What History Will Say of Us
By AngelQueen

Disclaimer: Star Wars is property of Lucasfilm and Disney (who saw that one coming?). I make no profit for this and write it purely for entertainment purposes. No copyright infringement intended.

She sits on a throne that more resembles an art piece than an actual, functioning chair. Delicate legs, coiled arms, latticed back. It is beautiful, it is elegant. Such is the way with the Naboo. Everything is meant to look beautiful, but it is also made to survive, to endure all that is thrown at it.

It's certainly more appealing than the monstrosity Palpatine set up during his… brief… tenure as Emperor.

She can easily imagine what people would see if they were to look at her now. A symbol of oppression, of betrayal, a tyrant who acts without remorse. There is nothing for it. The Republic forsook its freedom in the previous administration, she has merely inherited the mess it created. If they do not see and appreciate the efforts she has made on their behalf, that is nothing to her.

She does what is necessary.

The door slides open without warning and a figure dressed in the deepest black strides into the room, bringing a cloud of menace and danger with him. She stiffens a little, but he takes no notice. He never does. Still, she forces herself to remain in control. To show weakness could get her killed.

"You are leaving then, husband?" she asks, all emotion carefully concealed.

He nods, brisk in his impatience to be gone. "Yes, my lady," he replies. "The Hutts have proven… reluctant to implement the new anti-slavery laws you've instituted." He stares up the dais at her, and she sees the fanatical expression in his eyes, full of yellow fire where there had once been clear, intense blue. "The Five-Oh-First will show them the errors of their ways."

She nods in response, and then stands and steps down the dais. This is a risk on her part, coming within his reach, but it isn't as if he hasn't proved able to harm her when she is beyond his physical touch. No doubt she will be scolded later, but it is a calculated gamble nonetheless. It is a dangerous game she plays in keeping her husband under control.

He is practically vibrating with energy. He is eager for the battle, no, the slaughter that is to come. She has no illusions about his and his troops' intentions. The Hutts will be brought to heel through fire and blood. The days of diplomacy are long gone.

Yet, there is more to his zeal. His eyes rake her body, and she has no illusions as to the other origins of his excitement. Even in all the ways he has changed, he still desires her body, her touch.

To her, it is another method of control.

She lets him pull her against his hard body, lets him kiss her, lets him rake his fingers, both those made of flesh and those made of metal, through her hair, shaking the pins out and letting them fall to the floor. When he pushes her against the wall, she doesn't fight him. She even helps him, hiking up her skirts while he fumbles with the front of his trousers. He lifts her up, her weight no burden for his strength, and brings her down on his hard length in one fluid stroke. She is barely wet, but it is of little matter to him. She is the Empress, but although he has never taken the title of Emperor, he is still her husband. In his mind, that gives him every right to take his pleasure in her body. Her pleasure is a mere afterthought, if that.

How things have changed.

It is over quickly enough, thankfully. He snaps his hips against hers, the sound of skin slapping against skin loud in the throne room, and soon enough, he spills himself inside her. He sighs in relief and then slowly lowers her down to allow her feet to touch the floor again. A few movements and their clothes have been righted. Her hair is a lost cause, but that is of little matter. It will be dealt with.

Her voice is steady when she speaks, showing no sign of their previous activities. "Go, my lord, and enlighten the Hutts to my… displeasure. Tell them the Empress desires freedom for all living beings in the galaxy, and if they wish to continue to live in good health, they will see the… merits of my position."

Her words are so bloodthirsty, so cruel, and yet he finds nothing wrong with them. He is oblivious to how different it was to the compassion she had espoused during the war and even before. It's as though he doesn't even notice how ridiculous this whole situation is. Instead, he sees only an excuse to vent his own blood rage on others, a justification for more violence and destruction.

Who is this monster? Was he always like this and she was just too blind to see it?

("I killed them. I killed them all. Every single one of them. And not just the men, but the women… and the children too.")

She is blind no longer.

