lords and Republic chancellors - until they lapsed into silence just drinking in each other's longed-for presences.

So, yes, Queen Breha Organa of Alderaan knew exactly the effect she was having on her planet’s esteemed Senator. More than that, he knew from that sly smile dancing on her lovely lips, it was entirely purposeful.

Bail’s eyes narrowed, it would not do for Breha to think she had the upper hand in this conversation just because she’d let her hair down before calling him. He was, after all, the Senator of Alderaan, subtlty was his specialty, and laying these sorts of careful traps and pitfalls were essential parts of his job description. It wouldn’t do to have his queen thinking her chosen representative was slipping, now would it?

“My queen,” Bail said in his blandest voice, schooling his face to the impassivity he used to cover boredom once Senate session hit their fifth hour. “It seems you’re looking for someone special tonight. Is there someone you need me to transfer you to?” He felt a smile much like Breha’s trying to grow on his own lips, but he smothered it with a subservient lilt in his voice. “I’m sure I can recommend someone if you tell me what you’re looking for.”

Breha actually laughed, everything about her body softening in the warmth of the sound. Rosy bubbles filled Bail’s chest in delight at the noise. His smile broke through immediately, all affected seriousness crumbling in the face of his wife’s amusement.

She slouched backward, her queenly posture abandoned in her husband’s presence, long pearlescent nails tapping against her lower lip.

“Well, my very loyal senator, I’m looking for a man. He has to have black hair, the kindest eyes I have ever seen, and when he smiles it has to make the rest of the world feel just a little dimmer by comparison.”

Warmth was blossoming in Bail’s cheeks as his clever, teasing queen took the opening he’d so blindly given her. Only Breha could make his control slip like this. She was all but laughing at him as she kept going, certainly catching the flush darkening his cheeks as her gold-toned skin reddened with amused triumph.

“He needs to be able to argue for arguments’ sake and then be able to apologize in the most beautifully profound way possible with perfect sincerity before turning around and doing it again,” her white teeth flashed like frosted pearls as she smiled. “And most importantly he needs to be so absolutely, thoroughly good that I can trust him absolutely and love him no matter what because I know that whatever he did, he did it because it was the right thing.”

“ Breha ,” Bail Organa gave in and groaned, fighting the urge to bury his face in his hands to hide from her praise. 

She laughed at him again and Bail could feel his soul growing as though the sound was the rain in his drought-ridden garden of life.

“So, my dear senator,” she took it just a little further. “Do you know anyone like that?”

“No, my queen,” he managed to get out past a suddenly tight throat. “I don’t believe I do.”

“Oh,” she sighed in dramatic disappointment, sounding like a lonely wind in Alderaan’s mountains. “Well, then, my dear, I suppose I’ll just have to settle for you.”

“I do hope I’m not too disappointing, Your Majesty,” Bail’s retort would have been more impressive if he couldn’t feel his cheeks stretching with a wide smile like a love-sick schoolboy. “I don’t believe any subject of yours could claim to live up to your beauty or wit. Nor could any aspire to match your fierce bravery. I do believe that you may always have to settle for I cannot think of any man deserving of your shining perfection.”

Breha laughed in a sound more like a snort and dropped her head onto her desk in a charmingly unqueenly manner. But Bail had caught the blush spreading up her neck now that it was her turn to be plied with effusive yet absolutely sincere compliments and triumph settled in his belly like a warm meal, giving him the fortitude to meet her eyes again when she finally picked her head up.

As she sat back up, he noticed the tired lines creased out by her fading laughter and, glancing at his Republic Standard clock, realized that it must be quite late on Alderaan. Fighting a frown, he asked gently.

“How was your day?”

She smiled pleasantly, just a slight upturn of pink lips without the wry twist from before, idly twisting a lock of liquid hair around her finger. 

“What time is it there?” she asked instead of giving him an answer. 

Bail did not have to look at the clock again, before replying, “21:20 Republic Standard.” he was not phased by the non-sequitur, he and Breha’s conversations often followed this pattern. What the other asked was always relevant in some way to the original conversation.

“Then you’re fine to share a drink with me,” she leaned out of frame to retrieve a bottle made of thick crystal, containing a small amount of dark auburn liquid.

“Of course,” he replied, feeling less worried for her day. Breha never drank after bad days for fear of alcohol becoming a crutch to combat the many trials of queenship. 

He pressed a finger against the lock of a drawer to his left, unlocking it with his fingerprint. He pulled out a bottle identical to Breha’s, clinking past a Chandrillan fire-glazed tea set, a carved and polished wooden box of Nabooian nectar tea, and an unmarked tin that Obi-wan had presented to him with the summary “The best head-ache reliever known to human-kind” and a smirking refusal to reveal its ingredients. The fact that it was exactly as advertised only made Bail more suspicious.

With a smooth twist, Breha uncapped her bottle, balancing the tilted lid on the desk to serve as a small glass, pouring the alcohol in a precious stream like blood to glitter in the crystal. On his end of the call, Bail copied her actions, the fermented smell of the apples he and Breha had picked together rising enough to make the Coruscanti office feel just a little more like home.

In unison, the queen and senator of Alderaan took their first sip of the precious cider; only then did Breha speak again.

“It was long,” she began softly, one hand rubbing the back of her neck where she would, Bail knew from having massaged the same spot himself, be able feel the first knob of the metal implant wrapped around her spine. “But so very, very productive.”

She smiled and the alcohol warmed Bail as it spread through his chest as pleasantly as happiness.

“Lord Malachi put the modified version of the War Outreach and Relief program to vote today and I ratified it this evening,” her smile widened with triumph, gold-edged eyes glittering fiercely, “ With the Adoption Clause intact.”

Bail felt his cheeks ache with the width of his smile, wishing that he could reach through the screen and kiss his wife hard enough that she could feel how happy he was for her and how proud he was of her.

The War Outreach and Relief program bill had been through the Alderaanian Royal Council 3 times since the program’s inception and Breha had vetoed it each time for not addressing the adoption issues the program was facing. The last time, she’d called Bail, second guessing her decision when so many other parts of the bill were vitally needed as well. Bail had trusted his wife’s initial instinct in the matter. If Breha thought that yet another veto would spur her Council to address the Adoption Clause, he was willing to trust that it really would help, instead of killing the bill as Breha feared.

With all the orphans from the war, Alderaan’s refugee program had struggled to care for them. Not because there was a lack of willing homes, but because Alderaanian adoption laws required legal proof of the previous guardian’s death or unfitness to care for the child, such as a death certificate or legal witness. In the war zones of sieged planets, however, such proofs were hard to come by, leaving the refugee program buried under a flood of orphans who could not legally be placed with families that would gladly have raised them.

Now that Breha had finally managed to get the Adoption Clause passed through with the War Outreach and Relief program bill, orphans coming from war zones, or the party responsible for them, could sign a statement that their guardians were, to the best of their knowledge, dead and, if unclaimed by their previous guardians within 3 months of being thus registered by the refugee program, could be moved to Alderaan’s Planetary Adoption Program and be taken in by caring families that would give them safe and stable lives on Alderaan.

“That’s wonderful,” Bail breathed as though she didn’t already know. And then, inadequately, he added, “Well done.”

Breha’s smile widened like the sun coming out sending waves of warmth pulsing like a heartbeat across Bail’s skin. She took another sip and Bail followed suit, tilting his cup in her direction in a makeshift toast before bringing the smooth fruity taste to his lips.

“And how was your day?” Breha asked him, elegantly swirling the few sips left of her cider in the palm of her hand. “Your delegation met to formalize the complaints against Palpatine, right?”

“That was the plan,” Bail agreed with a small, polite smile which told Breha that things had not gone quite as well as Bail had hoped.

“Oh?” she said pushing the conversation along. “And?”

Bail shook his head, putting his glass down as his smile softened into something a little more genuine and a little bit exasperated. “And sometimes you go to brunch with people who want to talk about how we shouldn’t have trampled the Republic Constitution to give Palpatine emergency powers that the Senate didn’t have the authority to grant him in the first place and want to place blame and wonder why we did that.”

Breha sipped her cider patiently as Bail meandered to the point, resting his chin on intertwined fingers and feeling the tension of the day ease out of his back and shoulders now that he had someone to complain to.

“The very purpose behind this ‘brunch,’ however, took those facts as givens, yet half the meeting was people talking on and on about how Palpatine shouldn’t have been given emergency powers and not what we’re going to do now that he has been given them. The other half was then spent convincing several people that he is not going to just give them up because the senate is upset that he’s effectively curbed our power.”

“Those in power either never want to give it up, or can’t give it up fast enough,” Breha’s eyes crinkled at the corners with a sympathetic smile. “A person who gathers power for themselves usually falls into that first category.”

“You’d think Republic Senators , of all sentients, would know something about that,” Bail shook his head, tapping a smooth thumbnail against his chin. “I’m still amazed at how many people think Sheev Palpatine is some sort of exception to the rule that power corrupts.”

Breha tilted her head forward slightly in agreement, a lock of her luscious hair slipping from behind her curved ear and brushing against her soft cheek with the movement. 

“Still,” Bail continued, sitting up though his hands remained steepled, “We are finally getting somewhere. Mon was voted spokesperson for the delegation and she certainly suffers from no delusions about Palpatine not being corrupt.” He made a purposeful effort to never just complain to Breha, trying to always follow up his frustrations with a positive.

“Mon?” Breha asked, head tilting slightly so that the golden lamplight from beside the vanity left a shadowed outline of the curves and edges of the far side of her face. “I thought Padme was the more passionate about speaking out against the Chancellor?”

Bail shrugged, his own confusion like a cloak around his shoulders as he tucked his chin back into his hands. 

“Padme said she may be returning to Naboo within a month for a long Sabbatical, so she could not guarantee her attention as a spokesperson. Senator Papanoida was actually the one who suggested Mon, which brought a lot of the Outer Rim and fringe planets into line while giving us Chandrilia’s Middle and Inner Rim influence through Mon’s leadership.”

He smiled a little, lips twitching out of his thoughtful frown. 

“I was surprised at how well done that move was. I was worried it would take her a while to find her feet, but Chuchi seems to have brought her up to speed quite nicely.”

“Good for her,” Breha nodded in approval. “If I recall right, Chuchi took quite some time to get any traction when she came to Senate herself?”

Bail nodded, fighting a flush of pleasure that his very busy wife had bothered to remember such detail about one of his closer allies. 

“Yes,” he agreed. “And yet it’s been her actions that have given Pantora such a strong reputation among the Outer Rim now. After her handling of the Talz and her breaking of the Trade Federation blockade, Pantora has more influence among the Republic Systems than it has ever had in the history of the Republic.”

“Well, I’m glad the Senator managed to use that influence so well,” Breha commented genuinely.

“Yes,” Bail agreed, taking another sip of his cider, sour apple exploding across his tongue. “It was a slow start today, but we have a good foundation.” He put the glass back down, precisely in the condensation ring it had left on the desk, and relaced his finger beneath his chin. “We have more traction now with the delegation than we’ve ever had with any bill to curb Palpatine’s power during the war. I think,” he continued softly, leaning a little closer to the holo, “It’s for the best that Mon Mothma will head the delegation. Padme’s got too much of a reputation for heading failed bills that are all ideals and no substance. Mon has always been much more staid and sensible; the others trust her not to put her support behind an effort that’s bound to fail from the start. Neither Padme’ nor I are quite trusted that way.”

Breha nodded thoughtfully, taking a last sip of her cider. Bail followed her lead, swallowing tingly warmth and the smell of a sun-bright orchard afternoon eight years passed.

In response to some sound or sight out of Bail’s view off-screen, Breha turned and looked at some object to her left. With a small smile and long sigh, she turned back, leaning in toward the holo.

“I need to go to bed now, dearest,” she told him softly. “I love you, may the light follow you even in your dreams,” she finished with the traditional Alderaan goodnight wish.

“And may the stars gather radiant around you,” Bail gave the expected response. “I love you, Breha, rest well, sweetheart.”

The holo flickered and then went dark, taking the warmth and light from the room. Bail looked up as he closed the cider bottle and slipped it back into its drawer to realize that the sun had set and that night had spread across Coruscant. With the press of a button, he deactivated his security features, then stared as the dark film washed out of the blurred windows.

As he had already seen, the skyscrapers of Coruscant lit the night sky with layers of hazy light. Now though, he saw that the light coming from the dark domes and spires of the Jedi temple was not the usual artificial brilliance.

The Jedi Temple was on fire.

Cold slipped down his throat and plopped slimy into his stomach like an egg yolk from a broken egg, all at once with an uncanny smoothness. He stared for a moment, unable to comprehend the sight.

The Jedi Temple was on fire.

Then he was up, chair flying backward as he lurched to his feet, snatching his comm from his belt and selecting the captain of his guard with a tap.

“Tyrone,” he barked past the pressure like ice in his throat. “Prepare my speeder. Now .”

His heart was beating too fast, like the clicking of cicadas on muggy summer midnights on the Alderaan plains when he couldn’t sleep as he tossed and turned, sticky with sweat from the humid heat. It felt like his veins would burst from the pressure of the blood and adrenaline being pushed down them so rapidly as he all but sprinted towards the Alderaanian office’s landing bay.

Tyrone and the red-striped speeder were waiting for him, the captain’s gray eyes peering worriedly from beneath his silver-streaked hair.

“Sir, what…” he began but Bail cut him off.

“I’m sorry, but there’s no time,” He pulled himself into the speeder. “Something’s wrong at the Temple. I’m going to see what we can do.”

“I’ll come, too, sir,” Tyrone declared, limping around to the other side of the speeder, refusing to allow an old blaster shot taken to the leg in defense of his queen to slow him down in his new position of watching over her husband.

Bail shook his head sharply, already starting up the speeder with shaking hands, forcing his voice to work with some semblance of calm.

“I need you to coordinate with the Embassy to prepare to take in refugees if necessary.”

Tyrone stared; hands on the side of the speeder in preparation to haul himself in as the engine rumbled to life.

“Refugees? From the Temple?” Good man that he was, he was already reaching for his comm despite his confusion. “What exactly happened?”

“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” Bail met his guard’s eyes, seeing the man’s growing reluctance to let him go alone into this unspecifically dangerous situation. “The Temple is burning, Tyrone.”

“ Burning ?” the man repeated in disbelief. “How…”

Bail cut him off with a sharp wave of his hand. He didn’t know how a building like the Temple with top-of-the-line fire suppression systems following Coruscant policy could be burning. He didn’t know why his glance out the window had shown no emergency vehicles with flashing lights or streams of craft evacuating from the burning building. He didn’t know why there had been no announcement or panic in the Senate the minute an uncontained fire had started in the Jedi Temple .

What he knew was that there was pressure like a hand squeezing his throat and a feeling of dread stirring his insides with a rod of ice. What he knew, by the thundering surf in his ears like a storm rolling in, was that something was wrong and the dread tasted like should have known yet he could not grasp the entirety of the thought.

“Contact the Embassy,” he repeated and Tyrone snapped his mouth shut, unused to Bail Organa giving such sharp orders and instinctively obeying as though he were still a soldier in the queen’s honor guard. 

Bail released the speeder’s parking brake, when the captain called, “Sir!”

He looked up to see a dark object flying towards him, catching what turned out to be his captain’s blaster in its holster. He didn’t stop to wonder whether or not it was a good idea to be tossing such a weapon, simply strapped it on and nodded to Tyrone, spinning the speeder smoothly out of the bay.

He abandoned the established speeder lanes almost immediately, speeding illegally through the empty patches of Coruscant night sky led by the red glow of one of the planet’s largest and oldest buildings in flames. 

The Temple sector was absolutely empty; there were no firefighters, no emergency personnel, no news crews, nor even gawking bystanders. It was as though no one else knew that Temple was burning. Despite the fact that it was visible for miles and possibly the most prominent feature of the Coruscanti skyline, no one was there. 

Bail clenched the steering yoke tighter, yawing toward a lower Temple landing pad that seemed more removed from the burning upper levels. 

The cold feeling bubbled and grew, rising caustic in the back of his throat as he neared the platform. He saw clone troopers, gathered on the platform in loose groups as though guarding the burning building. Not just any clone troopers but Skywalker’s 501st battalion, Bail could tell by the blue stripes on their armor.

Several moved toward his approaching speeder, the rest were just… standing there. The Temple was burning but they seemed not to notice. None of Anakin’s famously reckless and heroic men were doing anything. They weren’t fighting the blaze, they weren’t saving their general’s people, they weren’t even watching the fire. If Bail hadn’t known better, he would have thought they guarding to make sure that no one came out of the burning edifice.

He landed the speeder and swung himself out smoothly, watching as the troopers approached with stiff precision, weapons not pointed quite at him, but raised slightly in a clear threat. Something warm crawled and itched under his skin like blood trickling, prickling as it dried.

Something was very, very wrong here.

Swallowing, he fought the urge to rest his hand on his blaster; to soldiers that would come across as threatening and possibly instigate a fight he certainly couldn’t win outnumbered on this platform. Never before had he felt threatened by the clone troopers; the idea of them and their absolutely unknown origins, yes, but the troopers themselves, no. Now though, with the white of their armor outlined by the red light of the fire at their backs and their subtly tilted weapons glinting against the night air, Bail decided to approach cautiously.

“What’s going on here?” He demanded in as calm a voice as he could manage. He straightened his spine, willing his presence to be commanding and unintimidated. Don’t let them know you're afraid he heard the voice of his 8th-year class’s hiking guide instructing him on how to handle rocky mountain cats They won’t attack if they don’t see you as prey . The rod of ice moved into his throat at how reasonable the advice on handling wild animals known for mauling hikers sounded when applied to the men in front of him.

“There’s been a rebellion, sir,” the lead trooper responded without inflection. “Don’t worry. The situation is under control.”

A what ?

He could feel the icicle drop right back down into his stomach, this time with sharp edges. 

He needed to find a Jedi. A Jedi would be able to explain. The troopers, on the other hand, were watching him as though they were just waiting for the order to blast his head off.

Throwing his shoulders back like Commander Fox, trying to exude the man’s unquestionable authority, he hazarded a step forward, heart beating as loud as a scream, as though trying to remind him that he was currently still alive and should be trying to stay that way. The clone’s weapons came up automatically, the one who had spoken practically poking him in the chest.

Bail froze, somehow surprised even though he’d been expecting the reaction. 

“I’m sorry, sir,” the clone said without a change in tone. “It’s time for you to leave.”

Bail took a half step back, heart continuing to thud loudly in his ears, trying to keep his breathing steady as the air in his throat tried to choke him.

He glanced at the Temple, still burning , then at the clones with weapons raised, unmoving.

They most definitely could not be trusted, some still rationally functioning part of his brain decided. He had to find another way inside. He had to find the Jedi.

“So it is,” he replied, channeling the steady voice he used for certain trying members of the senate such as Orn Free Taa and the Chancellor. He made a show of turning back to his speeder as if he didn’t feel the prickling sense of the blasters still leveled at his back; as if he did not care. His bones were made of lead as he rounded to the driver's side of the speeder.

Then blaster shots shattered the night.

Instinct sent Bail diving behind his speeder before bothering to register if he’d been hit or if he was even the one being shot at. A glance over the vehicle showed that he was not.

The nearest clones fell as a short figure - a child; Bail’s blood froze and his churning fear hardened at the realization - with a lightsaber - a Jedi padawan - charged wildly down the pathway to the landing pad, clones firing steadily at him as he deflected the lasers and cut them down. A stray burning smear of red singed past Bail’s shoulder but he hardly flinched, staring in horror at the blond boy standing in a circle of scorch marks, trying not to die.

In the hail of red lasers, a bolt finally slipped past the child’s guard. The boy hardly whimpered at the burning hole smoking in his shoulder, staggering away, flailing in desperation as the clones, like blood-hungry akkuls, moved in around him, outlined in the black sky by the orange flames of the child’s burning home behind them.

Bail stopped thinking and acted; the blaster seemed to spring from its holster into his trembling palm of its own accord. Once it was in his hands, instinctive memory took over, hours spent drilling on Alderaan at the PIF Academy, snatched moments in the palace range trying vainly to outshoot Breha, and the increasingly frequent practices at the rarely used Senate range he’d been pulling as the war continued to escalate.

Three troopers went down with steady shots from still hands even though the rest of Bail was shaking as though the Zillo beast was rampaging a few levels below. By the time the troopers seemed to realize where the shots were coming from, the padawan had recovered, taking a clone’s head clean off his shoulders and Bail flinched at the trooper’s death even as he kept firing.

Two clones were left by the time the child had hacked his way down the platform to Bail’s speeder, leaving lifeless troopers lying crumpled and mangled like crashed speeders in a trail behind him. They did not retreat from the Jedi and Senator as the child leaped up onto the edge of the speeder, deflecting bolts while his left arm hung limply, providing cover for Bail to scramble into the driver’s seat, banging his knee on the side of the steering column as he kicked the parking brake to disengage. 

A reflected bolt took a blue and white trooper in the chest, and a single man was left, still almost mindlessly trying to shoot down the child. He raised a gloved hand to his helmet to activate internal comms in a move Bail recognized from the troopers he’d worked with; a sick lurch of betrayed familiarity at a gesture that used to be a relief to see in the back of his throat. Grabbing the back of the child’s cloak to steady him, Bail jerkily backed the speeder off of the Temple landing pad. 

The gun he’d tossed onto the passenger seat as he’d climbed into the speeder rose to the unmoving Jedi’s hand, the boy perfectly balanced despite the speeder picking up speed as it arced away from the burning Temple. Lightsaber swinging from his belt, the padawan fired three rapid shots until the last trooper went down silently, leaving nothing but bodies on the platform as the two fled from the orang flames and billowing smoke.

Heart still pounding in his ears as the night air whipped around his face, Bail turned to the Jedi child, mouth open to ask what was going on, only to watch as the child tumbled bonelessly from his perch on the speeder’s side, slumping like a toppled snowman into the passenger seat, gun slipping from nerveless fingers into the shining city below. 

Bail allowed himself to swear once, as he reached for the child, trying to wrestle the little body upright with one hand as he ducked the speeder deeper into Coruscant, looking for a safe and obscure place to land. The boy was small - far, far too small to be the same child who’d just sliced through a squad of clone troopers, running for his life - and Bail tried to prop him up as gently as he could. He thought the boy was still conscious, but the fragile body was too still and quiet to tell for sure, shaggy blond hair blowing against the boy’s closed eyelids while the wind caught his delicate braid and set it flying out like a flag in the night.

Holding tightly to the boy with one hand, Bail guided the speeder to a flat roof three levels down from and out of sight of the Temple. Adrenaline was still kicking him in the stomach from inside, but it was fading from his veins, leaving him feeling like he’d been sick in bed for three days as he laid the unresponsive child out on the seat, digging in the backseat for the emergency med kit he kept tucked under the seat.

With his other hand, he activated his comm once again.

“Sir,” Tyrone’s voice filtered through the shadows on the grimy rooftop; a lifeline to a suffocating spacer. “Are you alright?” Worry glinted in his voice like light off the edge of a blade.

Bail opened the med kit on the seat beside the padawan, balancing his comm on the steering column as he dug for a lightstick, magnetizing it to the side of the speeder so that he could get a better look at the kid’s injuries.

“I’m fine,” Bail told Tyrone shortly, “But I need a medic to meet me somewhere not monitored.” The child had several cuts and bruises that Bail could see but only the one blaster shot, his little shoulder a charred and bloody crater of black scoring nearly the size of Bail’s fist.

“Sir?” Tyrone’s voice grew more concerned despite Bail’s previous assurance, but Bail ignored the question.

“Has there been any news about the Temple?”

“No, sir,” Tyrone’s voice recovered his even efficiency. “No one has been able to get any information. The Embassy reached out to Emergency Services but they said they had orders to stand down and then refused to answer any additional questions.”

What in all the hells was going on?

Bail swallowed hard as he started opening all the bacta patches he could find in the med kit and pressing the mass of them into the boy’s burn, noting almost distantly that the little body was shivering as his mind tried to swim up a waterfall to put the pieces of the situation together into something that marginally made sense. 

“The 501rst is at the Temple…” Bail informed Tyrone like he was swimming through syrup. Nothing made sense . “They’re at the Temple… killing the Jedi.”

With surprising steadiness, Bail’s hands wrapped bandages to hold the wad of bacta patches in place as the voice on the other end of the line choked off like someone was pulling its heart out of its throat with a rusty hook. The leather seats creaked under Bail in the silence as he moved, body swollenly calm as he wiped away blood, ash, and sweat from the boy’s face, revealing round, pale cheeks and a face that looked too young to be much older than ten.

Darkness settled heavy as lead into his bones, squeezing his lungs and pulling his heart down to silently settle like a stone on the ground.

“... Bail ,” Tyrone hadn’t used his first name since he and Breha had announced their engagement, Bail recalled vaguely. “Why… how… ” his voice died, unable to bear the weight of the rest of the question.

Bail shook his head blankly in the night, fighting through the weights on his limbs as he taped up a cut along the boy’s cheek. His eyes found the glittering monolith of the Senate dome in the distant skyline.

“I don’t…” Then his voice dried up in his throat; the silhouette of the Senate dome growing like a nightmare before his eyes. A trickle from the waterfall suddenly filled his heart with sharp shards of ice as he realized; as the pieces started to fall into place rapidly, one after another. The ice hissed and crackled as anger rose deep from his gut, going from slicing cold shock to boiling fury in a moment.

“Not “how’ ” he hissed the words like scalding steam into the air. The leather seat back creaked under his white-knuckled grip as he leaned towards the comm. “ ‘ Who ’ ”

The silence crackled around Bail, his body tense enough to snap as he made himself say the bitter truth, grinding it like sand in his mouth.

“Palpatine.”

Chapter Text

Zett Jukassa’s world had always been made of lights. 

            When he was younger, he hadn’t had the words to explain how he saw the world. All he knew was that the Jedi blazed in the dark and he had followed their light home.

Then, as a youngling in the creche he had seen a documentary on stars, and suddenly he’d had the words he’d been fumbling for in the nebulous shadows of childhood ignorance. Existence was space, dark and endless, lives were the stars, pulsing faintly in every color, and the Jedi were the giants that could be seen even beneath the veil of Coruscant’s atmosphere and hazy lights, blazing in the dark, the warmth in the cold. Drawing others into their orbit to protect and grow before they went hurtling off into vast existence again.

            Sometimes these great stars exploded into supernovas, blotting out the dark and making Zett feel like there was nothing ever anywhere besides the light and the warmth. Sometimes they disappeared, vanished from their patch of black existence, leaving a trace of cold, like the perpetual void mourned their passing and could not forget their leaving. Sometimes, rarely, they imploded into black holes, sucking and pulling at the warmth and light and fragile little stars, so, so hungry and yet also so, so dead.

            The void itself, existence - Zett had figured out as he’d grown up in the creche and learned from the Order of blazing stars that was his family - was the Force. It connected and held all things, everything was part of it - within it, yet separate - until they faded, leaving their trace of cold.

            After the war started and Zett had followed the most brilliant supernova he’d yet seen - dancing colors like watching a prism twisting in the sun, birthing trembling rainbows - to find his master, he’d heard older padawans and younger knights wonder if the Force cared. The Jedi were fighting and dying - the stars going out as the cold spread into their empty places - the galaxy was hurting - a little dimmer every day - and some of Zett’s family wondered if the Force was apathetic. They wondered if the Force cared; cared that the galaxy was mired in the Dark Side; cared that Dooku and his master twisted it and used it to cause pain; cared that the Jedi were dying.

            But Zett did not wonder. He knew. The Force mourned them - lingered over the places where its children had been with a slow, cold sorrow. It shivered as the stars went out and the lights grew dimmer. There was cold in the Force, but the Force was not the cold. 

Cold - Zett knew from that documentary - was the absence of heat; dark was the absence of light. The Force was not absence, it was just empty; getting more and more empty every day. The blackholes tried to drag everything away until the lights were gone and, in the absence, the darkness grew. 

But, Zett also knew, stars could get brighter. They could grow so much and shine so hard they would supernova. And there was nothing the dark could do about it then. Where that brilliant, glorious light was, the dark could not, by its nature, exist. Where the Jedi warmed the void, the cold could not stay cold.

            He never really had the words to explain that to the doubters as much as he knew it to be true. Zett and words did not tend to work well together. The world was made of lights and they were like stars, but they were not stars, not really. Stars, people understood, but Zett could never seem to explain the not really part so that people understood.

            At least his master had understood not being able to explain. His master who lit everyone around him in multicolored glory; who smiled crookedly because of the scar tracing away from the corner of his mouth but never let that stop him from smiling; who saw ghosts, not of the past but glimpses of the future. Who saw people beside themselves as they could be, might be, or would never be, and who rarely had the words to explain what he saw either. 

The Force had guided Zett into his master’s shimmering orbit to spin around his brilliant heat in the absence until it was time for the padawan to grow up and burn in the dark by his own power.

He had never expected it to be so soon. Or for the void to get this dark.

But now Zett was choking on cold smoke that scraped with rough scales in the back of his throat as the stars went out one by one. Now he was spinning out of control, feet clanging against the metal walkway as he ran. Flung out of orbit as his master’s brilliant pull collapsed in defense of a limping rhodian master - a pulsing, waning green light - who had never recovered from Geonosis.

Now his master was absence, cold and limp on the floor three rooms back. The green star had folded silently in on herself two steps later, eyes full of stars like the world, staring unseeing into the shadows of the Temple as the troopers marched by.

And the troopers - Zett spun as the Force told him to, blade knocking aside red lasers to burn holes through the night and two plastoid-covered chests - the troopers were gone, too. They had been silver lights, steady and shining in the Jedi’s orbit; pulled into place perfectly, blazing light to add to the Order’s wrapping warmth. Before Zett had felt the first Jedi lives vanishing into the void, he’d seen every silver star disappear. The troopers - he knew as he stabbed through a body and flicked a head from its shoulders, leaping through the air unstopping - were already dead.

The world was so dark and minute by minute grew colder. Ice should have been growing on his fingertips; his breath should have been clouding in the air. If he even should have been breathing at all. If he could keep breathing as his lungs seemed to frost over, brittle and rasping as he simply kept moving away from the once warm Temple, the fire consuming it no warmer than a candle in the face of its empty chill.

He slashed another body, forcing it to realize that the man it should have been was already dead. At the end of the platform, a star pulled at his senses from beyond the crowd of non-lights. His feet carried him towards it without thought; he did not need to think. Like a sailor lost at sea he headed toward the first sign of something existing, and so, in the void bare of stars, he headed toward the light.

The light was a man standing hesitantly before a speeder with red stripes that glowed in the firelight. He had dark hair, dark clothes, and a dark face, but as soon as Zett broke through the cloud of bodies, he could see that the man shone in the dark as polished and as steady as obsidian. More than the man’s light in the cold, though, was his pull. Like a star pulling planets into its orbit so that they could steady out and support life, the stranger seemed to tug at whatever warmth was left in the emptiness and gather it to himself, stoking it.

The man met Zett’s eyes for a moment, shock and horror pulsing outward in time with his rapid heartbeat, echoing in the Force around him. Distracted for a moment by the presence of someone alive and feeling, Zett failed to see the trooper - unlit and without warmth - until the laser was in his shoulder. 

It should have hurt, should have burned, but it didn’t. In the absence of heat that was the world, the flesh-melting laser was only a pale shade of what was real - of what real heat felt like. His arm went limp, he could not move it, but it did not hurt. The force of the impact pushed Zett to his knees before the flaccid river of bodies trying to kill him, and he looked up - a star barely pulsing with light anymore - into the muzzle of the blaster that would kill him.

Then the star at the edge of the platform began firing, determination blossoming in his core and singing in the Force, feeding his inner fire until it was blazing in Zett’s senses as bright as the blaster bolts the man was firing seemed to shine in the night. The man’s heat reached out for Zett, wispy arms of light soaking into his sputtering soul, pulling him to his feet and towards the man waiting for him.

Zett slashed a head from cold shoulders as he began moving again, then he plunged his glowing blade - slowly warming in his hand - through the beating heart of a dead man, forcing the trooper’s body into balance with his departed soul. One of the troopers near the pulling man turned to fire at him and Zett leaned into the Force, moving through the air as simply as walking on the ground, as swiftly as running, separating an arm from a torso, a torso from legs, leaving them scattered like children’s toys.

The troopers were trying to kill the man now, Zett realized like cracking through ice. The man had helped him and now the troopers had to kill the last star in the sky. Zett could not let them. He slipped out of the man’s pull - so strong, so warm now that he was closer - and took a step back among the bodies walking dead, ensuring with another strike - as delicate frost crept up his arm - that one of the dead could walk no longer.

Gasping in the cold, Zett surrendered to the pull, backflipping to the speeder - slipping into the man’s warming orbit - pulling at the gun the man had abandoned to end the last of the undead lives before it could fire at the star frantically trying to save them both.

The last trooper fell, a formless white shape among several other mounds of armor and flesh, lit by the flickering light of freezing fire masquerading as heat. The world went absolutely quiet as the man sped away from the Temple and Zett’s consciousness drifted away from his body; it was a husk and his soul was a star and space was empty, empty, empty. He stretched his light out in the dark, anchored in the gravity of the star that had pulled him into the speeder, searching for something, anything left. 

The Force stirred like a river trapped under layers and layers of broken and refrozen ice beneath his searching soul as he drifted, stretching out and fading against the dark as he reached. His meandering warmth brushed against another pull. A pull that took the breath out of his lungs and tried to catch the outer particles of himself, yanking glowing dust from his trial into an endless, empty maw - a black hole, spinning in the Temple, surrounded by nothing but dead stars.

Zett pulled away quickly, tugging at the warmth of the star anchoring him to gather himself away from the starving devourer. Light swirled around his center as the star did something to his body, but Zett paid no mind, daring to spread himself even more thinly into the empty - less than empty, carved out and bleeding - Force. There had to be something; something else in the cold, cold, cold sky.

The star flared and sputtered behind him, dimming and sparking in the horror at some looming realization, and Zett realized slowly that he had drifted much further than he had intended, further than he’d realized. He was all strung out across the Force and could barely feel the shudders ripple down his drifting awareness, the trails of sparkling dust behind shivering from the star’s horror. He tried to pull himself back again, back to the little cold clay vessel, where his light was really supposed to stay, that rested beside the star. His trail stretched out, further, thinner; fragile as frost on a window, ready to melt before a breath.

Something was pulling him further outward, so slowly, so softly that he hadn’t noticed, hadn’t protected himself. He pulled against it, now feeling the tug, feeling the tide trying to drag him down. Trying to drag him apart in the center, of… of the cold. 

Suddenly it clicked into place - a new magnification on the starseer - the cold had not just come to exist. It was something. It was a black hole so large, so big and hungry, that he hadn’t been able to see it. He was looking at a forest only to realize that the entire forest was a single tree. There was a hole in existence so big, so, so massive, sitting at the heart of the Force, and, Zett knew as he dug his awareness, himself, into the star’s pull - breathed in the star’s warmth, trying to escape the pull from everywhere to the emptiness - it had killed all the stars. Zett had found the Sith Lord - he finally found the words - the Master controlling the war, and he fled.

He pulled back so quickly it hurt, like tearing off a bandage - his self sticking and peeling and tearing with the sound of grinding teeth - recoiling in on himself until his form tangled confusingly. He pushed the star away for a moment, lingering and breathing in the little center that was his own existence, sweeping in the stretched and drifting dust at his edges and taking a moment to settle in the Force like water after a thrown stone. 

He did not want to hold too still in the Force for fear he’d freeze, but he grew still enough that a thin lace of delicate, twisted frost began to encroach around his soul. As he prepared himself to shake it off - to send a pulse of his heat out instead of dragging it in - the darkness shivered with a searing scream. The frost along his edges crackled and shattered, hissing into steam as boiling sorrow and rage splattered in blackened drops across Zett.

Without hesitation, Zett plunged after the pain, chasing the sparking red taste of it across the cold expanse at the edge of the hole. A star that could scream so loud and burn so hotly was a living star and Zett followed the agony like a hyperlane route through an asteroid field.

And there, there! A supernova orbited by a soul shining white with pain and seven little stars, so young that they were all heat and little brightness. Joy shuddered along Zett like a tide, down his spine to stoke his center even as the white star shivered brighter, agony scraping roughly along his reaching soul.

He stopped dragging himself forward, holding the smallest thread of awareness of the last stars in the sky, he let go of the dark and sprang back to his body, snapping like a rubber band. His whole body jerked, muscles spasming, head snapping up, throat raw with a scraping cry like gravel and an ache like jagged coals pounding behind his temples. With that movement, he promptly tumbled off a narrow couch, legs already trying to run toward the cluster of stars far below him.

Prickly carpet pressed against his face and chest with a smell like clean lavender. He managed to realize, through the cracking roar in his brain, that he was taking his steps in the wrong order. First, he had to stand up, then he could run.

“Kid! Kid, you alright?” concerned lights hovered nearby, though the star that had saved him was distant.

Zett managed to force his clay vessel with rubbery limbs to hands and knees, as hard hands reached for him in the barely bright light of the morning. On instinct, he jerked back. The hands hesitated, then the man crouched, kind blue light shining out of deep gray eyes as he held Zett’s gaze. The world settled a little in the focus of the man’s attention, the bobbing lights around them coalescing into three uniformed humans pretending not to be watching the exchange as they swiped through datapads or muttered into commlinks, while the room hardened and cleared into a small sitting room with a few couches and plush chairs standing on the prickly blue carpet.

“Kid,” the man said softly, his concern flaring and sparkling like pixie dust in the Force, settling all over Zett. “I know you’ve… been through some stuff.” His pink lips pressed together and Zett could feel him push down the storm churning in his soul. “But I can promise you you’re safe here, alright?” he reached out slowly, laying a hand over Zett’s shoulder, still pinning him with the focus of steely eyes. “You’re safe now,” he assured again.

Zett nodded slowly, breathing through the dust of concern coating his skin and the dull points of pressure beating against his skull. Carefully, he stood up, leaning into the man’s grasp for steadiness as his legs wobbled beneath him. One of the uniformed people brought him a glass of water and he sipped it thickly, nodding his thanks, finding that his words had fled again. Her honey-gold eyes shone with blue kindness, as did everyone in the room. In that blue glow, he did not doubt the man’s claim that he was safe here.

Shaking off another layer of dust, he set the cup on a little round pillar of stone serving as an end table and stepped towards the door. He could not stay with the kind people right now, he had to go find the other stars, his brothers and sisters who still lived.

A warm weight settled on his shoulder, the grey-eyed man’s hand again, his face hardening from open kindness to a pursed frown.

“You should stay here,” he said gently though it was certainly an order, command worn like a too-thick cloak around him but bravely born nonetheless.

Zett shook his head, blinking wet eyelashes against the claws tearing at his mind. His tongue darted out to lick his salty lips, unoccupied with the words his brain couldn’t seem to find. He was sure the kind silver man would understand if he used the right words, but his head flailed as uselessly as a burning flag, scattering sparks of pain but none of the knowledge he searched for, so he moved forward silently, pulling away from the man’s grip.

The hand on his shoulder tightened and jerked him to a stop, like a mag-anchor - not digging in or hurting, simply holding him still. The man limped around to stand in Zett’s way, gracefully favoring his left leg as he knelt in front of Zett again, resting his other hand on Zett’s other shoulder.

“Kid,” his grip tightened slightly, finger pads digging into Zett’s skin as another cloud of dusted worry settled across Zett’s skin. “Do you understand what I’m saying? Do you understand what’s going on?”

He really needed to say something, Zett knew as his thoughts settled just a little more in the pile of shards making up his existence and his skin seemed to itch under these blue lights’ palpable worry - they weren’t just going to let the child they’d rescued from a burning building walk away without a word. Where were his words? He just needed to answer the question.

The steel in the man’s eyes - like the unbending rod of fortitude in the man’s soul - steadied Zett as he forced himself to look up, open his mouth, speak… communicate… something.

“Yes.”

The lines around the man’s face deepened, shadows closing like doors over his eyes. 

“What…” he started, then his grip tightened further as sorrow ran across his face like a shadow and rippled across his inner being like a wave of crackling ice. “Then, where are you trying to go?”

Zett let out a breath and blinked hard against the blurriness pushing against the edges of his vision as his head continued to the thunder. This was the question he’d been looking for; that was the thing he needed to communicate. 

“I have to get the others.”

The man stared as Zett tried to pull away again. He’d communicated, and now he had to go. The other stars were still pulsing faintly at the scattered edges of his soul, but they were dimming, so, so tired. Even the supernova, burning herself out over the others. But the hands did not let go, in fact, they tightened, and then suddenly, Zett was being pressed against a hard chest, fierce fire hissing at the ice in the soul wrapping around him like a wall.

“Kid, kid… I’m sorry, but you’re people, the Temple… the Jedi… Kid, I’m so sorry,” the man’s voice crackled and cracked in his chest, arriving broken in the air and shivering over Zett’s head as he was pressed roughly against a cool metal buckle and the musky scent of military soap. “Kid, no one… no one else has come out of the Temple.” A hand carded through Zett’s hair, fingers catching and tugging at the tangles of the night in a somehow comforting way. “There was… there was an… announcement. That the Jedi are…”

“Gone,” Zett finished in a breath for the man as he struggled to say it. “The clones killed the Jedi.” 

He knew, he knew that the Jedi, all of them, were gone. He had felt them, each of them, go. Simply, the eight stars below him would not shine so brightly if the Force had not been so empty. The man, somehow, pressed him tighter, one arm dropping to pull tight around Zett’s waist while the other rubbed his back in erratic circles. The drumming fists in Zett’s head seemed to fade into the motion, softening at the edges.

“I’m sorry,” the man said again, his voice as brittle and blue as ice. “But I promise, kid, I swear, you’re safe with us, alright? And we’ll help you, and…”

“I know,” Zett pulled back and this time the man let him go, both of them kneeling on the thick carpet; Zett tangled his fingers in its softness as he faced the man’s eyes again. “So, I have to go get the others.”

“Kid…” the man started, voice aching and tight like an over-wound guitar fret. Then an idea flickered in his silver eyes - a blossom of pink purpling the blue in his soul. Sharp fierceness danced down the lines of his face like power, the sluggish sadness warming to a rush of hope. “What…” his voice caught and choked in its tightness, but the man swallowed and continued with steely steadiness. “What makes you so sure there are others?”

Words started to come back to Zett as he realized. The man had thought Zett didn’t know the Jedi were gone; he had thought that “the others” were the whole Jedi Order, were everyone who was dead. He sniffed hard against the knife twisting in the soft flesh of his brain and tried to smile to show the man that he understood the confusion now.

“I sense them,” the words were finally in his mouth, on his tongue, simple and easy. “There are a few still alive, altogether. We have to go find them.”

The man nodded, standing with sudden determination as purple blossomed through his soul and charged his veins and muscles. He pulled Zett to his feet with a steady nod, waving sharply at one of the background people, hand curling in a signal that had the woman hastily raising her commlink to her mouth as she strode out of the room.

“We’ll get them, okay?” he assured Zett, squeezing his shoulder in a painfully reassuring way with one hand while the other swiped through a datapad. “Lead us to them and we’ll help them, too.” he handed the datapad off to the man still lingering in the room, then turned his full attention to Zett, brushing a roughened finger delicately across his cheek under his eye. “So, you can stop crying, now, alright?”

