For Padmé

[bring_balance]

Anakin is waiting Padmé's apartment when she arrives home from work.

He's finally still, has finally had a moment to think, but he's a very long way from calm. But how can he be when all he can think of is what happened in the Chancellor's chambers. He'd put his unwavering faith in a Sith Lord and betrayed the order.

Perhaps Obi-Wan had been right to keep it from him, because he's unsure what to do with this knowledge now. There's no Republic in Darrow, no Palpatine.

The Masters had spoken to him time and time again about his anger, warning him that it was a path to the Dark Side. And it seems they were all right. As many times as Master Yoda had reprimanded him for his outbursts, he'd been right.

He was supposed to be the greatest Jedi of an age, the Chosen One. But it seems, he's just Anakin Skywalker, traitor of the Jedi. But maybe the best thing he can do is make sure that there's no chance that future can ever come to pass again. He won't let that future become real.

And the first step to all of that is telling his wife what's happened. He can't keep things from her anymore, and has no desire to.

Still, there's a twisting of nervousness in his stomach as he hears the door open.

Comments

[nabooqueen]

By the time Padmé makes it back to her apartment, all she wants to do is collapse onto her sofa. Running a political campaign while working full time is exhausting, house hunting on her lunch breaks is exhausting, and the two of them combined have upped her stress levels to the point of making her nauseous, which is its own kind of exhausting. She doesn’t have anything on her calendar this evening, though, which is wonderful, because she needs a nap.

She’s not so tired that she can’t read the look on her husband’s face as she opens the door, though, and she goes to him at once, exhaustion forgotten in favor of concern.

“Ani, what’s happened? Is everything alright?”

[bring_balance]

Disappointment. It's what he both expects and deserves from her. He's not sure he will be able to handle the look on her face when he tells her, tough he knows he must. No more secrets.

Anakin is certain that Padmé already knows the answer to her question, so he decides to get right to it.

"I betrayed them, Padmé," he says, looking up at her with eyes already threatening to spill over with tears, "It was me."

[nabooqueen]

For a moment, Padmé doesn't understand what he's saying. Who could he have betrayed, here where they have no reason to worry about such things? She runs through the list in her mind: Obi-Wan, Ben and Rey. Nobody else who's here would put that look on his face. Everyone else who could is back home.

"Anakin, I don't understand," she says softly. "Who did you betray?"