He bows to her, all courtesy like a knight bidding farewell to his lady, before turning on his heel and striding out of the room. The door hisses shut behind him and she is alone.

"That was unwise."

Or perhaps not.

She doesn't turn to face Obi-Wan, but then, she doesn't need to. They've had this discussion before. "Which part?" she asks, mockingly irreverent. "Letting him go wreck havoc and murder the Hutts?"

Obi-Wan doesn't share her amusement of the situation. "Letting him touch you," he replies. "You know how easily he can harm you, Padmé."

Oh, she does know. She has never forgotten how it felt to have invisible hands squeeze her throat, cutting off her ability to breathe. She has never forgotten the bewilderment, the panic that jolted her children into rolling in her womb in frantic protest.

Still, she plays this game with him because she must. She has been able to bring him back under control.

"You shouldn't be here," she says, changing the subject. It's true. Obi-Wan is meant to be on Naboo, guarding her children. She had sent them there to protect them, and to protect herself. There is no room for sentiment or weakness in this world. She doesn't dare present her love for her son and daughter to the world for her enemies to exploit, so she sent them away, to Naboo, where things are still clean and pure and beautiful. She sent Obi-Wan with them because of all of them, he's the only one still in possession of his soul. Her husband sold his to keep her tied to him, and she sold hers to manage this mess that they've created.

Her husband never even protested her decision to send the children away. It is her he has always wanted. The children, for all that he once called them a blessing, are afterthoughts at best. She didn't bother to tell him that Obi-Wan was with them. It's like he's forgotten the older man, forgotten how they nearly came to blows when Obi-Wan Force pushed him to make him release the grip he'd had on her throat.

He has her. That seems to be all he needs.

"The children are fine," Obi-Wan says, still behind her. "Ahsoka is with them."

She suppresses a flinch. Someone else she failed spectacularly. Now she is thankful that it is Obi-Wan here. She isn't sure she'd be able to bear seeing Ahsoka, to be faced the consequences of her unintentional destruction of Ahsoka's beloved Master. She can only hope that the Togruta girl can find some semblance of comfort in her Master's children, even if, by the tenets of the Order she once belonged to, they should not exist.

"Why are you here?" she asks. If nothing is wrong with the little ones…

He doesn't respond at first, and she takes his silence as an opportunity to turn around and return to her throne. She feels her husband's seed slipping down her legs, but it takes only a movement born of practice to wipe the spill with the fabric of her underskirts. As she seats herself, she at last lays her eyes on Obi-Wan.

He's grown older since she last saw him. It's been nearly three years since that day, and she can see grey at his temples that wasn't there before. Obi-Wan is by no means old - he hasn't even seen his fiftieth life day - but his eyes speak of a man who has seen more than a dozen lifetimes full or more horrors than anyone can imagine.

She wonders what he sees when he looks at her. A woman jaded and bitter from the loss of the way of life she'd devoted herself to? The siren who led his beloved apprentice and brother into the darkness? She isn't sure she wants to know.

"Organa has been trying to contact me," Obi-Wan finally responds.

Ah. She nods. That makes sense. Bail - another friend lost to her. He's never forgiven her for accepting the blood-splattered throne her husband had presented to her. He's never understood her reasons for taking up the mantle of Empress instead of seeking to restore the Republic. He's refused to see that the Republic was dead, and had been so for some time.

He doesn't speak to her anymore, beyond what the duties an Imperial Senator owes to the Empress. He doesn't ask after her health, doesn't ask after her family, nothing. She keeps tabs on him, though. She knows that he and Breha have just recently adopted a baby girl. She's seen the holos that have been released to the media - a chubby, delightful girl with a gloss of red curls. Mara, her name is. Mara Organa.

She knows he and Mon Mothma and many of the other Senators of the Delegation of Two Thousand are still thick as thieves. She isn't naïve enough to think that they're all just chatting and taking tea together. Her agents are very good at what they do, and much more subtle than Palpatine's cronies ever were.