Zett stared at him a moment, then reached up a hand to feel that his cheeks were wet. Even as he touched the tear tracks, fresh drops of warm water slid past his fingertips. He was crying; he hadn’t realized he’d been crying.

No wonder the kind, blue man with silver eyes was so worried, Zett thought through the hammer clanging dully inside his skull. He had tried to walk out without a word while silently crying. No wonder he had thought he needed to tell Zett over and over that he was safe.

And suddenly Zett was giggling. Laughter clawed up his stomach and bubbled in his throat like grape pop fizzing out of its bottle.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” he choked hysterically. “I… didn’t know… was crying.”

His legs decided to stop working all over again as his whole body trembled, core aching as all the cold dark sludge that had been thickening inside of him since the stars had started dying tried to come out all at once.

“Force!” The man was trying to hug him again, blue sadness nearly black sparking against the purple hope inside him. “Kid, hey kid, it’s alright, okay? It’s alright, kid.” 

He pressed Zett into the clean soap smell of his jacket and muttered nonsensical, soothing words, and it was almost like his master wrapping him tightly in a blanket the first time he’d felt a crechemate - one of his first bonds - die and rocking him while he’d cried for the cold and the star that had gone out and cried because he felt bad for crying but couldn’t stop. It’s alright, padawan, his master had murmured into his hair, Crying is just another way that your body communicates that you’re in pain. He’d wrapped his warmth around Zett in the Force, pulling him deeper into his radiant orbit. When the words come, tell me with words, but it’s alright to cry until then.

Then something warm was tugging at him, the star from the Temple rapidly approaching outside the room. His blaze tugged Zett into his orbit, the Force settling him like a bobbing cork in the man’s burning field of kindness, stoking the ice-blue tears and bubbling black giggles into a steadier purple. Zett looked up from the gray man’s arms as the dark man came through the door, followed by the woman who had left the room a few minutes before.

He stood up quickly, wiping his tears on a brown sleeve that smelled coldly like smoke and letting his legs carry him towards the pull. Behind him the gray man stood up also, knees creaking and weight leaning on one leg as he raised a hand, halfway to a salute before turning the motion into a sharp wave.

“Sir,” the gray man greeted the star, but the dark man was focused on Zett. Zett stopped walking, feeling as though he was settling softly into a warm bath, the man’s presence cradling him and insulating him from the cold rasping in the Force. His soul expanded slightly, opening like a flower in the man’s shielding warmth and the pounding behind his eyes dulled, blanketed to quietness by the soft cotton kindness surrounding him.

“Where are they?” the man asked, chocolate eyes staring with the same determined desperation Zett felt, steely green determination lacing through his brilliant blue soul.

Zett grabbed his hand without hesitation. 

“I’ll show you.”

Chapter Text

Bail’s hands wouldn’t stop trembling. Behind him seven lumps hastily covered with Master Ti’s cloak trembled as well; a green hand reaching out from beneath the mass to clutch at the pale hand of the padawan in an oversized uniform. The boy had directed him to the other Jedi with surprising accuracy. Bail hadn’t worked with a Jedi whose Force-feelings were this direct in a long time; not since the start of the war had any Jedi seemed to have such clarity from the Force.

Of course, his hands tightened on the steering yoke as he remembered, the war was over now. He would never have thought he’d regret the war’s end, but now bile rose in the back of his throat like a hive of biting lava ants at the memory of its end - at the recollection of how it had ended. In his mind’s eyes he could see Palpatine looming like the senatorial apartments they were approaching, dark cloak and deep hood obscuring everything but his rasping voice as he ended the war, betrayed the Jedi, and declared himself Emperor all at once.

Bail arced the speeder around a silver spire, keeping in its shadow as he waited for Tyrone’s signal. A long, low beep from his comm followed by two short ones told him that the cameras were looped for the next five minutes and it was safe to bring his secret cargo into the building. His secret cargo of children , of 5-and6-year-olds who the Emperor had sentenced to death for treason.

As he steered the speeder towards the bay, he tried to reign his breathing, trying to still the tremble in his hands and knees even as he could still hear Palpatine’s voice croaking in the back of his head like a chain around his neck. They slipped into the Alderanian bay, the door sliding closed behind them with a soft hiss. In the nebulous shadows of early morning and dimmed lights a small crowd of aides and guards waited with indistinct faces and eager hands.

The children were swept up, bundled under cloaks, and pressed against chests. Several were half asleep and settled down quietly into the arms of souls they knew were kind. One boy with white hair startled as hands reached for him.

“Shhh, it’s… it’s alright,” came the breaking voice of an aide with orange hair who tucked the boy’s head against her shoulder with tears glistening on her cheeks.

The padawan refused to leave Bail’s side, tucking close to him without quite touching, moving seamlessly in step as Bail led the group cradling the children to his own apartments. Blankets and cushions were already set out on the floor of the extra bedroom, the aides that had readied them hovered by the door, refusing to leave until they saw the children safely tucked into their fellow’s arms.

With painstaking, slow care, the warm little bodies were tucked under thick blankets, curls and lekku being gently swept off of round foreheads and chubby little hands being given one last stroke. A few of the children bolted upright as they were put down and their chaperones immediately went down on their knees beside them as though the rest of their legs had been sliced off with a laser sword. The aid with orange hair rocked the sleeping boy she was holding with tears still streaming down her face until one of her fellows urged her to move.

Tyrone adjusted a blanket spread over a mattress of pillows on the bedroom’s carpeted floor, folding it back invitingly.

“Hey, kid,” he began, pitching his voice low to avoid disturbing the other children.

“Zett,” the boy at Bail’s elbow spoke suddenly, in the steadiest voice Bail had heard all night. “I am Zett Jukassa, padawan of Arit Ghostseer.

Bail blinked thick eyelids as Tyrone nodded and held out a hand from where he was still half-crouched beside the makeshift bed. “Tyrone Interra, captain of the senator’s guard.”

“It’s an honor to meet you, Captain Interra,” the boy replied with rote politeness, shaking hands with Tyrone even as his eyes flicked to Bail’s face. “And are you the senator?” he asked, turning slightly to face Bail more directly.

They hadn’t really been introduced with all the running off to rescue the Jedi children, had they?

Bail nodded. “Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan at your service, Padawan Jukassa.”

Zett did not shake his hand. Instead, he tucked his hands into the overlong gray uniform sleeves in a familiar motion and gave a formal half-bow from the waist.

“Thank you, Senator Organa,” he spoke softly. “For helping us.”

Something in the center of Bail’s chest twisted and tightened so that he felt like he couldn’t breathe for a moment. He looked down at the boy with dirty blond hair and a soot-stained face, clean tracks from tears trailing all the way to his chin - down at this round-faced child in oversized clothes - who was so seriously thanking him for not letting him be murdered and found that the great Senator Organa was at a loss for words.

Finally, he went down on one knee and took the boy’s hands, trying to press his earnestness into the boy’s senses. “It is my honor to help,” he gave the antiquated Alderaanian response he had been taught once as a child and never used. A simple ‘you’re welcome’ had always seemed enough, occasionally a ‘my pleasure’. But here, neither of those rote responses even approached adequacy. “And my deepest sorrow that there was nothing more I could do.”

“We can only do what the Force puts before us,” the boy quoted, the words settling across Bail’s shoulders like a blanket of comfort, making them feel just a little lighter under the planet’s-worth of weight that had settled on them tonight. It was probably something to do with the Force, but Bail accepted the feeling gratefully anyway as he rose.

“Zett,” Tyrone recaptured the boy’s attention, speaking softly, mindful of the sleeping younglings tucked into makeshift beds on the floor as the aides that had carried them in quietly left the room. “You ready to get some rest?”

The boy shook his head, looking over the bed Tyrone was still crouched beside.

“It would be dangerous,” he whispered, “With no one here to anchor me. And,” he added as Tyrone and Bail exchanged looks of concern, confusion settling in wrinkles around Tyrone’s eyes. “If I’m awake I can shield the younglings a little bit.”

“Of course,” Bail replied, leading the way out of the room before Tyrone could try to force the issue. Bail wasn’t sure exactly what the child meant about needing someone to anchor him, but he was pretty sure nobody in the apartment was qualified to do that and he knew it was most definitely dangerous to mess around with the Force without some knowledgeable Jedi there to help.

The main area of the apartment was darkened, several aides lingering around the doorway to the entry, taking shuffling steps forward as Tyrone shut the door to the children’s room. An aide wearing a mechanic’s jumpsuit and dark jacket took another step forward and opened his mouth to speak, but Tyrone spoke first.

“I thought you said General Shaak Ti was with the kids?”

“She was. She and their caretaker, a Nala Tahl,” Bail explained, glancing at Zett before adding. “They went back to the Temple to search for other survivors.”

“Hmm,” Tyrone acknowledged, his face tightening to a formality that told Bail his guard captain did not approve of the decision. “Do we have an estimated return time for them?”

Bail shook his head with a grimace. He should have asked Master Ti to set a check-in time but had been more focused on getting the kids out of there.

“Alright then,” Tyrone moved on from the oversight with his usual efficiency. “What’s the plan, sir?”

Bail sighed inwardly and rubbed a hand across his aching eyes. With the hot pink streaks of dawn starting to outshine the city lights, he’d officially been awake all night. Beyond just clouded tiredness, he had no plan, no idea where to go from here.

“I still need to release an official response from Alderaan to Palpatine declaring himself Emperor,” he listed, organizing his thoughts out loud, “But I want to get in contact with Breha first. Also, I should make an official response to the declaration of the Jedi Order being traitors, but I want to keep that separate from…”

“Traitors?” The question reminded everyone of their orphaned Jedi, sitting on one of the tall stools by the bar that separated the ostentatious living area from the kitchen.

Bail swallowed a lump of ice and pushed the looming tasks out of his mind for a moment to address the boy. 

“Yes. The chancellor, who’s now declared himself emperor, proclaimed that the Jedi Order are traitors to the Republic, now the Galactic Empire, and has sentenced them to death.” 

Bail ran a hand through his hair, still tasting the shock of hearing that claim - of seeing how no one in the Senate had so much as protested as Palpatine had killed the Republic. Even Padme - explosive, dangerous, daring Padme - had hardly dared to whisper “So this is how liberty dies,” as the applause echoed like a death march.

“That’s why the clones were trying to kill you.”

Tyrone and the aides were staring at him, a few were frowning and a few looked startled with widened eyes. Apparently, they had not been expecting him to just tell it to the kid straight. But they also hadn’t been there to see Zett running out of his burning home, narrowly dodging death as he cut down trooper after trooper just to escape. He needed to know exactly what had happened; he needed to be able to handle the straight truth because he had lived it.

Zett frowned thoughtfully from his perch on the barstool, resting his black-smudged chin in a dirtier hand. 

“So, the Chancellor was the Sith Lord the whole time?” he asked finally.

Bail froze, staring at the boy in shock, feeling as though a bucket of ice had been dumped over his head. “The… the Sith Lord?” he managed to ask.

“The person that made the clones like that has to be the Sith Lord,” Zett explained simply, face creased with confusion at Bail’s surprise. “I sensed him when I was drifting. He stole their souls. So,” he leaned forward, hands gripping the edges of his high stool, “since Palpatine gave them the orders, he must be the Sith Lord.”

Bail stood for a moment later, mind scrambling like a child over rocks as the pieces clicked into place. He’d known, he’d known Palpatine was behind everything. No other person benefited more from the Jedi dying and the clones remaining. Then he’d gone and declared himself Emperor just in case Bail still had any doubts. But the mysterious, elusive Sith Lord? The Dooku’s boss, maybe-a-myth-to-divide-us Sith Lord? The war-orchestrating, Jedi-hunting Sith Lord?

Of, karking, course Palpatine was the Sith Lord. The Chancellor, actually the Emperor, was a Sith Lord . He hadn’t just taken over the Republic, he’d resurrected the kriffing Sith Empires!

The surety landed on Bail’s chest like a stone, squeezing the air from his lungs, cracking ribs, and pressing down on his fluttering heart like a vise. It sank into his stomach like a bad meal and too much caffeine, all bubbles and lead-laced mercury in his veins. He covered his face with his hands for a moment as he fought down the urge to scream.

Deep breaths.

He dropped his hands and met Zett’s wide eyes, the boy obviously privy to his mini breakdown.

“You’re right,” he managed. “Palpatine has been the Sith Lord this whole time.”

“Osik,” Tyrone sighed from beside Bail.

“Language,” The boy scolded almost absent-mindedly, “There are younglings present.”

* * *

Bail had had busy nights before, the next five hours were all of them combined plus eight.

By the time the sun had fully risen, he had managed to get ahold of Breha, interrupting her mid-morning tea with the extremely foul news that the republic had turned into a Sith empire overnight. From there he, she, and their respective PR teams had worked out Alderaan's cautious public reaction statement and prepared a second, much more daring statement of Alderaan’s continued support of the Jedi Order extended to any of its members that were not Galactic Criminals and Traitors to the Republic.

There had been no teasing smiles or loose hair this call and Bail had also not figured out a safe way to inform her of his new guests. The Alderaanian embassy was much less monitored than his Senate Office, however, he knew that all communications were screened by Senate security thanks to the most recent privacy invasion bill. Mentioning the Jedi as anything more than an abstract concept would be serving up the children to the Sith Lord on a silver platter.

The statements finished, edited, and published, Bail had dismissed his exhausted staff to go rest. To those with families on-planet he’d granted leave, telling them to get their partners and children back to Alderaan before things got worse. A few had volunteered to smuggle the Jedi younglings off-planet with their families, but Bail had decided to give Shaak Ti and Nala Tahl at least a day to return before he started moving their children without their permission; unless the kids were in immediate danger, of course.

Then, as he was leaning half asleep against the bar, cradling a warm cup of tea Zett had put into his hands a few moments ago, and worrying idly over what needed to be done next, his comm buzzed. He jolted, banging his elbow against the counter’s sharp, marble edge, perhaps a bit more asleep than he’d thought, and answered Tyrone who had gone to the vehicle bay to inform the next shift of aides and guards of what was going on in broad terms and dismiss most of them.

“Sir,” Tyrone’s voice was ragged with tiredness, “A clone security team is heading up to your apartments, apparently to search for ‘threats.’ They just entered the lift, probably 3 minutes out.”

The tea sloshed over the rim of Bail’s cup and spattered in gleaming droplets on the kitchen’s dark wood floor as his heart pounded adrenaline through his veins like chunks of ice.

“There’s a service lift at the end of hall 3…” Tyrone began, but Bail was already shaking his head, even though Tyrone couldn’t see him.

“That will definitely be monitored and,” he hastily put the cup on the counter before he compounded the situation with a mess, half-turned towards the children’s room, “It’s too far anyway. There has to be something else.”

“Tell them it’s Hide and Sneak,” Zett suddenly suggested from the bar stool where he had been meditating, hair still damply dark from the shower he’d been talked into. “Younglings are good at hiding.”

Bail floundered. As much as he had never met a child who didn’t love playing hide and seek, he’d never met a young one who could be considered good at it. Still, hiding them in the suite wasn’t a bad idea, perhaps the only viable option they had.

“Sir, the lift has reached your floor,” Tyrone’s voice thrummed with tight worry.

“Alright,” Bail said to both Zett and Tyrone at once.

Zett hopped off the stool immediately, knocking loudly on the younglings’ door before hitting the button to open it without hesitation.

Sleepy heads were already poking up from blankets; messy hair and bleary eyes glinting in the mid-morning light from the doorway. Two heads were still buried in pillows, but the rest of the children seemed more or less alert, at least enough that Bail could see the open curiosity on their faces. One togruta boy with nubby little orange montrals was sucking his thumb.

They were so young , Bail’s heart seemed to slow, buried under the weight of the thought. How was he going to hide them in the next two minutes? Where could he hide all of them where the clones wouldn’t find them? He could not, would not stand there and watch these children be killed, but how could he save them if they were found?

Zett interrupted his mind’s frantic chasing of less and less tenable options like a tooka chasing a laser pointer with the declaration, “Hide and Sneak.”

One of the heads still on the pillow, a Bothan girl with beads in her golden mane, opened her eyes just long enough to say, “No,” before snuggling back into her pillow. Several of the other, more awake, children scrambled up with excitement, a human girl with black curls nudging her reluctant companion with a foot, whining, “Come on , Lessa, you never want to play Hide and Sneak.”

“Can we hide anywhere in this here?” the Togrutan boy pulled his thumb out of his mouth and questioned eagerly.

“As long as the clones can’t find you,” Zett assured him. 

“We’re playing with troopers?” a purple twi’lek girl squealed with excitement. “Troopers are so fun!”

Bail could feel his heart slowly sinking like oil in water. The oldest of these kids was maybe 6, and hiding under the bed was not going to cut it. They all thought it was some sort of game. They thought that the troopers were fun playmates .

“But remember, you can’t let them find you,” Zett reminded them.

“Well yeah , we know how to play hide’n’sneak,” a human with dreadlocks and a yellow mark on his right cheek snapped in youthful irritation.

“Then I’ll start counting,” Zett said as Bail rummaged like a starving fox in a dumpster through his mind for workable hiding places in the apartment to guide the kids to.

Several of the kids scrambled out of the room, including the Bothan girl, who was dragged out of bed by her human friend, however, the white-haired boy and purple twi'lek girl lingered by the child still tucked into bed. 

“Ro can’t play ri’now,” the twi’lek tugged at Bail’s shirt while the boy pulled a nautolan tadpole out from her blankets, “She needs water and can’t walk.”

Zett scooped the girl up and shooed the other two away.

“Go hide, I’m still counting.” 

They quickly disappeared into the apartment, leaving Bail and the padawan staring at the little aquatic girl, her skin already starting to crack and peel from dryness. Young nautolans, Bail recalled vaguely, needed to spend most of their time in water or very damp air, only able to handle extended periods of dryness once they got older.

“We could fill up the bathtub?” Zett asked, knowing, just as Bail did, that the troopers would find her there immediately. 

Bail rubbed his tired eyes viciously.

He had to think! 

Water, where was there anonymous water in the apartment?

“Fishtank,” he muttered. “I have a saltwater fish tank in the living room. It has an Adleraanian giant eel-fish. Should be harmless. She can hide in its cave. She’ll fit. It's even bigger than she is.”

Zett was moving before Bail had even finished muttering his thoughts.

The girl peered over his shoulder with wide black eyes.

“I eat it?” she questioned.

Before Bail could even process the question, a child’s voice called, “It’s rude to eat other people’s food, Ro, he’s prob’ly saving for something.”

Bail looked around for the source of the voice, only to realize that he saw no children. The bar stools were neatly in their places, and the gleaming black cabinets in the kitchen were properly and innocently shut. The long, low couches in the living area would not have allowed for little bodies to squeeze under, and there were none tucked behind them, either. There were no hiding places under the wrought metal and glass-topped tables and no hands or feet sticking out from behind the large silver vases with their long, purple fronds. 

The younglings had utterly vanished.

Zett was helping the nautolan girl to wriggle out of her beige robe, kneeling by the large tank taking up one-half of the seating area’s far wall, completely unsurprised by the youngling’s apparent disappearance.

“Think it’s a pet,” another voice, apparently coming from a talking vase populated by bulging vines set beneath the giant, curving bay window. 

“So, I eat it?” The girl asked again, dressed in nothing but swimming shorts now as Zett bundled up her robe.

“Is more rude to eat people’s pets,” the first voice rebuked her from above. It took Bail a few moments of searching before he realized that the shadowy lump on the chandelier some 30 feet up, tucked into the living area’s recessed roof was, in fact, a child. His heart really did stop this time, breath catching in his throat like the air had turned to marble, resting crushingly against his esophagus, trapping his voice.

How had the kid gotten up there? What if he fell ?

“You can’t talk while hiding,” Zett chided calmly, lifting the lid of the tank and pushing the tadpole through with a plop. She spun happily in the water, moving within the tank’s confines with impressive agility.

The eel fish, tubular snout meant for sucking up worms from the plants in the tank, slithered out of his cave to investigate the disturbance. It was at least three feet longer than the nautolan tadpole, yet the padawan, unfazed, bared her needle-like teeth at it. 

Bail wondered what he was supposed to do if the little Jedi really did try to take a bite out of his extremely endangered pet and took a half-step forward in anticipation of having to somehow try to stop a fight in his fish tank. Then the girl darted past the undulating length of her new tank-mate and disappeared into his rocky cave, leaving a very confused fish to search for some other nice sleeping spot in the large tank.

A chirp rang through the apartment from the door and Bail jumped, eyes locking on the robe in Zett’s arms. 

“The bedding,” he stammered, taking a step towards the door then turning hesitatingly towards the room the children had slept in. The open door revealed the rumpled lines and pillows of obvious small sleeping spaces. 

“I’ve got it,” Zett dashed towards the room, lifting a hand towards the linens. They began to rise and crumple, folding in on themselves like a star collapsing in mid-air. “Where…”

Before he could finish the question, Bail was at the hall wall, swiping his hand over the pad that opened the laundry chute. A crumpled mass of cloth swept through the opening, brushing past Bail’s rumpled sleeve and Bail spun back to the front door even as the doorbell chirped again.

He swallowed a lump of burning coals, tugging his faintly smoke-smelling clothes into place and running a hand through his hair as his heart tried to beat a hole through his chest. Then he settled his features into his senate mask, imagining sliding beneath the surface of a salty ocean, insulated from the noise and sight of the world, and pressed the button to open the door.

The door hissed away to reveal three armored and shining clone troopers standing in the apartment hall as still as statues. Commander Thire was in the lead, while the trooper on the right had armor swirled with asymmetrical red flames and the trooper on the left wore untouched armor.

“Hello, Commander,” Bail’s voice was more even than he could have hoped, hands tucked neatly at his sides and far from the blaster he had only just remembered he was still wearing. “Can I help you with something?”

Thire’s head tilted slightly, the first movement from the group.

“Excuse us, Senator,” Bail wondered if the coldness in the commander’s voice was true or only his imagination. What was it Zett had meant about the clones’ souls being stolen by the Sith? “Your apartment must be inspected for threats.”

Keep your body language open, or you’ll look nervous , Bail reminded himself as he scrambled to figure out whether it would look more suspicious for him to protest or to give way without issue. Balance it, act like you don’t really care, but it’s an inconvenience.

“What sorts of threats, Commander?” he kept his tone as neutral as he could with his throat aching from sour panic. “I’ve heard nothing about this.”

“Threats to the Empire,” Thire replied unhelpfully, his voice even to the point of eeriness. He took a step forward, not holding a weapon but his armored bulk edging into Bail’s space with a clear message.

Bail studied him for a moment, looking for any sign of Thire in this Commander, resisting the urge to clench his fist against his thigh or offer more protests. He stepped back, arm moving slightly in a small gesture of welcome.

“Please come in, then,” and then, because some foolish and belligerent part of himself wanted to push back against this violation of Republic Search Rights, he added, “Thire.”

The commander did not even acknowledge the name with so much as a faltering step or head tilt. He simply led the other troopers into the still apartment with smooth, efficient movements. Of all the possible reactions to the use of the name, this one sent tendrils of ice crawling up Bail’s spine.

“CT-8211, take the right rooms,” Thire ordered; a sweep of the arm encompassing the guest bedroom, the guest bathroom, and the sitting room. “CT-6778,” he addressed the trooper with painted armor who surely had a name, “Take the left rooms,” Arm pointing out Bail’s own suite, bathroom, and office.

The troopers turned to their tasks without a single word - not even the hand signals Bail had so often seen tossed about in the sea of troopers with seemingly unreadable lightning swiftness - disappearing into their respective search zones. 

“May I ask what, precisely, you’re looking for?” Bail asked as Thire marched further into the living area, standing directly under the chandelier. Bail did not look up to see if the little shadow was still perched above. He made himself lean against the edge of the bar counter, the casual pose forcing his body to look more relaxed and less suspiciously stiff or nervous.

“Excuse me, Senator?” a soft voice emerged from the office, escorted by the fiery trooper.

Bail froze as he looked away from Thire to see Zett in his oversized uniform, arms neatly folded behind him, looking even smaller and younger in the shadow of the armored trooper. Somehow, in the feeling of Zett as his ally hiding the younglings, Bail had forgotten that Zett himself would need to be hidden.

He forced himself to straighten and breathe before his panicked stillness became noticeable, even as the dead chunk of ice in his stomach dropped between his legs.

“Should I leave now, sir?” Zett asked respectfully, pale fingers fastening the top button of his dark aide’s uniform.

Oh, oh .

“Who is he,” Thire demanded, body turned toward the padawan with an aggressive tilt, hand resting just beside his pistol.

“My assistant,” Bail explained, infusing his voice with just a hint of annoyance; only the innocent had the privilege of annoyance in the face of suspicious questions.

Thire paused, like an old datapad processing, and Bail knew that he was accessing information from the Senate databases. The first familiar action in the clones’ behavior tasted like ash caked on his tongue.

“Your assistant is Sheltay Retrac, Alderaanian female,” Thire countered, and his words sent the other two troopers stepping in closer, hands resting on weapons.

“Ms. Retrac is my daytime assistant,” Bail lied smoothly, familiar with the tone and twist of the words from his training, “Daniel Novi’er fills in at night.”

Thire processed again, the moment of silence stretching as he searched the Senate database for the name. 

It would be there, Bail knew. The Alderaanian Embassy always had a Daniel Novi’er listed on staff, a construct for times just as this when a false identity was needed. He was not sure what Daniel’s official role would be listed as, but it would be something vague enough that it could be twisted to be almost any job. 

“Understood,” Thire declared flatly, having accessed “Daniel’s” file with its distinctly unhelpful I.D. photo taken at the wrong angle and in the worst lighting imaginable to reveal a vaguely humanoid figure with hair and a possibility of eyes. The other troopers backed off a step and a “Proceed,” from Thire sent them back to their tasks.

Bail made his stiff muscles lean back against the counter, picking up the teacup still resting on it, though knowing better than to try to take a sip through the marble hand squeezing his throat and lungs.

“Yes, Mr. Novi’ere, you can leave,” he nodded at the padawan in the sharply cut uniform that was so obviously three sizes too big for him. “Tyrone will see to your dismissal.”

“Thank you, senator,” the pale-faced boy replied smoothly and - by the ancestors - bowed respectfully. 

Bail’s fingers tightened on the smooth, delicate china of his teacup as Zett stepped past Thire and started towards the door.

“No,” Thire’s flat command set the teacup creaking in Bail’s white-knuckled grip. Deliberately, he set the cup down, pulling oxygen back into his blood in a long breath before asking, “I’m sorry, ‘no’?”

The commander didn’t even look at him as he stepped up the step to the kitchen, dragging his plastoid boots across the rich wood floors, and began banging open the cabinets, searching through them.

“No one may leave or enter this apartment until the search for threats is finished.”

Swallow, breathe.

No senator would take that sitting down.

“That’s outrageous,” Bail straightened, willing command and spoiled outrage into his spine. “I have meetings to attend.”

Still, the commander did not look at him, only waved open the fridge and scanned its shelves, before moving on to the shelves under the bar. 

“Your next meeting is scheduled for 0900,” he replied without care as glass clinked under his searching hands. He moved from the kitchen and bar to the closet in the entry. “This search will be concluded before then.” 

He finished the closet as the two other troopers returned to the main area from their sections. Both reported, “All clear,” restoring at least five years to Bail’s life each. He picked up the tea again as Thire lifted a hand to activate his helmet’s comms, reporting to someone inaudibly.

The commander snapped his hand down sharply and marched two steps in front of Bail.

“You are to be informed that the Galactic Empire will be routinely checking for traitors among its high officials for the safety and stability of the governing body,” he reported in a dead voice that rippled sourly in Bail’s gut. “Obstruction of these searches is an attack on the sovereignty and stability of the Empire and is considered treason. This will preserve the safety of the members of the Empire’s governing body and the authority of the Emperor.”

Bail could not clench his fists while holding the teacup, and managed to unclench his jaw enough to reply, “Understood,” with the barest tilt of his head.

The troopers marched out without asking for leave or bidding farewell, and Bail’s control snapped like a wire as the door hissed closed behind them, his body going from taut and controlled to limp and trembling. He sunk back against the counter, not minding the marble edges that dug into his back and hips as cold tea sloshed in its cup.

After a moment of deep breaths, he managed to set the cup down, feeling his heart stop screaming quite so frantically in his chest. Zett seemed to be taking a moment to regather himself as well, eyes closed, hands folded over his chest. Then he straightened and managed a smile that startled Bail with a line of warmth like hot tea down his center.

“They’ve moved on to the next floor,” Tyrone’s voice filtered through the comm once again. “They seem to be only searching the apartments of select senators, sir.”

That was concerning. It meant that the Empire had a list of likely enemies and that Bail was on it. It was also a problem for later, Bail decided as his poor heart began to speed up once again. He pushed the thoughts away, shoving them into a dark closet in his mind labeled “After a Full-night’s Sleep” and locking the door.

“Thank you, Tyrone,” he replied calmly. Then, meeting Zett’s questioningly scrunched look, “You can tell the younglings to come out now.”

Zett rubbed his eyes and grinned, mischief lighting them to a green like the seafoam washed thickly against the rocky shores of Bail’s childhood home.

“That’s not how they play,” he leaned forward conspiratorially, “We have to find them.”

Bail blinked back the heaviness that was now replacing the fear in his system. “Find them?”

“They’re still playing hide and sneak, we have to be the finders,” Zett nodded, bouncing on the balls of his feet just a little. “Don’t worry, I’ll help you, they’re very bright and can’t dim themselves yet, so you don’t have to find them all on your own.”

That was just more Force-talk that Bail could only get the vaguest sense of, but he stretched and nodded, the boy’s excitement sparking some warm energy in his blanket exhaustion. 

“Alright,” he moved down into the living area, “Well, I know we have one on the chandelier.”

Above them, the dark figure groaned and waved down.

“You shouldn’t have talked,” Zett reminded them, as they crawled down the arm of the chandelier to its lower center, sending the construct of silver wire and crystal beads swinging and spinning in the air as they moved. Bail swallowed hard, watching the little figure spin in the air 30 feet above the floor.

The child wrapped their hands around the chandelier’s bottom piece and slid their body so that they were hanging there, feet dangling in the air of a drop 10 times their height.

“Wait,” Bail’s heart jumped right back into his throat as he took a step forward as if he could help the white-haired boy about to fall to grievous injury. “Don’t…”

“I’ll catch you if you can’t,” Zett called up before Bail could finish speaking. “It’s pretty high for a youngling.”

“ ‘kay,” the boy’s high voice called.

Then he dropped.

Bail barely had time to freeze in horror, before the boy slowed down in midair. Arms spread out and little face scrunched in concentration, he flipped once on the way down, then landed on his feet in slow motion, little robes flapping from the fall.

“That was really good control,” Zett praised, rubbing a hand through the child’s hair. “I barely had to cushion you at all.”

The boy beamed, the smile resurrecting dimples from his round cheeks.

Bail closed his eyes and let out the breath he’d been holding. Apparently, Jedi children were just as flippy as the adults he’d known, with the same disregard for safety. It had been foolish of him to assume that Obi-wan, Anakin, and Tano were exceptions. He was pretty sure he’d grown a new gray hair just watching the kid fall.

His heart was just starting to slow to a normal rhythm when the youngling turned to him eagerly, face looking up with a wide smile and ash still smudged on his cheek. 

“I can help be a Seeker now, right?”

Bail couldn’t help the small smile forming on his lips at the boy’s shining emerald eyes. “Of course,” he agreed. “Let’s find your friends.”

The youngling’s hot little hand in his seemed to drive a wave of warmth throughout his whole body as the boy grabbed his hand and tugged him impatiently further into the living room. 

“Ka’ress’s talking, too,” he chattered, “So, she’s in here some’ere. Hiding with the purple, prob’ly. She’sa good hider. Good at blending. Wants to ‘mpress a shadow for her master.”

Bail let the words wash over him, unsure exactly what the child was talking about as he dragged him over to the large vases of thick, purple-fronded bushes.

“Can sense’er here,” the boy told him, dropping his hand to grab the rim of a vase, peering with concentration into the bush. 

Bail followed suit, amused. The bush was thick but not thick enough to hide a whole child. 

But then, the boy reached his hand through the foliage and yanked. Suddenly a little purple twi’lek came falling out of the plant, landing in a cloud of dirt and long purple leaves on the floor. Her little round face pouted, cheeks bulging out almost the same color as the plants she’d been hiding in.

Her little friend laughed at her expression while Bail’s mind tried to figure out how she’d been hiding so well in the plant.

“Shoudl’t’ve talked,” the boy teased, repeating what Zett had just told him.

“Yeah, yeah,” the girl, Ka’ress the boy had called her, muttered, still grumpy, unwinding purple leaves from her sleeves and her short little lekku. “Troopers did’n see me, though.”

She bent over and began to pick up the scattered dirt and leaves on the floor, piling them back into the plant’s large vase. Her friend bounced forward eagerly to help her. They managed to get most of the mess back into the plant, which, Bail noticed, looked more thinned out than it had a moment ago, and the rest of the dirt was smudged across the mirrored floor awaiting a mop. 

“Let’s find t’others!” the boy cheered, wiping his dirty hands on his robes, the little girl did the same, wiping the dirt off her hands onto her friend’s robe. “Lessa’s here, can sense’er,” the boy grabbed Ka’ress’ hand and they bounded up the short, wide steps into the kitchen.

They paused in the middle of the kitchen, closing their eyes to focus. The boy’s face scrunched up in concentration as he spread out an arm like a mini-jedi master trying to move a starfighter. Ka’ress tugged hard at her lekku, mouth open thoughtfully, stepping in a circle.

Bail watched, paused in amusement with one foot up in the kitchen and the other still in the living area, as they wandered around the kitchen that way, trying to find their friend using the Force but mostly walking in circles. He glanced at Zett, who had moved to the fish tank where the nautolan youngling was swimming in agile loops and circles, and seemed to be trying to sign to her to swim up to the surface which she either did not understand or was refusing to do. 

Turning his attention back to the younglings, Bail saw that they were now both, strangely, stopped in front of the gleaming fridge. 

Why exactly were they…

He didn’t even get to finish thinking the question, as the two of them tugged open a door at least twice as big as they were, releasing a hissing breath of cold air. Ka’ress yanked open a low drawer with eager purple hands and Bail winced at the grinding of the automatic door being forced open manually. She poked a large, fuzzy fruit and it uncurled into the Bothan girl who had not wanted to play Hide and Sneak.

Bail just stared as the girl, Lessa he believed, clambered out of the drawer and pulled on the robes she’d been lying on. The youngling had just… stripped down and hidden in the fridge. At a casual glance, he would have assumed she was some sort of fruit, just as he had assumed the youngling hidden in the plant was part of the plant.

It was impressive, to say the least.

A wet splash behind him had Bail turning to see the Nautolan girl outside the tank, dripping a puddle of water on the shining floor. Zett stood beside her with a dark wet stain splashed over his clothes, lowering the lid of the tank while the eel-fish swam back into its cave with an injured air.

“Can I use the bathtub for her?” Zett asked. “Salt’s good for her skin but freshwater is more hydrating.”

“Of course,” Bail nodded. The youngling shivered as the water dripped down her skin. “And see if something in the closet will fit her. The laundry won’t be back for 2 days.”

Zett nodded, glancing towards the room Bail had gestured to, then paused, cocking his head thoughtfully. “He’s shining pretty bright over there,” he said softly, “You should find the little star first.” With that, he bundled the shivering girl into the master bathroom where the giant tub waited.

Bail glanced back at the other 3 children, all now fully dressed and listening to the conversation with childish concentration. 

“Does that mean someone is hiding in the closet?”

The younglings brightened at the idea, wide eyes and smiles growing as little bodies bounced eagerly. They huddled together, eyes closed in concentration, little round faces tilted as though listening to some soft, stray song. 

Then the white-haired boy jolted up with a cheer of, “Trist!” and bolted toward Bail’s bedroom where the giant senatorial closet waited.

The girls followed him with more cheers, laughing on his heels. Their excitement pulled Bail along like a sparkling leash, tingling with warmth like alcohol. Closets would have been searched more carefully than a plant pot or the fridge, but he was past protesting disbelief at the hiding places the younglings had chosen. 

The lights in the closet lit down the rows of clothing as they stepped through the doorway, sparkling off mirrors and gleaming on satin sleeves and silk vests. The younglings bounced over the lush green carpet in bare feet with squeals of delight and Bail remembered that their shoes had been neatly lined up beside their beds, probably bundled up with the linens and sent down the laundry chute. After a minute or so of jumping around on the plushy floor and swishing their feet through the long strands, the children remembered what they were in the long room for.

“Trist!” the boy called, spinning in a circle in the center of the room, hand out again as he tried to find his friend in the Force.

Lessa prowled around the edge of the room, snout wrinkling as she sniffed the air.

“We know you’re in ’ere, Trist!” Ka’ress called, poking through the shirts hanging on Bail’s Senate Business rack. Bail was rather certain that the clones would have poked through the clothes to make sure nobody was behind or under them already and checked in the bins on the shelves.

“Here!” Lessa shouted triumphantly, springing to a rack of Bail’s cloaks and capes. They did look like a good hiding place, all trailing down to the floor in layers of thick cloth, which made Bail sure the troopers had already checked them. Sure enough, Lessa swept the cloaks aside to find empty space behind them. She paused, snout wrinkling and mane rippling in confusion. “I smell him,” she declared.

The other two considered this for a moment, and then Ka’ress’ lekku went stiff with excitement. 

“Not behind them,” she exclaimed, rushing to her friend’s side and yanking at the thick winter cloak Bail kept as a reminder of Alderaanian winters even though it was too warm for Coruscant’s mild climate and non-existent weather. 

Inside the heavy folds of silvery Cacuasa wool, the togruta boy hung from the hanger. His silver-blue skin was somewhat similar in shade to the outside of the cloak and his brown Jedi robes blended with the brown inner layer of the cloak, while his orange-striped montrals leaped out from the duller colored background.

He grinned with sharp teeth and jumped down among his friends.

“I’m not first this time!” he cheered.

Then there was a shriek from the bathroom, followed by a yelp and the sound of laughter. Everyone in the closet spun to face the bathroom as the door flew open. A sopping wet human girl with dripping black curls ran through the door, trailing dark wet stains over the carpet behind her. Through the doorway behind her, Zett could be seen laughing so hard he was on his knees with his hands over his face in the puddle of water covering half the floor, and the Nautolan youngling was perched on the edge of the huge tub, arms crossed triumphantly, wet green skin shining in the bright lights above the tub.

“Don’t jump outta’da vent an’ scare me!” she yelled at the dripping girl. “Is mean, Kir’a!”

“You splashed me!” the human girl, Kiria he thought, hollered back.

“Des’rved it!”

“Nuh, uh” The culprit argued. “I’m’ll wet now!”

“Me, too!” The other girl, Ro if Bail was remembering correctly from earlier, shot back, flinging an arm out with a spray of water droplets for emphasis. The gesture knocked her off balance and she fell from her perch back into the deep tub, spraying water over the still kneeling Zett. Her head popped up with a glare firmly attached.

Bail felt a smile breaking through at the corners of his lips.

“You’re getting wet every’ere, Kiria,” Ka’ress spoke up, purple finger pointing accusingly at the water stain spreading beneath the other girl.

“Go dry,” the white-haired boy added, pointing to the towels hanging in the bathroom. “Ro, no more splashing,” he warned the other girl, who did look like she was waiting for another chance to splash her opponent, lurking by the edge of the tub like a sea monster.

Kiria trudged back into the bathroom, shaking water from her curls, pale face blushing pink from the argument even as she tugged a towel off of its hook. She peeled off her outer robe and threw it to the floor with a moist plop, wrinkling her nose at her wet undershirt and pants. 

Her face scrunched a little, sharp nose flushing pink. “Don’t like t’be wet,” she whined, tears glimmering in her eyes.

“You can see if you can find something dry to wear in the closet,” Bail told her as comfortingly as he could manage. With all the capability the younglings had been displaying he had forgotten that most of them were 5 or so.

That cheered her up immediately.

“Even t’fancy ones?”

Bail couldn’t resist the warmth in his chest blossoming at her eager smile.

“Of course.”

“Me too!” Ro surged up out of the water, splashing more water into the puddle on the floor and getting Zett even wetter than before as she charged after Kiria, obviously remembering Bail’s suggestion from earlier.

Zett did not so much as flinch as the water splashed over him and the half-naked youngling rushed past. He was still kneeling, hands over his face and shoulders shaking with laughter.

Or not laughter, Bail realized suddenly. Zett was covering his face because he was sobbing silently in the puddle of water.

“Why don’t you four go find our last hider?” Bail said softly to the four younglings beside him. Ro and Kiria were rummaging through his party shirts on the other side of the closet and wholly absorbed in what they were doing, trailing water across the carpet.

“Right, Qual!” The white-haired boy cheered.

“Saw ‘im go into t’bedroom,” Lessa said.

The white-haired boy snatched the girls’ hands and pulled them away, eagerly racing to the guest bedroom, with Trist at their heels.

Then Bail moved to Zett’s side, kneeling in the cold puddle around him on the floor.

“Zett, what’s wrong?” he asked softly, uncertain whether he should put his arm around the boy’s shaking shoulders or if that would only make things worse.

Zett made the decision for him, throwing his arms around Bail’s chest and pressing his face against Bail’s shoulder until Bail could feel the warm wetness of his tears soaking into his shirt. Bail’s arms instinctively wrapped around the small body, his body sinking to sit in the cold puddle so that he could take the boy’s weight.

How old was Zett? He had been so mature and helpful earlier, but now he looked as small as the younglings.

“Don’t have the words,” Zett muttered into Bail’s shoulder, sounding all of 5 years old. His shaking seemed to slow after a moment then he spoke again, “He would have thought it was funny. I reached out without thinking. It’s too cold everywhere. It’s all dark.”

Bail did not know much about the Force, but he knew that the Jedi sensed each other. He knew they felt each other die. He knew they reached out for comfort to those closest to them. Zett had reached out and felt nothing but the emptiness where his family should have been.

He could not imagine what that was like, but he did not have to imagine what the grief felt like. Sorrow coiled in his gut like oily tentacles, writhing up towards his heart.

“I am sorry,” he said carefully and precisely, holding the boy just a little tighter, “That you have to feel that.”

Zett’s frame was still, no longer shaking, and a moment of still silence reigned.

“It’s better when you're here,” the boy spoke finally, voice calmer, less like it was going to shatter apart like a porcelain vase. “You’re warm and… heavy; I can stay still when you’re here.”

Bail shifted in the cold water, soaking whatever part of his pants was still dry, so he could pull Zett properly against his side.

“Then I’ll stay here for as long as you need me to.”

Chapter Text

     It did not take long for Zett to pull himself together. He lingered, a warm weight against Bail’s side, and Bail could feel the boy’s lungs filling and deflating with purposeful breaths for a few moments. Then the boy ran a hand down his slim braid and stood.

      “Thank you, Senator Organa,” Zett bowed slightly, “You have done so much to help us already, I hope I’m not being a burden.”

     Words swirled in Bail’s mind like muddy water, sluggishly churning through a cold sadness that the child would think his grief could be a burden. 

     “Of course not,” he finally assured the boy, “Never.”

     The little girls who had been changing in the closet rushed in with smiles and giggles to show off the clothes they’d found as Bail pulled himself out of the puddle he’d been sitting in, pants dripping wet.

     Ro, the little nautolan girl had bundled herself in an orange sweater of Bail’s, its hem falling below her knees. Toddling to one side on under-formed legs she dramatically revealed the taller human girl behind her with a wave of her arm. Kiria wore a multicolored dress shirt edged with sparkles wrapped around her childish frame.

     She held out her arms and twirled so that the sparkles sent flecks of light dancing across the dark tiled bathroom, obviously very pleased with her outfit.

     “Good choice,” Bail congratulated her and was rewarded with a pink flush of pleasure darkening the girl’s freckled cheeks.

     Ro laughed suddenly. “You all wet.”

     Bail looked down at his soggy pants clinging coldly to his skin, dark wet stains soaked into the gray linen. Beside him, Zett twisted the wet hem of his over-large shirt, droplets of water splashing into the puddle they were standing in.

     “So we are,” Bail agreed with the child’s assessment mildly. “Should we dry off and change like you and Kiria did?”

     “Me too!” a voice cried from the closet door.

     Bail turned to see the rest of the younglings filing back into the closet. The dark-skinned human boy, Qual, had been found and followed his friends inside, a pillowcase draped over his shoulders like a cape.

     “We want t‘get dressed, too,” Ka’ress told him, dirt from her hiding place still streaked across her face and robes.

     The other younglings, Bail noticed when he looked them over with a critical eye, were all similarly dirty, dust and soot sprinkled liberally as powdered sugar across their skin and hair. Ro and Kiria, in contrast, were clean from splashing around in the bathtub and were dressed in Bail’s clean shirts.

     “How about a bath for all of you, then some new clothes?” Bail suggested. “That way, everyone can be nice and clean.”

     “Okay,” Ka’ress agreed solemnly and her companions nodded with varying levels of eagerness.

     “Girls in this tub, boy t’da other’un,” the white-haired boy directed.

     “Do you need me to get it filled for you?” Bail asked as the boys gathered themselves up and headed for the guest bathroom. Ka’ress and Lessa were already wriggling out of their dirty robes to jump into the tub Zett had filled for Ro.

     “I can do it,” Qual declared pillowcase still flapping from his shoulders. “I’m seven now, big enough to help.”

     “Of course you are,” Bail agreed, burying his amusement, “Go ahead then.”

     The younglings scampered off to their baths while Bail and Zett dried off and changed, Bail cleaning his own soot-dusted face with invigoratingly cold water. He pulled the little used med kit from an upper shelf and taped a new bacta patch over Zett’s blaster wound, which was already scabbing over and healing. If Bail hadn’t had any experience with the Jedi’s natural healing abilities combined with the miracle of bacta the progress would have shocked him.

      Zett managed to dig up another staff uniform from the hall closet, this one a women’s in a smaller size that fit him much better, while Bail opted for a soft silk set that was balanced just between business casual and loungewear.

     By then, the girls were clambering out of the tub and drying themselves off, eager to get into Bail’s closet. Meanwhile, Ro and Kiria had cleaned up the water they’d splashed everywhere, shoving the wet towels and their friends’ dirty clothes down the laundry chute. As Kiria and Ro loudly advised their friends on what to wear, Bail and Zett made their way to the living area to give the girls some space. 

     Bail’s feet stopped on the veined marble tiles of the dining area as a familiar whistling melody filled the air. His heart richotched into his throat as he whirled, stumbling frantically to the unassuming comm beside the living room’s holo-screen.

     The clones were killing the Jedi, the Republic had become a Sith Empire, and Bail had been so busy with the younglings and Alderaan’s reaction that he had all but forgotten that he had a private comm with a secure connection to Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi .

     He was flicking the comm on almost before he had it in his hands.

     “Obi-Wan,” Bail breathed, all formalities forgotten in the relief of seeing his friend’s form flickering in blue projection, “You’re alive.”

     “So you know?” The question was not so much a question as a sigh. Obi-Wan Kenobi’s face was lined like a man twice his age, tucked beneath the hood of his robe in flickering shadows.

     Obi-Wan looked beyond the comm into the distance, as though seeing a ghost beyond Bail’s projected face. “Even Coruscant,” his voice stumbled and died for a moment, then, even softer, “Even the Temple, then?”

     Bail’s eyes wanted to look anywhere but at the grief carved in lines into his friend’s face, but he did not let himself look away as he replied.

      “The Temple burned,” His own voice wavered and weakened, stretched out and thin like an elastic band. “Almost everyone inside…”

     “Is gone,” Obi-Wan finished for Bail when his voice gave out entirely, aching in the back of his throat as caustic as bile.

      The robed figure made of blue light seemed to crumple in on itself just a little, Obi-Wan staring sightlessly down at his comm with eyes as glassy as a corpse’s. The shadows around him undulated across the rough stone like a reflection from water.

      “Where are you?” Bail asked. If his friend was anywhere near clone troopers, he was not safe.

       Obi-Wan shook his head with heavy exhaustion. 

       “My men turned on me. I fell down one of the spiral mines. I found a network of tunnels down here.”

       His voice was bland and even, as though these events were distant and inconsequential things.

       Bail swallowed, glancing back at Zett, who was watching the discussion from a few steps back with wide eyes and a blank face.

       “Obi-Wan, there were some survivors.”

       Like a spark on tibanna gas, the Jedi Master’s face lit up. He leaned in towards Bail, voice dropping.

       “You know of someone who made it out?”

       “I have seven younglings and a padawan hidden in my apartments right now,” Bail’s own voice dropped to match Obi-Wan’s caution. “The youngling’s caretaker and Master Shaak Ti are alive as well, though not with me.”

       Obi-Wan pressed a dirty hand to his mouth in the shadow of his hood, blinking back tears in the flickering blue light of the holo-projection.

       “I’m coming,” he choked out. “I will be there as soon as I can, Bail.”

       Bail’s hand tightened on the comm, his relief at seeing his friend alive blossoming into a larger realization. 

       “No,” he said hurriedly, words bleeding into each other, “If you survived off Coruscant, others might have as well.” Obi-Wan’s eyes widened. “You have to find them. Master Ti and I will handle everyone on Coruscant, but you…”

       “I have access to the locations of all the active campaigns,” Obi-Wan finished for him, plans animating his face and movements. “I can sweep the Middle Rim deployments for survivors.” 

       He was already moving, Bail could tell as the rough-hewn stone blurred bluely at the edges of the projection.

       “Where should I send them?”

       Bail froze.

       Where could the Jedi go? He hadn’t even come up with a plan for the ones who had almost been caught hiding in his apartment.

       “I’m still working on it,” he told his friend honestly. “Send them to me or to Breha, whatever is easiest in each case. I’ll let you know when we have a plan.”

       Obi-wan was focused on racing through the tunnels, not even glancing at the comm that bounced with his movements.

       “Very well. I will check in within the next three days.”

       He paused his movement for a moment, bringing the comm closer to his face so the hologram zoomed in on his face and eyes.

       “The Force be with us both, my friend.”

       Then the hologram blinked out, severing the connection between Bail Organa and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Bail clutched the small device for a moment, staring into space where his friend’s projection had been. 

       “He’s alive,” Zett breathed in wonder from behind him and Bail turned to see tears once again shining on the boy’s cheeks. “Master Kenobi survived.”

       Bail moved to his side on instinct, wrapping an arm around the boy’s shoulder, sharing in the salty, warm relief.

       “Not everyone died.”

       “No,” Bail agreed with equal wonder, “Not everyone died,” and it was a feeling as warm as waking up bundled in blankets on a snowy winter morning to think it.

       Zett’s whole body shuddered as he let out a long breath. Then his straightened, shoulders squaring as he turned away from Bail’s touch, stepping up into the kitchen.

       “I’m going to make tea,” he declared, not looking at Bail.

       Bail nodded, eyeing the cup that still sat on the edge of the bar countertop since the clones had left. It was probably cold by now and a warm cup of tea sounded wonderful.

       “Thank you,” was all he said in response.

       “Our turn for clothes!” A young voice cheered as the boys broke the silence hanging over the living area. They were dripping wet and wrapped in towels, racing barefoot across the cold tiles to Bail’s room where the closet waited invitingly.

       A trail of dripped water followed them as they disappeared into the closet, their excitement settling into a distant, indistinct chatter, rising and falling like surf.

       While the water heated in its kettle, Zett pulled mugs from the cabinet, lining them up like soldiers along the countertop. He stared at the line he’d made for a moment, then spoke.

       “Why am I crying?”

       He turned away from the cups so that Bail could see his face, tears indeed still running over the creases of confusion at the edges of his lime eyes.

       “Master said crying communicates pain, both physical and emotional, but,” the boy wiped his tears off his round cheeks with a dark sleeve, “I should be happy because Master Kenobi survived, shouldn’t I?”

       Bail looked down at Zett, warmth cracking through cold bars in his chest.

       “Honestly,” he replied, picking up the cold cup of tea to dump it into the sink, “I feel like crying, too.” He rinsed the cup out, feeling Zett watching from the side. “It’s good that Master Kenobi survived, but I can’t feel very happy, can I? He shouldn’t have been in danger. It’s relief, not happiness that I feel,” He put the teacup in the dishrack, turning to face Zett once again. “It’s relief because there’s a little bit of hope in too much darkness. But the dark still hurts.”

       Zett nodded, wiping his tears away again.

       “It’s hard to tell with a void this big,” he replied softly and nonsensically. “That’s why I’m making tea.”

       As if on cue, the water boiler hissed a shrill whistle and Zett turned back to his task, sparing Bail from having to come up with a response. Carefully, Zett measured a spoonful of sweet blue tea into each cup, going systematically down the row of nine cups. Then he methodically poured the steaming water, filling them all to the same level with impressive precision. Again, he went down the line of mugs, giving each cup of tea a swirl with the spoon to dissolve the tea into the water. By the time he turned back to Bail, his eyes were dry and his face had relaxed from its tight lines of confusion.

       “The younglings will want some,” he told Bail as he returned the tin of blue tea powder to its place, “But we should let it cool first.”

       “Of course,” Bail agreed, accepting the steaming cup Zett gave him, relieved that the ritual of teamaking seemed to have helped. “Thank you.”

       Then the doorbell chirped.

       Bail’s heart lodged in his throat like a chunk of ice and he looked up to see his panic echoed in Zett’s eyes.

       “It’s not clones,” Zett murmured faintly, “I would have sensed them approaching, they feel all wrong.”

       Bail nodded, a flicker of hope melting the ice enough for him to start breathing again.

       “Keep the younglings in the closet,” he whispered, tugging his shirt down so it was smooth. “I’ll send them away as quickly as I can.”

         Zett offered a quick nod and darted across the tiles to the bedroom door, disappearing inside. Taking another deep breath, Bail crossed to the door, opening it with a wave of his hand as he tried to smooth his face to calmness.

         Dark hair done up in a dramatic curve held by gold bands, Padme Amidala waited for him, a rich purple dress he recognized from yesterday contrasting against the gray tones of the hall. The dark circles under her eyes confirmed that she’d had no more sleep than him, yet for some reason she had not covered them with her usual impeccable Nabooian make-up.

         “Senator Amidala,” Bail greeted her, fighting the polite instincts that urged him to invite her in. “Is there something I can do for you?”

         She took a breath, visibly calming herself, wide emotion edging her eyes. Something was very wrong for the senator of Naboo to arrive without her facade intact, even at a friend’s private apartment.

         Of course, something was wrong, Bail mentally shook himself away from his worry over the children hidden a few rooms away. The Republic had just become a Sith Empire overnight, and, Bail realized, staring down at the small nabooian, it was Padme’s predecessor, one of her mentors, that had done it.

         “Bail,” Padme dropped even the smallest tinge of formality, “Have you…” She caught herself, blinking rapidly, “May I come in?”

         Inside Bail’s stomach guilt, worry, and fear coiled and writhed like tentacles, hand clenching at the hem of his shirt. Instinct urged him to invite her in and help her with her troubles, but his racing mind stuttered at the thought of the younglings tucked away in his closet.

         He didn’t know if he could keep them hidden with someone in the apartment. And if Padme found the younglings… well, Bail trusted her, of course, he trusted her. She would never turn them over to the Sith Empire. 

        But knowing would put Padme in danger and with how close she was with the Jedi, she already was in quite a bit of it. Beyond that the more people knew about the younglings, the more danger they would be in. Some of that danger, Bail had to admit to himself, came from Padme being so righteous and hot-headed. He could easily picture her doing something rash to help the younglings that backfired.

         Bail trusted Padme, but her was not sure he trusted her judgment, at least not at the moment.

         He hesitated and she noticed. She knew him enough to pull back when he didn’t immediately invite her in.  Bail saw a little of her mask slip back down, breathing evening and spine straightening.

        He couldn’t help wincing inside to see his friend pull away from him when she needed him.

        “It would be best if we talked elsewhere,” he managed, then, looking for the vulnerability the conversation had contained before, added, “Please, Padme.”

         She was a senator and her confusion was written in only the slightest crease at the corners of her eyes, but she understood the message, whatever she might assume the reason behind it to be. She nodded.

         Then a wail shattered the silence—specifically, the wail of a child coming from Bail’s closet. 

         Bail whirled, heart choking him like a lump of lead in his throat as his fingers twisted the shirt he clutched with the shock of rushing adrenaline.

        “Is that a child?” Padme asked, mask shattered into a face squinting in shock and concern.

        Bail turned back to her, mind racing. Then he grabbed her wrist, jerked her roughly into the apartment, and waved the door closed in one motion. He locked it with a touch of trembling fingers and turned back to his friend.

       “Bail…” she began, snatching her wrist back. Then her whole body seemed to melt as she went down on one knee, attention focused beyond him, face suddenly smiling sweetly.

       “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” She cooed softly and Bail saw Kiria standing in the doorway, red-faced and sniffling.

        “ ‘m hungry,” the girl whined as Zett appeared behind her, pale-faced with Ro clenched tightly on his hip. “Pad’wan Zett said we had to be quiet an’ could’ave tea after, but I want food!”

       Zett said nothing, eyes on Padme and hand lingering by the pocket Bail had seen him stash his lightsaber in earlier.

      “It’s all right, Zett,” Bail said softly, holding a hand out calmingly. “Senator Amidala isn’t going to hurt you or the younglings.”

        “Bail?” Padme asked again, still kneeling, but looking up at him now, heart-shaped face lined with creases of worry.

        “Help me get them some food and I’ll explain,” Bail sighed, already heading to the kitchen. “It’s a long story, no need for them to starve while we talk.”

Chapter Text

The story Bail told her was… well, it was hardly unbelievable. Not anymore, not after watching Sheeve stand before the Senate and declare himself Emperor without anyone offering even a word of protest or act of defiance. Not after realizing that her old compatriot, a mentor she had once looked up to actually had amassed enough power to be Emperor, to overthrow democracy so simply and so easily.

         She sipped a warm cup of nectar tea that Bail had made her, the fruity taste comforting in its familiarity. The younglings were gathered around one of the low tables in Bail’s living area, seated cross-legged in their oversized, colorful clothes. Senators’ kitchens were not usually stocked for cooking, a Senator ordered out or had cooking staff in the lower kitchens; the apartment kitchens were for show and to store snacks. Fortunately, Bail had stashed a box of tea cakes in his fridge and the younglings were more than happy to accept the treats as breakfast, sipping their tea and munching with relish.

         The story was horrible, of course, to think that every one of these children had been sentenced to death. But Padme understood horror. Padme had lived the horror of being fourteen years old and watching her people be killed to get at her. Her planet had been conquered by an invading force two months into her rule, her people had been forced into labor camps. The Trade Federation had killed so many of them while she had run away, a child who still put her faith in the Republic and in Palpatine.

         The galaxy had no shortage of horrors. She forced her grip to relax on the rough clay teacup, brushing her fingers over the thick, glossy glaze. She was a senator because she couldn’t turn away from the horrors. Because how could she retire as though just serving as queen during the invasion had been enough?

         “Senator Amidala?”

         She turned to see the padawan who had been helping Bail with the children holding out one of the teacakes. His eyes were green and too large in his pale face, earnest and tragic in turns. He was around the age she had been when she’d first started living through horrors. She knew for a fact that it was too young; he was too young.

         “Thank you,” setting her tea on the counter she leaned against, she took the little plate with the spongey pink pastry, drizzled with a white glaze and sprinkled with velvety red streusel. She smiled down at the boy, remembering like icy water in her center how it had felt to be his age and trying to at least help at least someone, anyone, in the middle of the world falling apart. Now it seems she had managed to help the wrong person back then.

         “Have you eaten, Zett?” Bail came up behind the boy, a cup of blue tea in one hand as he rested the other on the boy’s shoulder without hesitation. He had always wanted children, Padme knew, and would have made such an amazing father.

         “I don’t think I can,” Zett shook his head, leaning into Bail’s touch slightly. “Tea is enough right now.”

         Bail frowned softly, not his careful senate frown that Padme knew so well, nor his exhausted “the senate is being more evil than usual” frown that had become more and more frequent as Palpatine had amassed more and more power and the war had gone on longer and longer. This one was warm and worried as he led Zett to the fridge, trying to convince him to eat something.

         She knew that frown too. Not because she’d seen it on her friend’s face before, but because she’d felt it on her own. She’d felt the creases and folds of worry grow deeper and deeper, become harder and harder to smooth away under her Senatorial mask each time Anakin had gone out to fight a war, up until she would see him with his own two feet on Couruscanti metal. And then he would be gone again, maybe not to come back.

         And this time… this time he hadn’t even gone anywhere.

         Because that was the thing about the story Bail told her. If it was true - and it was, she knew it was - then the Temple had burned. The Temple had burned and those inside had died trying to get out, to get each other out. They had died trying to save the people around them. They had died at the hands of their trusted men, at the hands of the 501rst. Everyone in the Temple had died.

         And Anakin… Anakin had been in the Temple.

         There was ash in the back of her throat as if she had walked through those burning halls herself. Her lungs ached with it, shriveling and choking on air.

         And maybe he would have made it out, maybe he could have brought himself to kill his own men and escaped, but he was Anakin… he didn’t do no-win scenarios, he believed in saving everyone. He would have stayed until every last child and knight was out of the Temple because he refused to lose anyone. 

         She had loved that about him so fiercely. And now it felt like that fire inside her was racing up her veins, agonizing, burning, consuming her from the inside. There was no more control, the flame had turned into a wildfire.

Because she knew him. She knew that he had always believed so firmly that he should be able to save everyone, that it was within his power, he just had to grasp it.

He would not have run.

It was the taste of salt in her tea that brought her to the realization that she was crying. 

Padme had never been a pretty crier. She didn’t trickle a few silent tears like a holodrama star. As Queen Amidala, she had simply determined not to cry in public, ever. But now she could feel the sobs climbing with claws up the back of her throat.

Suddenly the plate was being lifted out of her hands, the first bite still on the fork. Bail was beside her, an arm around her shoulder as he led her to the smaller living area attached to the guest quarters. Zett slipped a small warm hand into hers, following beside them.

“It’s alright to cry,” the boy told her softly. “It’s alright to cry when it hurts, until the words come.”

And that was too much for her. The sweet bit of kindness toppled the dam of bitter grief.

Because it was never okay to cry, a person shouldn’t cry, they should roll up their sleeves and find a way to fix the bad things. But now the sobs were coming out, hiccupping as loud as blaster shots. Her body shook with the force of her pain wrenching the sounds out of her chest.

She was distantly aware of Bail guiding her to a low couch. It took her a moment to register why he froze when she sat down.

“Oh,” he said softly, “Padme…” he didn’t finish, instead knelt in front of her, face creased softly by emotion.

Something fizzing and dark choked her and left her gasping instead of sobbing.

And it was almost funny, because here she was, crying her eyes out and so, so obviously pregnant with Anakin’s child, and Anakin was dead . Anakin was never coming back. And she was sitting here weeping. Weeping , when Anakin was dead and she had his child and she should be getting ready to pay back Sheeve pound by pound in blood for every Jedi he had killed. Pound by pound in hell for her husband. 

And all she could do was cry.

For a moment it was all cold, everything was cold except for the dark, bubbling thing inside her rising like the nausea of only a few months ago.

“We were married,” she told Bail, because it didn’t matter anymore, or because it suddenly mattered so, so much. She rested a hand on her swelling belly and it was like she could feel the other life thrumming beneath her skin. “Anakin and I were married.”

When Bail didn’t know what to say, he didn’t say anything, so his silence as her tears began to dry up, and the bubbling blackness that blotted out the rest of her messy emotions did not surprise her.

Then, hesitantly, “May I?”

She nodded, and Bail slowly laid his hand next to hers on her swollen middle. The child inside her moved, a center of beating warmth in the bubbling blackness, and Bail Organa became the first person besides Padme herself to feel Anakin’s child kick.

He met her eyes, tears shining in his own, face aching with emotions because he had always wanted this thing that she and Anakin had and he was so, so sorry for the world as it was.

“Congratulations, Padme,” he finally said. “She’ll be beautiful.”

That earned another jerking sob before Padme covered her mouth and forced herself just to breathe.

“I know,” she managed.

Then Zett knocked softly on the door and stepped in. She hadn’t even realized he’d left, but in his hands he cradled her tea. She took it gratefully, feeling the boy’s gaze on her middle and wondered if he’d heard who the father was.

Then Zett focused on Bail, face grim.

“They’re back, Senator,” he said softly. “Nala’s injured, but they’re back.”

Bail sprang up, then hesitated.

“Padme, if you’re alright for a moment, I need to…”

Shaak Ti appeared in the doorway behind Zett, filling the space with her towering frame.

“That’s alright, Senator Organa,” she held out a hand, inviting the two figures behind her into the room. “It’s best we talk in here.”

At her motion, little, green Master Yoda shuffled into the room, followed by a young human woman, limping with a bandage visible beneath a charred hole in her pants above her knee.

Yoda met Padme’s gaze and there was such deep sorrow in his eyes that Padme knew he knew; knew about her and Anakin and knew exactly what had happened to her husband, knew how he had died. The human woman also caught Padme’s gaze, but her face was sharply creased in a fury so pointed it made the hair on the back of Padme’s neck rise; her hand rested near the lightsaber on her belt.

“Concerns Senator Amidala, this does,” Master Yoda explained.

Bail glanced back at her and she nodded. The bubbling settled a little, cooling and hardening like magma. She did not want to hear how Anakin had died, but she needed to. 

Beyond that, she needed to know how to help his people. She needed to know how they were going to fight back. She needed to make Palpatine pay.

Yoda stepped forward as Shaak Ti shuffled Nala to one of the other couches, the woman seemed resistant at first, but eventually, the Jedi Master convinced her to sit down. 

“Skywalker’s child, it is?” Master Yoda asked softly, leaning on his cane in a way Padme had never seen before. Anakin had always suspected that Yoda didn’t even need the cane just carried it just to whack wayward knights and masters in the shins. Right now it seemed like the only thing keeping him from blowing away.

“Yes,” she replied, running a hand across the tight skin. “We were married.”

At that Nala sprang up from her couch, taking a few steps forward as though she wanted to slam somebody up against a wall. 

“You kriffing married him?!”

“Nala,” Shaak Ti said firmly, as Padme just stared at the girl. She knew that Anakin had said marriage was forbidden among the Jedi, but was that really the most important thing right now?

The other woman sucked in an audible breath and retreated back to her couch, still glaring.

“Zett,” Bail said softly, taking a half step to be in between Nala and Padme, “Could you keep an eye on the younglings for a moment, and close the door so they don’t hear us?”

The boy met his gaze, hesitating.

“I’ll tell you everything afterward,” Bail promised. “You should know what’s going on, but the younglings don’t need to.”

Zett seemed to accept that, blond hair flopping in his eyes as he nodded and left, closing the door behind him.

Yoda thumped his cane softly, drawing everyone’s attention back to the conversation at hand.

Padme felt the dread bubbling up a little more.

“Grave news we bring,” Yoda began, then stopped, he stared at her, face wrinkling in a way that reminded Padme of a child about to cry. “Grave news…” he said again, softer.

“Let me tell them, Master,” Shaak Ti spoke gently after a moment of silence. “It should not have to fall on you.”

“Grandmaster of the Order, I was. My mistakes they were, my failures,” Yoda returned, voice hardening. He hobbled over to Padme, taking the hand that wasn’t on her belly. “Fallen, your husband has.”

Padme squeezed the papery, fragile hand in hers.

“I know,” she replied. “I know he’s dead, just tell me how.”

Nala choked on a hysterical laugh and Yoda’s ears drooped. Padme could feel his hand trembling in hers. The bubbling in her gut lurched sickly.

“Not fallen as in dead,” it was Shaak Ti who finally voiced it, and realization and horror bloomed over Bail’s face as he caught on a moment before Shaak Ti said it, “Fallen as in to the Darkside. Anakin is a Sith.”

The bubbling blackness froze into stone in Padme’s stomach, heavy as lead all up and down her veins.

“That ridiculous,” she replied automatically. “You’re…” joking , she had been going to say, but faltered. Nobody would be joking now, nobody would be joking like this, least of all the broken and mourning Jedi in front of her. “... mistaken.” 

And that was it, that made sense. There was a mistake. 

Because a Sith was someone like Dooku. Someone who strode into a room, red blade in hand and killed everyone who stood in his way. Someone who glared into your soul with yellow eyes and threw lightning from his fingertips and choked a person to death with nothing more than a thought and a raised hand. Someone who burned planets down without care to get at one person. Someone who killed even the children.

Even the children , she could hear it in Anakin’s voice, Even the children, she could see his wild eyes tinged with gold, tears glistening, unfallen, Even the children.

And then Nala was in her face, expression twisted beyond fury, that same grief shining in her eyes.

“Mistaken,” the other woman’s voice rasped low like wires rubbing together, sparks flying. “You think we’re ‘mistaken’ about this ?!” she slammed a holo-projector down on the gleaming black coffee table, straightening out of Padme’s space as a recording flickered on in blue.

A security recording, Padme could tell, as a figure in a hooded robe strode into a Temple hallway. It was Anakin, she knew immediately. Something about the way he strode like a rolling storm, blade gleaming in his hand. A glimpse of his upturned face left no doubts that it was her husband.

No doubts at all as his blade sliced through a Jedi knight ushering two children at her side along the hall. 

Blaster bolts, blue in the wavering hologram, burned through the air, impacting with two other Jedi in the hall who sprang towards Anakin. 

Anakin who turned and drove his blade through the Tholothian boy beside the woman he had just killed. The other padawan, a human girl with her braid looped behind her ear, ignited her blade but just stared, frozen as the boy fell until Anakin’s blade ended her as well.

No, Padme thought, no, no, “No,” she tried to say as the recording flickered and switched to a different room, but it came out as a low, whimpering whine. The room was round, edged with high windows… and filled with children.

Even the children , his voice was clearer now, breaking between fury and horror, “The children, too.”

“No,” she sobbed as he entered, saber in hand, cloak billowing like the shadow of death from her childhood fairytales. 

The little boy in the center of the room stood and came forward, asking Anakin something. The saber lit, gleaming a sickly, nauseous blue in the grainy blue of the hologram.

Padme tried to look away, but she was frozen. Her whole body had turned to noxious stone as her mind spiraled and screamed, kicking at its frozen cell.

The boy’s round face stared up at Anakin in confusion even as her husband plunged his burning blade through the boy’s stomach up to the hilt. He flicked the lightsaber off and the boy’s body fell, expression still staring in simple confusion. 

The bubbling blackness came to life again, warm and rotting and rising in the back of her throat.

Anakin advanced. The children backed away.

Padme leaned off the couch and threw up all over Bail’s guest lounge.

Chapter Text

Nala Tahl was 24 years old when she watched her son die.

People were dying all around her, her home was burning and she felt it. Felt the rising, blistering heat, and choked on the thick black smoke roiling in the Force. She felt souls go out, burned to a crisp, fried to ashes by searing lasers in an instant. She felt her master die, felt the agony of that thread of her soul being pulled from her heart as it raced from the base of her skull down her spine as though a cold hand had grabbed her head and twisted it backward on her neck.

But she had seen her son die.

Her soul had been jerked from her body to his little frame and shoved in alongside his own being. She had watched through the green haze of the emerald eyes his father had forced into a face so like hers.

She had seen who killed him.

And so she was not surprised when Master Yoda found the recordings of Anakin’s betrayal. She was not horrified to see him kill the children in flickering blue. She was not left reeling and shattered by Anakin’s Fall. She did not harbor the agonizing loss that cut to the bones of her masters.

All Nala felt was rage.

All she felt were the tremors in her core like an earthquake. Running down the fault lines of her limbs, the shaking growing to a trembling. She clenched her teeth until her jaw hurt so that they did not chatter with it. Her hands shook and spasmed, and the only thing that could steady them, she was sure, was wrapping them around Skywalker’s throat.

As they hurried through the silent halls of the Temple, ancient stones echoing their shuffling footsteps, as they tried to walk without tripping over bodies, Nala could only stare at her shaking fingers and distantly wonder how they would look coated with Skywalker’s blood. She wondered if it would be hard to scrub out from under her fingernails once it was crusted and dried.

She carried in her pocket the little silver disk holding the videos of Anankin’s murders, of him slaughtering children. It burned against her chest in the pocket of her robe, cradling the recording of her son’s death; the moments she had already lived once.

It had frightened her, how much her son had moved inside her before he was born. He was restless and she’d wondered if it was wrong, if the warmth in her middle was writhing and falling apart because her body was failing. Because once again she was failing.

But when Anakin had come to kill him, her son had been so still. Stood without movement as the blazing blade of light plunged into his little body. Fell to the floor as soft and slow as snow. And laid unmoving, dead.

So, so still.

The unfathomable weight of it rested like a live coal against her chest and she carried it out of the blackened halls of her people, filled with empty bodies and echoing sorrow that howled and slashed like a storm wind. She carried it to Bail Organa’s apartments where the children waited, the children she had cared for and raised for two years now; the children she had been so excited to see become Jedi; her children.

Their presence filled the rich apartment like the morning sun coming through the window. Their contentment as they ate and chattered, in clean clothes and rested bodies, mingled with the echoes of laughter and swelled like light reflecting off a mirror, making everything brighter.

On one hand, it helped. It helped to feel that they lived, that they had even laughed. It loosened the clenching heart in her chest to brush a dark curl off of Kiria’s forehead and receive a wide smile from A’zel as he peered at her through the white fringe of his bangs. On the other hand, the ache in her middle, the empty gaping hole where a child had once been, grew teeth at the feeling of the children around her. Starving with the loss, it bit and gnawed at her soul, the absence heavier than any presence around her.

 The padawan who had let them in watched her carefully, not ignoring her flaring pain and choking anger as Masters Yoda and Ti had ignored it in the Temple.

“I’ll let Senator Organa and Miss Amidala know that you’re here,” he told them jade eyes moving from Nala to Master Yoda.

Master Yoda’s ears twitched.

“Here, Senator Amidala is?” he asked the padawan, his voice rippling with some deep current beneath the surface.

Master Ti stirred too, the burning Force around her lapping higher at the emotions in her head.

“She and Skywalker were close,” the togruta murmured, more to herself than to her fellow Jedi.

The name tasted like space fuel in Nala’s mouth, running thick and oily down her throat.  It fed the roiling fire in her heart that poured noxious black smoke into her shriveled lungs and crumbling, ashy mind. Her anger flared and the padawan winced. The younglings looked up in alarm their bond with Nala sparking with the scorching emotion. Guilt festered somewhere in the bottomless pit in Nala’s middle, but it was too distant for her to reach.

“Tell them,” Shaak Ti told Zett softly, glancing back at Master Yoda’s slow, cold sadness and Nala’s flashing fury. Nala could feel nothing of the older woman in the Force and see nothing of her thoughts in her dark, unfathomable eyes. Master Ti had cut herself off from the Force completely, or very close to it.

Master Yoda, in contrast, lingered in it as he and Nala followed the tall togruta into the little parlor where the senators waited. His sorrow was so deep - salty and cold like ocean water under ice - that not even the blazing pain of the Force seemed able to warm it.

A fresher sadness suffused the room they entered. Senator Amidala sat huddled on the couch, like some fragile flower, tear stains on her cheeks and streaked across her soul like cobwebs, as though she had something to mourn. The black smoke in Nala’s heart thickened, billowing as thick as oil. Senator Amidala’s people were still alive, her home was still intact, her father had not been brutally murdered, her children were not being hunted down. What right did she , who had been so close to Skywalker, have to mourn?

Master Ti guided Nala firmly to a couch on the opposite side of the room from Amidala as Master Yoda shuffled forward, leaning heavily on his cane, the freezing, wet sadness wrapped around his hunched little shoulders like a cloak made of iron chains.

“Skywalker’s child, it is?” he asked softly and without preamble.

The world paused, time itself unmoving as Nala realized what the Master had said. What he meant.

After all, she of all people should know what a pregnant woman felt like in the Force.

Everything inside Nala froze instantly, flames of pain and anger freezing solid in jagged twists, black smoke hanging in the air like noxious fog instead of rising. The ice felt like cold fingers bruising her neck and skeletal hands burrowing under her clothes, raking across her hips. Something warm dangled by a thread in the freezing cavity in her middle, warm and in the soft, nebulous shape of sympathy.

After all, Nala of all people should know what it felt like to carry the child of an evil man.

“Yes,” the senator replied to Master Yoda’s question. She ran a hand over the tight swelling roundness of her belly. “We were married.”

The sympathy shattered soundlessly and the flames sputtered back to life, flaring as Nala leaped to her feet, anger surging through her veins.

She took a step forward, hands trembling with the violent need to shake the other woman. That or slam her up against a wall.

“You kriffing married him?!”

Amidala stared at her with wide, wounded eyes, shrinking back before Nala’s fury, her body soft and stomach round and heart, apparently, belonging to a genocidal Sith .

“Nala,” Master Ti’s voice was flat and firm, as though she were erecting a wall between Nala and Amidala. Senator Organa edged himself between the two human women, face creased with concern and confusion.

They didn’t need to stop Nala though, her fury had rooted her to the floor. Her muscles were so tight they trembled all up and down her frame as though they would peel right off her bones. The quiet pressure of Shaak’s gaze finally sent her retreating stiffly to the couch. Her emotions buzzed so loudly in her ears and rested so heavily against her skin that she couldn’t feel anything at all. Her tangled anger, and hurt, and sadness, and agony, and pity, and rage , buzzed beneath her skin as though she was stuffed full of stinging insects getting ready to burst from her seams.

Quietly, Bail dismissed the padawan to check on the younglings. Dimly, distantly through the pressure in her ears, Nala knew that she should have thought of them before now. The guilt only made the emotions buzz louder.

Master Yoda tapped his cane with gravity, his attention had not wavered from Padme the whole conversation and he addressed her again.

“Grave news we bring,” he began, then seemed unable to continue, shoulders hunching further. “Grave news…” he said again, softer, and Nala felt a flapping, screaming voice try to claw out of her throat hauling a load of acerbic accusations and bitter words.

“Let me tell them, Master,” Master Ti spoke gently after a moment of silence. “It should not have to fall on you.”

“Grandmaster of the Order, I was. My mistakes they were, my failures,” the elder Master returned, voice hardening. He hobbled over to Amidala, taking the hand that wasn’t on her swelling belly. Nala could feel the little life inside of the senator stir at Master Yoda’s presence and jealousy buzzed up through the stinging swarm in her veins.

Master Yoda’s Force presence churned slowly forward. 

“Fallen, your husband has,” he croaked.

The senator nodded, the sad lines on her face softening with some sort of sympathy.

“I know,” she replied. “I know he’s dead, just tell me how.”

The laugh coming out of Nala’s throat hurt as though it were made of acid and not air. If only. If only he were dead. She wanted to say but the laugh wrapped a cord around her neck, driving the air from her lungs and salty tears to her eyes.

Nobody said anything for a moment, Master Yoda seemed defeated by Senator Amidala’s blazing mistake and Nala choked impotently on all the things she wanted to scream into the woman’s face.

“Not fallen as in dead,” it was Master Ti who finally found words to correct the woman. “Fallen as in to the Darkside. Anakin is a Sith.”

The Force swelled coldly, cruelly, and the buzzing things in Nala’s veins died at the clear picture of Skywalker looming with a blade through her son’s stomach that was carried in the cold surge. The clarity of the hate that followed the frosted agony was breathtaking.

The senator’s face shut down in surprise; sympathy and pain disappearing behind a polite mask.

“That's ridiculous,” the smaller woman replied without hesitation. “You’re mistaken.” 

Nala’s searing clarity drove her to her feet almost before her mind had processed the protest. The image of her son’s dead face burned in her mind and in a pocket against her chest.

Not even Master Ti stopped her this time as she stalked over to the senator. 

Nala’s hands itched to slap the woman, but her fingers were busy pulling out the burning holoprojector. 

“Mistaken?” she hissed, the word tasting like death and tears. “You think we’re mistaken about this?”

And she started the world’s end playing in blue for the senator to see. She threw the red-hot truth into the woman’s face and watched her shatter.

Nala had felt this sick sort of satisfaction only once before. It was beautiful; twisting and rich as oil. It was Dark, she knew, she knew it was, but - just as she hadn’t cared that it was when her Master had come to her, ‘saber hilt still in his hand, to tell her that the man who had hurt her was dead - she did not particularly care now.

So, she watched her son - her child who she had carried just as Amidala now carried Skywalker’s child - die again. And she watched the woman’s broken-hearted horror to watch her husband kill Nala’s child . And she watched the woman cry and shatter, bleeding from the shards of her own heart. And she watched as the senator crumpled, unable to continue watching the scorching truth, and threw up on the expensive fluffy carpet covering the floor.

Nala looked down at the woman kneeling, broken, on the floor at her feet and felt nothing at all but the satisfaction and the Dark, not even the pain.

“Padme!” Organa cried, moving forward, but Nala moved first, kneeling in front of Amidala with careful precision. She grabbed the other woman’s filthy chin and tilted her head up, forcing the senator to meet her gaze.

“He was your husband?” Nala’s voice was calmer than she would have expected, mocking almost. “The father of your child?” Amidala’s brown eyes staring into Nala’s were wide and frightened, more animal than human in the fear it seemed to Nala, and the satisfaction wrapped around her shoulders like a warm cloak. Distantly, she was aware that Master Yoda and Ti were calling her name, telling her to stop. She didn’t care. Her fingers tightened on the senator’s pale chin until her fingernails cut into the smooth flesh that Skywalker must have so lovingly stroked. “Well, that was my child! My child that he killed !”

The Dark was screaming in her voice and her pain. Amidala flinched away.

A strong hand found Nala’s shoulder and jerked her backward roughly. Nala didn’t fight Master Ti, staring only at the crumpled, defeated form still kneeling on the carpet, head bowed in shame and blood trickling on her chin.

“Knight Tal, that is enough!” Master Ti’s voice was a command though it held no anger. Bail Organa hurried to Amidala as Shaak spun Nala to face her, strong hands firmly holding the sides of the young Jedi’s face until she met her gaze. “Bring your shields back up,” the Master Jedi commanded a little more softly, “You’re in a feedback loop with the Darkside. Center yourself.”

Nala stared into Master Ti’s dark eyes as the master pressed at the edges of her Force presence, cutting Nala off just slightly from the searing inferno around them both. It was like falling from a cliff into the ocean, the rush of power draining in the cold water Shaak splashed against Nala’s writhing soul. The strings were cut and in the place of the satisfaction was exhaustion, pulsing loudly in her ears.

Exhaustion and shame. She could not look at Senator Amidala as Bail tended to her and summoned a cleaning droid. Her gaze suddenly too heavy under its own weight dropped from Master Ti’s gentle eyes, the understanding in them like salt in Nala’s wounds. Her hands were still now, limp.

Then she heard the crying, the younglings’ sobs rising above the heartbeat drumming in her ears. She spun to face the door pulling away from Master Ti’s hands. The Darkside had spilled over through her bond with them. She had hurt her children, frightened them, without even noticing.

The shame rose like bile in the back of her throat and she felt weak, like her very bones had been stolen from her frame. Without the anger, she was empty, unstuffed; hollow and cracking. Tears prickled in her eyes. She had messed up and her children were still crying.

Shaak Ti saw the shame creased into Nala’s brow, the weakness trembling like tears in her eyes. “Go meditate with the younglings,” she gave the younger human direction, “Go calm them. Go center yourself. We will talk later.”

Nala hesitated, her heavy eyes catching on the blood drying around her fingernails. Behind her, the cleaning droid whirred around Senator Amidala’s feet as Bail helped her stand. Nala could not turn to look at the other woman now. Amidala’s presence behind her felt like a blaster pointing at her back, heavy and building like a storm.

She had hurt her. Nala had hurt the senator. Nala had attacked a pregnant young woman. Nala had wanted to. She had enjoyed it.

The trickle of dry blood seemed to itch on the tips of her fingers.

And now she was supposed to watch children? With blood literally on her hands?

The wails in the other room began to quiet, turning to hiccups and the gentle shushing voice of the padawan. Nala’s gaze was too heavy to drag from the floor, she lacked any sort of strength. Her chest was empty of a heart and her soul had been wrung out and sucked dry.

She was supposed to go help the children. She was too weak.

She had reached out to the Darkside. She was too weak.

There was a rustle, then a hand found her shoulder. Another tilted her head, as heavy as lead, up to meet Master Ti’s gaze once again. Beyond Shaak’s shoulder was Senator Amidala, blurred as though through tears.

“Do you feel them calling for you?” Master Ti asked, so softly no one else could hear. She nudged Nala’s presence gently, tugging on gray threads that stretched away to little souls. The threads were humming, warming. They thrummed down into Nala’s soul. Carefully, flinching, she opened herself up to them, waiting for the fear to come pouring in, the hurt and the betrayal.

The threads lit up golden with love. They hummed and sang like birds, calling for her, pulling her soul like warm little hands eager to show her what they had found. They breathed and beat and Nala’s heart and lungs began to breathe and beat with them.

“Go to your children,” Shaak Ti ordered again.

And Nala stumbled to the door, pulled by the threads that tugged and begged. Dragged through the door by Light she’d almost forgotten existed. Met by a crowd of little faces already seated in a meditation circle, little hands waving her down to a spot in the center. A centering circle, to calm hurt, just as she’d taught them to do for each other. And now they were doing it for her. 

Her children, wrapping their comforting presence around her like a bundle of little blankets. Vaguely, she was aware of the pale padawan at the edge of the circle shielding them all from the screaming Force. Instead of their tangled souls sinking deeper into the Force for comfort, they wrapped around each other. Instead of letting the heavy weight of the pain and the anger slide off into the endless Light, they spread it between them, outshining it with their own Light, with peace and hope and that golden, golden love.