"He wants the backing of the Jedi for his movement," she says aloud. "With Yoda having vanished into exile and any other survivors of Order Sixty-Six lying low, you're his only other option." Even though Obi-Wan had done so much to show that he was no longer involved in the wider events of the galaxy, having shown that his only interest is in the children of his former Padawan.

She sighs and shakes her head. "I don't remember him being so hasty," she murmurs. "If only he'd been patient and trusted me."

Obi-Wan raises an eyebrow. "It's been three years, Padmé," he points out. "Look at it from his point of view."

She knows. Bail sees her enjoying the power that Palpatine wrested from the Senate and the people of the Republic, sees her encouraging her husband to drench himself in the blood of all those who oppose her. He sees nothing of what else she has been doing, of the little regulations and procedures that are slowly falling into place.

"These things take time, Obi-Wan," she replies, standing up again. She sweeps down the dais and toward the balcony that is just off the throne room. He follows her. "But it's no matter," she continues. "It's time."

"For what?" he asks her, his voice laced with growing suspicion. Perhaps the Force is warning him of what is to come?

She doesn't answer him, merely looks out over the city. She can see her husband's Star Destroyer rising into the air, making for the upper atmosphere. "I loved the Republic," she says. "Loved it more than my own life, and even more than those I cherished closest in my heart." She sighs, her eyes watching the ship rapidly grow smaller and smaller. "A part of me died that day, Obi-Wan," she continues, knowing she need not explain which day she is referring to. "I had no desire to see the galaxy fall under a dictatorship, much less be the head of one."

"None of us did," Obi-Wan says.

She glances to her left, where he has come to stand. He is also looking up into the evening sky, his expression as sad as ever. She cannot even begin to imagine his own feelings, given what he has lost. His people, his brother, his very purpose for being. How does she say this without breaking him even more?

"He had no faith in the system," she finally tells him. "I knew that even before the war. I just never thought he would actually think it better to tear the entire system down rather than try and improve it. But this new one he has put into place is no better, is in fact worse." She's done as much as she can to limit and prevent the worst atrocities that the Empire would seek to mete out. Suggestions to all but enslave the Wookiees have been met with a cold reception from her, and the plans build that abomination Tarkin called 'the ultimate method of control' have been put on indefinite hold. That her husband never even protested the idea of enslaving an entire race alone shows her how much he has changed, how he is no longer the man she once believed him to be.

"He'll never let us restore the Republic, Obi-Wan," she whispers, her eyes going back up to the sky. "Not as long as the Empire gives him free reign to do whatever he pleases. It must stop."

There are several moments of silence, and she can feel his eyes on her. She wonders if he is trying to read her with the Force, to discover what it is that she has been dancing around. Whatever it is that he does sense seems to alarm him. "How… What have you done, Padmé?"

She closes her eyes and bows her head. "What is necessary."

It's Obi-Wan's strangled gasp that makes her open her eyes again and look up. A bright light has appeared, fiery even in the evening sky. An explosion, large and unforgiving. Then, as quickly as it appeared, it faded, leaving only a faint hint of the burning wreckage that is now lingering in orbit.

It's done. He is dead. She sacrificed much of the Five-Oh-First in the process, but she knows there was no hope for it. He'd never have gone without his personal troops, the men he trusted with his life.

It had to be done, but that does nothing to negate the terrible pain blooming inside her. It does nothing to comfort Obi-Wan who has sunk to his knees, a single hand remaining on the balcony railing, holding on with a white-knuckle grip. She doesn't reach out to him, somehow knowing that her comfort will not be welcomed.

They stay side-by-side in silence, knowing that it will not last. Soon enough, people will start pouring into the throne room, full of questions and reports and looking to her for answers and leadership. As ever.

"What now?" There is still a faint, hitching sob in Obi-Wan's voice.

She doesn't hesitate. It's what she has been planning for. "Now, the revolution begins."

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