Nala had not realized how heavy the Darkness had been on her chest before her children slid it away and she suddenly found she could breathe again. The tears started, warm rivers caressing her cheeks as they poured down; dripping off her chin and running along her jaw. A warm, heavy form settled itself into her lap and the emptiness in her middle eased. Instinctively, Nala curled her body around the smaller one, her arms cradling the bright little being against her chest. She buried her face against the small head and cried silently in the circle of little Jedi until everything drained out of her but the golden Light.

Chapter Text

Padme took her time in the shower. Bail did not blame her at all. After everything that had happened, he thought she deserved the time alone. Showers were very nice for hiding things like tears. They always seemed to offer a new, clean strength afterward. Like all your sticky sadness and exhaustion could be washed away as easily as blood and dirt by the scalding water.

Once the cleaning droid had finished addressing the mess on the floor, Bail dismissed it and went looking for the Jedi Masters. They had folded into the huddle of kneeling children on the floor, in a circle surrounding the young woman, Nala, whose child Anakin had killed.

Caustic, bitter bile crept up Bail’s throat just at the thought of it; at a flash of memory of that security recording. He had seen death before, even that of innocent children. Before becoming Alderaan’s senator he had been one of the royal representatives attached to their interplanetary aide commission. He had been sent to help with the aftermath of the Cryshan Massacre. He had seen children’s bodies then, used as a vicious, un-sentient message for a raving terrorist. For years afterward, he’d had nightmares about what he’d seen there.

But this was different. He hadn’t trusted that terrorist. He hadn’t been best friends with the man that raised him. He hadn’t known personally, cared for, or previously supported the people who had been killed. Did it make him a horrible person to say that the worst thing about that child’s death - all those children’s deaths, Bail remembered where the video had cut off - was the betrayal it stemmed from?

Bail considered as his gaze returned to the woman kneeling in the middle of the circle as limp and lifeless as a doll. He couldn’t help but look for Padme’s blood on Nala’s hand, just a few brown smears on her fingernails. In the center of the circle, where she sat so utterly still, she hardly seemed capable of attacking anyone. Still, Bail knew better than to trust the appearance of an apparently innocent, gentle young woman. 

After all, Padme herself had once dragged him into personally and extra-legally investigating a murder with nothing but a blaster on her hip and her passion for justice and truth.

The white-haired child, whose name Bail still did not know, crawled into Nala’s lap and the young woman curled around him, hiding the tears shining on her cheeks in his messy hair. Bail’s heart tried to jump out of his chest to embrace the woman and child as well. He had the sudden urge to join the circle and pull one of the precious younglings into his lap.

Though they had given no sign that they’d noticed his entrance, both Jedi Masters rose in unison and turned to Bail. With an elegant tilt of her head, Shaak Ti motioned silently that they should return to the guest room and Bail followed with a reluctant glance back at the open spot by Zett. He was no Jedi, and perhaps he could not help, but he had always dreamed of having the responsibility of comforting a child.

He shook the half-baked, jiggling thought away and pushed aside a familiar pang of longing, following the Jedi into the other room. There were other things to do, he reminded himself firmly. Other ways he needed to help the children. Still, walking away felt a little like leaving a blazing fire to hike out into a blizzard.

“Remove the younglings from Coruscant, we must,” Yoda began without preamble as soon as Bail had shut the door behind him.

Shaak Ti nodded. “And we need to do something about Mace.”

“Mace?” Bail turned to her in surprise, interrupting his own nod of agreement with Yoda’s words. “As in Windu?”

“A chance to mention it, we did not have,” Master Yoda croaked softly. “On the lower levels, Master Windu, we found. Gravely injured, he was. In a charity clinic, in a coma, he is.” He leaned heavily on his cane. “Know who he is, we do not believe they do. Found on the street, he was, and called in, they were.”

Bail let out a long, low breath, the rising tidal wave of relief almost surprising in its strength. He had not known Mace Windu all that well; could only picture a forbidding frown etched into the man’s face. But by the warmth of happiness that surged and swirled sweetly in his chest, Master Windu could have been his dearest friend. Just to know another Jedi was alive was such a miracle, Bail half thought he might actually cry.

“How did he make it out?” he instead managed to ask a relevant question.

Shaak Ti and Master Yoda glanced at each other, then Master Yoda nodded to the taller Jedi.

“Mace wasn’t in the Temple,” Shaak Ti explained in a low voice, almost as if she was afraid of being overheard in the room that was empty except for the three of them. “He and a few others went to arrest the Chancellor. They had discovered he was the Sith Lord somehow.”

Bail could feel his eyes widen as he leaned in closer, trembling with sudden tumbling suspicions and horrors. “The Jedi knew ?” his voice cracked on the question he was trying very hard not to phrase as an accusation. “How long did you know?” That part was a little sharper.

“That was last night, Senator,” Master Ti’s voice was not defensive, but somehow a little colder. Bail felt a chill of shame shiver down his spine. Of course, the Jedi wouldn’t have just sat on the information that the chancellor was a Sith Lord. “We think the arrest attempt is what triggered the clones’ attack.” Lines in her face deepened with sorrow, “I had only just arrived back on Coruscant and Master Yoda was, of course, off-planet. Neither of us have a very clear picture of where Mace got his information or what exactly he was planning to do with it.” She paused, taking a moment to straighten her sleeves, seemingly trying to draw strength from the moment before she continued. “We do know that those that went with him to confront the Chancellor are dead, and he is gravely injured.” She looked up to meet Bail’s eyes with her sharp, predator’s gaze. “There is absolutely no doubt that Palpatine is the Sith Master.”

A rush of cold water seemed to flow down Bail’s throat and into his middle with a shiver. Zett had already said it, Bail had already all but known, but still, to have it said aloud, confirmed in stone, breathed a new chill into the air.

“And his new apprentice, Skywalker is,” Yoda croaked, his ancient voice frayed like a cord about to snap, or quietly crumble into dust.

That betrayed ache rose again, stinging, crystalline and sharp like glass shards.

Poor Obi-wan, the thought cut like a vibro-blade, and with that thought, a sudden clarity.

“We need to warn Obi-wan,” Bail realized aloud. “He needs to know about Anakin.”

“To contact Kenobi, we have not the means,” Yoda’s ears drooped as he murmured. “To warn the Jedi away from Coruscant, change the emergency beacon, all we were able to do, it was.”

Bail fingers were eagerly fumbling in his pocket before Master Yoda had finished, closing around the smooth disc of the encrypted comm. He presented it to the Jedi Master with a slight tremble in his hands.

“Use this,” he dropped it into a small green hand. “I’ve already reached him on it today.”

The wrinkled master cupped the comm like it was a delicate egg as Shaak Ti gasped softly.

“He’s alive,” her voice was soft, cradling the words like Master Yoda cradled the comm.

Bail nodded. “He’s trying to find any survivors in the outer rim.”

She pressed her knuckles against her lips, looking silently at Master Yoda, who inclined his head in a nod, clutching the comm closer to his small body.

“Contact him, I will,” Master Yoda announced, “After, continue the search for survivors on Coruscant, we should.”

“We should rest first,” Shaak Ti finally spoke, voice stronger than Bail would have expected. “You have been in constant communion with the Force since this started. Even cut off, I can feel the pain fraying at me.” Her hand drifted to her side as Master Yoda gave a slow, heavy nod, as though his head were made of stone and it took enormous effort to move it at all. “And without the Force, my injury requires more consideration.”

Bail looked up in alarm. “You’re hurt?” When they had come in, the only noticeable injury had been Nala’s leg, which should, he noted to himself, be tended to at some point as well.

She sloughed off her robe in a single gesture, tossing the mass of scorched, torn, and dirtied cloth onto the couch, then pulled up her shirt to reveal a sprawling patch of purple and brown bruises stretched over her red skin from her left hip, across her ribs, and moving upward along her side. Internally, Bail winced, wondering if there was any way she hadn’t busted a rib beneath all that bruising.

“I fell,” Master Ti explained simply, letting her shirt drop back into place, “Ordinarily, I would use the Force to catch myself.”

Master Yoda nodded again, more easily this time. “Contact Kenobi, I will. Tend to your injury, you will. Then eat, we both shall.”

“Very well,” Master Ti agreed, “Senator, I assume you have some sort of med kit in this apartment?”

“Of course,” Bail turned towards the door, “Let me show you.”

He led her through the door, closing it softly behind them, heading to the hall closet he’d stashed the med kit in after treating Zett’s wound earlier. As they emerged into the main living area, however, Bail spotted the med kit on the floor, open beside Nala as she tended to the blaster wound above her knee. While she smeared burn cream and bacta gel over the patch of red and black charred flesh, Zett led the younglings in some sort of stretches, having them reach stumpy arms towards the ceiling, then fold their round little bodies in half to touch the floor.

As Nala began wrapping white lengths of bandage around her thigh, Shaak Ti scooped up the bacta gel and patches from the white box of the med kit.

“Would you mind assisting me, senator?” she asked Bail, shoving the items into his hands.

“My pleasure,” he replied, setting them out on a nearby table to roll up the loose sleeves of his silky shirt.

Mast Ti pulled her shirt off, the bruising even clearer against her red skin in the light from the living room’s windows. The purple and brown mottled her skin all the way across her ribs, tight against the outline of the bones beneath her skin as she breathed. As Bail began to tear open the bacta patches, Master Ti breathed in deeply, wincing, then let out the breath in a long sigh, carefully pressing a hand against her side in the center of the discoloration. She felt along the ridges of her ribs, face distantly blank as she applied pressure to the tender skin.

“None are broken,” she finally declared, hand rising to unconsciously rub her lekku, and Bail let out a breath of relief he hadn’t realized he’d been keeping in, “simply bruised.”

He uncapped the tube of bacta gel, which was more than half empty due to all the use it had seen today. “Let's start with some of this then.” Shaak lifted her arm out of the way as Bail squirted the cold blue slime onto his hand, grimacing instinctively at the viscous ooze trickling across his skin. With a moist splat, he spread the freezing gel across the mottled bruising. Then, wiping his hands almost unconsciously on his shirt to get the feel of the gunk off his fingers, Bail carefully taped the bacta patches over the areas that looked worst.

He stepped back, rubbing his hands on his pants one last time as Master Ti carefully explored his patch job on her side with long, thin fingers.

“Thank you, Senator,” she smiled at him, the expression crinkling tired lines at the edges of her eyes. She reached for her shirt, as Bail gathered up the bacta patch wrappers and the now empty tube of bacta gel. He made a mental note to have Tyrone find him another med kit.

“Master Ti,” a high voice interrupted, as little Kiria with the curly black hair trotted over, “Your shirt s’dirty, you should find a’new one in t’closet!” She suggested cheerfully, holding out the over-large shirt she wore in demonstration.

Bail couldn’t help the chuckle bubbling in his throat as he looked down at the small, earnest girl. He knelt, “You’re exactly right Kiria, do you think you can find something in the closet that can fit Master Ti?”

The little girl nodded, eyes frowning with seriousness as she considered the mission. “Yes, sir!” she accepted it firmly, little shoulders squared in resolution and then she bolted away towards the closet in Bail’s bedroom.

He couldn’t help laughing again. Turning, he found himself suddenly swarmed with younglings, little hands tugging at the hem of his shirt. Cries of, “Wann help, too!”, “S’not fair!”, “Crechemasser Tahl needs’ome, too!”, “C’n I get some’or creche-master Tahl?” filled the air.

“Younglings,” a voice cut through the hubbub, not loud, but firm and the children quieted, turning to look at Nala Tal almost in sync. “How do we ask for things?” The little bodies shuffled ashamedly for a moment, and then the white-haired boy turned back to Bail, green eyes shining with pleading as warm as liquid chocolate. “Please, mister’sir, can we get crechemasser Tahl some, too?” He actually clasped his hands together eagerly, like a child in a holo-drama might and Bail could practically feel his heart melting into nothing but warm, liquid love, puddling in his chest.

“Well done, A’zel,” Nala praised the boy, and he smiled with pleasure.

“Of course you may,” Bail managed to reply rather than drowning in the rising tide of warm affection in his center. 

As one, the children turned towards the closet with cries of happiness.

“Younglings,” Nala’s quiet voice somehow cut through the children’s cheers. “What do we say when someone grants our request?”

There was some bumbling turning around, then each youngling managed a bow and a “thank you” before shooting off again.

Nala Tahl turned to Bail, smiling fondly. Bail could feel his own smile practically splitting his face.

“Thank you,” Nala tucked her hands into her soot-smeared robes and bowed herself, “for taking such good care of them.”

Instantly, Bail’s throat was as dry as a Tatooine desert. He swallowed hard against years of such deep and aching longing . “It has been my honor.”

Swallowing again, he stepped up into the kitchen, shoving the bacta wrappers and empty tube into the trash chute. He rinsed the last traces of bacta goo off his hands in the sink, scrubbing them dry with a towel for good measure. He picked up his personal commlink from the counter where he’d left it and called up Tyrone with a push of a button.

“Is everything alright, sir?” Tyrone’s voice crackled through.

“Quite fine, Tyrone,” Bail replied carefully, well aware that a personal commlink was not as secure as it had been before the beginning of the war. “I was just wondering if you could find me a new Med Kit.”

“Understood, sir, I’ll bring one up shortly,” came the quick reply.

Bail slipped the commlink into his pocket, turning back to the living room in time to see Master Yoda hobble silently out of the side room, the holo still cradled in his gnarled claws. The ancient master moved like a step too fast would send him shattering into a million shards to blow away on the wind, never to be seen again.

“Contacted Obi-Wan, I have,” the bowed Jedi reported softly, his voice plodding with heaviness, as though the weight of the ocean sat on each word. He held the comm out and Bail took it carefully, feeling like a sudden movement would topple the little master. Master Yoda’s cane thumped dully as he turned to his fellow Jedi. Master Ti still stood shirtless, bacta patches patterned across her ribs, while Nala had cleanly sliced off one pant leg to better treat the mass of bandages wrapped around her thigh, and Zett huddled nearby, dressed in a senate aide uniform that hid the blaster hole in his little shoulder.

The last of the Jedi, a voice echoed emptily in Bail’s mind as he watched the four frail figures in his living room. Cold pricked his eyes like salt and thorns, so he blinked hard and swallowed, rubbing his arms against a suffocating chill that seemed to wrap around the four Jedi outlined by the weak light of the rising sun. 

It made him remember madly, as one remembers a fever dream, a proverb he had heard once as a child, words wrapped in distant lilac splashes of memory. A chessboard resting on its four towers, if one was removed the whole board came crashing down. 

The four towers stirred at once, as though a breeze brushed through Bail’s living room. 

“Treated, your injuries you all have?” Master Yoda asked, dropping his voice like a stone into the pool of silence the cascading ripples awakening his fellows to nod.

Yoda hobbled a step nearer to the Padawan. “Padawan Zett Jukassa, you are?”

“Yes, Master,” The bow gave a shallow bow. “Padawan of Arit Ghostseer.”

“Troubled by your own Sight, have you been?” The ancient master leaned on his cane as he peered up at the boy.

The boy shook his head. “I Drifted a bit after…” he choked off, blinking rapidly several times, then started again. “After, I Drifted for a bit, but Senator Organa was a good Anchor. I haven’t reached out again, I don’t know if I could keep together, I might not be able to come back.”

Master Yoda nodded in understanding, straightening up a little, “Mediate with you, I will. Familiar with grounding meditations, I am. When young, Drift, my grand-padawan did, though outgrew it, he did.”

“Thank you, Master.”

Then the crumpled master turned to Bail. 

“A plan, we need, to remove the younglings from Coruscant.”

Once again, Bail nodded his agreement, brain humming with half-considered possibilities that had been stirring since the night before when he had dismissed his staff. 

“Several of my people offered to smuggle them off of Coruscant with their families, since I dismissed everyone back to Alderaan, however, I didn’t want to move the younglings until after your return.”

Shaak Ti opened her mouth to speak, crossing her arms over her bare stomach, but Bail continued, thinking aloud as he spoke.

“It probably would have been too dangerous anyways, passports for aides who work with high-profile clients are generally flagged and checked, so extra children traveling with the families would likely be noticed. And if we go the usual smuggling route of hiring actual smugglers, not only is it more dangerous for everyone, especially the children, but a group of children is definitely going to stand out among a smuggler’s usual cargo. We need to find a low-profile means of transporting them that won’t raise suspicions that a group of children is traveling off-planet.”

Master Ti, Master Yoda, Knight Tahl, and Padawan Zett considered this for a moment. 

“Perhaps a school group?” Shaak Ti offered, frowning lines of thought wrinkling her brow.

“Going all the way to Alderaan?” Bail asked shaking his head, “Field trips off-planet are usually reserved for much older students and only go as far as the moons or Coruscant’s nearer satellites, not to a whole other system.”

Shaak Ti nodded her understanding, the lines of thought on her forehead deepening.

“Really?” Zett asked into the heavy silence. “Most Coruscant kids have never been to another system?”

Bail blinked at the interruption in his train of thought, staring blankly down at Zett’s pale round face for a moment. It had never occurred to him before that Jedi children were probably a lot more well-traveled than the average Republic citizen. The Jedi, he knew, made it a pointed part of their curriculum to introduce their padawans to as many different planets, peoples, and cultures as possible. 

“Yes,” he finally answered the question. “I imagine that not too many of them have even ever left the planet unless their parents are spacers.”

Of course, the war had disrupted that, children from insular and rather racially homogenized planets, were being evacuated as refugees, and orphans were being sent all over the galaxy as planets that had not yet been turned into battlefields increased their aid efforts.

Bail’s brain sputtered with a sudden thought, sparking then catching and roaring to life like a flame.

“The aid programs,” he turned back to the Jedi masters and Crechemaster Tahl, hands trembling with excitement. “A lot of them use Coruscant as a processing center. Not having papers or any more than an escort as a guardian wouldn’t be suspicious. We can send them to Alderaan under the new War Outreach and Relief Act!”

“As refugees?” Shaak Ti asked slowly, considering the plan, hesitation clear in her carefully still features.

“Refugees they are,” Master Yoda pointed out, pouring icy water across the flames of Bail’s enthusiasm with the harsh and biting truth. “A good plan, it is. A better one, we are unlikely to create.”

“I can use some of my contacts in the refugee program to ensure they’re sent to Alderaan.”

Bail jumped at the soft voice speaking up from behind him. He turned to see Padme approaching the group, looking somehow both more fragile and more dangerous with her make-up washed away and her dark hair hanging wet and limp around her shoulders. She was wrapped in a wine-purple Nabooian silk Kimono that she had given to him and she wore it better than he ever had, the delicately embroidered gold and red flowers setting off the fierce paleness of her face.

She met the eyes of every member of the group, without flinching, chin raised and back straight with a queenly iron though her eyes were rimmed with red.

“I have used the refugee program to travel without attracting attention before and have cultivated contacts that we can trust to ensure the children are sent to Alderaan.”

Her gaze came to rest not on Master Yoda but on Nala Tahl, the question in them for the crechemaster alone.

Nala met her gaze with dark, wet eyes, glinting blue like a stormy ocean. Then she gave Padme a small formal bow. “We would be honored to accept your help.”

Bail saw the quiver, the tremor far beneath Padme’s iron will at the acceptance. Then Padme Amidala former queen of Naboo drew herself up and nodded. “I’ll contact them at once.”

She swirled away, pulling a comm from an inner pocket Bail hadn’t even known the kimono had. Taking a few steps away from the group, she began speaking quietly into it.

Bail’s own personal comm chirped from its place on the counter, Tyrone’s caller ID shone on the screen, but beside it flashed the Republic symbol, meaning that this call was being made over official channels. Bail answered on audio only.

“Yes, what is it, captain?”

“Sir,” Tyrone’s voice buzzed through, even and cool without a hint that he’d spent all night rescuing Jedi and getting Alderaanian aides off-planet. “I must inform you that Captain Panaka has been very unfortunately unable to get in contact with Senator Amidala,” Padme looked up from where she was busily typing, shaking her head at Bail’s questioning glance, she did not know what this was about.

“Why inform me?” Bail asked for the sake of whoever was listening through the surveillance nets on all official channels. 

“I regret to inform you that she’s in danger, sir,” Tyrone continued without inflection. It was eery how empty the man could keep his voice. “The Imperial Guard is ordered to arrange her security, however, Captain Panaka has been unable to contact her.”

“That’s unfortunate,” Bail met Padme’s wide eyes as she registered what Tyrone had said. Her fingers tightened around the comm, knuckles paling to white as her mind raced. “I haven’t heard from her either. What is the danger?”

“The Emperor is concerned that she is under threat from rogue Jedi, sir,” Tyrone replied almost before Bail had finished talking, “He informed Captain Panaka that he worries that since the attempt on his life by the traitorous Jedi Order failed, they will instead strike at his home planet’s senator.”

The Jedi stirred, all shifting to look at each other as Padme lifted a hand to her mouth, realization falling across her face like a veil.

“I see,” Bail replied as neutrally as possible, even as his pulse began to pick up speed, thumping in his chest. “Thank you for informing me, Captain, please keep me appraised of any further developments.”

“Of course, sir,” Tyrone replied and signed off with a click.

A moment of silence followed; then Padme spoke.

“He thinks I’m going to run. He knows I won’t take the overthrowing of the Republic sitting down. He’s going to be looking for me,” she straightened again, cold iron stubbornness lacing up her spine, “I have to go, my involvement is going to put you all in even more danger.”

Bail winced, already shaking his head, a cold dread creeping slowly up the inside of his stomach. “Protection” from the Imperial Guard would be no better than house arrest. Even before the fall of the Republic, Palpatine had been violating sentients’ rights in the name of “protection.” How much worse would it be now that he was emperor? 

Captain Panaka’s warning via Tyrone was given so that Padme could avoid that fate.

“Padme,” he began his protest, already prepared for a difficult battle by the set of her delicate jaw and the fire in her dark eyes.

Nala interrupted.

“Palpatine knew about you and Anakin, didn’t he?”

The hard fight in Padme’s face softened into confusion. “What?”

Nala stepped forward, hands outstretched slightly as though halfway to touching Padme’s swelling middle.

“It’s not about you,” Nala said gently. “He’s after Anakin’s child.”

The determination and stubbornness drained out of  Padme’s frame immediately, leaving only a bloodless, wide-eyed horror. Her free hand fell to her stomach, hovering just above the bulge in the silk kimono as if afraid to touch it.

Bail felt it himself. The emperor who had overthrown the Republic and wiped out the Jedi wanted  Padme’s child. Anakin’s child. Anakin who had slaughtered a room of children. The emperor wanted his child. The same emperor who had ordered the deaths of all of the children in Bail’s apartment.

No. Not happening.

“You’re going off planet with the younglings.” Bail declared before Padme had recovered enough to speak. “The emperor doesn’t get you or your child.”

Padme opened her mouth, perhaps to protest, maybe even agree, tears trembling like diamonds in her eyes. 

Zett spoke first.

“Children, you mean,” he said with a simple wisdom. “There are two stars wrapped in her warmth.”

Chapter Text

Obi Wan Kenobi’s hands trembled as they flew over the ship’s controls. They hadn’t stopped shaking since that first breath of slashing agony as the Force started screaming. He had felt the pain and thought it must be Master Yoda who had passed for the Force to scream so loudly.

But it had been so much worse than even Yoda’s loss would have been.

The next thing he’d felt clearly in the sudden blur of pain the Force became - beating at his mind as he tried to push it away and concentrate on the battle he was fighting - was Cody blinking out of existence. It wasn’t death; it was simply that one moment Cody was right there, a golden sun, and the next he wasn’t.

And the next, none of the clones were.

And then they had started shooting at him.

He had known then, as he fell down the pit into the depths of the planet, that something much worse than he could ever have imagined had happened. And then Bail had called him.

The Temple burned .

Those words were all he could hear for a few moments. Even now, they beat in rhythm with his pounding heart.

The Temple burned.

The ship shuddered and leapt into the bright white streaks of hyperspace as the pulse continued.

The Temple burned.

The Temple burned.

His hands still wouldn’t stop shaking.

The Temple burned.

It was worse than he could ever have comprehended.

The Temple burned.

The comm on the dash buzzed and Obi Wan flinched in surprise, forcibly pulling his thoughts from the dark drumbeat they’d been pulsing with. He had not expected Bail to contact him again so soon. It wasn’t safe, frequent comm calls could be flagged and triangulated, even if the line was secure.

He answered, fingers still trembling as the comm flickered on.

Master Yoda’s bowed, diminutive figure flickered into existence lined in blue light and a palpable weight of sorrow.

“Master,” Obi Wan choked, heart leaping in a drunken lurch of joy, hands tightening around the comm as though it and Yoda would disappear if he didn’t cling to it.

“Obi Wan,” Yoda replied in the same tone, voice trembling with relief and disbelief and clouded drops of bitter pain.

“Master, you’re alive,” it was perhaps a foolish thing to say given the evidence in front of him, but Obi Wan felt the need to state the obvious, have it confirmed in words, in the cost of breath it took the verbalize the statement, that the other Jedi master lived and breathed. 

Yoda nodded and Obi Wan’s hands tightened even further around the comm, knuckles turning white with the strength of his desperate joy and staggering loss.

“Alive, I am,” the Grandmaster of the Jedi Order agreed, “Alive also are Master Ti, Crechemaster Tahl, her youngling clan, Padawan Jukassa, and Master Windu.”

Obi Wan barely dared breathe as the ship hummed through hyperspace. He felt that he might wake up if he moved too quickly. Master Ti, the younglings, and the padawan Bail had told him about, but, “Mace is alive too?”

“Injured, he is, gravely,” Master Yoda grounded the dream with the cold news, “But alive, he is.”

Somehow the bad news relieved Obi Wan, as though the galaxy would never give him a true gift, so the caveat assured him that the news was real. He forced his fingers to loosen before he broke the comm trying to ground himself to a holographic image. His breathing loosened as he realized he’d been holding it and the fine tremors running along his muscles settled like a stone in a pool.

He wanted to just bask in the news for a moment, like it was the warmth of a space craft after venturing out onto Illium, but he had a general’s brain and it was already cycling through the facts he knew and the questions he had. Like a puzzle, his mind started to fit the important pieces together.

“So, you’ve found Bail, then?” he asked, mentally moving the pieces around on his galactic map. Master Yoda nodded, and Obi Wan felt his heart rate begin to speed up again. “All of you?” 

“Hidden in a clinic, Mace is; with Senator Organa, are the rest of us.”

That was not good, all the Jedi in existence gathered conveniently in one place in the middle of Coruscant; in the middle of the Senate district . He did not know exactly what had happened, but the news had carried even to his little starship’s comms, Palpatine had organized this, declared the Jedi traitors, ordered their deaths. Palpatine was starting some kind of Empire on Coruscant. It was the worst possible place be hiding the last of the Jedi, especially the younglings.

Not to mention that hiding so many Jedi right under Palpatine’s nose put Bail in an unimaginable and frankly unacceptable amount of danger. Obi Wan’s friend was brave and smart and above all kind , but he was no Jedi and no soldier and Obi Wan did not like the idea that he was nearly defenseless and still sticking his neck out like this.

“You have to get off of Coruscant, Master,” Obi Wan instructed, “I’m trying to track down survivors in the middle rim, and I’ll meet you wherever you go.” 

In truth, all of them splitting up would be the wisest move, but Obi Wan couldn’t stand the thought. There were so few of them already and the galaxy was so cold and so vast, they could not lose each other now.

“Know this, we do. Working on it, we are,” Yoda replied and Obi Wan fought back a flush of embarrassed heat, feeling like a scolded youngling. Of course Master Yoda and Master Ti and Bail knew to get the Jedi off planet. “The reason I contacted you, that is not.”

Obi Wan frowned, eyes flitting to the time until he exited hyperspace for his next jump. If it was not to talk about what the plan was to get the Jedi off Coruscant and where they were going, what justified risking a comm call? Did Master Yoda perhaps know for sure of another Jedi in the Rim who’d survived?

“What is it, Master?”

Obi Wan did not like the sick way the Force twisted as soon as the question left his mouth. It was like a kick to his stomach and it brought his attention to the way the Master Yoda hunched lower, ears drooping, the way his wrinkled face twisted as though he were a youngling about to cry. 

A moment of silence stretched out, as delicate as the porcelain teacups on a high shelf in his quarters that Obi Wan had banned his padawan and grandpadawan from ever touching.

They’re probably gone now anyways, those teacups, the thought rose unbidden and unexpected, with a sting like a whip, The Temple burned.

“Master?” he managed the soft question through a dry mouth, shattering the silence and pushing the dark thoughts away.

Finally Yoda dragged his gaze back up to Obi Wan’s and it rested there as heavy as a load of duracrete as Obi Wan held it.

“Fallen, Anakin Skywalker has.”

Beneath Obi Wan the pilot’s seat creaked in the silence as his mind tried to grasp the great, massive thing that had just been handed to him. The shape of it seemed to elude him as he tried to hold it, see what it was, his mind slipping off of the wet stone words.

Aanakin Skywalker… Anakin … had… Anakin had…

Fallen

That was what Yoda had just said.

Anakin had Fallen.

Anakin had Fallen .

The Temple burned and Anakin had Fallen.

“No,” Obi Wan said into the silence. The Force screamed back, keening with death and smelling of smoke. So Obi Wan turned away from the Force, back to the empty and desolate figure in wavering blue. “No, Master, he’s Anakin , he can’t have…” the words choked his throat like smoke, his voice catching as it came out, “no, Master, please, no, please , no.” 

He was pleading like a youngling as the Force continued wailing. Pleading as though his Grandmaster could do anything, could change anything, could fix the pain the burned along his bond with his padawan as he poked it, the worn braid ending abruptly somewhere so cold and dark it didn’t feel like anywhere at all. 

“He’s Anakin ,” he repeated, not to the watching figure with tears in its large eyes, but to himself, to his own fracturing soul. 

And it didn’t change anything, the bond was quite clear; Anakin was dead.

***

Sabe’ slipped through the crowded street unnoticed. To a bystander she was unremarkable, a young human, or human-passing, woman bundled into layers of light colored cloaks. No one who happened to notice her passing would have seen anything threatening, actually the bigger danger was that she seem too harmless and be targeted by one of the many types of predators lurking in even these middle levels of Coruscant. It was generally acknowledged as a bad idea for a female - especially one of a so universally-considered attractive race as humans - to travel alone in any but the highest rings of Corsucant. 

Sabe’, however, was unconcerned. For one hand, she had a blaster tucked away, easily accessible in her refugee get-up. With her training, she was unlikely to even need to use it, in all honesty. For another hand, nobody in the crowd was in a hurry to notice, or be noticed by anyone else. The flow of sentients hurried along with downturned eyes and hunched shoulders , passing without trouble the clonetroopers now posted at seemingly every corner.

Coruscant had gone from not having enough troops to stop the violent energy riots as the war had cut power to homes on lower levels, to suddenly having enough troops to cover every level with a notable level of space-access. Now the white armored statues loomed over the crowd, scanning the scurrying masses from behind blank helmets. 

Nobody wanted any trouble, and only the foolish would start any, so the crowds hurried by silently, bowed under the weight of the strange changes taking place in the highest levels of the senate that trickled brutally down and Sabe’ slipped through without attracting attention.

Even with the unrest, and cold changes, and the heavy weight of unease hanging in the air over the planet - or perhaps, in truth, because of it, Sabe’ considered -  there was already a queue outside the refugee offices. Not just a queue, she saw, glancing up from beneath the rim of her hood, but two clone troopers as well on either side of the entrance. 

That was not good, she considered as she joined the line, shuffling forward in the warm mass of bodies, more than a few in need of showers. Padme’ had given her a quick rundown of the situation, namely that she needed to smuggle herself and about a dozen Jedi, mostly children, off-planet. The ultimate destination was Alderaan, but for the first leg, just about anywhere that wasn’t Coruscant was acceptable. It wouldn’t be the first time Sabe’ had organized using the refugee program as an unobtrusive way to get herself, other handmaidens, or even Padme’ Amidala herself a few times, off planet. 

However, it was clear the the dear new emperor, or one of his malignant toadies had considered that the refugee programs could be a useful way for escapees to slip away. 

Mentally, Sabe’ shrugged, shuffling forward with the line, inching nearer to the troopers. It added a layer of difficulty, but it was hardly insurmountable. Before the war had started there had been an added layer of difficulty due to regulations attempting to prevent the refugee programmed being used for smuggling or trafficking. Early in the war, Palpatine had removed those safe guards, ostensibly to help relieve the crush of refugees, but is was telling that shortly thereafter the Zygerrian Empire had begun gaining power on the back of its steadily rising slave trade success.

She would simply have to fall back on the secondary routes she’d built up before the regulations had been removed, routes that allowed her to place refugees without them having to go through the offices themselves. It simply remained to see how many of her contacts were still in place.

The limping Rhodian in front of her stumbled inside, bringing Sabe’ level with the clones. As she’d seen the others in line do, she stared straight ahead, ignoring them as though if she didn’t notice them, they wouldn’t notice her. 

The tactic failed. One of the troopers shifted towards her, Sabe’ catching the movement in the corner of her eye, despite her studious ignorance, and raised his blaster slightly.

“Hood,” he barked hoarsely, voice creaking from disuse.

Sabe’ feigned a surprised flinch, aware of the beings behind her edging away from the possible confrontation. 

“I’m sorry?” she turned towards the trooper with a nervous bow in her shoulders, glancing up enough to make it clear she was paying attention, but not so far that she was staring into the dark eye lenses of his helmet. Ordinarily, civilians tended to avoid looking a trooper full in the helmet, Sabe’ had noticed throughout the war, so she copied the behavior now.

“Remove your hood,” The command was clearer this time, and more forceful.

Quickly Sabe’ shoved her head covering back, exposing her brown hair in its simple loop and allowing the troopers a good look at her face.

“I’m sorry,” she stammered too quickly, allowing a nervous tremble into her voice as she shuffled her feet on the rusted metal of the sidewalk, “I didn’t realize I had to take it down. I’m sorry. I’ll remember next time. Sorry.”

As she stammered through the apology, she was aware of the troopers examining her face carefully. This wasn’t just about the hood, she realized, she fit the description for Padme’ Amidala, and it appeared the senator was on a searchlist. 

That was a very bad sign. The Emperor was either aware that Padme’ was trying to escape Coruscant, or guessed that she was going to try at least. It meant he was very purposefully and specifically searching for her , not just generally for people trying to leave when they shouldn’t be. And it meant that he knew her patterns enough to know that the refugee program was one of Padme’s ways of getting off-planet without notice.

Sabe’ could feel herself tensing up, even as the troopers waved her forward, realizing that she wasn’t the wayward senator she resembled. Behind her, a twilek family hastily pulled off their hoods before the troopers had to stop them, but the troopers paid them no mind. After all, a twilek family did not fit any of the descriptions of the fugitives they were watching for.

Everything had gotten quite a bit more difficult.

 Inside the Refugee Program office building an old lobby all in shades of faded blue welcomed the crowd, dividing them into several lines for various help desks. Sabe’ joined the one furthest in, where a dinged up old protocol droid answered questions in a low monotone, running food stamps and I.D.s as each displaced soul took their turn at the desk. As the long line inched forward across the pattern of worn blue tiles, Sabe’ twisted the strands of a plan together in her head, weaving it carefully behind a face blank of anything but a weary mask.

“I.D.?” The droid demanded impersonally as she made it to the front of the line. 

“I don’t have one,” Sabe’ twisted the hem of her cloak nervously.

The droid whirred audibly as it processed the statement, either an ancient model, or in desperate need of a tune up, likely both.

“Registration number?” it replied in a flot monotone.

Sabe forced her shoulders to tense.

“I don’t have one of those either.”

Another whir, longer and louder this time. Behind Sabe’ several members in the line shifted impatiently. 

“Handler’s name and planet of origin?”

“Christophis ,” Sabe’ lied smoothly, allowing her features to relax, “and Glendin Besk.”

The droid nodded and tapped a few buttons on the machine beside it. A moment later it spit out a thin slip of plasticel with the information she’d given printed next to a round bar code.

“Proceed to line 3,” the droid intoned, “Your request will be processed there.”

Sabe’ moved out of line and the next being stepped up, offering his I.D. without problem as she moved away.

Line 3 was moving much more slowly as each being went through the process of giving their registration number and applying for a Coruscanti I.D. card. This also wasn’t the right line, Sabe’ knew, as she didn’t even have a registration number, but to get where she wanted to go, she need to let the system shuffle her around and thoroughly confuse themselves about where she was supposed to be and who she was supposed to be with.

She’d already confused it, she thought with satisfaction as she rubbed a finger over the still warm plasticel card, by giving the planetary name first and handler second, the droid had filtered based on missions to Christophis and not by missions lead by the handler she’d named. A sentient would have automatically corrected the mistake, but the droid had simply processed the information given. This meant the droid had accidentally created a completely fictional aid mission to Christophis lead by Glendon Besk and the computer had automatically linked it to the real most recent Christophis mission.

All that remained was for her to confuse everyone a little further and see if she couldn’t get this fictional aid mission ratified. Smuggling someone onto an aid ship with the Empire watching so closely was a terrible plan. But Sabe’ didn’t need to smuggle anyone. She was going to have an entirely legitimate mission with exactly the right number of documented refugees and nothing suspicious or out of the ordinary to attract the Empire’s attention.

The Emperor might think he was clever to have the refugee program watched, but Sabe’ Amidala was going to be even more clever.

That determination settled warmly in her gut as the line managed to inch forward a little more. It was at least another half hour before she made it to the front of the line. The building was becoming even more crowded and the line had doubled in length behind her. At the desk a woman whose skin was a tad too blue to be entirely human already looked utterly exhausted as she waved Sabe’ forward. Perfect.

Sabe’ handed over the card the droid had printed for her with a nervous smile.

“The droid told me to come here, since I’m not registered yet,” she mumbled just loud enough for the woman to hear her.

The woman blinked, sliding the card into the computer’s scanner automatically. 

“No registration number yet? Who brought you in?”

Sabe’ made her hands fiddle with the hem of her shawl.

“Uh, Glendin Besk. I was in the shelter on level 34. They told me I had to come here to get processed.

“Of course they did,” the woman muttered to herself, and Sabe’ smiled internally. 

The shelter on level 34 was notorious for never properly processing their refugees. Sabe’ knew the shelter was often used as a front for smugglers and worse who had been allowed to flourish as everyone’s attention had been forcibly directed elsewhere by the war. It wasn’t unusual for refugees sent to shelter 34 to wind up back in the refugee program further down the line after being rescued from slavery or Trade Federation factories, which amounted to the same thing. 

Had Padme’ had any time to do anything but try to stop the Republic from committing war crimes, shelter 34 would have been addressed a long time ago. As it was, if people got too suspicious of disappearances at the shelter, 34 generally claimed that they had too many refugees to process properly and sent a load to the other Refugee offices. While an awful circumstance, it was useful for Sabe’ as any documentation flagged as incorrect would be attributed to shelter 34’s malicious incompetence and not to her manipulating the system to create a false aid mission.

“Alright,” the woman sighed, too busy to have to deal with 34’s osik and still dealing with it just the same, “I’ll make a temporary registration card for you in the system, but you’ll need to get it verified by you handler at 34 or Besk before you can draw ration stamps or apply for an Coruscanti I.D., okay?”

Sabe’ nodded obediently, knowing as well as the woman that getting a handler at 34 to verify anything would take a miracle and a half. The poor refugees who had to deal with trying to make this flawed system actually work. Sabe’ was having an easy enough time breaking it further and she hadn’t even needed to bribe anyone yet.

“Name, last, then first,” the woman asked in a monotone, eyes glazing over as hse began filling out whatever form would give Sabe’ her temporary registration number.

“Nabia, Roselle,” Sabe’ lied smoothly, extracting a fake speeder license from a hidden pocket. 

Christophis was a developed enough world that refugees would generally have some form of I.D. however, Christophis didn’t have a reciprocal system with Coruscant, meaning that Christophis citizens wouldn’t be expected to show up in a Republic database if they hadn’t ever travelled off-planet. Christophis had also been in the middle of the war long enough that no one was going to bother trying to ping Christophis’ I.D. systems for confirmation for a while yet.

It wasn’t the greatest fake Sabe’ had ever made, but the woman at the desk barely glanced at it long enough to confirm that the name matched what Sabe’ had just given and that the picture resembled her - or any Amidala for that matter - before nodding and continuing to fill in the form.

Sabe’ tucked the I.D. away as the woman continued, “Date of birth, in Republic Standard.”

She made a show of thinking about it, adding to her image of a Christophis citizen who had never been offworld, while the Doug behind her sighed impatiently. Or it might have been a snore, it was quite possible that he’d fallen asleep on his feet.

“23-7-1-208?” she added the year like it was a question, knowing it was incorrect for her new facade.

The woman sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Do you know your age in Republic Standard years?”

“27,” Sabe’ nodded.

“Then you’re 23-7-12-209,” the woman corrected as she typed the numbers in. 

There, giving the woman something to poke holes in and correct made her less likely to question facts if Sabe’ seemed confident about them.

They continued through the form until the woman was satisfied with Sabe’s basic information.

“Alright,” she said, pulling the plasticel card out of the scanner, “I updated your information on this and gave you a file in our system. Your handler at Shelter 34 should link any of your other files to that one, and link you to the mission you came in on, since it looks like the damn computer got that wrong too. Once that’s done, you can get a registration number, be processed through, and apply for a Coruscanti I.D.”

Effusive with her thanks, Sabe’ pulled herself out of the line and made her way outside, passing the clone troopers without trouble. 

She was well on her way now she smirked to herself as she carefully tucked the plasticel card into a pocket of her cloak. Spreading the blame between shelter 34 and the faulty computer system, she’d managed to have a file created in the refugee system. Since she wasn’t going to apply for a Coruscanti I.D. she didn’t need all that many supporting documents. All she needed to get transferred to another planet was a registration number, and all she needed for that was verification on her file from her handler and a mission number and description to be linked to.

That was her next task.

Two levels up, Sabe’ slid into a booth in a small diner, smiling politely as the waitress droid took her order, chattering at her all the while. She updated Padme’ on her progress on a secure channel, then very slowly began to pick apart her food, waiting.

He walked in a little over two hours later, sliding into the booth with a rustle of his dark robes and headdress, giving her a small nod of greeting. Glendin Besk was a tall Mirialian man with dark curled tattoos resembling waves inked along his jaw. The system had pinged him that he’d been incorrectly attached to a mission, and he’d known to come looking.

“Hello, Ami,” he smiled as he called her by the shortened version of the all too recognizable “Amidala”, “And which one are you?”

“Same as before,” she replied quietly. Besk maintained that he couldn’t tell the Amidalas apart given how alike all humans of similar coloring looked anyway. “Sabe’.”

He frowned, the wrinkles by his eyes deepening. 

“Then you’ve gotten sloppy,” he accused in the deep, almost musical accent many Mirialians developed from singing their daily liturgy. “You created an entire false mission just trying to get your registration number to get off-planet.”

Sabe’ smiled but could feel that it was too small to meet her eyes, taking the last sip of her very cold caf.

“I did that on purpose,” she corrected smoothly, watching his reaction carefully. “I need an entire mission’s worth of space.”

His head tilted, headdress exaggerating the motion as he examined her face with sharp gray eyes. She stared back levelly.

Finally he blinked, then leaned back, shrugging. “Very well, but that will be double the usual payment.”

She echoed his shrug, nodding without protest. She had been expecting as much.

“Then,” he pulled a datapad from his robes and opened a form. “All I need is the details for this mission of yours.”

Chapter Text

Nala tried to watch without moving as Sabe’ brought the sharp tool with its inky black tip up to her eye. She must have failed, because Sabe’ breathed out a soft sigh and narrowed her eyes.

“Stop moving,” she hissed, then pressed the cold tip of the eyeliner pen to the corner of Nala’s eye. “Just give me a moment, I’m trying to alter your eye shape.”

Nala breathed out a slow breath, calling on all of her meditation experience to hold herself perfectly still.

Across Senator Organa’s ridiculously large bathroom, Senator Amidala was perched on the counter while her handmaiden Eirte’ patted some sort of dark powder over her face; with each pass, the senator’s skin tone was growing closer and closer to Nala’s golden brown. Honestly, the changes these Nabooian women were working with simple cosmetics were nothing short of miraculous.

She let out another slow breath as Sabe’ began patting around her eye with a fluffy brush, fighting the urge to grimace at the unfamiliar sensation.

Lined up on the edge of the bathtub that Ro was happily splashing in, her girls giggled at her, Ka’ress especially seeming to find the exasperation Nala was allowing to leak into the Force amusing. It felt good to be able to make them laugh with something so simple. It made it feel like the shattered pieces of her heart could still hold a little warmth in their cold and jagged edges.

She’d cleaned her hands several times, but it still felt as though flecks of dried blood were itching under her fingernails. 

Nala had been careful not to allow her Force presence to reach beyond the small bubble of Light created by her children. Master Yoda or Shaak Ti had been shielding the younglings since their return to the apartment. Before then, Zett had handled it that first night. Before anyone had even thought to, too exhausted and distracted by the screaming and the vast, vast darkness to consider more than the younglings’ physical safety. 

Another night had passed, and the poor boy still hadn’t dared to sleep, his hold on reality too tenuous for him to be sure of waking up when visions clawed at him. But he’d kept her children shielded anyway, when she hadn’t even thought to.

It was just another way Nala had failed in the last few days.

She’d been in a feedback loop, just as Master Ti had said, too lost in her grief and the Force’s Pain to manage any other thoughts. The Darkside fed on her soul’s bleeding wounds like maggots fed on a corpse. The inevitable danger of attachments had sent her plunging into that violent blur that had left her with blood on her hands.

So now she was very, very careful to stay bundled in the fragile Light. Because her wounds were still bleeding and the Dark was still hungry. She could not risk Falling. Not now. Her children needed her.

So she would be better.

She would push the grief aside. It could wait, but her children could not.

“Alright,” Sabe’ finally said, stepping back as she looked Nala over critically. “That should do it. Eirte’, what do you think?”

The other handmaiden turned from her recoloring of Padme’s skin to examine her fellow’s handiwork. She cocked her head to the side, hair just a shade lighter than Padme’s and Sabe’s sliding loose from its bun.

“Yes, I definitely see your vision with the eyes,” she said thoughtfully, commenting with the air of a craftsman. “I can work with that,” and she turned back to her own project consideringly, before stealing the eyeliner pen to start on Padme’s eyes.

Nala glanced over to her girls, forcing a soft smile to her lips. 

“What do you girls think, do I look different?”

The four examined her closely, taking the question seriously.

“No,” Lessa said definitively at the same time Ka’ress replied, “Maybe?”

“Think your face’s rounder?” Ka’ress followed up as though it were a question, forehead wrinkled in youthful concentration.

“An’ your eyes’re smaller,” Kiria commented more authoritatively.

Nala nodded understandingly, turning to the wide mirror to examine Sabe’s work herself. She still looked like herself, certainly, but Sabe’ had managed to make her look like a different subrace of human than her own by somehow changing the shape of some of her features. Her eyes were more almond-shaped than before, while her jaw had been softened to look more round, and her cheekbones somehow shifted higher. It was a strange feeling, examining her altered face.

There were far more sophisticated ways to change a person’s appearance, but somehow the handmaiden had worked the miracle with nothing but colored powder.

“I’m going to set it now,” Sabe’ spoke, and Nala turned back to her in time to receive a spray of something smelling strongly of latex to the face. She could feel it sticking, settling across her face like a second skin. “That will keep it in place for days. It’s waterproof, alcohol will be required to remove it.” 

Nala nodded her understanding, still trying to clear the scent from her nostrils.

Without another word, Sabe’ turned back to her mistress, crossing the room to help Eirte’ with the rather more extensive changes being made to Padme’s appearance. Nala had to admit that now that the Senator’s skin tone had been darkened to a more similar golden tone, she and Amidala resembled each other. Hopefully, it would be enough for this plan to work and get them and the younglings off Coruscant.

“Alright,” she turned to her charges. “Let’s get you dressed in your… disguises.”

Eyes lit up at her word choice, even Kiria’s, though she’d been complaining earlier about having to give up the sparkly shirt she’d stolen from Senator Organa. Sabe’ had arrived earlier that morning after having arranged their passage with several sets of clothes more typical of refugees, and it was to this pile on the floor of Organa’s closet that Nala led her girls.

The boys were already waiting in the closet, jumping up as Nala and the girls exited the bathroom, Ro wrapped in a towel and scowling at having been made to leave the water.

“You don’t look any different,” Qual announced with palpable disappointment after an eager examination of Nala. “Thought they’re gonna disguise you.”

“They were more focused on making the senator look more like me,” Nala explained, amused at his disappointment.

“You already look alike,” he complained. “They coulda made you blue.”

Nala even managed a laugh at the complaint. Two small human women with brown hair and brown eyes probably did look quite alike to non-humans, despite the difference in skin tones and face shapes. It was, in all honesty, something they were relying on.

“Come on,” she coaxed them towards the pile. “Let’s get you all your disguises.”

Kiria immediately waded into the pile, sorting out the items she found sufficiently interesting with eager little hands. In a flurry of clothes, the others were coaxed in as well, strewing the neat pile across the senator’s closet as they all tried various outfits on. It was chaos, but a familiar, soothing chaos; it almost felt like home.

By the time the handmaidens had finished with Senator Amidala, Nala had all her children dressed in a mishmash of clothes that had them properly looking like refugees.

“It’s time to get you and Padme dressed,” Sabe’ announced, coming out of the bathroom to look over the younglings’ disguises approvingly, “We’re meeting Glendin in half an hour.”

Nala obediently followed Sabe’ back into the bathroom, shooing her children to go ask Zett for the lunch he and Bail had been preparing. It was far too early for lunch, but they’d already been up for several hours, preparing for departure, so it was high time for a second meal.

Curiosity dragged her gaze to the Senator’s face, even though thick, smoky guilt choked her throat every time she glanced at the woman. An apology had not been enough, even though the woman had offered her forgiveness freely, mixed with an intense sympathy and pity as it was. 

But an apology, even Amidala’s forgiveness, fixed nothing. It did not change the fact of Nala’s actions. That she had hurt the Senator; that she had wanted to. And despite the guilt that choked her throat and coated the inside of her lungs with grit, the anger was still there, too. The pain and jealousy. And it only made that cold sludge of guilt thicker, because she couldn’t get rid of it.

Still, her eyes were drawn to Amidala’s face, marking the changes in its shape and structure, the way her round eyes had been widened to mirror the changes to Nala’s, and how her skin tone now matched Nala’s own. 

She felt some amount of tension seep out of her shoulders. They could certainly pass for sisters. It would keep both them and the younglings safer. It would work. She would make sure of it.

Noticing her attention, the senator gave her a small, tight smile, one hand resting protectively over the curve of her belly as it had ever since Zett’s announcement. Nala’s eyes darted away before she could stop them. That mix of guilt and pain in her middle churning like a thunderstorm of swirling, rumbling clouds was too much to bear when she had to meet Amidala’s eyes.

The handmaidens quickly worked Nala and Amidala’s hair into braided loops, decorated with modest silver cords, before pulling out the clothing they’d selected for the pair. Layers of blue, brown, and cream were settled over Nala’s frame before she had time to examine them, and adjusted with further silver cords as the handmaidens fussed and tucked. Ultimately, the ensemble seemed to have fewer layers than her normal robes, but was somehow far more complicated to assemble.

Nala was simply glad that she had not been left to figure it out by herself as she tried to get used to the fabric skirts swishing around her ankles.

Amidala was dressed in the same colors, though in a similar but even more complex style of long, layered draping fabrics.

“Alright,” Sabe’ said simply, examining the pair of them one last time, “Let’s go.”

The younglings were assembled in the living area, munching on some sort of snack bars the Senator had provided, and enjoying the tea Zett had made. Their mood was more subdued now, hanging heavy in the Force as they felt the adults’ preparations drawing to a close. As they sensed the mood in the apartment growing more serious.

Nala coaxed Light along each strand connecting her to her children, wrapping them in her affection and tangling herself firmly in their little web of Light as well.

Zett pressed a cup of tea into her hands as she turned her attention to the soft conversation happening in the kitchen between Sabe’, Padme, Master Ti, and Senator Organa. Sabe’ beckoned her over with a short, commanding wave, and Nala crossed to the huddle, still finding the long skirts around her ankles strange to move in. It almost felt like she was gliding across the floor rather than striding.

Sabe’ handed her a holo-ID with the name Roselle Nabia printed beside a picture that honestly could have been any of the human women in the apartment, along with the false aid-ID she’d managed to get created earlier that morning. Nala skimmed over the information on the ID quickly, committing it and the rundown of the information on the aid-ID that Sabe’ gave her to memory. 

Amidala was handed a similar holo-ID proclaiming her to be Jasmere Nabia, though no aid-ID. Nala’s ID and the information Glendin Besk had ratified concerning the false aid mission would be quite enough, Sabe’ had already assured her.

“Practice introductions,” Sabe’ commanded while Bail and Zett packed small bags on the counter with snacks, blankets, a few extra pairs of clothes, and some credits.

“I’m Roselle Nabia,” Nala said smoothly, leaning into training several years distant when her master had taught her how to bluff her way out of things. “It’s always helpful to combine it with a bit of Force persuasion. Often, it doesn’t even need to be a full Mind-Trick if you speak with enough confidence, just a nudge enough to give your words weight,” he’d explained. “And this is my sister, Jasmere,” she gestured to Amidala. “These are students from the school I work at, we were evacuated together, and Jasmere and I were named their temporary guardians.”

The Force nipped at her as she reached out to brush against Sabe’s will, but Nala tucked herself away from the cold bite carefully, reaching out only enough to touch Sabe’s iron soul and keeping herself firmly clenched to the anchor of her children’s bright Force bubble.

Sabe’ hesitated, blinking, eyes narrowing as she stared intensely at Nala, obviously feeling that faint hint of suggestion that Nala had laced her words with. The awareness of the gentle manipulation was quite impressive, and Nala tucked the information away, adding it to the new facts about Nabooian handmaiden training that she’d been collecting all morning.

“Well, done,” was all the woman said.

“Call her Jaz,” Master Ti interjected. “Once you’ve done the formal introductions, call her Jaz when you refer to her informally.”

Sabe’ nodded in agreement as Master Ti tilted her head, lekku swinging slightly as she explained further, sensing Nala’s question.

“People are unlikely to truly notice if you call someone by a nickname, however, they may notice if you continually refer to your ‘sister’ by her full first name. It is simply one of the things that might register as strange in a sentient’s brain, even if they cannot quite put their finger on why.”

“I see,” Nala accepted her Master’s far greater experience in such matters and turned to Amidala, “Informally, I’ll be Rose then.”

“Now you,” Sabe’ addressed Amidala.

The senator tilted her head, then gave a sudden sweet smile, staring at Sabe’ like she’d never seen her before in her life.

“Hello!” she said cheerfully, “I’m Jasmere Nabia. This is my big sister, Roselle. We’re in charge of her students until we can get in contact with their parents.”

Nala watched the senator’s changed body language carefully. She’d been taught to bluff and lie, but this was on another level, this sudden soft cheerfulness as every bit of tension seemed to seep out of the senator’s body. Nala would be doing most of the talking if they could help it, to keep attention off Amidala, but it was clear the other woman was a better liar.

She must keep these tricks in mind when she introduced them to a stranger.

Again, Sabe’ gave an approving nod, her dark hair brushing in waves around her face as she immediately turned to Bail and Zett.

“Are the packs ready?”

The two nodded, handing them out to the younglings as Master Ti spoke. 

“I’ve already practiced with the younglings,” she told Nala, and the warm relief at that washed away a cold fear Nala hadn’t even realized had been lodged in her chest. Her children were smart and good, and with Master Ti’s coaching, they wouldn’t slip up and say something that would put them in danger.

“I think that’s everything,” Senator Organa spoke up, handing slightly larger packs to Nala and Padme. “Zett, you should go get changed into your refugee clothes.”

The sudden spike of steel-will in the Force had every Force-sensitive immediately turning their attention to the Padawan as he hesitated, then met Organa’s eyes.

“I’m staying,” he declared.

The prickling along her soul from the wave of confusion and worry that rushed from Bail Organa warned Nala that she’d extended too far out into the Force, and she quickly pulled back, all but severing her connection with both Zett and Master Ti as she focused on reinforcing the bubble around herself and her children.

“What do you mean?” the senator asked, “Zett, you need to get off this planet.”

Zett glanced at Master Ti before straightening his spine and turning his attention with utter seriousness back to Senator Organa. “The Force is being very clear that I’m supposed to stay with you,” he explained simply.

Nala resisted the urge to prod the force-bond between Zett and Organa as she watched Shaak Ti narrow her eyes, presumably poking at it herself.

“Padawan,” Shaak Ti spoke up while the Senator stared, mouth partially opened as though he had so many protests, he couldn’t pick one, and had simply frozen with a thousand words tangled on his tongue. “It is not safe for you to remain here.”

Zett clasped his hands tightly together, turning to Matser Ti with determination carving lines between his eyes. 

“But the Force says I need to stay here, with Senator Organa.”

Zett and the younglings may not even have noticed, but Nala was sure of the pain she saw flicker across Shaak Ti’s carved red face. She understood. The Force wasn’t clear about anything right now, it was simply screaming in agony. Perhaps it had created some sort of bond between Zett and Organa, but the thing telling Zett to stay was not the inconsolable, incoherent Force; it was Zett’s own desperate loss, clinging to the first Anchor he’d found after all of his had been ripped away from him.

“I’ll be following you all to Alderaan as soon as I can,” Bail assured Zett softly.

Zett hesitated, fists clenching as he stared at the Senator, pain or confusion, or perhaps both, carving wrinkles between his eyes.

“I’m not…” he started, then choked off, starting again, “The words aren’t making sense.”

He closed his eyes, taking a slow, deep breath, then reached out and grabbed Senator Organa’s hand from where the man crouched in front of him. Zett’s mouth moved silently for a moment as his fingers tightened around Organa’s wrist. The senator waited patiently as the boy tried to work out the right words.

“I’m in your orbit,” Zett told him finally, opening his eyes to search Organa’s face for understanding. Nala frowned, almost able to picture what Zett was talking about, maybe, it sounded like a way to describe a bond? But cut off from the Force, she couldn’t know for sure. “I am all dust and scattered, but your pull keeps me solid. I would,” he hesitated, likely seeing confusion in the Senator’s eyes, then forged on, blurting out the words desperately. “I would drift, I wouldn’t stay together outside your orbit. I… the Force… you’re keeping me here .”

“Oh,” said Master Ti softly, and Zett turned to her hopefully. “Zett, did you leave your body?”

Oh, Nala understood now what Zett had meant. His tether to his physical body had been damaged somehow; his soul, his consciousness, was more in the Force than in his body. This wasn’t just about getting lost in visions and losing the ability to tell reality from dreams, nor being worried about falling asleep and unable to wake up, while the Force screamed. Zett belonged more to the Force than the physical right now, and somehow, Senator Organa’s presence was keeping his soul in his body.

Zett nodded, and Nala grimaced.

Before… before everything, what was happening with Zett would have been very serious. Serious enough to warrant a stay in the Halls and likely several meditation sessions a day to heal his connection with himself. It was a severe injury despite its metaphysical nature.

Now it was even worse, with the Force screaming and pulling and full of so much pain, roiling in pouring clouds of heat and knives. And now they had no Halls and no mediation sessions and no real way to save this boy from disintegrating into the Force.

“When will you arrive at Alderaan, Senator?” Shaak Ti asked, frown lines creasing between her eyes as she considered the issue.

“When’re we gonna go?” Qual whined from the group of younglings gathered up with their backpacks in the living room.

“In a moment,” Nala hushed him softly, absent-mindedly stroking his dreadlocks. “When Padawan Zett is okay.”

“At least 3 days,” Bail responded after a moment’s consideration. “Likely more like a week.”

Amidala silently nodded her agreement with the assessment, grasping just how much Bail had to do after everything that had happened. How much she would be doing if the Emperor weren’t going after her.

“You said you told the clones that Zett was one of your staff?” Shaak continued.

“Yes?” Bail turned the answer into a question as he rose to his feet, one hand still locked in Zett’s grip.

“Then it should be possible for him to remain with you for as long as you stay and accompany you when you return to Alderaan.”

Zett tucked himself closer to the senator as Organa sputtered in surprise.

“No… I mean, yes, but… it would be dangerous. This building is crawling with clones!”

“It would likely be more dangerous for Zett to leave you,” Master Ti tried to explain. “You are grounding him.”

But the confusion on the Senator’s face made it clear he didn’t understand what she meant.

“Senator Organa,” Nala spoke up, stepping forward from her younglings. “What’s happening with Zett is different from what we thought,” she tried to explain, “He’s injured in a way. Its like,” her brain suddenlly provided a metaphor, “It’s like he’s been stabbed and is bleeding out, but instead of blood, what he’s losing is himself. He’s bleeding out into the Force.”

There was understanding in Organa’s eyes as he tugged Zett closer to him, but he looked at Nala with overwhelmed panic edging the whites of his eyes.

“But I don’t… I can’t help with that,” he said softly, voice pitching higher with desperation as he finished. “I don’t have the Force, I don’t know how to help him.”

To Nala’s relief, Master Ti took over the explanations again.

“You don’t have to do anything but be there for him,” she said, “It’s like you're a bandage. He wrapped you around himself to keep himself together, so just having you there prevents him from bleeding out. It’s possible for us to help him heal, but it takes time and a great deal of undivided attention. The most I could do is quicken his healing, but you can stop him from bleeding out while I do. It is best he stay with you and we wait to tend him until you can be there with us as well.”

Bail absorbed the information with a frown.

“I… see,” he said finally. “Alright. Yes, I can arrange for him to stay with me.”

Zett visibly relaxed, straightening from where he’d been leaning against the Senator.

“If that’s sorted,” Sabe’ spoke, not unkindly but in an obvious hurry. “We’ll be late to meet Besk. We must go now.”

Organa nodded and typed a quick message into his comm while Nala got the younglings ready to move again.

“The cameras are looped,” the senator announced, and Sabe’ led the way out the door, followed by Nala and the younglings, Master Ti and Amidala bringing up the rear as they hurried down the quiet, gleaming hallways of the Senate Apartments. A few breathless moments spilled the group out onto Coruscant’s streets, and they kept moving, Sabe’ setting a pace that forced the younglings to trot to keep up.

None of them complained, though Nala did scoop Ro up almost immediately. The Younglings could sense the serious haste of the adults and focused on keeping up, complaints falling away under the importance that they sensed hanging in the air. When they were truly tired out, Nala knew, the complaints would come, but right now her children were fed and full of energy.

After a few minutes of hurrying through the sleepy senate district, Sabe’ ushered them to a large lift to take them down to the Refugee docks level. 

As their breathing echoed in the lift, Nala spent the time gathering up the Force brightness of her younglings, strengthening the bubble of Light surrounding them. The heartbreak, fear, and pain of the refugees would only add to the wailing cries of the Force, and she didn’t want her children to feel one moment of it. 

As they exited the lift several minutes later, Nala was startled to realize that she had included two Force presences she did not recognize in her bubble of light. Adjusting Ro on her hip, as the group wound through narrow streets already beginning to fill with people, Nala trailed the two new threads.

The twins, she realized; Padme’s twins.

They sang in the Force like twin suns, so closely wound about each other that their presences almost seemed to be one. She turned to examine the swell of Padme’s middle as they followed Sabe’ into a large building, pulling the two Force-bright souls further into the warm bubble she had made. Her children’s Force presences accepted the two instinctively, pulling them in like creche-mates, likely without any of the younglings even really realizing they were doing so.

Unborn Force sensitives were usually harder to touch, Nala knew. They tended to slip under their mother’s presence, even if she wasn’t force-sensitive. A Force-user could sometimes sense that an unborn baby was Force-sensitive, but to be able to reach their souls like this… Well, Nala knew from personal experience what it meant and was glad that the group was hurrying.

Finally, they turned into a cavernous bay where a dingy space-freighter rested, her three-man crew sprawled beneath her feet, looking up as the group entered. A Mirialian man who had been standing near the door crossed to Sabe’ quickly, clutching a datapad to his chest.

“Hello, Ami,” he greeted with a smile, “Your ship is ready for its mission to Alderaan.” He extended the datapad for her to examine. Then began quickly tapping through pages, occasionally stopping to sign something.

“I’m witnessing your group's arrival and departure, verifying your IDs, authenticating ‘Nabia’s’ temporary guardianship of the children, and signing off on the mission,” he narrated quickly, finishing the tasks by rote within a few minutes.

Nala knew that at least half of those tasks should have already been done for a legal aid mission, and he certainly had not even looked at their IDs.

“All you need to do is pass this datapad over to the Alderaanian refugee center when you arrive,” he finished, handing the pad over with a flourish. “And you are officially out of the Coruscant system’s AOR.”

“Thank you, Besk,” Sabe’ said, handing the datapad to Amidala since Nala’s hands were currently occupied. “And the medical files I sent over were included as well?”

Besk nodded, though he examined the group with a critical eye, “Yes, though I don’t see any member of your party that’s injured enough to warrant them.”

“He will be arriving soon,” Shaak Ti spoke up, and Sabe’ nodded in support of the statement.

Glendin shrugged without comment.

“Well, your ship departs in 20 minutes,” he warned.

“He will be here within that time.”

Sabe’ swung her bag off her shoulder, reaching in and pulling out two tall glass bottles.

“Your payment,” she offered the wine to Besk. “This one is from the year of your grandfather’s death,” she passed over one, “And this one is from the year of your great-great-grandmother’s death.”

“Well,” was all Besk replied, but he took the second bottle with a gentle care as though it would shatter at a breath. “Very well.”

He tucked the bottles under an arm.

“Good luck, Ami. Farewell,” and with that, he was gone.

Almost as soon as the door had hissed closed behind him, it opened again, to reveal a hover cart holding a medical stasis pod, accompanied by a dark-haired aide of Senator Organa’s.

Nala kept the children out of the way as Master Windu was gently loaded into the ship. She couldn’t see him through the fogged lid of the stasis pod, but by his Force presence alone, she could tell that he was in very bad shape. His presence was so, so faint, flickering with pain even while he was unconscious in stasis. Moving him was risky, but so was trying to hide him on Coruscant. She could only pray to the unlistening Force that he would survive the trip to Alderaan.

But there was nothing she could do for Master Windu as his medical pod was moved to a small, messy room that was as much a storage closet as the ship’s medbay.

Nala examined it, pressing her lips together tightly while Master Ti laid a gentle hand over Master Windu’s stasis unit. The state of the so-called medbay wouldn’t affect Master Windu; the stasis pod would keep him stable, hopefully long enough to reach Alderaan.

However, Nala knew, wrapping warm Force around those two new presences, there might be another medical emergency requiring the room before they reached Alderaan.

She waited, monitoring the situation as she sat the younglings down in the dingy common area and urged them into a simple singing game that would not overtly betray Force-sensitivity. Though the point of the game was to use the Force to sense what should be said next, it was likely that anyone watching would assume that the Younglings all simply knew the words to a long and complicated nonsense song.

“She sees the…” A’zel sang, projecting outward to Ka’ress with a concentrated frown.

“Hat,” Ka’ress hazarded a guess, continuing the song, “And loses her…”

“Apple sauce?” Lessa guessed, looking at her friend in confusion. A’zel and Qual giggled while Ka’ress frowned, closing her eyes as she concentrated harder, trying to tug at the threads of a shared memory between the two of them.

“Oh,” Lessa’s confusion faded, then she took up the melody again, “And loses her spoon.” Ka’ress nodded, and the game continued around the group. “So, she trades her…”

Seeing that the younglings were engaged, Nala sat beside Amidala, ignoring the ache in the back of her throat and the sudden itch beneath her fingernails. The ship rose out of the bay, preparing to break through the atmosphere as Amidala watched the younglings curiously, softness edging her eyes, though Nala noticed that her fingers were tightly intertwined over her belly.

Nala felt the contraction before she heard the senator’s muffled groan. The other woman breathed in three sharp breaths before settling herself again. She must be used to false contractions by this point, Nala guessed, eyeing her carefully.

Of course, these were not false contractions. But they were also not anywhere near close together yet, either. They had time.

A few minutes later, as the ship exited Coruscant’s atmosphere, the next wave of pain took the senator by surprise, her breath sighing out as she leaned forward, a hand absently rubbing her swollen middle. Nala rested a gentle hand on her shoulder, and Amidala turned to her with wide eyes.

“I do not know if we will make it to Alderaan in time,” Nala said softly. “Labor takes time, longer than many people realize, but your children are rather eager to come.”

The other woman’s breath caught, eyes widening further as sudden panic flashed around her in the Force. Nala immediately drew her presence back from where she’d unknowingly reached for Padme in the Force.

“I’m… I… they’re coming?” 

Nala nodded.

“What… what do I do?” The panic around Padme’s presence spilled over her features, pupils contracting, breathing picking up, hands trembling as her muscles went stiff with charged adrenaline. “I don’t… What do I do?!”

Nala took her hands, ignoring any itch of blood beneath her nails or rasp of acrid smoke in her throat, sliding off the bench to kneel in front of her.

“Breathe, first,” she commanded as the ship hummed and shuddered, jumping into hyperspace. “Just breathe.”

She led her through meditation breathing until it seemed less like Padme would hyperventilate, imposing a rhythmic rise and fall on both of them. They were not deep breaths, those could help with panic, but they didn’t always help with pain, so Nala focused on ensuring that Padme’s breaths were even and short, neither speeding up nor slowing down, providing her body and brain with oxygen.

“Good, very good,” she used the same soothing voice she did when trying to urge a sick child to sleep, though she didn’t dare reach out to press an air of comfort and relaxation into the Force as she would have done before. “Have you done any preparation classes, Jaz?”

She remembered the months leading up to her son’s birth. She had taken so many preparatory classes, learning breathing and pain-relieving techniques, studying over and over again the process of delivery in humans. She had felt like she was drowning; the dark waters of pain and useless weakness rising around her every time she thought of the Force-bright soul in her center. 

She had been so sure that she would mess it up, be just as weak and useless as she had been that night when he’d grabbed her. She’d known that her body would fail her again, but this time it would cost an unformed, innocent soul its chance at life; it would kill that soft little light that shouldn’t exist but did anyway. 

It was her padawan-brother, her master’s first student, who had suggested the courses. “What happened to you… You weren’t in control of it,” he’d said softly, tentacles twitching as they sensed her overriding, constant fear. “You had no power. Maybe it will help you now to have some power, to have some control. It might help to learn everything you can. At least you won’t be confused and helpless during the delivery, if nothing else, right?”

It had helped a little bit. Helped her to feel she had a choice, given her something she could control, even if it was just her knowledge level.

But it was also going to help a lot right now, too, Nala declared in her head, squeezing Padme’s hands as the senator shook her head, eyes wide with fear despite the breathing she kept to, clinging to the rhythm like a lifeline. Nala knew the human birth process better than anyone else on this ship; she could help Padme through this.

“No… no, I didn’t,” Padme gasped out, voice high and tight, “I didn’t… I couldn’t. It was a secret.” Tears were shining in her eyes. “Oh, Force , Nala, should I have? The babies… are they…”

“They’ll be fine,” Nala was quick to assure her, “Keep breathing, they’ll be fine.” She waited for the other woman’s breath to settle again, focusing on keeping herself as calm and still as possible. She wasn’t equipped to deliver babies, but she was going to trust that the Force would provide. And what had the Force provided but her? Here and now, the Force had provided her, so she would be enough.

“It will only make it a little harder on you, that’s all,” she assured the senator, and the relief that softened Padme’s rigid muscles was obvious.

And then the next contraction hit, rolling across her body, and her breathing choked off.

“Keep breathing,” Nala repeated, and Padme nodded, staring at a distant point on the ceiling as she forced her breathing back into an even pattern. “Focus on your breathing when the pain hits; it will help.”

Nala hoped it would be enough. When she’d given birth, it had been in the Halls, surrounded by skilled healers and the best of what medicine could offer. Any pain too intense for her to handle had been soothed away by a healer, though given her training and preparations, Nala was able to flow quite a bit of it out into the Force herself as she’d focused on helping her body prepare to bring her baby into the world. But she had none of that now, no healers, no medicine, and no Force for the pain.

“What do I do?” Padme asked, forcing her breath to keep steady.

Again, Nala squeezed her hands comfortingly, ignoring the whisper in the back of her mind to search for the scratches hidden beneath Padme’s make-up.

“Nothing for the moment,” she said soothingly, brain flitting through the information piled in her memory from each course she’d taken those years ago. “This will go on for some time, likely several hours, as the contractions grow closer together. Eventually, you will feel the need to push with each contraction. That is when the delivery will begin. For now, just focus on the breathing.”

Padme nodded, eyes blinking rapidly even as she forced her breathing to stay even.

“If you would like to walk around now, that may also prove helpful with managing the pain and preparing your body for the delivery,” Nala added. “I will go prepare the Medbay as well as I can.”

Padme nodded, latching desperately onto the suggestion, leaping to her feet as Nala rose. As the senator hurried down the hall, Nala paused to look over the younglings, still engaged in their game. Assured that they were fine and happy for the moment, Nala turned down the hall towards the makeshift medbay.

Master Ti was kneeling beside Master Windu’s pod, eyes closed and breathing slowed in meditation. As soon as Nala entered, she pulled herself from the shallow embrace of the Force that she’d allowed herself.

“Ms. Roselle, what’s wrong?”

“Jasmere has gone into labor,” Nala explained succinctly. “I have come to prepare what I can for the delivery.”

Worry passed over Shaak Ti’s face like a cloud before her expression cleared into composure again.

“What can I do?” The Jedi Master asked. She knew that here, Nala was the one in charge, the one who knew best what should be done.

“Help me to sterilize a surface for her to lie on, please,” Nala listed, already clearing a long table in the room of the various junk atop it. “Then it would be best if we could locate a laser-scalpel, just in case. And towels to absorb the blood.” She grunted as she strained to lift a heavy crate from the table, firmly keeping herself from reaching to the Force for assistance. “After that, I would appreciate it if you could check on the younglings. Labor usually takes several hours.”

Master Ti lent her assistance immediately, helping Nala to get the medbay into as much order as possible and locating the tools she’d mentioned. Then she left to check on the younglings.

Nala tracked the Senator down, where she was pacing along the hallway to the engine room. Her movements were smooth and her breathing even, though every few minutes she would pause as another contraction rolled across her body, concentrating on breathing through it.

“We should keep track of the time between your contractions,” Nala explained, “Once it's less than a minute, you should come to medbay to get ready.”

The senator nodded without responding, continuing her smooth pacing, keeping her breathing and heartbeat controlled. Her face and body were more relaxed, but even cut off, Nala could feel the anxiety crackling around the other woman in the Force.

“I’m sorry, I won’t offer you anything for the pain,” Nala continued talking, trying to convince both of them that she knew what she was doing. “I don’t know if what they have on hand here is safe for the babies.”

She hadn’t bothered to learn much about painkillers that could be used during labor. She’d had the Force and the best Force-users in the galaxy to deal with her pain. But she knew that not all painkillers were safe for a pregnant woman to use, so she couldn’t risk it. She would just have to do what she could to help the senator manage the pain.

Nala kept her own breathing firmly even and hands still as the senator nodded. “I understand.”

Unable to release her anxieties into the Force, Nala hurried back to the medbay, shoving her worries as far into the back of her mind as she could. They buzzed there, sparking like broken wires, but she ignored them. Breathe in, breathe out.

She focused on helping the senator.

 Hours passed, and Nala sank herself into a light meditation. She didn’t touch the Force, but she allowed herself to sink into the bubble of her children, their contentment lighting up the ship as Master Ti sat them down to the meals packed into their backpacks. She managed to achieve a relaxed state similar to that of the meditation of non-Force-sensitives, and waited that way, focusing on regulating her breathing and heart rate.

Finally, the senator entered the room, breathing evenly, face flushed with exertion.

“They’re 40 seconds apart,” she said, and Nala rose smoothly.

It was not time yet, Nala could tell by the Force around the children, but it would be soon.

“Focus on your breathing,” Nala spoke lowly as she helped the senator up onto the table. “Focus only on your breathing. I will tell you when to push. I will handle everything else. Your task now is to breathe.”

Padme nodded silently, the fear in her eyes hanging heavy over her shoulders as another contraction rippled through her body. 

Nala had found no gloves in the medbay, so she turned the water in the sink on as hot as she could bear, then scoured her hands and forearms until the skin was red and raw.

Around Padme, the Force swelled, building to a crescendo like an orchestra, two hearts beating in a pattern of drums as Nala wrapped them further in the bubble of the Force. Padme groaned and breathed desperately as another contraction hit, and another. The Force rippled, widening, deepening, pressing over the two bright souls.

Nala helped Padme into position, slipping herself as far into the Force calm bubble as she dared, while the senator breathed and wept unending, silent tears. She did what she could to wrap Padme’s flailing, fearful soul in it too, as the Force thrummed with pressure, humming with expectation like a rumble of thunder.

The Force-Touch would not help the woman much, but perhaps it could give her some comfort.

The rumble built, singing beneath the pressure, and then…

“Push,” Nala commanded as the pressure broke.

The minutes crawled by like hours. Nala was distant and moving in the Force as it sang around its two new children. She called them to her, to the younglings humming happily in the bubble they’d created. With all the warmth she could pull from inside her, all the tenderness she remembered from a moment so much like this years before, she urged them out into the world.

Padme groaned and wept, and once, screamed, but Nala’s brief touch on her wrist quieted her. She breathed in time with Nala’s breathing as her body pulsed in pain and she delivered her children, one after the other. Her daughter and her son.

She continued to cry as she nursed them, while Nala cleaned her and disposed of all the blood-soaked towels and organic matter. 

Padme’s exhaustion and deep, unadulterated joy poured over the ship like warm water. Her happiness sang in the face of the screaming Force, and Nala found herself leaning into it, suddenly able to breathe without a rasp in her throat. She was almost humming as she finished cleaning the small room.

“Nala,” Padme croaked, sweat-soaked and surrounded by tangled hair, bathed in the light of the Force and shining like a star as Nala turned to her. “Thank you.”

Nala only smiled and hummed, too drunk on the sudden rush of light and warmth and golden love to speak. Padme did not seem to mind; she closed her red, exhausted eyes and kissed her children as they nursed against her chest.

Nala turned away to wash the last of the blood from her hands, scrubbing the life-bright red from beneath her fingernails.

Chapter Text

Breha Organa waited on an open-air balcony, the scent of Jailen blossoms filling the air as she overlooked the capital. She was very good at waiting. She was very good at waiting for her counselors to come to the decision she had already made, for her plans to come slowly and inevitably to fruition, for her husband to come home for a brief visit between the weight of his responsibilities, for the child she might never be able to have to finally exist.

Breha was a queen, and therefore, she was good at waiting.

Even more, she was good at looking like she was waiting, at showing a still, peaceful face when inside, her mind was busy detangling plots and weaving plans. That was her secret. She was good at waiting because even when she was waiting, she was always doing something; always acting, even in her inaction.

The pink-tinged gold of the afternoon sun highlighted the pale browns and deep blues of the city as it tumbled away towards the rising, snow-capped mountains beyond. Behind her, the peace of the balcony was broken by soft footsteps, then Secretary Anterra cleared his throat and spoke.

“My lady, your guests are here.”

Breha turned with a genuine smile tugging at her lips to see the group standing behind her assistant. 

Padme was easy to recognize, even beneath her makeup that made her look as though she could be a native of Alderaan. Beside her was another woman of similar appearance whom Breha didn’t recognize. Not one of the handmaidens, she was sure; or at least, neither of the ones that served Senator Amidala. She would have recognized Sabe’ or Eirte’.

Both women were carrying sleeping infants, and behind them was a small group of young children, all bundled into shapeless layers and clutching backpacks tightly. 

Breha knew that Master Shaak Ti was at the hospital Master Windu had been delivered to upon their arrival earlier that day. The hospital was run by Bail’s cousin, and his discretion was absolute. He was, after all, the one she and Bail had trusted to do the fertility treatments they had secretly undergone, though to no avail. He could be trusted to treat the Jedi Master and keep him safe and hidden.

“Padme,” she sighed softly, then hurried to embrace her husband’s friend. They’d met in person only twice, when Padme and her handmaidens had been invited to state dinners, but the other woman was a close ally of her husband’s, and so Breha knew all about her and considered her a friend.

“Hello, Breha,” Padme returned breathily, shifting the dark-haired infant in her arms to hug Breha back. The hug was deeper than Breha had expected. Padme had always been somewhat reserved with physical affection, willing to receive an embrace but keeping it short, pulling back after a perfect and polite amount of time. Now she leaned into Breha’s touch, free arm tightening around her waist.

Breha was the one to pull back first this time, examining Padme’s made-up face and seeing the exhaustion beneath the careful mask of colored powder and creams, the sadness edging eyes rimmed with narrow bands of red.

“I’m sending you a bereaved friend,” Bails’ message had been, speaking in their language of riddles and metaphors, “A woman of flowers.” That was their term for Padme. But Breha did not know who she had lost.

“Meet Leia,” Padme held up the child in her arms with softness stealing even the lines of exhaustion from her face, “And this is Luke,” her thin hand crept to the blond-haired boy in the other woman’s arms, “They’re…”

“Yours,” Breha finished for her, seeing the tenderness and the tiredness and the fierce, fierce love dancing in Padme’s eyes like tears. Bail had not mentioned this. “When…” she began, but the other woman spoke up.

“On the flight over,” she replied before the question was finished. “They’re 19 hours old.”

Breha felt her smile widening across her face, lips curling in genuine joy for her friend as she took Padme’s face in her hands. Alderaanian culture was far more tactile than that of Naboo, but Padme leaned into the touch.

“They are beautiful, Padme,” Breha filled her voice with as much of her joy for her friend as she could, overflowing it with warmth and sincerity as she finished with the traditional Alderaanian congratulations. “They shine and you shine in them.”

“Thank you,” Padme’s voice was hoarse, and her arms tightened around Leia as she blinked rapidly.

Breha made no mention of it as she turned to the other woman, reaching out her arms in greeting.

“And please, who might you be?”

The woman shifted Luke in her arms, eyeing Breha warily, obviously wondering if she should answer truthfully.

“It’s alright,” Padme spoke softly, “She can be trusted.”

The woman hesitated a second more, face creasing with some sort of sad longing. Breha simply waited, holding her smile. She could not force the poor woman into anything, nor did she want to. Trust was a gift that could only be given, never taken by force.

“I’m Crechemaster Nala Tahl,” the woman finally said softly, eyes holding Breha’s conscious of the revelation she had just given her. “And these are my charges.”

Breha’s smile widened genuinely, grateful for the trust as she turned to look over the children. There were seven of them of various species, all looking to be around 5 or 6. They watched her uneasily, shifting and perhaps a bit tired if their heavy eyelids and grumpy expressions were anything to judge by.

She crouched to be more level with them, glad to see that despite their eclectic outfits, they looked better fed and cared for than many of the refugee children that she had met throughout the war.

“Hello, my name is Breha Organa,” she waved in greeting, having long since learned that not every culture was fond of handshakes and that children who had just gone through hell were unlikely to react well to a strange adult reaching out to them.

The children eyed her, glancing back and forth among themselves for a moment before a boy with white hair stepped forward. Tucking his hands into the sleeves of the oversized jacket he wore, he gave a small bow, and the other children quickly followed suit.

“Is nice to meet you, Miss O’gana,” he spoke for the group, with an adorable solemnity to accompany his childish voice. Breha fought back an amused smile.

“And you as well, younglings,” she replied with equal solemnity instead.

A girl with bouncing black curls pushed forward, eyeing Breha curiously, face tinged pink with some sort of excitement. 

“Wait, Organa?” she pronounced the name carefully in her high voice. “Like Sen’tor Organa?”

“Yes,” Breha nodded. “He’s my husband.”

And then suddenly she was in the middle of a group of young children gushing to her about how amazing and nice, and fun Bail was and how he’d given them cake for breakfast and let them steal his fancy clothes, and how he still had Zett with him, a fact several of the little voices seemed jealous of. Breha laughed and agreed that her husband was amazing and assured them that he’d be here soon and would love to play with them when he arrived.

Finally, the little huddle was broken apart by a gentle “Younglings, let’s not suffocate the queen,” from Nala Tahl, and the children all drew back a little, each face lit by warm, eager smiles.

Breha felt a familiar dull ache in her chest as the children drew back, but she rose quickly, still smiling with the joy they’d brought, and turned back to Nala and Padme.

“There is a wing of the palace that has been given over to the Relief Society since the original influx of refugees. I’ve ensured that you all will have quarters there. The space can be easily expanded once more of Obi-Wan’s rescues begin to show up.” She kept her steady gaze locked on Nala’s as her smile bled away to seriousness. “As many Jedi as are found, we can take in.”

The pain and relief warred across Nala’s face like thunderclouds, trembling in the slightest quiver of her lips and a shine in her eyes. She bowed her head gratefully.

“Thank you,” she managed to whisper in a thick, heavy voice, and Breha’s heart squeezed with the thought that she had really done so little in the face of what had happened to the Jedi.

“Heaven has fallen,” Bail had said, “And the Angels are dead.”  

And Breha had known what the terms meant, but she hadn’t understood then, couldn’t wrap her mind around it at first. How could the Jedi Temple fall? How could the Jedi be dead?

Yet here it was, the truth, and all Breha could do was open her home to the surviving angels.

“It is my honor to help,” she replied to the woman, “And my deepest sorrow that there was nothing more I could do.”

Nala opened her mouth to reply as the sorrow washed across her face like water, but then she stopped, the space between her eyes creasing with a thought as she adjusted Luke in her arms again.

“Did you say ‘more of Obi-Wan’s rescues’?”

The smile that suddenly split her face almost hurt as Breha’s mood lifted with the good news she had.

“Yes,” she replied, “He’s already found two survivors and sent them to us. Two padawans, Caleb Dume and Cal Kestis.”

***

Bail was trying very hard not to twitch in his pod as nervous energy buzzed through his veins. The air around him was filled with the held breaths of several thousand sentients, the silence weighing heavily against his prickling skin as the Emperor spoke.

Palpatine had called a senate session without warning, and every senator had hurried to the chamber without preparation or knowledge of what this might be about. And now they stood and listened to Palpatine droning through the policies he had changed, the laws he had erased, and the rules of his new order. 

Every new code of law the Emperor declared added another noxious bubble to the acid boiling in Bail’s middle. And every right or protection he removed without a single voice of opposition, replaced more of Bail’s marrow with ice-cold mercury.

But, of course, no one dared speak up. Padme might have been foolish enough, but she was not here. Riyo might have been clever enough to ask the right questions while still seeming innocent, but the Pantora pod carried only poor, new Senator Pampanoida, who had only been senator for two months and now had to deal with this storm. Mothma would only pick a fight if she was sure of a way she could win, so she was silent and solemn in her pod, as still and cold as a statue.

And Bail couldn’t risk speaking up. He had too much to hide, too many people to protect. He could not get himself arrested for interrupting the Emperor to protest that sentients’ rights were being trampled, justice thrown out the window, and mercy ground into dust. He had to get Zett to Alderaan. He had to protect his planet.

Of course, that is what the Emperor was counting on. No one would speak up because they were too afraid of putting either themselves or their planets at risk. In the changing tides, they would look out for their own interests first of all, leaving righteousness on the table.

So Bail held very still as the fear in the senate choked him, as thick and viscous as oil in his lungs. He clenched the railing of the pod beneath white-knuckled hands and waited for this endless hell of a session to be over.

Eventually, it did end, and the senate was dismissed by a creaking, warped voice. They shuffled out in silence, none of the chatter, laughter, or yelling that had always before accompanied the representatives of the planets of the Republic mingling in the halls of the Senate Building. 

For a moment, Bail hesitated, considering seeking out his remaining allies, even as his heart tugged him back towards the young soul hidden in his apartment. He didn’t want to leave Zett alone any longer than absolutely necessary. But he had a duty to Alderaan; he needed to start working behind the scenes, putting together a plan with the people he could trust.

Mothma seemed to materialize beside him even as he thought it, appearing from the crowd in a swish of white fabric.

She said nothing, and he didn’t break the silence either. They simply walked together wordlessly down the halls of the Senate Building without acknowledgement of the other’s presence, as if they just happened to be strolling in the same direction, until the crush of the crowd behind them had faded away to empty lavender halls with their silver walls.

A few more steps in silence, Bail’s senses prickling beneath the cloud around his friend that murmured “keep quiet” as gently as a mother shushing her child.

Finally, Mon spoke, her voice so quiet that it rasped in her throat.

“A statement needs to be made.”

Bail waited, saying nothing. It was clear what Mon meant and the necessity of something being done. Someone had to speak out against Palpatine, someone had to show the galaxy that the Senate was not, in fact, just bowing down and letting Palpatine overthrow everything the Republic had ever stood for. 

They were both aware that it would change nothing in the Senate itself. It would simply give Palpatine an example to show the other senators what happened to those who spoke against him. But it would mean something to the rest of the Galaxy.

It might even give them a martyr.

But both Bail and Mon were well aware of these facts, so Bail waited for Mothma to say what she’d sought him out to communicate.

A few moments of silence passed as they turned down another hallway, perfectly in step without so much as glancing at each other.

“Padme would be the best choice to make it,” Mon commented. Her voice was even, cool, as though she had not just suggested that one of her dear friends should sacrifice herself to make a useless protest against the man who had overthrown their democracy.

She was right, of course, Bail knew. Padme would be the best choice to make a statement. She had enough influence for her voice to matter, she was well-regarded across the galaxy for her willingness to assume personal risks during the Clone Wars and her mercy missions to those suffering in the conflict. Even more, she was the Senator from Palpatine’s home planet. For her to speak against him would weaken his credibility in a way that he might never be fully able to recover from.

And she was Padme Amidala . She would speak up regardless. She always did.

So, once again, Mon was simply stating a fact that they both already knew. She wasn’t giving him new information, she was asking a question.

Where was Padme? Why hadn’t she already spoken up? Why wasn’t she preparing to?

“Her priorities have been shifted,” Bail replied cooly, recalling the swell of Padme’s middle, the tremble in her pale fingers as she rested her hands over the bump where she carried Anakin’s children. “She is unavailable.”

Mon Mothma did not nod, or tremble, or sigh at the news, she kept walking as though the information were more inconsequential than the weather. But Bail knew her, knew that underneath her perfectly crafted mask, Mon was rapidly running through calculations of what this meant; how it affected them, and their strategies and the senate and the Galaxy at large.

They passed a clone trooper standing stock still in his station, and Bail fought back the shudder that crawled up his spine as the blank helmet tracked their passage, hiding an even blanker face.

Several hallways later, Mon spoke up again.

“Alderaan cannot lose you. Your connection to Breha is too dangerous.”

Another cold fact that they both knew. It was not about his ideals or his wife, simply one of the things that must be weighed when considering the viability of their options. The senator who spoke out must be able to distance themselves from their planet. Bail was married to his planet’s queen, there was no distance there and no conceivable way to get it either.

“Cham Syndulla doesn’t have enough influence in the Senate and never has. Riyo isn’t a senator anymore,” Mon continued softly, running down the list to the conclusion that hung nebulous and aching just within sight. “And Senator Papanoida is the daughter of Pantora’s Chairman.” 

And they had reached the end of the list. It was so very, very short to contain all their truest allies; all the people who would be willing to speak up and lay their lives down for the greater cause.

Mon stopped walking and Bail stopped with her, aching to turn to look at her, to take her hand and meet her eyes and assure her that they would find another way.

But they both already knew they wouldn’t. And she so hated for him to comfort her that way. She hated to have to acknowledge that her emotions might run contrary to what must be done. She was too pragmatic for regret, and she would not thank Bail for forcing her to feel it; for forcing her to share in his.

So he stood still and did not look at her as she shoved whatever emotions she might have been feeling far away into a dark corner where they would not stain her resolve.

“I will find a proper time to act,” she finally announced, her voice as even and cool as it had been the whole discussion. “This is likely all the warning I will be able to give you.”

And then she strode away, leaving Bail alone in the silent hallway without a glance back.

Bail swallowed a cold lump in his throat as her white figure receded, sucking in a deep breath in a vain attempt to still the trembling in his core. He ignored the pricking in his eyes as he turned towards the lift, feet carrying him automatically towards his quarters in the distant Senate Housing.

Mon Mothma would not appreciate him crying over her, not when her actions were so clearly the only reasonable path to take. Not that her opinion on the matter was going to stop him. But now was not the time to cry; he would mourn her later, now he had to act, had to prepare for the fire she was about to burn herself to light.

She was trusting him to be able to nurture the flames, grow them in the right direction.

And he had other responsibilities as well. His planet, his people, his wife, the last few Jedi survivors, and Zett, waiting for him in the middle of a planet hunting him, hiding right under the Emperor’s nose.

So he tucked his emotions underneath a heavy resolve as he entered the Alderaan wing in Senate Housing.

Then he stopped, seeing a familiar figure waiting in the antechamber, curled into one of the plush chairs that stood outside the entrance to his private quarters.

Riyo Chuchi stood quickly, tucking her hands behind her and straightening her spine to reach her full, diminutive height. Though she was shorter even than Padme with that Pantoran delicacy to her frame that made her look almost fragile, she stared up at him with such a cold resolve in her brown eyes that Bail almost took a step back.

“Senator Organa,” she said primly. “Come to dinner with me.”

Internally, Bail winced, though he kept his own mask as smooth as hers. She needed to speak to him, somewhere far from the senate, not trusting even their personal quarters; that was clear enough. He understood the need.

But he had another responsibility. Poor Zett was waiting in his quarters for him to return, alone and undefended and apparently bleeding out into the Force.

“My apologies, Lady Chuchi,” he held her gaze, trying to convey his understanding of her urgency and reasons, trying to communicate his own urgency. “Perhaps another night would be better.”

She hesitated, suddenly much more like the Riyo Chuchi he was familiar with. Riyo was rarely one to be forceful. Padme would yell with passion, and Mon would demand respect, but Riyo would talk solemnly and sweetly of right and wrong. She would hesitate and fall silent, not out of weakness, but because she found softer, subtler ways to be heard.

Then her face hardened again, and in Bail’s stomach, yet another worry was added to the bubbling pool that rumbled in his middle.

“Tonight would be best,” her voice was unyielding, and that was how Bail knew that to her, this was an emergency. She always came prepared to negotiate, ready to let her opponent push her into the position she’d always meant to hold, making them feel as though they’d forced her to the compromise she’d wanted the whole time. But she was not negotiating now.

Indecision wavered in his mind like air shimmering over a fire, then he let out a long breath.

“Then give me one moment, please.”

Zett would be alright for a few more hours. Riyo, it seemed, might not be.

He stepped into his quarters and let the door shut behind him. Shadowed by the dim light of the setting sun, Zett was seated cross-legged on the floor of the living room, meditating.

He opened his eyes and stood as soon as the door closed behind Bail.

“Ah, should you be doing that? Meditating?”

Bail didn’t know much about Force wounds, as in nothing at all, but he did know meditating was a Jedi’s way of connecting more deeply with the Force, and doing that while bleeding out into the Force seemed like the equivalent of peeling a bandage off a wound.

Zett just shrugged as he stepped closer, face in deep shadows in the dim room, the last bits of orange from the setting sun haloing the edges of his light hair.

That was not at all reassuring.

“You have to go?” his voice was soft with the question, probably sensing Riyo behind the door.

“Yes,” Bail nodded, “A friend of mine needs help. I’ll be gone a while. Tyrone should be up soon, though.”

Zett nodded silently, and Bail felt a soft pang in the hollow of his chest. A suddenly very loud part of his mind told him to go back to the door and tell Riyo that he couldn’t talk to her tonight. It urged him to stay here with Zett and order dinner, make sure he ate, and then send him to bed, and just take care of the child.

“I’ll see you when you get back then,” Zett’s voice was a little louder. “The Force be with you, Senator.”

Bail nodded and pushed the voice back, reminding himself firmly of the hardness in Riyo’s face and the urgency in her demand.

“And with you,” he replied softly, reaching out on instinct to ruffle the boy’s hair. “I’ll be back as soon as I can be.”

And with that, he left, feeling strongly that he should have stayed.

Riyo was still standing just outside the door and nodded to him as Bail turned to follow her, typing a quick message to Tyrone as he went. The route she led him was quick, ending at a nearby cafe favored by senators with a spare hour or two to step outside the senate building for food and they were seated just as quickly, taking a secluded table in the back where their conversation would be covered by the artificial waterfall bubbling in its gleaming fountain.

A droid quickly brought them a crystal pot of steaming, orange Nabooian tea, without waiting for their order, the owner well-accustomed to judging whether his customers were there for food or the relative anonymity of the location. Bail poured a cup for Riyo and one for himself, waiting for her to speak.

She stared into her cup for a moment, eyes searching as though it would tell her how to speak, taking several breaths as though to start, only to fall back into silence as Bail took a slow sip.

“I meant to tell you and Padme this after the Delegation,” she finally spoke. “Perhaps Mothma as well, but I wanted to speak to the two of you first.”

Bail nodded encouragingly, holding his silence.

“You three were all so focused on forcing Palpatine to let go of some of his power. But I was working on my own plans. Ones I’d put in motion over a year ago.”

She took a sip of her tea, and Bail waited. He had wondered why Riyo had been so quiet during the formation of the delegation. He’d wondered why she hadn’t run for reelection as Pantora’s senator as well, especially when she’d stayed on so long to help her planet’s new senator come up to speed on what was going on. She hadn’t stepped out of politics, simply out of her role, and several of them had wondered what that was about.

So he would wait as long as she took to tell him why.

“You’re familiar with the Republic Establishment of Intergalactic and Interplanetary Contracts and Treaties Act, of course?” she asked unexpectedly.

Bail nodded. It was a staple of Republic law, and one of the laws Palpatine had been so eager to infringe on and overturn. Apparently, a legal act that required you to uphold contracts made on one Republic planet on a different Republic planet had been considered inconvenient to the Sith Emperor.

She took another sip of her tea.

“According to the Or’jon vs. Necronopolis legal precedent, that Act also requires the Republic to uphold all marriage contracts made on Republic planets as well as uphold legal grants of citizenship given on the basis of marriage on Republic planets.”

Suspicions began to flicker in the back of Bail’s mind, and he took a sip of his tea before he blurted out questions that he would likely regret and that would certainly derail the discussion further.

“Pantora has a similar legal code governing contracts made in the clans. Some traditionalist clan marriages do not include legal documentation, so clans may submit marriages within the clan to the Pantoran government and have them upheld, creating documentation for them after the fact. Thus, a marriage and grant of citizenship based on marriage done through clan traditions is upheld by the Pantoran government, and is then, under the Contracts Act, upheld by the Republic government.”

Bail took another sip of tea, not even sure what would come out of his mouth if he tried to say something right then. His thoughts, on the other hand, were stuttering in surprise and darkly asking if every woman he knew was in a secret relationship.

“The key point, though,” Riyo continued, eyes fixed on her tea, refusing to meet Bail’s eyes though her body hunched under his gaze. “Is that a traditional Pantoran marriage in a clan does not usually require an ID or proof of citizenship. To marry a member of a clan is to marry into that clan, meaning that the Pantoran government will issue that person an ID as a member of that clan and log them as a citizen of Pantora without any previous records being necessary.” She finally looked up, wet brown eyes crinkling at the edges with a wry, humorless smile. “As I’m sure you can understand with Alderaan’s relief efforts, this makes it very convenient to process refugees and citizenship applications through marriage, rather than the more common legal means on other planets.”

Bail nodded, the pieces falling into place. So, at one point or another, Riyo must have married a refugee in order to get them Republic citizenship. He wasn’t sure how that fit into her recent behavior, but he had some guesses now.

“The only reason it isn’t more commonly done is that, usually, many of the clans that allow for such undocumented, traditional marriages do not allow for divorce. You must either have a legal marriage and get a legal divorce, or have a traditional marriage and never divorce. There are only two clans I know of in which a traditional marriage can actually be dissolved rather than ignored, and one of those requires some rather unpleasant rites involving a knife.” Her face wrinkled in distaste as her eyes fell back to her tea, fingers tapping anxiously on the cup. “The point being that once married traditionally, a person is generally legally married for life, by both clan and Pantoran, and therefore, Republic, law.”

Bail considered the woman in front of him. So Riyo was trapped in some sort of marriage. He could see how that could be a problem, especially since it was a marriage she had apparently done a great deal of work to keep secret from her fellow senators. It was a political decision that he understood; he’d heard her name come up in a few backroom discussions of advantageous marriage alliances fellow senators had discussed. It was an additional bargaining chip in the Republic Senate to be unmarried.

He still did not quite understand what precisely was so urgent about the fact right now, after everything that had happened. Nor did he understand what her secret marriage had to do with whatever plot she’d been working on and her decision to leave the senate. 

What had changed now that would prompt this urgent confession? 

Unless..well, unless she also… Bail’s hands tightened on his mug.

“Riyo, you didn’t marry a Jedi, did you?”

Because that would be a problem. For Riyo to be legally and irrevocably married to a Jedi. The danger that would put her in…

He needed to find a way to get her to Padme and Breha on Alderaan.

The way Riyo’s jaw dropped open in enough shock that her gaze was torn away from her tea and once more focused on Bail was a greater relief than Bail would have suspected. It felt as though a stone had been lifted from his shoulders as she stammered and flushed.

“What? No… Ah, what? Jedi can’t get married, Bail.”

Which was legally true; a fact Bail was intimately familiar with given the sheer number of times he’d had to help Obi-Wan annul yet another marriage some alien princess had tricked him into by giving him some sort of traditional dish, making him a piece of clothing, crowning him with a wreath of flowers, or that one notable time in which one had asked him to help her read a “poem” that was actually the traditional wedding vows of her people. But also, it sounded as though Riyo had found a very clever workaround that might actually have worked to keep her married to a Jedi.

“Thank the Force ,” Bail breathed out. He needed Riyo as an ally in the Senate, he did not want to lose her to his stash of Jedi and Jedi sympathizers that he apparently now had to hide and protect in this wretched, wretched galaxy.

“No,” Riyo repeated her denial, gulping the last sip of her tea then sucking in a deep breath, forcing he unsteady gaze to hold Bail’s. “I’m married to Commander Fox.”

All his relief shattered in an instant, falling around him like broken glass.

“What?” 

He was aware that his jaw was gaping, but it took him a moment to school his face back to something slightly more neutral before anyone else in the cafe took notice. 

She’d married Commander Fox. Clone Commander Fox. She’d married a clone. She’d made them a citizen of her clan and a citizen of Pantora. She’d made a clone a legal citizen of the Republic. Fox was legally and irreversibly a citizen of the Republic .

It was brilliant. 

It was insanely dangerous.

With the galaxy as it was now, it was a death warrant.

“By the Mountain and her Blood,” he swore under his breath, leaning back on the curses of his home, unable to come up with anything better as his brain reeled.

“I was planning to kick off the battle for clones’ rights,” Riyo spoke softly and quickly now that the news was out in the open. “Once the paternity of the baby was confirmed, we were married in the eyes of my father’s clan. Five months ago, Fox was officially logged as a Pantoran citizen, and two months ago, it went through the Republic systems as well, without getting flagged. Fox and I are married. According to Republic law, he is a citizen of the Republic. And so, according to Republic law, literally everything about his job is illegal. Literally everything about how he and his brothers are treated is illegal.”

Her voice had risen, and now she took a deep breath, forcing it to drop back below eavesdropping range.

“I arranged to have a new senatorial election held on Pantora. I knew my friend would win, I knew she could take care of Pantora, I knew she would support me, but keep Pantora out of it when I took up my new task as defendant for the clones. I knew that when the plan was in place, I could count on you and Padme to support me in it. I knew I could use Mon to pit Republic law against itself. I had a plan… ”

Her voice trailed off achingly, and Bail could hear the tears hiding behind her voice.

“I had a plan. And now this. And now the Empire. And now Fox won’t snap out of the Blackout mission. Now every clone is under orders, and they’re not waking up. Now I can’t reach him .”

With jerky movements, she poured herself another cup of steaming tea, gulping the scalding drink to hide her tears and avoid Bail’s gaze.

He didn’t have words for what he felt, watching his young friend try not to cry into her tea. But he’d felt it before, felt it as he’d watched Padme weep over Anakin, watched Nala cry in the circle of her children, watched Obi-Wan’s face crumple as he realized that not even the Temple had withstood the Emperor. It was warm, dark, helpless emptiness. A sharp-edged and bleeding sympathy. A salty taste on his tongue like tears.

He didn’t have the words, so he simply reached across the table and took Riyo’s hands, giving her all the comfort he could offer there and then. A few quiet moments passed while Riyo wrestled her tears away, then she sniffed and pulled her hand back, wiping at her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly, “I’m not here to dump this all on you. I’m here to tell you what’s going on. I want you to know why I’m going to disappear very soon. I don’t want you to worry when I do. I’m going to take Fox and as many clones as I can back home. I’m going to figure out what’s wrong with them. I’m going to fight for them. And I’m going to get them back.”

She took Bail’s hands again, and he squeezed hers hard, nodding his understanding, trying to push away the dying light in his chest that screamed it was unfair. It was unfair that he had to lose all his allies right when he needed them most. It was unfair that he had to lose all of his friends to this wretched, wretched reality. He couldn’t do this alone. It was unfair.

But it also wasn’t about him. It was about them, about their safety. It was about the dead and gone Republic. It was about the Temple burning in the night. It was about the younglings hiding for their lives from the clones who would have chosen to die for them rather than harm them. It was about Padme and her unborn children, who were going to breathe their first breaths in this dark and screaming galaxy.

It was about Zett, alone in the shadows of Bail’s apartment, trying not to bleed out into the Force that should have cradled him.

“Alright,” he finally breathed through a dry mouth and an aching throat. “I’m glad that somebody’s fighting for them.”

And it was only then, as he took a deep breath and sipped his now lukewarm tea, that his mind caught on something she’d said earlier. He sputtered through his sip of tea, nearly spitting it back into his cup.

“Wait, did you say something about a baby ?”

“Oh,” Riyo’s cheeks flushed a dark, dark blue. “The marriage traditions of my father’s tribe require, ah, consummation. So, um, Fox and I… we have a son. He’s 3 months old. His name is Silver. He’s with my parents.”

And Bail’s brain could only manage to wonder more seriously if truly every woman he knew was hiding secret families from him. He might need to ask Mon some pointed questions before she went through with her plan.

By the Force, she had better not have kids.

Chapter Text

For a time, the only thing Ash knew was that his head hurt . It felt as though a legion of his brothers were thumping across the tender flesh of his brain in full kit, bringing thousands of shining white boots down on his head with every beat of his heart.

Where… his tortured brain began What… but both questions were interrupted before completion by a white flash of pain that carved his brain from his skull. Hazy images blurred in the light, as though seen through tears. But, as the moments passed in screaming heartbeats, the memories resolved themselves to a painfully sharp clarity. The lines of them edged with that bright white pain.

His general turned to look at him, dark eyes wide with something he might have called fear, except that he’d never seen that emotion on her face. She raised a dark hand, and he did too, except his was holding a blaster… except his was pointing directly at her.

Her hand clenched, hurling padawn-commander Rin away from him. His hand clenched too… around the trigger… of the blaster… pointed directly at General Nayat.

His was not the only bolt that hit her. From behind her, a group of clones between her and the Temple filled her back with holes. But his hit, too, a red laser leaving a smoking black crater where her heart should be. He was at close enough range that the nominal armor she wore did nothing against the laser bolt.

His general fell, wounds still smoking, on the red-lit landing pad of the Temple.

He turned to little Rin. She stared up at him with a pale face and blue eyes so wide with fear they didn’t look human; they were just the glassy pools that reflected the terror of prey in the face of its hunter. 

He raised his blaster, laser bolts from the other clones already beginning to fly around them.

She charged him, lightsaber blazing in her hands, tears gleaming in streaks along her cheeks.

His hand squeezed the trigger. Her lightsaber carved through his head.

Bright…

…White…

…PAIN

And then…

…Darkness…

The memory receded, dragging its claws as it backed out of his gutted consciousness, leaving long and bloody furrows in the ground.

Ash recoiled, and reality shivered as his head flashed with pain.

He was suddenly aware that he had a body because his arms flailed uselessly, trying to bat the images away, sore muscles screaming with the movement as stiff and floppy legs thumped ineffectually against the ground. He had eyes, too, trapped in darkness beneath closed lids, feeling as gritty as though dust coated them inside and out like on Halvin II. But they were there because it must be them that were crying the warm tears he felt sliding down his cheeks. 

He could taste the salt and the gritty, sour dust, and so he must have a mouth as well. That mouth was probably what was making the inhuman hiccups and wails he was hearing. And he was hearing them, so he must have ears, despite the ringing in his head that tried to convince him he could hear nothing.

He tried to open his eyes, and reality shivered again, light from the world outside himself melting his brain with its all-consuming, agonizing brightness.

He slammed his lids shut again, and in the after image of the blinding light was Rin’s face, staring up at him, eyes too wide and face washed out beyond color by the white agony of his head.

He raised his blaster…

Oh, Force, oh, gods, oh, kark… what had he done ?

All further thought was washed away by the blinding pain of trying to force his eyes open again. All coherence dissolved, and he was left with nothing but his horror and his tears as he blinked rapidly, willing the burning light around him to resolve into images.

His body was far more obedient than his eyes, pulling and stretching until he was on his knees, then unsteadily, inch by inch, on his feet. If it hurt to stand up, then the pulsing white screams in his head were the most effective numbing agent he’d ever used, because he could barely feel his body at all.

And finally, the image appeared with a rush of recognition followed by a rush of burning bile rising up his throat.

The landing platform.

He had to kneel again as the world swayed around him, still too bright and far more unsteady than it should have been. The bile rushed up his throat and out of his mouth before he was even aware of it, spraying across that worn metal his general had died on.

Before he’d even finished the thought, without even bothering to wipe the vile, acidic taste from his mouth, Ash lurched to his feet, head pounding with tangled, half-formed thoughts, and turned to look at where his white-edged memories told him his general’s body was.

She wasn’t there.

Neither was little Rin.

There were only several blaster burns, scuffed into the resilient metal of the platform.

If there had been anything else in his stomach, he likely would have thrown up again. But he’d already emptied himself, and now his throat choked on nothing, squeezing strangled noises out of his mouth.

His vision blurred at the edges with white pain as he lifted his gaze to the Temple.

In the cold light of the afternoon sun, the fire damage was clear. One of its towers had collapsed, and several crashed speeders dotted the platforms nearer it.

Beyond that, Ash could somehow see - could somehow know - that it was dead .

The Temple was empty and dead.

For a few thundering heartbeats, there was only the pain and the horror that tried to drag him under a dark and sour tide and hold his head underneath to drown.

Then his lungs were screaming because he hadn’t been breathing, and black spots danced in his vision. He realized that he had begun to stumble toward the gutted monolith looming over the skyline like the carcass of some giant beast.

He only got close enough to see the white figures patrolling the stairs and walkways, swarming like ants over the crashed speeders, wriggling in and out of the scorched carcass like maggots.

From behind her, a group of clones between her and the Temple filled her back with holes.

Ash turned and ran blindly, head pulsing too loudly for him to form a thought. All he had was some animal instinct screaming without words away! away! Get away!

What had they done?

For a while, the world was a blur of white light and washed-out colors. It was too bright, and his head hurt and so instinct set Ash running for the deepest shadows he could find. It was only when he slipped and fell into something so foul-smelling that it penetrated his vague and screaming mind that he managed thought again.

He was in some shadowed, rank alley, packed full of dumpster bins and refuse. He hadn’t descended too many levels in his haze, because the street was still tinted blue from the true sky; however, he must have wandered down a few, because alleys up near the Senate level were not allowed to stink this badly.

Whatever he had fallen in was splattered across his armor, as was his vomit from before that, and beneath both of those, the smell of blaster smoke and death. He thought of the gleaming white armor patrolling the dead Temple and stripped, keeping only his boots and his utility belt to cover his blacks.

His helmet pulled and tore as he tugged it off. He would have screamed, but the white-hot lightning dancing through his brain, slicing and cauterizing his thoughts, had already driven all the air from his lungs. Bits of blackened, melted plastoid crumbled away as the helmet fell from his nerveless fingers. Melted plastoid stuck to his skin, surrounding the pulsing, beating, molten pool of pain that started at his temple and blossomed across his brain, writhing with white-hot barbs. A slash was burned through the side of his helmet.

Her lightsaber carved through his head…

He dropped his shaking fingers before he could touch the wound. 

She had tried to kill him. Little Rin had tried to kill him. His friend, his little padawan-commander who he’d been fighting beside for the last year, had tried to take his head off with her lightsaber.

And he… he’d tried to kill her. He’d pointed his gun at her, he’d pulled the trigger .

He was vaguely aware that his legs were shaking underneath him as he staggered away from the helmet staring up at him with its blackened streak.

Rin wouldn’t have done that, she wouldn’t do that, if it wasn’t all real. If he hadn’t turned his gun on her. If he hadn’t turned it on General Nayat. But she had, so he must have.

The edges of his thoughts frayed in the blazing pain pulsing through his mind, but that realization stayed sharp and clear.

He had done it.

He’d killed Nayat.

He’d killed Rin.

He’d killed his Jedi.

He was on his knees in another alley, narrow walls pressing in from the sides, from above him. The pain tasted cold and coppery in his mouth as his whole body shivered. He felt like something inside him was trying to climb out, his muscles trying to shake off the skin that covered them and abandon ship; abandon the blood on his hands.

Nayat looking at him with fear in her face.

The pounding in his head enveloped him, ringing metallic in his ears, tongue coated in bitter iron.

Rin’s wide blue eyes staring up at him.

The pain in his head swelled like the waves on Kamino, swallowing him up in darkness and salt, and freezing emptiness.

His lungs screamed. He couldn’t breathe. The pain pounded like hammer blows. He couldn’t breathe. Black spots danced in his eyes. He couldn’t breathe. The ringing grew louder, pealing like screams. He couldn’t breathe. The agony flashed white-hot cracks across his vision. He couldn’t breathe. His head drifted away from his body.

He couldn’t breathe.

And then he could.

There was a hand on his chest, and cool air came washing through his starving lungs, dousing the fire of his pain as it went.

“When called me here, the Force did, expecting to find a trooper with soul intact, I was not,” a voice croaked from below him, despite the fact that he was already kneeling.

Ash cracked open eyes he hadn’t realized he’d closed. The pain receded when it should have spiked, murmuring in the back of his mind instead of screaming as he tried to gather his thoughts. His eyelashes were wet with tears he didn’t remember crying, the skin around his eyes tight with the salt left behind from their trails.

He blinked several times at the small, familiar figure, trying to make out details in the dim light of the alley. Trying to make his brain work and explain what was going on.

The small, clawed hand stayed firmly pressed against his chest.

“General Yoda?”

The little Jedi huffed.

“A general am I?” he asked bitterly. “An army I have?”

He pulled his hand away, and Ash groaned as the blinding pain returned, flashing up and down his nerves, pulsing white-hot in his brain.

“No, a Jedi Master, I am. A better Jedi, I should have been before.”

He watched Ash stagger to his feet with a face carved deeply with exhaustion and sorrow, the wrinkles in his ancient skin turned to gashes by his loss.

“Come with me, you should. Allies to contact, I have. Help you, they may,” he tapped his cane thoughtfully, eyeing Ash. “And help us, you may.”

***

In the gray dark of very early morning, Ashla prodded at the coals of last night’s fire, trying to awaken a small flame from the smoking embers. Her stomach growled unhappily, the rumble echoing up her lekku to the hollows of her montrals, reminding her that she’d had no dinner the night before, but she ignored it. She knew she was well capable of going for several days without food if necessary.

The man curled up on the ground beside her stirred, armor clacking beneath the dirty poncho he wore as he sat up. His dark face was haggard, and even in the dim light, she could see the hollows beneath his eyes and the rough blonde stubble beginning to take over his face.

“How’s it looking?” he croaked with a disused voice, scrubbing at his eyes.

“Nothing to report,” she murmured, eyes heavy from her watch.

Well, it was not only from her watch, she knew. It was from the weight of the emptiness all throughout the galaxy pressing down on her, dragging at her limbs. She was weak and empty, and her muscles ached just trying to hold her body up. Her ligaments felt stretched out and brittle as though they’d snap at any moment and all her bones would snap loose. 

It was a hell of a way to find out how much she had relied on the Force for strength all these years; this leaning into it only to have her strength sapped away.

She gave up on the fire and staggered stiffly to her feet. Rex followed suit, shaking the stiffness from his limbs and tightening the armor pieces he’d loosened before trying to catch a few hours of sleep. Neither of them really slept these days.

Neither of them brought up that fact either.

“We should reach town in the next few hours.”

Two days ago, they’d sold their stolen Republic ship at another spaceport on this backwater planet; it was too easy to track, too noticeable. Wanting to put some distance between themselves and the sale, they hadn’t chartered their ride out of that port, instead hiking through several miles of patchworked fields and meadows, heading towards the nearest town with a reasonably-sized spaceport.

They were both good navigators, even on this planet that neither of them had ever been to after only about half a minute’s examination of the planetary map in the space port. It was a skill that a war spent fighting battles on a new planet every week had instilled into them quickly and irrevocably. So they split the last of Rex’s ration bars and trekked onwards, finding themselves at the suburbs of a dusty farming town surrounded by fields blooming in purple by the time the sun had fully pulled its body above the flat horizon.

They hardly stood out in their dusty ponchos and muddy boots as they made their way past the scattered outbuildings of the town and onto the paved streets. Soon, they were surrounded by warehouses and processing facilities that prepared the planet’s produce for transport off-world. Without a word or hesitation, they turned to follow the production line to the spaceport that already buzzed with cargo ships despite the early hour.

They paused unobtrusively in the shadows of the wide columns supporting the roof, tucked out of the way of the crowds making their way towards security checks or docking bays. 

“One of those cargo haulers is probably our best bet,” Ashla murmured to Rex, eyes tracking the big-bellied ships lifting off and landing, cluttering the sky above the port. 

She knew that they were the usual way laborers without ID generally jumped planets, cargo hauler captains accepting a small fee to look the other way as rough-spun sentients slipped into their cargo-holds and camped out amidst the giant crates of their actual cargo.

To be entirely honest, she didn’t know how that system worked precisely. She had been a wartime Jedi, and wartime Jedi were given missions and ships to complete those missions. Her grandmaster had served during the days when a Jedi used such unofficial systems to travel. Her master had as well, but given his skill as a pilot, he’d often been granted ships by the Order for his missions.

Even her time alone had not taught her this sort of travel. She’d been given credits and an ID by the Order when she’d left. She’d been able to pay or work for passage legally when she’d wanted to travel.

Her fingers tugged nervously at the hem of her poncho as she considered the ships, her brain trying to shuffle a rough plan into shape. She could figure this out, she was sure, but the difficulty was doing it in such a way that it didn’t stand out to those around them.

No, the real difficulty was that she was doing this alone. No Force to guide her, to shine a path forward. No nudges or premonitions. No sense of the honesty and emotions of the beings around her. Just a weight dragging at her limbs like mud.

She let out a low, almost meditative breath, willing the bubbling in her stomach to settle as she turned back to Rex.

“Let’s go,” she said, slipping along the walls towards the large docking bays holding the cargo ships. And Rex nodded, eyes steady beneath his dirty bandana, and followed her easily, without question, because he trusted her judgement.

Somehow, that hung as heavily on her shoulders as the sodden, empty Force.

She approached the bays slowly, carefully, as though she expected the ground to be mined, watching the world around her from the shadows as she pulled her hood up. Rex followed suit, tugging the hood of his poncho up and stepping carefully behind her, though his plastoid boots were not as silent as her synth-leather-clad feet were.

Her vigilance was rewarded when she saw a few similarly clad figures stopping by a Bothan man in orange uniform overalls lounging on a crate. A few brief words were exchanged between them, something passed hands, and then the figures slipped into the open hold, ignored by the workers busily shoving giant crates on hovercarts.

Squaring her shoulders and cycling another deep breath through her lungs, Ashla signalled for Rex to wait where he was with a quick hand sign and strode over to the dark-furred man lounging on his crate.

“ Lookin’ fer passage, little miss ,” he drawled in Huttsese. It was times like these in which she was especially grateful that her master had insisted on teaching her Huttsese himself, because if she’d only gone through the Temple courses, she never would have understood him through the thick accent of the Outer Rim.

“ For two ,” she replied simply, hands clenching around her bag of credits beneath her cloak. The less Huttsese she had to speak, the better; her accent was far too Core for her own good.

“Fourteen bit,” he named his price in Basic.

Asha did as her master had taught her and simply looked at the man, unimpressed, managing a slight eye roll at the price. In truth, she had no idea if it was a fair price or not; actually, to her, it seemed laughably low for two people’s passage. But her master said people always overcharged, and only the Core Rim dainties named a fair price at first.

The man bared his teeth at her, though it was slightly more smile than snarl. 

“Twelve bits, girl,” he groaned, “But I don’t negotiate.”

Ashla decided she’d pushed her luck - and her nerves - about as far as she wanted for this exchange and nodded, counting out the credits underneath her poncho. It would be foolish to let the man see how full her pouch was. Most people did not carry a ship’s worth of credits on them. She handed them over carefully as the man’s lips twisted into something that looked more genuinely like a smile.

“We pull out in a half,” he said gruffly. “Git yourself aboard or git left behind.” Then he slid off his crate to go yell at his crew.

Ignoring the lively sound of the crew yelling back and the metallic scraping as another crate was slid off its hovercart and into the hold, Ashla turned back to Rex.

And then she froze, the bubbling nerves in her stomach suddenly spiking and sending adrenaline pumping through her veins.

Another hooded figure was over by Rex, standing between her and Rex, and from all appearances, talking to him. Getting noticed was not a good thing.

Body humming with energy, she crept closer, placing her feet as carefully as possible, waiting to hear whether or not Rex was in trouble before she acted. She was hardly breathing as she took another step closer to the man wrapped in a brown cloak in front of her.

Over the man’s shoulder, she could see that Rex’s face was pale, and his eyes were wide with fear. Her friend seemed frozen, not even noticing her behind the figure.

Muscles tightening, she swallowed down a dry throat, her hand slipping to the vibroknife beneath her poncho, her blood buzzing in her lekku. 

And then the man in front of her huffed a breath somewhere between a sigh and a laugh.

“Captain, would you please tell ‘Soka not to stab me in the back?” An amused voice asked politely, light and familiar in its Core accent. “It would be rather rude after all the trouble I went through trying to find you two.”

Her nerveless fingers slipped from her knife handle as all breath wheezed out of her lungs like someone had driven a fist into her abdomen.

“Mas…” she began, gasping the word, then cutting it off just as quickly, her brain screaming distantly about the danger of saying it out loud. But even that was a hazy side note as Master Obi-Wan turned, joy crinkling in lines at the edge of his eyes as he beamed at her.

“Just Ben, my dear,” he said softly as he wrapped his arms around her. “Thank the Force you’re alive.”

And suddenly she could breathe again. Suddenly, she could breathe and laugh and cry as she sank into her grandmaster’s embrace.

Suddenly the wet weight of the empty Force was not enough to bow her shoulders and suck her strength away. With her grandmaster’s arms around her, it was suddenly a burden she could bear.

***

Obi-Wan had found the crash they’d left behind as he was trying to track them down, and then he’d found the graveyard where she and Rex had buried all the clones they couldn’t save. And when he’d knelt to pay his respects, just as she had, he’d found her lightsabers.

Once the three of them were on his ship, safely in hyperspace, he brought them out.

“I know you buried these for a reason,” he said softly, running gentle fingers over the scuffed silver hilts. “But, if you’d reconsider…” he did not look up to meet her eyes, where she sat in the seat across from him. “The Galaxy needs Jedi more than ever now.”

Ashla tried to mask her tears with a smile, but she could feel a bitter twist in the corners of her lips, and the tears swelled in her eyes anyway, as she clenched her fists in her lap.

“I’m not a Jedi, Master,” she replied just as softly, the dull pain prickling in her center as it always did. It was not bitterness anymore, hadn’t been for months now, but the pain was still there, like prodding at a bruise that hadn’t quite healed.

His hands reached out and wrapped around hers, his skin sickly pale against her vibrant orange.

“You’ve always been a Jedi, Ahsoka. Even when you were not a member of the Order, you were a Jedi.”

His thumbs stroked across her knuckles, his eyes dragged up to meet hers, blue and earnest and holding nothing but truth as the ship hummed around them.

“There isn’t a Republic for you to swear yourself to, anymore,” his voice trembled, but that did not stop him. “So do as the Jedi of old did; swear yourself to the Force and take your blades in service to it.”

In Ashla’s chest, something tender and full yawned wide with longing, pushing up around her heart, climbing up her throat so that, for a moment, she could not speak. She simply squeezed her grandmaster's hands as tightly as she could in her own and focused on being able to breathe.

Finally, finally, she was able to get the words out. “I swear myself to the Order and the Force.” She modified the traditional words she had said once before, standing before the Council right before she was shipped off to join her new master in the field. An oath she had expected to repeat only at her Knighting. “I swear my life to service and my strength to peace. I swear my soul and my blades to service of the Force.”

And then Ahsoka Tano took her lightsabers from her grandmaster and clipped them to her belt.

Chapter Text

Zett Jukassa lay very still in his bed, eyes wide open and staring up into the dark. Senator Organa had asked if he wanted a light left on or the door cracked open, but Zett had simply shaken his head. It wasn’t the warm darkness of the room that bothered him; in fact, that felt comforting, like closing his eyes in the middle of an embrace. The darkness of the room breathed gently and cocooned him in the blue warmth that had seeped into every inch of this place where Senator Organa and his unending kindness lived.

And yet, thus cocooned, and though he was so tired that his eyes felt as though they had been washed in saltwater, Zett could not sleep. 

He had not slept in three days. That first night, he hadn’t even had a moment to feel tired. That first night he hadn’t felt much of anything besides cold, as he’d tried to protect the delicate little warmth of the younglings from being snuffed out in the freezing wind of the Force. The next day, being there with the warmth of the younglings and the anchor of Senator Organa had helped. The frost creeping up his toes and fingertips had melted away as the younglings built their own little system in the sky, feeding each other in a loop of warmth and innocence.

But he’d known better than to sleep that night. 

The cold was no longer trying to kill him with every breath, but the edges of himself were still too blurry. The dust that made up his being too ready to drift away at a breath.

He’d had bad nights before, hours when his master had sat vigil to help Zett hold on to himself. Given his master’s visions and Zett’s tenuous connection to his own body, the two of them had never been made soldiers in the war. Their missions had always been short and close to home, tucked away from the death and ravaging cold spreading from the frontlines. And still, he’d had times when all he could do was cling to the pull of his master and wait for his own sense of self to solidify.

But even those nights had never been as bad as now.

He hadn’t realized really what he was doing that night that the Temple burned. He’d just drifted out as far as he could, searching for anyone at all in the cold. His master had just died, his tether gone, and he’d hurled himself into the sea anyway. He should have been swallowed by the waves. Every bit of his soul should have been consumed into the Force.

It was a miracle that he’d made it back more or less intact. And still, he was missing things, he knew, like when Senator Organa had arrived back from his meeting wrapped in a soft pink surprise muddied with weariness and had asked Zett what his favorite food was. Zett hadn’t known, couldn’t remember. 

Surely he must once have had a food he preferred over others, but it was gone now, lost in the blurred colors where Zett ended and the Force began. And more of himself kept trying to drift away like dust in a breeze. But the Force had sang something about pasta and so that was what Zett asked for.

He was pretty sure he had enjoyed it.

But now he was warm and tired, with the food digesting comfortably in his full stomach, staring into the darkness. Now he breathed out, half expecting his breath to cloud in the cold Force that had moved in to fill the younglings’ absence. 

It didn’t, of course, because his breath was part of his body and his body was not in the Force. It wasn’t his body that was cold, it was his being, shivering beneath his skin, wearing his body like the thinnest of blankets.

He was warm and he was tired, but he was so, so cold. He knew he should not sleep when he was so cold. When the edges of himself blurred into Force so much that he didn’t know which parts were him and which were the Force, and which were them coloring each other.

A few rooms away, Bail Organa pulled at him, gathering the dust of his being, sheltering him in a system of warmth and light, shot through with a purple determination so fierce it was blinding. Zett concentrated on that pull, grounding his being in it, burying himself in it like a youngling diving beneath a pile of pillows and blankets.

The shivering beneath his skin lessened, his soul settling a little more firmly into his body, his eyes dipped closed and he wrestled them open, sliding out from under the blankets around him. If the temperature of his body changed when he abandoned the warmth of his bed, he didn’t notice. He let the pull of warmth and heavy, pressing light guide him across the dark apartment. Every step he took closer settled him further, chased the chill away just a little more. 

“Zett?” Senator Organa was sitting on his bed, dressed in silk pajamas that rippled with a rich blue sheen as he leaned forward from the datapad he’d been looking over.

Zett’s body was too heavy to keep upright, so he let himself fall onto the other side of the bed, feeling his soul swell warmly to fit inside his skin as Organa’s pull wrapped around him firmly. There was a weight to Organa, a weight to his determination, a weight to that heavy burden of kindness he so unflinchingly carried. It settled across Zett and pressed his drifting being back into place.

“Zett, are you alright?”

Ah, yes, he should speak. He should say something. Zett’s sleepy brain reached for the words through the warmth of Senator Organa’s gleaming silver presence. He needed to ask first, like crechemaster Beren-Leien had taught him when he was little.

“Can I stay here?” he asked, curling into the senator’s presence.

He could feel Senator Organa stiffen a little, surprise shifting through him in a wave of dull pink. Zett pulled back, forcing himself to sit up despite his head being heavy and full of soft, warm clouds. In a memory an echo of his master’s voice reminded him about waiting for permission before he invaded someone’s space. Some of the other Jedi had such strong pulls, but, despite Jedi culture being rather tactile, not everyone was prepared to get hugs from strange padawans because “their light was so bright and beautiful.”

“Does it help?” Senator Organa asked after a moment of hesitation.

“Yes,” Zett said, trying to find the words to describe what it felt like to be able to just exist steadily in his own skin in Organa’s presence. But he didn’t need to.

“Then yes,” Organa said and Zett immediately curled up beside him again.

As he drifted off to sleep, he was vaguely aware of a hand stroking his hair. It was nice. And even nicer, he was pretty sure that when he woke up, he would still be Zett, in his own body, with hair to stroke.

***

Bail Organa woke with eyes gritty from too little sleep 5 minutes before his alarm went off. The warm weight by his side reminded him why his brain was frantically insisting he get to his alarm before it started screaming into the sleepy silence. Poor Zett had climbed into bed with him a little after midnight and fallen asleep immediately, obviously exhausted. He didn’t need to be woken up 6 hours later by Bail’s alarm.

Stifling a groan Bail pulled himself out of bed, realizing, not for the first time, that he was getting too old to run on a rough 5 hours of sleep. Especially not coming off of two rather sleepless nights before. He remembered longingly the early days of his first term when he could get three hours of sleep at night and a three hour nap in the afternoon and be just fine for the remaining 18 hours of the day cycle.

Still, he knew, as his hand came down on the alarm face set into the wall and it brightened to show a cheery “Alarm Skipped!” on the screen, automatically bringing up the lights in his room to a dim orange, he truly didn’t miss those days all that much. He enjoyed sleeping full nights, in fact. He just didn’t necessarily enjoy needing to sleep full nights.

The dim lights glinted off Zett’s sleeping face, outlining the round edge of his cheek in orange. Bail resisted the urge to reach over and smooth down a wayward lock of the boy’s hair that stuck up in a way that defied gravity. He didn’t want to wake him.

A few hours later, when he’d showered, dressed, had his first cup of tea, received a message from Breha disguised as a poem that told him how her guests were doing, attended a brief meeting a with a few of the former Delegation senators, had his second cup of tea, worked through his forest of messages, had his third cup of tea, and survived several calls with allies, potential allies, and enemies all trying to subtly or not-so-subtly feel out where he was standing on new issues and policies, he was starting to rethink the decision not wake Zett. He was just starting to consider messaging Breha to ask if she knew how long children should sleep for when Zett shuffled out of the bedroom.

His hair was wild and his eyes were sleepy, his gaze settling on Bail immediately. Then he smiled a soft, sleepy smile and padded over, throwing his arms around Bail’s middle. It was the warmest hug Bail had ever received, washing through him like a cup of hot tea on a cold afternoon. Bail couldn’t help but hug him back.

“Good morning, Zett.”

“G’morning, Senator Organa,” Zett mumbled into Bail’s shirt.

Bail huffed a laugh, feeling that warmth pulsing even brighter in his middle as he ruffled the boy’s messy hair, and eventually Zett pulled away.

 “You can just call me, Bail, if you like.”

Zett said nothing, but wrinkled his nose in clear distaste. Bail had met enough Jedi children to know that they had a general dislike for calling adults by their first names and he couldn’t help another soft laugh as he turned on the kettle to heat some water for tea.

“How about Aija, then?” he offered, pulling out his various boxes of tea to let Zett pick a flavor. “It’s a formal Alderaanian term, similar in meaning to the Basic ‘uncle’.”

Which was mostly true, though Alderaan did not really have formal titles of affection. The actual Alderaanian term for uncle translated to something like “second father,” and Aija was a step out from that, usually used with a family member that someone was not close with but didn’t want to address with a formal title such as “sir”.

“Aija,” Zett tasted the word, then his smile widened and he nodded.

“Now, what kind of tea do you like?” Bail held out his eclectic collection, dropping a bag of his preferred heavily spiced black tea into his own cup.

Zett looked the tea bags over, smile fading into seriousness as he considered, a little line of thought wrinkled between his eyes. Then suddenly his smile was back, wider and more blinding than ever and the whole room seemed to get just a little brighter as a result.

“I like Purple Charsis tea!” he declared, snatching the tea bag out of the box Bail held, cradling it in his hands like it was some valuable object. He practically danced over to his cup and plopped the tea bag in, still grinning as the kettle began to hiss with steam and chimed to let them know the water had boiled.

Feeling the edges of his lips still curved upward with a smile, Bail poured the water while Zett darted to the bathroom to get ready for the day. He was back on his datapad by the time Zett came back, shuffling his way through the messages that had piled up since he’d put the device down. They drank tea and ate the last of the cakes for breakfast, while Bail studiously ignored all the notifications calling for his attention.

Then, as Zett was rinsing the teacups out, he turned suddenly to the door.

“Master Yoda is coming,” he said softly, head cocked to the side, a wrinkle between his eyes. “He has a clone with him. He’s all whited out by pain, but he’s there.”

It took Bail’s brain a moment to parse that.

“He has a clone that isn’t…” He trailed off, not sure how to describe what had happened to the clones; Was it mind control? Factory reset? Something else entirely? So far, the only description he’d really received was Zett saying that their souls were missing.

And wait, Riyo had said something too, hadn’t she? Used a term he hadn’t heard before; blackout mission .

He was pulled from that thought by Zett dropping the mugs into the sink and hurrying to the door. He opened it and a tall figure wrapped in a cloak stepped through, Zett shutting the door behind them quickly.

The figure got quite a bit shorter when the top part scrambled down and stepped out of the folds of cloth to become Master Yoda, moving spryly without his cane. The rest of the figure detangled itself to reveal, as Zett had predicted, a clone, wearing only his boots, belt, and blacks. A torn scrap of cloth was wrapped around his head like a bandage.

“Ash, this is. Himself, he is.” Master Yoda announced without preamble. “Wounded, he is also.” Master Yoda thumped his cane, which had apparently appeared in his hands out of thin air, to emphasize his next statement. “Smuggled off of Coruscant, he must be.”

“Hello, Ash,” Bail greeted, eyes straying once again to that makeshift bandage as his brain hurriedly sorted through what must be done now. 

A clone who was himself was a miracle, and one they desperately needed to figure out how to replicate. What he really needed to do was get Ash to Riyo. But he didn’t know where she was and couldn’t risk her plans by trying to track her down. No, he would need to get Ash to Alderaan first. Once Riyo resurfaced, then he could send him her way.

Ash shuffled, face lined by weariness and pain.

“General Yoda said you could get me to people that might be able to figure out how I… woke up.”

“I know of one who’s actively working right now on trying to save your brothers,” Bail nodded. “I can’t get you to her yet, but I can get you and Master Yoda off-planet to Alderaan, to wait until it’s safe to send you to her.”

Ash frowned, dirt-streaked lines of his face creasing around clean tracks left by recent tears.

“She’s… trustworthy?” he asked. “I mean no disrespect, sir,” he added hastily, “But…”

“But you’re people are being used against their will to do things they would never choose to do, and you need an ally, not another scientist running an experiment,” Bail finished for him when the man stumbled.

“Yes, sir,” Ash nodded, relief at his understanding softening just a few of the lines carved into his face.

“She is,” Bail held his eyes, trying to communicate his absolute honesty. “And all she cares about is finding a way to save your brothers. She’s married to a clone. She’ll do whatever it takes.”

That statement pulled Ash up short, his mouth dropping open slightly as he stared.

“She’s… what ?”

“Married,” Bail repeated himself simply, fighting off the smile trying to edge its way onto his lips at the other man’s bewilderment, “To a clone.” It felt nice to get to be the one delivering the shocking news this time.

Ash continued to stare. Zett was giggling softly, as though this conversation were the most amusing thing he had ever heard.

“And they have a child,” Bail added helpfully. He hadn’t thought the man could look more flabbergasted, but he did, eyes going wide and face going two shades paler than its natural coloring.

“So, I’m rather confident in her trustworthiness,” Bail finished and the man nodded numbly.

Master Yoda tapped his cane against the floor again, drawing everyone’s attention.

“Glad, I am, that sorted, that is,” he began, eyes turning to Bail, “For go back, we must, to leaving the planet, who is.” His eyes narrowed, the wrinkles around them deepening, “For leaving the planet, I am not!” He banged his cane on the ground for emphasis. “More Jedi here, or coming here, there may well be.”

That pulled Bail’s attention from his amusement and his hope to the plans already in motion. He took a breath, feeling cold determination settle in his chest.

“Master Yoda,” he said, “I need your help. There’s someone I need help saving.” The Jedi Master’s stubborn wrinkles softened and Bail knew he was at least willing to listen. “I have a plan,” he explained, “But you would have to flee the planet  when it's over.”

Master Yoda scowled thoughtfully, leaning heavily on his cane. No one else said a word as he considered in silence. Then his ears twitched as he seemed to come to a decision. 

“This plan,” he commanded, “tell me.”

***

Bail was not surprised when his comm beeped with the notice that an emergency Senate session had been called. He noted without surprise that the Emperor’s seal was not affixed at the bottom of this notice.

He simply swallowed the heavy dread slowly dripping through his veins like icy saltwater and ignored the ways his hands tried to tremble as he fastened his gray silk cape, clipping it to the epaulet on his right shoulder and wrapping it under his left arm to clip the other corner over his heart. He carefully straightened his collar and arranged the silver chains draped over his chest. He ignored the buzzing in his stomach and the way his intestines seemed to shiver low in his middle as he straightened his cuffs and polished his cufflinks.

He did not usually take so much care for a Senate meeting, but this session was different.

Mon had given him as much warning as she could. He was going to be as prepared as possible.

So with the last touches in place, Bail hurried to the Senate chamber. He waited outside the door to his pod, watching the Senators buzzing around him, most in confusion, some in fear as they made their way to their pods. But there were a few with faces as stone-hard as Bail’s, dressed in all their finery as they strode purposefully to their pods.

He saw the ripples in the hallway before he saw her, sentients moving out of the way, feet whispering over scarlet carpet as they stared.

Mon Mothma did not walk down the hall; she strode , powerful step after powerful step, as though every problem of hers was laid across the floor and she was grinding them to dust beneath her heels. Bail had thought no one could wear righteous fury quite like Padme. But Mon wasn’t wearing it; she simply was cold fury, from her flapping white silks to her face made up elegant and severe, her eyes outlined darkly like some ancient, vengeful goddess from Alderaanian myth. 

She came through the halls like a storm, the aura of power she had always carried turned to something dark and eminently dangerous. A force of nature; a hurricane. Those gathered in the hallway were silent in her wake, hushed in the awe and fear that hung oppressively in the air of her passing. Even the laggards hurried to their pods after Mon passed by.

Bail stepped through the door and into his pod, trying to remind his lungs how to breathe as his hands clenched tightly around the pod’s controls. He launched from the wall, steeling himself as the whole of the Senate chamber came into view, pods full, many already hovering as their occupants edged forward. 

Mon’s statement had already begun. It had begun with that message, with an orange starbird at the bottom instead of the Emperor’s seal. It had begun with the simple way she had strode down that hall, carrying herself like the world ought to fall at her feet. It was beginning right now, as the extra lights around the Senate chamber dimmed, leaving only the central light shining down on the Chancellor’s pod.

It had already begun, and Bail was just along for the ride.

The Chancellor’s pod rose in the center of the chamber, the shadows around the Emperor seeming to writhe in fury as the attention of the gathered sentients fell on him.

“Who dares to call this emergency meeting?” Palpatine hissed into the speaker of his pod. Even from where he was docked on the wall, Bail could see the burning yellow eyes peering out from under the hood’s shadow. He didn’t have the Force, but he was relatively certain that the chill sinking into his bones as the Sith Emperor scanned the gathered senators was not due to natural causes.

“This is treason against…”

A sudden shrill feedback screech cut off Palapatine’s threat. A clicking pulled Bail’s eyes down to his own pod’s speaker system, now flashing the yellow warning “Disabled.” Bail did not sway as his head grew faint. Mon Mothma had somehow disabled the speaker systems of every pod in the Senate, including the Emperor’s. The murmurs of surprise from thousands of sentients from ten thousand planets barely made a dent in the new silence.

And then Mon Mothma rose into view, her pod taking the floor far above the emperor’s. 

From twisting gold decorations on her shoulders fell layers of white gauze, sheer and shining like waterfalls. Her train was pure white, her clothing snowy silk accented with silver. Gold bracelets wrapped her bare arms, and a gold belt crowned her middle. 

She caught the light and shone .

In the way the Emperor in his dark robes seemed to eat the light and spread shadows, Mon Mothma fed the light and reflected it to the world around her.  She was the Emperor’s antithesis, and she had the senate captive.

Padme had always dressed for show, but now Bail knew that Mon Mothma did it better. She was going down, but she was doing it with a dramatic flair even Obi-Wan couldn’t have aspired to. 

She had a point to make, and she was going to make it if it killed her.

Absolute silence reigned as every eye turned to Mon Mothma. It was then that Bail realized that Mon had always been the best person to make this scene; to hold the Senate captive and broadcast a statement to the galaxy.

Because Mon Mothma was not like Padme, was not like Riyo Chuchi, or even Bail himself. She had believed in the Republic not for its ideals, not for the good it could do, or even for what it could become under kind guidance. Mon Mothma’s Republic was first and foremost legal and just. She did not care to have a kind government so long as it was a fair government. 

“People,” she’d told Bail once after Padme had, in exhaustion-induced anger, accused her of being heartless after Mon had reduced some kindness-focused bill of hers to nothing but its impractical legal bits.  “Can be kind up until two things: The kindness kills them, or the government does. The galaxy cannot be a kind place if it is not first a just place. It is up to the government to be just, to be fair. It is up to people to be kind.”

But now, Mon Mothma glimmered in the light of the Senate chamber, as furious and implacable as a storm. The Republic had died in its corruption, and the Empire had been born from it without a bone of justice in its body. Padme and Bail had been fighting a losing battle for the Republic’s soul for years now. 

Mon Mothma had lost her fight for its bones all at once.

And it was those bones that gave her a platform to stand on now. Her reason, her practicality. The trust even her enemies had been able to place in her to always do the sensible thing. It was what held her up now, even as she took Palpatine’s power from him for a brief moment and spoke against him

Mon Mothma was the final cry of justice as it died, and she was out for blood.

So, Bail listened to her speak. He listened to the brief words she flung at the Emperor and his Empire like a Molotov cocktail, the fire ready to break through fragile glass and ignite the galaxy. 

He listened to his pulse pound in his ears as he saw the Emperor’s pod retreat into the shadows of the Senate floor. He listened; the horror and sorrow that had never stopped churning in his stomach since he’d first seen the Temple burning rising as bile in his throat, as he watched Clones in Senate red piling into pods and launching from the wall.

He simply stood, still and placid, as his friend gave her last speech before the Senate.

And then, as the clones reached Mon Mothma’s pod, as the Emperor rose again, face twisted into some melted approximation of a smile, as the emergency lights flared on, painting everything in blinding red, there was a soft hiss as every pod suddenly erupted with clouds of white gas pouring from their fire suppression systems. 

And Bail allowed himself to smile.

By the time the smoke had cleared enough to reveal the center pod, Mon Mothma was no longer in it. Instead, a small figure was perched on the edge, brown robe flapping around him, cane in one hand and lightsaber in the other.

Several senators who had not taken the opportunity to flee during the whiteout turned and ran now, the rest stayed out of some sense of duty or morbid fascination.

“Darth Sidious!” Somehow, Master Yoda’s fragile voice rumbled through the chamber, “Killed the Jedi, you did! Burned the Temple, you did! Judge you, the Force does!”

And though Masters Yoda and Ti had told him that Palpatine had killed several Jedi already, somehow Bail was still surprised to see the red saber that ignited in his hand. The man screeched, and the way that demonic scream shivered through the room set Bail’s skin crawling. His stomach tried to wretch up anything inside it as Bail stumbled back, body moving on instinct, screaming to get away from the noise as his bones tried to claw their way out of his skin.

And then Palpatine moved… Bail had no better word for it than that. It was not the incredible grace of the Jedi, not a Force jump or flip. Sideous was simply in his pod one moment, and the next, he had twisted through the air to try to separate Master Yoda’s head from his shoulders.

Like the rest of his fellows, Bail wisely fled before the two Force-users started throwing Senate pods at each other. Unlike the rest of his fellows, Bail was fleeing to the next step of his plans.

He had quite a few people to get off-planet, after all.

Including, ultimately, himself and his boy.

Chapter Text

Appearance was important on Naboo. It was not just that looking nice was considered socially expected, though that had certainly followed the value placed on appearance. But it was that appearance said things, appearance communicated things about a person. Enough so that many Nabooians could have a whole conversation with just their wardrobe.

Some people certainly cared about it more than others. Some took it too far and some didn’t care at all. But, in general, appearance was culturally and socially important on Naboo.

And for no one more so than Naboo’s rulers and representatives.

Padme Naberrie had learned that from a young age. She remembered her mother’s mother teaching her to do make-up when she was three, explaining the significance of the colors and shapes. Explaining when subtly was important and how to craft a bold statement with creams and powders. She remembered her grandmother’s papery fingers dotting berry red onto her cheeks and her low voice asking her “Now, what do you think? Should I blend it in, or leave it bold?”

“Leave it bold,” she’d declared after careful consideration of everything her grandmother had been telling her. 

And when she’d looked in the mirror with those two spots of red bright against her round cheeks, little Padme had seen a different vision of herself. A bolder, brighter version of her own ego that she’d never seen before.

It was no great surprise that it was the face she’d crafted for Queen Amidala when the time came; a figure of full, bold red, unphased by anything that came her way.

Padme’s grandmother would have been very impressed by Mon Mothma’s presentation of herself - aired over the holonet, shining from every public screen on Alderaan - as she made her final speech before the senate. Color was important on many planets, but on Naboo it was the cut and style of clothes; the material and complexity that really spoke. 

Mon Mothma had a train of sheer white billowing around her, ephemeral and building like a storm. It washed behind her like a wake in stormy water and fluttered around her like wings, contrasting with the shining, clean lines of the silk wrapping the rest of her. The silk was edged with whirling designs embroidered in silver, supporting its own weight with the solid surety of armor, sharp lines outlining the edge of Mon’s figure.

The high neckline of her shirt was propriety, maturity, befitting the experience and power Mon carried. But those bare arms, with simple gold bands around her biceps? That was a declaration of war, an invitation to combat. 

And the gold belt that every line and design in the rest of her get-up was designed to lead to? Well, on Mandalore, gold was for revenge, it was painted onto armor. On Alderaan, gold meant death, their fallen were buried in it. On Chandrilla gold was for promises, exchanged during a vow. 

And on Naboo gold was for hope, a bride wore gold jewelry.

So Mon Mothma stood before the Senate, dripping in defiance. She was a storm of her power and experience. She was a warrior in armor, wrapped in revenge and death. She was a vow of hope to the galaxy.

She said all of that without saying a word as she strode onto the screen that Padme, holding a wide-eyed, quiet Leia, Nala, cradling a dozing Luke, Master Ti, the two quiet padawans, and the younglings were gathered around in Breha’s office. Queen Breha herself was attending a public showing of the speech in the main square in front of the palace, the late night darkness of Alderaan shadowing the faces of the crowd turned out to watch the speech.

And then Mon started speaking, the screen flickering as whatever camera watching her in the Senate chamber tracked the movement of her pod to the spotlight in the silent Senate.

“The Republic was founded at a wedding, at a union in which two became one.” Her voice was not beautiful, it was not smooth and musical, singing to the galaxy. It rolled across the listeners, thundering through the silent Senate almost without inflection. It flowed as smooth and powerful as a freezing river. “It was an intimate union, the Justice of the Republic and the Mercy of the Jedi. Together a combined force that shepherded the galaxy for a millenia.”

Seated crosslegged on the carpet, several of the younglings shivered, leaning into each other as Nala adjusted Luke, holding him even more tightly.

“It has been said that the Empire is the new Republic. A stronger, more unified Republic without its faults and weaknesses.”

Sour anger churned in Padme’s gut. She could see that emotion in the iron line of Mon’s hard face. Cal Kestis hugged his drawn up knees from where he sat beside the silent Caleb Dume on the floor, blinking hard over shining eyes.

“That is a lie.”

The words hung in stillness for a moment, the pause bringing everyone’s attention to what had just been said, to the declaration Mon had just made.

“The Temple has burned. The Jedi are gone. And without them, how does the Republic survive?”

Mon’s eyes caught the camera, blue pearls of a burning sadness and an icy anger, dragging at the camera and the viewers beyond like an anchor.

“It doesn’t,” she stated simply. “The Republic is dead. And I am here for its funeral.”

Somehow, the solemnity of her voice made her words somber and sacred, as though they were declarations from heaven echoing in an ancient temple.

“I am here to bury not one body, but two. Those two and a billion more beside them. Because in this Empire without Justice, in this Empire that has killed Mercy, that grave dug for two will soon overflow with the innocents of every world.”

Sher took a single step forward in her pod, a simple action that screamed in a thousand silent ways of command and resolve as her train rippled white and shining behind her.

“I am here for their funeral, but I swear on this grave that the Empire will receive no such burial.”

“ I will see it burn .”

The last words fell like a hammerblow against metal, sparking and ringing with some piercing note of hope, shivering to life as fire in the frozen wound in Padme’s chest where a furious love had once scalded her.

I will see it burn. It echoed in her mind, settling in her bones like stone and iron, heavy, but building her strength, stoking her fortitude. Padme swore it to herself, taking the vow that Mon had; “I swear on the grave of the Republic and the Jedi… I will see it burn.”

On the screen, the Senate filled with white smoke, Mon disappearing into it in moments as it clouded unnaturally around her. And then a green light tinted the silky clouds and it cleared as though before a wind to reveal a small green figure crouched on the edge of Mon’s now empty pod.

“Master Yoda!” several of the younglings cheered.

Padme’s heart clenched with dread as the Jedi Master exposed his existence to the Senate. Beside her, Nala stiffened with the same emotion. Little Luke’s eyes flew open, and he waved a small fist towards the screen.

Then suddenly, the camera feed cut out, leaving only a gray Senate seal with an apology message shining on the screen. The Empire had finally managed to get to the feed.

Leia began to cry.

Immediately, Padme’s attention was yanked from the screen to her daughter, warm and squirming in her arms. Her little face was scrunched up into a mass of red wrinkles, and her sobs hiccuped like she couldn’t breathe. Pedme’s heart squeezed with sudden panic and worry as she rocked her baby.

Desperately, she turned to Nala as Leia’s wails grew louder.

“What am I doing wrong?”

“Nothing,” Nala told her calmly, Luke in her arms frowning at his sister in a way that might have been confused if he wasn’t only two days old. “She is hungry and senses our emotions on top of it.”

Adjusting Luke to rest on one hip, Nala helped Padme settle onto one of the comfortable settee’s tastefully scattered around Breha’s office to nurse Leia, sitting down beside her with Luke tucked in her arms. Luke began to fuss, making small, whimpering noises.

“Hush now, little light,” Nala murmured soothingly, brushing a hand across his forehead and blond wisps of hair. “Wait your turn.”

Luke obligingly quieted though his face remained pouting, little lips pursed and eyes scrunched, ready to begin crying again at any moment.

Padme tried to brush away the strange jealousy that stuck in the back of her throat. She knew that part of Nala’s skill with the children was from the Force, from her capabilities that were outside of Padme’s reach. But there was also simply her experience as well. She knew how to handle children. She was good with them, confident and comforting. She did not suffer from the sudden panic that kept stealing Padme’s breath every other moment as she tried to figure out what to do with her babies.

She had never guessed that she would be this terrified of doing something wrong, of hurting them in some way. But she had also never expected them to be so small , so fragile and helpless, so wholly dependent on her. And on top of that, there was an Empire hunting them down, a Sith whose hands were stained with the blood of countless other helpless children who wanted to take hers from her.

Padme Amidala had been the queen of her planet during an invasion. She had united her planet in a way no ruler in the history of Naboo had done before her. She had become her planet’s senator in the Republic Senate. She had survived innumerable assasination attempts and run dangerous missions into warzones. Padme Amidala was not used to feeling afraid.

But her children brought to the surface a tender terror that trailed all the way into the center of her chest. And she did not know what to do with it.

Padme was brought back to the moment when a small head leaned against her knee. Several of the younglings had moved towards her and Nala and now the boy with white-hair was leaning against her, patting her leg.

“Don’t be scared,” he told her solemnly as the twilek girl crawled onto the couch to sit between her and Nala, “Th’Force’s with you.”

Her eyes prickled with sudden tears and she blinked hard, managing a watery smile at the child instead.

“Thank you,” she reached out to pat his fluffy hair before returning to her task.

There was a lump in her throat from his childish comfort and she wondered at herself, at all this newfound weakness.

“It’s the hormones,” Nala told her casually, helping the Nautolan tadpole to clamber up onto the couch on her other side. “I remember after Sors was born, I was a mess. I couldn’t even meditate properly; as soon as I reached out into the Force, I’d feel him there and just burst into tears.”

Her words did ease that hard lump in Padme’s throat. It helped to know that this was more or less normal, that this weakness wasn’t some sort of problem.

And, at the same time, though, the weakness was still there and it felt in some way like a failure.

She had already decided, before everything, that she was going to make her child her priority. She had already been preparing to leave the Senate, she had spoken to her parents about taking possession of her inheritance of her grandmother’s estate. She had been preparing to approach the Queen and discuss finding a new position on Naboo where she would have the familial support she needed to raise her baby.

She had only been waiting for Anakin to make his choice about his priorities.

And now, when the choice of her priorities had been forced on her, when she’d had to take her children and run from her responsibilities, she wondered if it really was the right choice.

Watching Mon appear before the Senate declaring rebellion, Padme had felt the aching absence of not being right there along with her. She wanted to stand in that cold Senate chamber and look Palpatine in the eyes and spit in his face. She wanted to act, she wanted to fight. 

And now she was pinned down far away from the place she was needed by the little warm life nuzzling her chest, by the blue eyes that watched her from Nala’s arms.

In some way, it felt familiar, it felt like being fourteen and being driven from your palace in order to carry the hopes of your people as they suffered. But really, it was completely different. This time, she’d abandoned her people with no intention to return, with no mission to save them, and with no warning either.

This time, it felt like running away. And Padme Amidala did not run away from anything.

But apparently Padme, mother of Luke and Leia, did.

Against her skin, Leia huffed a soft noise as she nursed and Padme dropped her head to kiss her daughter on the head, smelling that soft, dusty scent of newborns, and fought back those incessant prickling tears.

***

Cal Kestis was worried. Which was fair, he knew. There was a lot to be worried about. A Sith Lord had taken over the galaxy, the Temple was, well, you know, burned, and empty, and the Jedi were scattered and dying, and Master Tapal was… Just, yeah, the galaxy sucked at the moment, and there was a lot to be worried about.

But specifically, right now, Cal was worried about his fellow Junior Padawan, Caleb Dume.

Caleb had already been aboard Master Kenobi’s when Master Kenobi had brought Cal on board. Cal didn’t know where Master Kenobi had saved him from or what had happened to him. He hadn’t even realized that Caleb was there at first, too wrapped up in the relief as Master Kenobi soothed away the built-up aching, itching, burning Force residue around Cal’s soul. He had taken Cal’s gloves off and handed him a meditation stone wrapped in memories of peace and unity. 

It was drinking cool water when you were dying of thirst. Even with how careful Cal had been - always was - the screaming in the Force had bled through the protective layers of cloth and drummed against his sensitive skin. Just walking onto Master Kenobi’s ship had brought him visions of golden painted troops and searing laser bolts with the change in the air. And so, to have Master Kenobi so skillfully soothe away the pressing Force and give Cal something else to focus his gift on had brought a relief so intense that Cal had almost cried.

The point being that it wasn’t until after all of that, as Master Kenobi jumped the ship into hyperspace, that Cal had the presence of mind to notice the dark-haired padawan sitting silent and completely still in the shadowy corner of the ship’s small lounge area. He had been so withdrawn into the Force, or perhaps, so withdrawn from the Force, that Cal could barely sense his presence at all.

He’d recognized him, of course. Even though they weren’t close friends or anything, all padawans knew each other in the community of the Temple. They were close to the same age and shared several classes, but Caleb had always been kind of quiet, and Cal was, well, chatty, and they had never really gravitated towards each other. Still, to see another Junior Padawan, a sort of distant sibling of his, had loosened something cold and tight in Cal’s chest and filled it with a warmth tasting faintly like salty tears.

“Caleb,” he’d said softly, and slid onto the seat beside him, “Do you remember me?”

Yeah, it was kind of a silly question given the whole “all padawans knew each other in the community of the Temple” thing, but Cal hadn’t been quite sure what to say.

After all, “how are you doing?” had an obvious answer, as did something like “So what have you been up to?” and he didn’t think much easy conversation was going to come from the replies of “Oh, terrible, my master got murdered and I’ve been trying not to die to the clone troopers that were my friends but are now trying to kill me.”

So, “Do you remember me?” it was.

Caleb did not seem to mind that it was a silly question because Caleb did not seem aware of Cal’s presence at all. He didn’t so much as stir, much less turn to look at him or reply.

“Caleb?” and that was when Cal had reached out to touch Caleb’s shoulder, stupidly forgetting that Master Kenobi had taken his gloves off.

“Run, Caleb! Run!”

Gray smoke, 

Gray skies,

…Red…

Red lasers flying…

His Master’s teardrop face 

…Pale with fear…

Fear choking him with black gloves…

…Wrapped around his throat…

Digging into the soft flesh of his neck

…And if the Force was screaming…

Caleb couldn’t hear it…

Because he was screaming louder.

Cal jerked back with a strangled scream trapped in his throat by the pressing fear from Caleb’s memories. He scrubbed tears from his cheeks and looked back up to meet blue eyes, finally looking at him. They were blank and dull and dry.

Behind them, Cal now knew, Depa Billaba was still screaming for her padawan to run.

He’d quickly scooped up the stone again, rubbing it between his fingers and drinking in the images of cool blue water and green plants in a Temple meditation chamber, accompanied by an air of peace pressed into the stone over years of Jedi using it as a meditation focus in this room. After a moment to center himself, Cal tucked the stone into a pocket and pulled his gloves back on.

Caleb had not really gotten better since then. Master Kenobi had managed to get him to be a little more present; enough so that he was able to charter the two of them a ship to Alderaan and trust them to follow his instructions to contact Queen Breha while he left to chase another lead. But Caleb still hadn’t spoken a word; when addressed, he just nodded or shook his head. The most communication he’d done was when he’d suddenly grabbed Cal by the shoulder and yanked him into a side room to avoid a security droid on Alderaan while they were trying to contact the queen.

So, yeah, Cal Kestis was worried. But Cal also had a plan. 

A plan that had him quietly pulling Caleb out of the room where Miss Padme was nursing her son and Crechemaster Tahl was leading the younglings through a nostalgic creche song covering the Basic, Huttsese, and Ryl alphabets while cradling Miss Padme’s daughter. Master Ti eyed them as they left, but Cal just smiled and mouthed that they were going back to their room. She seemed to accept this, sharp eyes moving from Cal’s face to Caleb’s, creased at the edges with the same worry Cal felt, then turning her attention back to the datapad she’d been typing on.

He’d originally planned to do this at night, when the older Jedi and Miss Padme were asleep. But then he’d realized that his destination would also not be open to visitors at night, so he’d changed the plan. So far, though, the sneaking out seemed to be going well. They managed to slip down several hallways they definitely shouldn’t have been in and make their way out through an entrance on ground level.

Immediately, they were surrounded by the glorious smell of fresh air, carried on a slightly nippy wind that rustled through the thick green shrubs and trees that adorned the palace grounds. Making their way through the gardens unnoticed was easy enough and it was really nice to be outside, breathing in the sharp scent of the needled trees they passed, boots whispering softly through the grass each time they stepped off the path. They’d been cooped up in the palace for a while, and Cal was starting to think that even if this excursion didn’t end how he hoped, it would still be worth it for the stroll outside.

Caleb would obviously know that something was up by now, but he didn’t say a thing, of course, just letting Cal lead him through the garden. Well, right up until they came to the exit in the garden wall that led off of palace grounds. He stopped there for a moment, digging in his heels and pulling back as Cal tried to drag him forward.

“Oh, come on,” Cal groused, “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of getting in trouble for sneaking out.”

Caleb didn’t say anything - of course - but he also allowed Cal to pull him through the gate, which Cal was counting as a win.

A step through the gate put them immediately in the middle of a bustling city, long purple shadows of the darkening twilight splashed across pale, paved streets. Though night was slurping up the last drops of the golden sun as it descended behind the dark mountains ringing the city, there were still enough people on the streets that Cal was able to get he and Caleb comfortably shuffled into the bustle.

He didn’t dare touch the Force, even to project a “see me not” suggestion. Master Kenobi had warned both of them quite severely against reaching into the Force, and he could already feel the sticky ache beginning to build back up around his shields the further he and Caleb got from the creche bubble Crechemaster Tahl had made. Still, no one seemed to take too much notice of them as they hurried along.

Cal had carefully memorized the route to their destination a few days before when he’d come up with the idea and even without the Force, he was able to drag his fellow padawan down the right streets, the buildings around them getting ever taller and shinier. Now there were proper sidewalks and humming hover-lanes full of rumbling traffic. Now also, two children wandering the streets by themselves were beginning to get second glances from the adults in various uniforms and evening-wear who walked the sidewalks.

But Cal wasn’t worried, they were almost there. He smiled brightly at a few of the adults until they turned away and pulled Caleb up to a large set of doors under the shining, projected letters, “Corushberry Clinic”.

The lobby inside was quiet, a transition from the dimly lit street and bustle to bright light and a sea of empty seats in the waiting area. Behind a curving front desk that blocked entrance to the rest of the building sat a small, thin man, perched on a high stool who dragged his eyes away from the screen set into the front desk as the padawans entered.

“Can I help you?” he asked, vibrantly blue eyes narrowing above a dusting of bluish scales that trailed across his cheeks and along his jaw like freckles.

“No,” Cal replied quickly, beaming at the man with the sunny smile that always seemed to convince adults that he was fine and didn’t need to be bothered with. He kept one tight hand on Caleb's wrist as he shuffled a step across the cool, gleaming tiles towards the hall leading further into the hospital. “We’re just here visiting a patient.”

Instead of that seeming to reassure the man, he narrowed his eyes further and leaned over the desk towards them. 

“All visitors need to check in with the front desk.”

Cal felt a sinking sensation in his chest, that one that so often preceded a plan falling apart spectacularly. “That, youngling,” Master Tapal had told him teasingly once, ears twitching with amusement at the mess Cal had just gotten himself into, “Is the sensation of your common sense dropping dead into its grave after being so long neglected.”

“And all minors need a guardian to check in unless we have written permission on file.” The man finished, “So,” he tapped a finger with a long claw-like nail on the desk, “Where is your adult?”

Cal’s brain swung wildly between dashing towards the door and making a tactical retreat, or making a run for it further into the hospital and hoping the man couldn’t chase them. Beside him, Caleb had gone tense, and Cal could feel his fellow Junior Padawan’s eyes burning into the back of his head. If he did try to dash further into the hospital, he wasn’t sure if Caleb would come with him.

“I’m with them,” a low, smooth voice spoke up, and both padawans whirled around, Cal’s heartbeat suddenly kicking up a fuss as he recognized the figure. Master Shaak Ti smiled down at the boys, lips quirked with just the faintest bit of amusement around the edges.

Ah, busted.

“Oh?” the man asked, leaning back into his stool to look up at the Jedi Master. He glanced in confusion between the tall, togrutan woman and the small, human boys.

“And we would like to check in,” Master Ti continued. Cal felt a tiny bit of golden hope flickering up in his chest.

“Can I see some ID?” the man asked, and Master Ti obliged, though Cal knew that whatever she showed him had to be fake. He tapped some things on his screen, then handed each of them a white bracelet with the words “visitor” displayed. And just like that, they were in the hospital corridors.

“How much trouble am I in?” Cal finally dared ask the question eating at him as they followed Master Ti down the mostly empty hallways. It went without saying that he was the mastermind of this whole sneaking out thing and therefore in the most hot water.

Master Ti didn’t reply for a moment, and that only made Cal’s heart do a little stutter and start beating faster, but finally, as they turned down a wing smelling strongly of antiseptic, she spoke.

“First, I would like to know why you didn’t just ask me or Nala to bring you and Caleb here.”

And that was… a fair question, actually. Cal grimaced as he considered it; honestly, he hadn’t even really thought to ask for permission. Miss Padme had her babies, and Crechemaster Tahl had her younglings, and Master Ti had been working with Queen Breha on something, and also helping with the younglings, and also was Master Ti and not someone you asked to do stuff for you. It was clear Caleb needed something, and Cal had just kind of figured it would be up to him to take care of him, just like he’d been the responsible one when Master Kenobi had shipped them to Alderaan.

And, yeah, now that he actually thought about it, that was kind of silly.

“I guess I just figured you guys were too busy,” he mumbled weakly, attention on the floor.

“And you came to the conclusion that we would rather have you two disappear without a word than have you interrupt us?”

Yep, pretty much.

Cal could feel his face turning red, a warm flush crawling up his neck and spreading across his cheeks as the embarrassment rose through his body. Unfortunately for him, he was as fair-complexioned as a human could get, and he knew that his companions would be able to see how scarlet he had gone.

Master Ti took his silence for the answer it was as she led them down a narrower, quieter hallway, the only sounds the beeping and whirring of machines behind the closed doors on either side. 

“And my final question is, how exactly were you planning to locate the proper room once you were here?”

“I, uh, just figured if we wandered around enough, we’d find it eventually?”

It wasn’t meant to sound like a question, but here they were. Caleb pulled his wrist out of Cal’s grip, apparently needing some space from his fellow’s stupidity as Master Ti stopped in front of a door bearing the name plate “Intensive Care Unit 6: Aric Jarrus” in bold black letters.

“Oh,” said Caleb softly, the first sound out of his mouth all night.

“Jarrus is your lineage’s preferred alias, is it not?” Master Ti asked him gently.

Caleb didn’t respond, only reaching out a hand as if to push the door open, face gone several shades paler than its usual golden tan. His hand paused before it touched the door, seemingly frozen.

Cal obligingly reached past his fellow’s trembling hand and pushed it open himself. Caleb stumbled inside as though tugged along by an invisible thread.

The room was small and done in white and light blue. In one corner a a full-body bacta tank sat empty between sessions, while along the opposite wall, a status pod hummed steadily. It was a modern one, sleek and fitting with the private hospital’s expensive set-up, the domed top clear, lights ringing the inside painting its occupant in a gentle golden glow.

Caleb stopped beside the pod, reaching out a shaking arm to rest a hand over the clear dome. His grandmaster lay inside, looking almost peaceful, the gold light glistening on his dark, burnished skin and the thin white shift covering him for modesty’s sake.

Cal hadn’t been sure what state to expect Master Windu to be in. Again, honestly, he hadn’t thought about it very much at all; he’d just hoped that seeing his grandmaster would help Caleb out of that moment of gray skies and red lasers and a beloved voice screaming for him to run.

He hadn’t been expecting the raised, glossy scars tangling their way up the master’s body like knotted vines, sealed with bacta but still needing a few treatments to heal completely. He hadn’t been expecting the sunken hollowness in the master’s cheeks and beneath his eyes from having been in stasis for so long. He hadn’t been expecting the missing arm , a stump swathed in bacta wrappings just above where Master Windu’s right elbow had once been.

Cal grimaced at the sick, lurching feeling in his gut. Yeah, he’d seen injuries before, he was a war padawan, after all, but this was different. This was Master Windu . And Master Windu had always been untouchable.

Caleb made a low sound, both hands pressed flat against the clear dome, eyes fixed on the mangled remains of his master’s master, and Cal started to wonder if his brilliant plan to help Caleb had been such a good idea after all.

The noise came again, a low whine, a fragile, inhuman sound, and Caleb’s shoulders began to shake. Cal started forward, apologies on his tongue, guilt nipping like frost at his lungs, but Master Ti’s firm hand on his shoulder stopped him. And Caleb crumpled forward over his grandmaster’s body and began to sob, tears running down his face as the endless moment in his head broke and came gushing out, dripping onto the clear barrier between him and Master Windu.

He just cried for a minute or two, and Cal stayed silent and still by Master Ti, then finally he took several trembling breaths and pushed himself back up, leaning on the pod as he scrubbed at his eyes with his sleeves. He cleared his throat several times, the low lights of the room glistening off the tear tracks still on his cheeks as he took several more deep breaths. Then he looked down at his grandmaster again.

And then, for the first time in a week, Caleb Dume spoke. 

“Hello, master,” he murmured softly, in a rough and disused voice.

And then, as a machine began shrilling an alarm and the stasis pod began beeping, Master Mace Windu dragged himself out of the deep, dark depths of the Force he’d been drifting in and opened his eyes.

***

Bail Organa smiled as he felt the ship drop out of hyperspace. Getting off Coruscant had taken a few more days than he had wanted. 

Master Yoda had been ushered off immediately following that explosive Senate session, escaping the planet in a small ship that was more pod than ship, promising to meet them on Alderaan after he’d bounced around the Outer Rim long enough to be sure he wasn’t being followed. 

Mon as well had vanished in the aftermath, though Bail had had no hand in her escape, leaving her to organize her own exit. He could only wait for her to reach out to him when she was ready for the next steps.

And now, finally, he and Zett had made it off the planet as well, bringing along Ash disguised as one of Tyrone’s staff. They’d gone through another med kit treating his head wound, a grisly burn even Bail could recognize as having come from a lightsaber, sparing only a few bacta patches for Zett’s now-scarred-over blaster burn. The man likely needed more treatment, but there was only so much Bail could do for him in the privacy of the Coruscant apartment. Hopefully, Corushberry could take in another secret guest. Maybe Jaseph could even figure out why Ash was himself.

But Bail’s thoughts couldn’t linger on even that hope for long as the beautiful, shining blues and deep greens of his planet rose into view of the windows. His smile could only widen until his cheeks ached as a familiar surge of warmth washed through his whole body, easing muscles he hadn’t known were tight and taking the stiffness from his spine. 

Curled up on an armchair in the comfortable little viewing deck, Zett giggled from behind him. Each day as Bail had left the foreboding weight of Coruscant behind, shrugging off the malevolent shadow with growing relief as they hurried home, Zett had become more smiles and bubbling laughter. 

He still slept in Bail’s bed every night, but during the day he was all but bouncing around the small ship, humming songs to himself and doing strange stretches in odd corners or occasionally meditating with his ‘saber in his lap.

“What’s so funny?” Bail asked, eyes still fixed on Alderaan’s expanding surface as the white tips of her massive mountains began to come into focus.

“You,” Zett replied easily, slipping out of his chair and padding over to the window to stand beside him as they began to descend through the atmosphere. “Being around you is like drinking something warm and sugary.”

Bail just nodded in agreement, feeling much the same feeling himself as the ship shifted, natural gravity taking over as they swooped above the city, turning towards the palace.

“Oh,” Zett gasped, staring at the mountains towering over the capital, “It’s pretty.”

The palace rolled into view below them, and Zett reached out to touch the glass.

“I can feel the younglings from here,” he added, smiling down at the patchworked grounds below them.

Bail would have responded, but his attention was yanked away as they descended towards the private landing strip on one of the towers outside the royal quarters. There, with a silver cape catching the winds that stirred through the valley, stood a familiar dark figure, waiting for their arrival.

Breha .

Impatience danced under his skin in warm white arcs of anticipation as that figure grew larger. He was turning to the doors almost before they had set down, Zett following a step behind him, still grinning widely, laughter dancing in his eyes. The doors slid open and Bail stepped out quickly, some distant decorum barely reigning him in from an all out sprint across the landing pad.

And then Breha was in his arms, the scent of her perfume, like the earthy spice of the fir trees in the mountains, wrapping him in a cloud of nothing but soft warmth. They leaned into each other for a moment, stealing a frozen breath of time to be simply Bail and Breha, two bodies wrapped around each other and breathing in unison. 

Breha.

The world that had been spinning since Bail had looked up to see fire-orange lighting the Temple settled into place, coming to a quiet, steady stop as he held his wife in his arms.

Then Bail kissed her tenderly on the forehead, and the queen and the senator pulled back as the rest of Bail’s companions made their way off the ship, and several figures slipped out from the doors leading into the tower behind Breha.

“Sen’tor O’gana!” a young, high voice cheered as a group of children raced out of the tower’s shadow to throw themselves at Bail’s legs, followed at a more sedate pace by Crechemaster Tahl and Master Ti.

“Zett?” A redheaded boy at Master Ti’s side blinked at the boy beside Bail in disbelief for a moment, then threw himself forward as well, pausing just before he touched his fellow padawan, still staring with wide eyes.

“Hi, Cal,” Zett grinned and pulled Cal into a hug. “But don’t touch me with your hands. I’ve been Drifting a bit.”

Cal leaned into the hug, obediently holding his hands out from his body.

“Caleb’s here too,” he babbled. “There’re three of us now. Three junior padawans. Caleb’s here, but he’s with his grandmaster. But now there’s three of us.”

Bail’s smile ached on his face as he ruffled hair and patted lekku, drinking in the warmth of the little bodies surrounding him even as he tried to keep his footing under their onslaught.

“Let’s head inside,” his wife laughed at his predicament, her face red and full with a happiness that made everything about the world brighter and clearer, and more vibrant. The group stumbled and scrambled its way after her, Cal hastily shoving his hands into gloves so that he could grab Zett’s hand as though he expected his fellow to disappear, and Nala scooping up Ro so that she could keep pace with the other younglings dancing around Bail.

-

Master Ti waited as the rest of the group passed, watching the staff and guards disembark from the ship. 

“Hello, Ash,” she greeted as the disguised clone finally made his way off. He paused, staring at her, his emotions dropping like glass raindrops in the clouded Force, cold dread and searing guilt, shattering as they hit the ground. Dull pain echoed around him like a worn refrain, and his fists clenched tight enough to tremble as she took a step closer.

“General Ti,” he began, voice breaking, “I…”

He fell silent as her hand settled on his shoulder gently.

She smiled, keeping her fangs covered and thinking soft thoughts of the young clones on Kamino. She thought of the Tubies, peaceful and unformed in their growth chambers. Of the cadets, running around, shouting with joy as they played the games she had introduced. Of the young shinies, throwing themselves at their tests again and again, almost desperate to be allowed out onto the battlefield. 

Ash was young enough to have been one of the ones she’d watched shipped out, aching at the fact that she had helped so little. The Republic had tied her hands and made her watch as it took the young men she’d comforted and counseled and sent them out too young to face something no one should ever have to face.

In brief moments of respite, between overseeing drills and tests and trying to be there for the hundreds of thousands of young boys growing up in those sterile white halls, she had wondered why.

And now… now she knew.

“It is good to see you, Ash.” She infused it with as much warmth and sincerity as she could, one hand reaching up to touch the bacta patch covering the worst of his ‘saber scar. “I’m glad you’re here.”

She turned away before he had to hide his tears from her, letting him pull himself together as they trailed the group into the tower.

-

Breha could feel her smile turning mischievous even before they had settled everyone in the office. Master Ti and Ash trailed in as Bail finally managed to fit two of the clamoring younglings in his lap and turned to her with a questioning look while the rest bounced onto the couch around him.

“So,” Breha leaned against the front of her desk, the excitement that buzzed in her veins balking at the thought of sitting down. She usually had far more self-control than that, but sharing her ideas and surprises with Bail always managed to turn her into a schoolgirl. Right now, it was taking all her self-control not to bounce in place as she continued. “Shaak and I have had an epiphany.”

Bail’s eyebrows shot up as he adjusted Trist before the wiggling young togruta could slip out of his lap and onto the floor.

“An epiphany ?” he leaned forward over Ke’ress’s head. “Do tell.”

Breha glanced over at Shaak Ti, but the other woman was busy softly convincing Ash to sit down so that she could examine his wound, so she forged ahead alone.

“We know we can’t simply hide the younglings and padawans forever. Eventually, they will need identities that allow them out into the galaxy. And yet, getting those sorts of false identities is usually extremely difficult and expensive.”

“Not to mention illegal,” Bail added, nodding along.

“Exactly,” Breha noticed that her fingers had started tapping in anticipation, and put a stop to that.

 “On top of that, we would like to keep all the Jedi together, but trying to hide this large a group - one that will continue to grow as we find more survivors,” she said firmly, feeling a stony surety in her chest that she tried to impress with words alone into the fabric of the galaxy around her. They would find more Jedi; this was not all that was left. “Would be difficult and likely add to the danger everyone is already in, especially since that many minors without parents, even if they had false IDs, would look suspicious.”

Bail nodded again, absent-mindedly patting Kiria on the head as the curly-haired girl leaned against him. He was well aware of these difficulties, having already given them some brief thought. But he had not seen any clear solution, and his mind had been occupied by many, many other immediate concerns.

So, as usual, he left the long-term planning to his wife and sat back, prepared to be amazed by her solution. His clear faith in her settled around Breha like a familiar, warm shawl, and her smile widened just a little more as she continued.

“Shaak mentioned to me that smugglers sometimes hide cargo by making up ownership documents for it so they could have it in plain sight. As long as it looked like it belonged to someone else, port authorities weren’t suspicious, and even if they were, they would try to track down this ‘owner’ first, giving the smugglers time to slip away.”

Breha and Bail leaned towards each other in unison, Breha’s smile pulling at the corners of her mouth to reveal her sharp canines, while glimmers of ideas danced across Bail’s eyes as he tried to figure out where she was going.

“She brought it up with the suggestion that we get all the children fake school IDs so that it would look like they belonged together, even without parents there. But then I realized that we could take that one step further.”

She couldn’t help it, her voice began to pick up speed as she continued, fingers back to drumming against the side of the desk she leaned on.

“We just passed the War Outreach and Relief program with the new Adoption Clause . Half the planet has registered to adopt war orphans.”

Bail’s face lit up with understanding, and Breha was certain that he never looked more beautiful than with that excited flush of an idea taking shape, that golden glow of a cause to strive for and work to do. His shining eyes caught hers, his smile matching the one carved into her features.

“So, we pick the guardians very carefully, and no one will look twice at the younglings because they’ll have the same families, IDs, and documentation history as any other war orphan.” He finished for her, savoring his wife’s brilliance. “And Alderaan’s already taken in over ten thousand. Like the smugglers, they’ll be hidden in plain sight.”

“Yes!” Breha crossed her arms, whole body stiff with excitement, “But take it even further! Shaak was right, we need to find a way to keep them together. And her suggestion is perfect. A school, Bail, we start a school for the Jedi. A boarding school here in the capital. Our guardians that we pick sign the paperwork, and we have a completely legitimate documentation trail. Orphans who are adopted are then sent away to a private boarding school in the city. It's a completely ordinary, unremarkable chain of events.”

“And it would hardly be the first small school the royal family has funded,” Bail caught onto the idea immediately. “And then the only trickery we need to pull is getting the adult Jedi certification as teachers. And,” his eyes lit up even brighter, jumping to Nala’s face, “Roselle Nabia is already identified as a teacher!”

Breha was all but basking in his enthusiasm. Praise from Bail was a thousand times more valuable than praise from anyone else. She was not ashamed to admit that she pulled for it a little bit.

“So, you think it will work?”

He laughed, a warm, relieved sound that spilled into the room like sunlight as he gently pushed the younglings off his lap and crossed to her. He folded her hands in his, and everything about the world was steady and golden.

“Of course it will,” he said with certainty, "because you, Breha Monte’a Reina Antilles Organa, are brilliant.”

Chapter Text

He didn’t bother knocking before coming in. Sabe’s warning was the sound of the door being thrown open so violently that it cracked into the entry hall wall, accompanied by the sound of shattering glass as the mirror that had long decorated that wall gave way.

She was on her feet immediately, instincts prickling with fear even as years and years of training took over. Her heart was beating too fast, but her breathing was even as she slipped the stunner disguised as a hairpin out of the drawer by her bed. Adrenaline gushed through her veins, trembling in every muscle, but her bare feet were silent as they slipped across the bedroom floor.

The screen by the door flickered on, showing her the camera feed of the entrance as another crash echoed through the apartment. The Alderaanian vase in the entry hall, she assumed.

A tall figure, with wide shoulders tapering to a slim waist, in the shadows of the darkened hall. Tousled hair over a familiar face with a slanting scar, and one pale human hand clutching a silver hilt, the other hidden beneath thick black gloves. He was dressed all in black leather under black armor edged in blood red, and the black cape behind him billowed like a cloud of doom.

Anakin Skywalker.

No, she corrected herself firmly, reaching for the bracelet that hid her emergency beacon in its beads. Not Anakin; Darth Vader. 

She could not fall into the complacency of treating him like Anakin Skywalker. He was not her mistress’s stupid, sweet, secret lover with his ridiculous temper and manipulable obliviousness. Sabe’ had never seen the Hero with no Fear that the galaxy had praised during the Clone Wars; she had never seen that reportedly cunning general and vicious fighter. In all honesty, she had always held a bit of disdain for Skywalker, who was clumsy and foolish and romantic in all the worst of ways.

He had made Padme happy, so she had put up with him. But she had never respected him, certainly never seen him as a threat.

So no, she could not treat this man in her apartment, who raised a black-booted foot to kick over the sweet little angel statuette that hid Sabe’s illegal stim stash, smashing it with another echoing crash, as Anakin Skywalker. He was, she fixed firmly in her mind as she pulled on a thick silk shawl over her night gown, Darth Vader, a sith, a threat, the Emperor’s attack dog.

Firmly twisting up her hair and slipping the armed pin into the bun, she took another steady breath, mixing that cool oxygen and the burning adrenaline in her muscles, and stepped out of her bedroom. She slipped the small blaster hidden in the bookshelf into her hand as she passed, more as a distraction than anything else. Vader would easily handle a blaster, but hopefully, he would also assume it was her only weapon. 

Even knowing it was unlikely to do her any good, the smooth, cold metal in her hands was comforting against the pulse pounding in her palm as she stepped out into the living area. 

The dining table had been thrown against the hutch holding her dishes, though the solid wood of that antique piece had not smashed like the fragile decorations in her entry hall. Vader stood in the shadows in the middle of the room, his breathing echoing in the darkness beneath eyes so orange they almost glowed.

They were fixed on Sabe’ before she had even stepped through the doorway.

“Where is she, Sabe’?” he growled, voice rough enough in its depth that it almost sounded as though he’d torn it to shreds by screaming or crying.

Sabe’ swallowed down a strange, instinctive fear that rose at the growl, at the obvious threat of the looming man now striding towards her.

“Hello, Skywalker,” she greeted cooly, “Lovely seeing you, thank you for knocking so late at night, please do come in, mind the vase, it’s an antique.”

The disdain came easily, mixed in with just the right amount of annoyance, that her fear did not show. And now she watched to see his reaction; how would he take her lack of fear; how would he take that clear criticism of his behavior?

“Shut up!”

The red blade flicked on, and Sabe’s blaster came up on instinct, pointing squarely at Vader’s chest, his breastplate now reflecting a bloody light. The shadows from the saber light only washed his face out more, deepening the sharp shadows along his cheeks and around his eyes to make him look almost corpse-like as he glared down at her.

“Where is she?” he ground it out again, now only a few steps from Sabe’, apparently completely ignoring the blaster in her hand. Sabe’, on the other hand, could already feel her skin prickling with awareness of the nearby heat of the scarlet lightsaber.

“Where is who, Skywalker?” She pushed a little further, refusing the instinct to take a step back, even though her body was screaming up and down her spine to move away from the taller man with the laser sword.

“Don’t play games with me!” The growl was suddenly a roar, and that startled Sabe’ enough that she failed to block the blow he followed it up with, a stinging black fist colliding with her cheek.

She flinched backwards, surprised despite herself. Deep down, she had not expected Anakin to be physically violent, apparently. The yelling, yes, the throwing and smashing things like a young child throwing a tantrum, that too. But for him to immediately strike her?

Vader, she reminded herself, pressing her lips together tightly over another testing comment, not Anakin, Vader.

“Where,” he leaned into her space, breath hot against her face, eyes wide and wild, “is Padme?”

It was harder than it should have been to maintain eye contact with those burning yellow eyes. Her eyes wanted to slide away, her body begged to cringe back, to make itself small and unthreatening, her hands wanted desperately to tremble. Sabe’ had faced danger before; she had felt fear, even terror.

It had not felt like this.

But having Vader right there… it seemed to thicken the air in the room until it was like trying to breathe warm water. Her lungs burned, and she could hardly get a steady breath, much less think straight. 

“Where,” he continued, getting even closer so that her blaster was pressed into his stomach, where the armor didn’t reach, still ignored, “Did you and Obi-Wan take her?”

“Obi-Wan?” Sabe’ used her genuine surprise at the question, pouring it into her voice until it sounded innocent as she ignored the heart desperately trying to claw its way out of her chest with every beat. “Anakin, what are you talking about? What does Master Kenobi have to do with my mistress?”

Vader pulled back a step, and something tight and rusty around her lungs loosened a hair.

Then there was a vice around her throat, and her head slammed back into the wall behind her. Vader’s fingers tightened, cutting off her breathing entirely as he shoved her against the wall.

“Don’t lie to me!” he roared again as Sabe’ kicked hard at his kneecap to cripple him, only for her bare foot to bounce off his armor. “My master told me that Obi-Wan must have worked with somebody she trusted to kidnap her! She trusts you more than anyone! Where did you take her, you traitor!”

Pulling her legs back as black spots began to cloud the edge of her vision, Sabe’ brought both her feet up, hanging from Vader’s leather-gloved grip, and drove them into his unprotected stomach. The air wheezed out of his lungs, and he stumbled back a step, allowing her to collapse to her hands and knees, gasping for breath.

“You think…” she wheezed desperately, forcing the words through her aching throat before Vader retaliated. “That I would be… more loyal to Master Kenobi… than my own queen?”

She was shoved up against the wall again, Vader a few steps back, hand extended. This time, at least, he left her enough airway to speak, though the sensation of her body being pinned against the cold wall, when her senses insisted that there was nothing pinning her, was disorienting in a way that made her feel uncomfortably helpless. Her blood itched in her veins to fight back against the attacker, but there was no one there to hit or kick or bite, just the world itself, holding her still.

“You have the Force, Skywalker,” she panted. “You can tell if I’m lying.”

She managed to muster enough will to meet those burning eyes again, though it felt like hot coals rolling across her skin just to look at them.

“I would never betray my mistress,” she spat. “And certainly not to Master Kenobi.”

That was the truth, and the Force must have told him, because the glare in his eyes cooled, though his hand stayed steady, holding her in place even as he looked away.

“But then, who helped him take her?” he was not talking to her; she was not important enough for him to think about while he took this momentous effort to adjust his conclusion and make a plan.

Sabe’s lip curled with a familiar disdain. But she did not speak up. She did not comment on how Padme Amidala rarely got taken by anyone, much less a friend. She did not ask pointedly if he was so sure that Padme didn’t leave willingly. She did not point out the flaw in his thinking.

Sabe’ wanted to survive this encounter, thank you very much; she was not going to be so foolish.

After a moment’s thought, Vader whirled back towards her, cape billowing with the motion.

“Surely you’ll help me find her,” he said decisively. “You’re loyal to Padme, you won’t let her stay captured.”

“Of course,” Sabe’ agreed easily, “I will always save her if she needs it.”

It was another truth. Skywalker didn’t realize that it was not the agreement he thought it was. That was the best way to lie to a Force user; only tell truths.

“Yes, yes,” Vader nodded, seemingly not realizing or simply not caring that he still had her pinned to a wall. “You’ll help me find her. You can help me find Obi-Wan’s ally. You can help me find out where they’re keeping her and my son.”

“Son?” Sabe’s blood ran cold, a picture in her mind of little Luke’s face on the holocall from Alderaan that she had received only a few days ago. How did he know about his son?

“Yes,” Vader’s gaze sharpened, eyes narrowing as he stared down at her in a way that physically hurt, like sharp nails scraping across her skin. “Me and Padme’s son. I felt his birth.”

He must have sensed her sudden spike of fear for suspicion burned in his eyes; Sabe’ cursed inwardly, mind spinning for an angle.

“Oh,” she said softly, muscles trying to tense against the wall, but still unable to, “I thought it was too early for the baby to be born yet.”

A truth, the twins had come almost a month earlier than their due date.

He eyed her, weighing the words as her fingers curled into nervous fists, apparently still allowed that small range of motion.

Her brain was still spinning, though, sudden ideas straightening from clumped panic into a clear thread. She opened her mouth and kept talking.

“That’s a lead then.”

His eyes narrowed further, but she just waited. The hook was baited, and it only took a moment more for him to bite.

“A lead?”

“A baby has to be born somewhere,” she said simply. “Especially if he was born early. Master Kenobi would need a hospital.”

Still a truthful statement. Not something that had happened, but perfectly honestly what would have been needed in another circumstance.

“That’s not helpful,” Vader growled, and the nothingness pressing Sabe’ to the wall seemed to tighten a little. She bit back a gasp, body trembling to fight or flee, full of oxygen and adrenaline, yet unable to do either. “There are hundreds of thousands of hospitals on any single planet.”

“But this…” Sabe’ pushed through the growing pressure on her limbs and chest, wondering if Vader was doing this on purpose or really lacked control to that extent, “Would have to be one… that Master Kenobi… trusted. Somewhere far… away… somewhere they wouldn’t… ask questions.”

“The Outer Rim,” Vader breathed, face alight with the idea. 

Relief washed through Sabe’ in part because his Force grip loosened, and she suddenly fell back to her hands and knees, gravity reapplying itself. But mostly because Skywalker had provided the false information for himself. The Outer Rim was his idea; he would believe it now, and cling to it past all logic and reason pointing the opposite way.

“Would he know of any hospitals out there, from his campaigns during the war?” Sabe’ built on the idea as much as she dared, fanning the flames and sitting back on her legs, unwilling to risk standing up quite yet. Besides, she had a feeling Vader would appreciate the idea of her kneeling before him.

“I’m sure he does,” Vader growled. “His Commander will know.”

And just like that, she was forgotten again, unimportant in Vader’s busy mind. 

After a moment’s more consideration of the idea, Vader muttered, “Yes, Cody will know,” and turned on his heel, leaving the apartment without another word.

Choking out a sound somewhere between a sigh and a sob, Sabe’ took just a moment, sinking back against the wall and allowing that trembling from fear and adrenaline to wash through her muscles. With shaking fingers, she reached up to touch her bruising throat, fighting to get her breathing back under control.

A moment was all it took, though, and then she rose shakily to her feet, breathing in and out through her nose in practiced steadiness.

“Alright,” she said aloud to herself, voice soft but at least not wavering in the dark apartment. “Alright. What’s next?”

And that answer, as she got her body under control and reached for her comm with steady fingers, was simple. Warn the other handmaidens to disappear. Report what had happened to Padme. And get the hell away before anything like this could happen again.

She was Sabe’ Amidala, Vader would not catch her out a second time.

***

Master Ti stepped through the door into a familiar, dim hospital room. The lights had been flicked off and illumination came from the window set in one wall and the light of various monitors by the bed. Where there had once been a stasis-pod was now a life-support bed full of sensors to monitor its occupant’s health. Sitting up in it, clad in nothing but loose trousers after a dip in the bacta-tank, was the shadowy figure of her friend.

“Hello Mace,” she greeted softly, voice almost a purr in her throat. Her eyes traced over the closed scars, branching in pale, jagged lines across his dark skin. They were healed now, and perhaps with time and certain creams would fade somewhat, but he would always carry them. Beneath the scars, his skin was loose and grayed, his frame gaunt and bony where it had once been firm and muscular.

But it was not his marred appearance that seemed to make the shadows of the room darken around him, draping over his bowed shoulders like a dark, silk cloak. It was something about the way he sat, proud shoulders hunched beneath the weight of the shadows around him, one arm folded in his lap, the other ending abruptly above the elbow, unable to join it. Something about the sudden lines of age in a gaunt face that did not seem to recall even the memory of smiling.

And the feeling that the world seemed to slow the closer she came to him, heat leeching away and colors fading and blurring, was not simply a result of seeing a mighty warrior brought so low, Shaak knew. It was as though some ragged, ephemeral specter of darkness sat beside her friend in the gray dimness, throwing tattered shadows across his former brightness.

“Caleb said that you wanted to see me,” she continued as she pulled the chair from the corner and closer to the bed to sit within touching distance of her friend’s crumpled figure.

Mace Windu let out a long breath and looked up from where his left hand did not clasp his right.

“Hello, Shaak,” he managed in a husky voice, so low that it was nearly in the range of a growl despite lacking aggression. “Thank you for coming.”

The silence settled back across the room for a moment, Master Windu’s too-heavy breathing emphasized in it, stirring through Master Ti’s sensitive lekku.

“I’ve been thinking,” Mace finally started again, looking down and clearing the smell of bacta from the back of his throat. “I’ve been thinking that it might be best if I go back under for a while.”

Shaak frowned slightly, examining her friend’s turned-away face, marking the lines carved at the corners of his eyes, and the sunken hollows beneath them and his cheekbones. Over all of those, he wore a heavy pain like an open wound, just waiting for the next dig into the soft flesh and bleeding tissue.

“Why?” 

He looked up, meeting her eyes, leaning forward as he held her gaze, the Dark cloud around him washing over her at the proximity. In his familiar brown eyes were streaks of unnatural, freezing yellow, branching like cracks in glass; branching like the scars covering his body.

“Because,” he said softly, “I’m not strong enough for this, Shaak.”

His voice broke as he said it and he pulled back, crumpling in on himself even more, looking more mere and mortal than the great High Councilor Mace Windu had ever looked.

He looked away again, the yellow in his eyes turned towards the weak sunlight filtering through the window.

“Pain is an old friend,” his single, empty hand in his lap clenched and unclenched. “A result of my blessing from the Force.” He said it too bitterly, breathing a chill into the air that had Shaak’s instincts warning her to pull back. “But never like this. It’s always been there, but there’s never been nothing else…”

His voice hissed out like a hovercar burning through its last powercell.

He bent over his missing arm, breathing too heavily, breath ragged at the edges as if it was difficult to pull it in and even more difficult to push it out.

“There’s nothing else, Shaak,” his voice flickered somewhere between a moan and dying out, “There’s nothing else but the pain.”

“Mace,” Shaak reached for him, heart twisting to see him so clearly hurting, the distress written into the sharp edges of his usual stoic mask. Her instincts wanted to pull back, but her heart reached out and her head tried to fit pieces together into a path forward.

“I’ve been trying… to hold it together… for Caleb,” Mace curled forward even more, not looking at her, gasping the words between clenched teeth. “I don’t want to…leave him. But I’m… it's getting worse, Shaak.” His fingers dug into the fabric of his trousers, crumpling the loose cloth in his fist. “The Force is screaming… and I can’t hear anything else.”

He stayed in that position, curled over his missing limb, scars gleaming on his skin, gasping for breath through a pain that had nothing to do with either of those physical injuries.

Shaak Ti had never seen her fellow master like this. 

His sight, that special connection he had to the Force, had caused him discomfort in the past. As the war had worsened, so had his pain from it. But it had never stopped him, it had never weakened him. Mace had always had his pain, but he had always simply endured it, doing what he wished, even if he did it in pain. He had never let it affect him.

It had never stopped him. The pain had never, in a lifetime’s battle against the man who had been knighted at 16 and been made a master before his 20th birthday, managed a single victory.

And now it had.

And now it had a chain around her fellow’s soul, and it dragged him down into the cold Dark like an anchor, filling every thought and breath, every heartbeat pulsing with the unending agony that had followed him like a ghost his whole life.

The pain had won a victory, Shaak thought firmly as she reached for Mace’s hand, but it had not won this war. The Dark had not won Master Windu. It would not defeat him with this comforting oblivion, this all-consuming promise that there was nothing else beside it. 

Her clawed red hand closed around his, squeezing tightly.

She would not let her friend fall this way. She would not let him surrender to the enemy he had fought his whole life. She would help him drag his broken body through this agony and back into that fight.

She opened herself fully to the Force for the first time since it had started screaming in her head, thrashing at her with those first burning waves. It came rushing in, howling with its Pain, cold and burning, and so very empty. 

Instead of flinching away, throwing up walls, tucking away from it, Shaak pushed herself out into it. She gathered her determination, her vicious hope, her bleeding love, the predator in her soul that licked its wounds closed and climbed back to its feet, limping back to its pack.

She let the Darkness in and returned it with Light.

It wrapped around the man in front of her, around the tangled mass of fractures and cracks, the shattered heart in his chest, cracking to smaller and smaller pieces beneath the weight of the pain all around, beneath the ocean of blinding, agonizing cold that he was drowning in. She breathed out the pain that came rushing in and pushed her hope into that crunching, cutting glass hollow of his soul.

Mace sucked in a sharp breath, feeling her warmth brushing through his wounds.

His limp hand in hers flinched, then squeezed hers. His eyes met hers, and the yellow cracks were blurred by the sudden, warm tears gleaming in them.

“It is not,” Master Shaak Ti promised, “The only thing there.”

***

Lord Orrin Antilles was many things: a philanthropist, a widower, a caf-addict, the last Lord Antilles of his great-grandmother’s bloodline, a conservationist, a hunter, and a decent cook, but first and foremost, he was the father of Bail Antilles-Organa, the first Lord Organa of his bloodline. 

Bail Organa, the son who had shown up to visit his old father with a data pad and a proposition.

Orrin took another sip of his late afternoon caf and considered the words that had just come out of his son’s mouth. He set the mug down with a click on the stone tabletop of the small table in the garden and leaned back to examine Bail’s face in the yellow sunlight.

“You would like me to adopt a child?”

“Yes.”

Orrin raised an eyebrow and looked supremely unimpressed, a technique he had perfected during the long and difficult years of Bail’s early teenagehood. He waited for his son’s steady face to crumble with the punchline of the joke.

It did not.

In fact, the breeze instead chose that moment to rustle through his son’s hair, giving him a noble air that only made his expression look more calm.

“You’re serious?”

“Yes,” Bail said again, and raised his own eyebrow, copying his father’s unimpressed face.

Orrin picked up his caf for another sip, then set it down with a sigh.

“Bail, if you want more children in this family, get one of your own. I already raised you, I’ve paid my dues.”

Finally, his son’s expression broke, eyes widening with surprise as his mouth twitched with a smile.

“Dad,” he sighed, running a hand through his hair, “That is not what this is about.”

“Oh?” Orrin asked as incredulously as he could manage, burying the teasing smile that was trying to twist the edges of his lips.

“No,” his son said firmly, with all the overdramatic wounded dignity he had mustered as a teenager. “We need a legal guardian for this child so that he can go to a private school in the capital without it looking suspicious.”

“And so? This legal guardian can’t be you who lives in the capital because?” Orrin kept up the teasing tone, but the desire to smile had fled. This child must be in a bad situation then, to need to hide like this, and that thought seemed to make the breeze blowing through the sunny gardens colder as it brushed against his skin.

“Because there are many of them. We’re trying to scatter them around.” Bail answered with a seriousness that matched the cool breeze.

Orrin took another sip of caf, thinking, his heart already softening like butter in the warm sun even as his brain that had managed the Antilles title and lands since he was 17 remained even and calculating.

“Who are they?” he finally asked, setting the cup down exactly in the same place.

“Jedi,” Bail answered honestly. “Jedi younglings. Children that the Empire is trying to kill.”

The Empire. The bitter taste of the caf soured in Orrin’s throat. He had not heard of its rise right away, content in his quiet retirement to receive news of galactic happenings only from his son during his visits. The monumental news had not reached his ears for nearly three days. Even now, two weeks since then, he was struggling to wrap his mind around what had happened and what it meant. The thought of the Empire did not seem to want to mesh with the reality of the previous 62 years of his life before its founding.

And yet, here was the reality of it, written into the lines around Bail’s face, shining up at him in the picture on the datapad between them of a chubby little silvered-blue face framed by nubby, orange-striped lekku, smiling.

Orrin reached for the pad, drawing it closer, examining the little face and the information beside it.

“His name is Trist, you said?” he asked, though the name was shining just beneath the picture, along with a last name “Tern” and the information “5 years old”.

5 years old, and with a galactic government trying to kill him.

“He likes our traditional fur coats, and you have quite a collection.” Bail smiled, but his thoughts must have been the same as Orrin’s because it didn’t reach his eyes. “And he’s a carnivore, so he’ll like all your wild-game recipes. Quite likely, he’ll even enjoy joining you on your hunting trips when he’s old enough. It seemed like you’ll get along well.”

“When he’s not at this school of yours,” Orrin’s hands were already tightening around the datapad with Trist’s smiling picture possessively.

“Dad,” Bail began gently, but Orrin waved him off.

“No, no, I know, I’m teasing mostly. I understand he needs to be with his own people. Still, perhaps it would be good to put some guidelines in place for how these adoptive parents you’re recruiting should interact with their charges.” He slid the datapad back to Bail. “I know I won’t be his father, but legally he will be my son, or at least my ward, and I would like to know what affection I can show him and what relationship I can build without overstepping.”

Bail frowned, not upset, but thinking over what his father had said as Orrin took another sip of his bitter caf.

“We haven’t really discussed that,” he admitted. “It’s a good point, though. I know the Jedi are rather insular and discourage certain forms of relationships, but perhaps visits or gifts would be acceptable.” He sighed, brushing his wind-ruffled hair back as he thumbed through the datapad and entered a new note. “I will speak to Master Ti about it.”

Orrin nodded, watching as Bail thumbed back to the adoption forms.

“So you accept?”

Orrin wasted no time in scrawling his signature onto the screen. “Of course.” He took a last sip of his caf and rose. “And I will give you something to carry back, in case gifts will be allowed.”

“Oh?” Bail rose as well, tucking the datapad away into his long, fitted jacket.

“You said he likes our fur coats, right?” Orrin couldn’t help an affectionate smile spilling over his lips. “I have a few children-sized ones in my collection.”

***

The musty scent of old perfume and the dusty scent of older tapestries swirled gently through the air of Riyo’s old bedroom as she pushed the curtains on the tall windows aside. The faint pink of sunrise lit the dust motes swirling lazily over her curtained bed, the familiar armchairs, the bookshelves, the wardrobe, and her old desk that she had cleaned out completely before she’d left her planet five years ago to begin her service on Coruscant.

She crossed to the desk, running her soft fingertips across its wood, polished and gleaming even beneath the layer of dust that covered it. It was a fine, heavy piece of furniture, made by the craftsman of her father’s clan for her sixteenth birthday when she had come of age.

She could still remember the weight of disappointment she’d felt when she’d discovered that she had been assigned to serve as a senatorial aide during her year of civil service. She’d wanted so desperately to follow in her father’s footsteps, serving in the hospitals, and coming out of the Service Office the day after her birthday, she had dragged her feet at the thought that now all her dreams would have to be put on hold for a year, instead of her service being in the area she wanted to serve.

That year on Coruscant had changed everything.

Her dreams had shifted so abruptly and dramatically that it must have given her parents whiplash when their seventeen-year-old daughter came home with one goal, to serve her planet as its senator.

She had spent days straight at this desk, writing, studying, and writing some more. She had spent months at a time on Coruscant, learning under her predecessor. Within the year, he had appointed her as his junior representative. And the next year was spent mostly on Coruscant, with brief visits home to feverishly write and write and write, her papers appearing in every political publication on Pantora as she made her case for why she should be the next senator.

Her predecessor had endorsed her. Her mother’s political contacts had endorsed her. Her father’s clan had endorsed her. 

And perhaps it was simply that so few people on Pantora cared about the wider galaxy. So few thought the Senate was of any sort of importance to Pantora. So few saw what Riyo saw, the change that could be affected, the voices that needed to be heard. Perhaps Pantora simply did not care to protest in the face of Riyo’s zeal.

Whatever it was, she had been nominated the next year.

She could still remember the feeling, the high that had carried her nineteen-year-old self through the cleaning out of this empty desk. She could still remember the satisfaction of stepping back and looking around her empty room, knowing she would be leaving for years, maybe even never to truly return.

With a sigh caught somewhere between nostalgia and weariness, Riyo swiped away the dust on the desk and set down her datapad, holo-projector, Republic comm, private comm, and digital-notepad with neat precision, cluttering the space back up in a moment.

She was no longer nineteen with a fire to be a senator.

The fire was still there, but it had become more focused, smaller in area, and brighter in resolve. There had been a war to fight as Pantora’s senator, but Riyo had realized that there was one particular battle she wanted to devote herself to. Something both bigger and smaller than Pantora, something that she could offer herself to, but could not drag her planet into with her.

She had done her service to Pantora, and now she had something else to serve.

The thought of it caught in her throat, rough and raspy like tears, but she had already cried herself out, she was sure. So she breathed through the ache in her throat and chest and sat down, pulling the datapad to her as she flipped through the files until she found the one that she had been staring at for the past three days. 

Results of Initial Testing: Inconclusive

The phrase was followed by dense medical jargon discussing the tests that had been run, the hypotheses formed and disproven, and the questions still remaining, but it all boiled down to those words: “Results of Initial Testing: Inconclusive.”

In short, they still had no idea what was wrong with the clones.

Riyo rubbed away the sting as those words seemed to burn themselves into her eyeballs, building into a migraine in her head as she closed the file out.

A knock on her bedroom door pulled her attention away from the ashy helplessness threatening to sink into her chest and turn to sludge in her veins. It was pushed open without waiting for a reply by a young man, gold freckles speckled across his blue skin and long red hair worn loose behind him. 

She remembered the days when her cousin had seemed tall. He was tall, for a Pantoran, and liked to wear heels to make a point of it. But compared to the Nemoidians, Togruta, and such new races that she had encountered in the Senate, he no longer seemed to tower over her as he once had.

“Hello, RiRi!” he called cheerfully, leaving the door open as he stepped further in, adjusting the child on his hip. “I brought you a visitor!”

“Hello, Jo'ri,” she managed a smile, rising as he seemed to bring a breath of fresh air into the room with his entrance.

Then Jo'ri carefully lowered Silver to the floor, letting the baby boy fold down to hands and knees.

“Want to crawl to mommy, Silv?” he coaxed.

Riyo knelt a few steps away, holding her arms out to her son, smiling fondly with the warmth that always spread through her chest when she got to see him and ignoring the bitter grief that nibbled at the edges of it.

“He’s crawling?” she asked, and ignored the guilt that she had to ask that about her own son. She had made her choices, and she’d known that it would cost her the chance to be there to experience all of Silver’s firsts. Perhaps she was wrong for choosing that, but she’d chosen it already, and she could not let this guilt taint what time she did have with her and Fox’s son. “Isn’t he too young for that?”

Perhaps she was something of an absentee mother, but she had done her research when she’d first conceived this plan. Human and Pantoran children had similar development as infants, with Pantoran children developing slightly faster. However, mixed children were often judged on the rate of human development, which meant that crawling was at least another three months away. Even for a fully Pantoran child, this would be early for crawling.

Jo'ri shrugged as her baby did in fact start to clumsily crawl, shuffling his hands forward a few lengths in the thick rug that covered the wooden floor before sinking back down to his stomach about an arm's length from Riyo. He looked up at her with light, silver eyes just beginning to darken to a golden brown at the edges as he babbled wet noises.

“I guess he’s hit a lot of milestones early,” he told her. It was only because she’d grown up with him that Riyo could notice the tight worry underneath his cheerful smile and light voice.

She gave in to the warm urge in her chest and pulled Silver to her, tucking him into her lap as he burbled happily. She stroked a curl of his hair between her fingers as she considered what Jo'ri had said. 

Her son’s hair was black, like his father's, but with a purple undertone unnatural for humans. In much the same way, his skin was his father’s golden brown, but far paler, and underlayed with a bluish purple blush, instead of human red. At his fingertips and toes and the thin skin of his ears and his soft cheeks and round nose, all those delicate places where humans were pink or red, Silver blushed purple.

Still, he looked so much like his father that it startled Riyo to see his mouth open in a toothless laugh as Jo'ri reached over and tickled him.

And this developmental speed was from his father, too, Riyo guessed. Not a human thing, but a clone one. Somehow, Fox had passed on whatever gene the Kaminoans had created to make the young clones age more quickly to adulthood.

She bent down to kiss her son on the head, ignoring the worry her heart wanted to bury itself in at the thought that her son was aging too fast. That his very genetic make-up had been altered in the same way his father’s had. She traced a finger over the soft, smooth skin of her baby’s arm and fought down her instinct to panic.

She would have to go to Silver’s doctor later. Ask him if he’d noticed, help him figure it out.

She would do something about it. She would act. Fox’s baby would be fine.

She was glad Jo'ri had thought to tell her. She had spent over a standard week making her winding way to Pantora with five clones she had managed to snatch unconscious aboard, then spent 3 sleepless days sequestered in the lab with her father and his most trusted assistants, trying to figure out how to break the clones out of this unending Blackout mission. Trying to figure out what caused the condition, to no avail. She’d crashed the night before in an armchair in the basement.

Not once since she’d been back had she seen Silver.

And here Jo'ri was taking care of him, and making sure that she got to spend time with him, and giving her the information he knew she wouldn’t have picked up on by herself.

“You have a wonderful uncle,” she murmured to her baby, smiling her gratitude at her cousin, watching him blush purple at the compliment.

Silver squirmed in her lap, reaching for one of her shiny earrings.

“Uncle, huh? If I had known I was in the honorary older-brother position, I feel like my response to your request back then would have been different,” he deflected the compliment with a teasing smile, as he usually did, gathering his loose hair up as he pulled it into a long tail. “I believe responsible older brothers are supposed to have less encouraging responses to being asked for advice on how to seduce someone.”

Riyo snorted, falling into the familiar rhythm of teasing the son of her mother’s sister that they had maintained throughout their whole childhood.

“Fortunately, you are neither my older brother nor ‘responsible’ in any way, shape, or form. And I believe it is entirely fair of me to ask the man who somehow successfully flirts with every court girl, clan daughter, and heiress he crosses paths with how to attract someone. Besides,” she adjusted Silver in her lap as his little fingers began to tangle in her hair. “I did not ask you for advice on how to ‘seduce’ someone, I asked you how to get someone’s attention.”

“Really?” her cousin lounged back on his elbows, kicking his long legs out in a dramatic fashion on the plush carpet. “I don’t know, RiRi. It’s a pretty particular form of ‘attention’ that lands you with a whole child.” He smirked and bobbed a nod towards Silver, whose attention was now on the glittering bracelet on Riyo’s wrist. “And generally I believe the term for that sort of thing is ‘seduction’.”

“I did not seduce Fox,” Riyo protested, feeling heat flushing into her cheeks; somehow, Jo'ri always managed to lure her into the most ridiculous conversations. She slid the bracelet off her wrist to let Silver play with the metal loop, ignoring the empty hole in her chest that got a little wider when she spoke her husband’s name. “I had a crush on him, and I wanted to know what to do about it.”

He had been so aloof and distant - trying to keep himself and his men safe from the machinations of the Senate, she now knew - and she had been tired of turning into a stammering wreck every time he was around. So, one night, she’d decided to ask the one person she thought might actually be willing to give her good advice on the subject.

“A crush?” Jo'ri raised both eyebrows in a ridiculous, skeptical expression. “A crush does not lead to a whole child, RiRi.”

“You know how Clan weddings work.”

“A crush does not lead to a whole Clan wedding either.”

“Well, neither did your advice,” Riyo replied primly, “It didn’t help at all.”

In truth, she hadn’t even tried most of it. She’d taken some suggestions on how she could talk and act and even dress to try to catch Fox's ever-distracted attention, but so much of it had been about how to initiate the relationship. 

And despite knowing very little about this whole attraction thing, Riyo knew enough about politics and about Fox to know that taking that approach would be not just ineffective but wrong. 

She was a senator, and he was a clone. She had all the power, and he had none. She conceivably had the lives and happiness of his brothers in her hands, and he’d had nothing but his own iron determination to do whatever it took to defend them.

He was noble enough to never say a word to his brothers about what he had suffered for them. He was strong enough to never break under the late nights followed by early mornings, followed by days of derision and jeers and orders and mistreatment. He was loyal enough to keep doing it, to get up and stand still when another man would have fled long ago.

He would do anything for his brothers, and Riyo could never ever make him feel like he had to make her happy to protect them. She could not put the burden of her affection on him. She could not bear the thought that he might think he was required to give her what she wanted from him for the sake of his men.

She could at least leave him that choice out of all the choices he didn’t have; she could never do anything to jeopardize that choice.

So she’d found her own path. She’d proven her loyalty to his brothers first. Proven that she would protect them even when there was nothing in it for her. Proven that she would do the right thing, even if it never got her what she wanted.

And, eventually, she had been able to have a relationship with Fox. Eventually, she’d had that Clan wedding. Eventually, she’d had Silver.

She kissed her son again, allowing herself one brief moment of unadulterated longing, wishing with all her heart that Fox could be kneeling here, that she could turn and see him sitting in the plush carpet, carefully twisting out of his armor and asking if he could hold his son. She held that image for a moment; Fox painted in the pale sunlight, his lips as close to smiling as they ever got, his eyes watching her and Silver with the tenderness he was still miraculously capable of.

Then she let it fade, swallowing down the burning tears in her throat, blinking the pity and anger and grief out of her stinging eyes.

Some day, they would have that, she promised herself. Someday, they would have that picture.

She would make sure of it.