It didn’t start out as a disaster.
It was meticulously planned, as were most things in the Senate Dome. Padmé and Bail had spent hours preparing their notes—constructing their ironclad arguments and looking for loopholes and wiping the whole slate clean again each time they found one. It was miserable work. That solitary fact was about the only thing every politician agreed on. And yet, Padmé couldn’t deny a certain satisfaction in it. It was a game. A war of words and wit and willpower. One in which she intended to dominate.
That is, so long as nothing went wrong.
“Senator Organa,” she said as she neared the committee room, falling back on formalities out here in the open halls. “You’re early.”
“So are you,” Bail replied. It was first thing in the morning—even the earliest sessions wouldn’t begin for another hour—yet the hallways had already begun to buzz.
“Never hurts to be prepared. Especially…”
“With all that’s at stake, yes, I know. And the Spirans take everything as an attack. Even the invitation to negotiate was returned unopened with…harsh words.” Bail smiled, but it was a tired one. “But I don’t think we have anything to worry about. Word is, they’re sending a Jedi to mediate.”
Padmé’s heart fluttered. A Jedi? They hardly ever made appearances in the Senate these days. Often, with the Order spread so thin out on the front, Padmé wasn’t sure if there were even any left on Coruscant.
“Do you know who?”
“Not Skywalker,” Bail said immediately. Padmé Amidala had years of training under her belt to keep her face absolutely blank. But still, she felt the prickle of heat on her skin.
“I know,” she said. “He’s shipping off to the Outer Rim this afternoon.”
“Is he? Now that, I didn’t know. How interesting. Do you get regular reports on Jedi whereabouts in your inbox? If so, you’ll have to show me how to sign up for the mailing list—”
His tone was playful, but Padmé found little patience for it. She afforded him a brief eyeroll before brushing past him, into the negotiation room.
The table was set with six chairs, three on each side. Padmé set her datapad down at the last spot.
“In any case,” she said, “we shouldn’t let our guard down. Who knows—with all the best Jedi out on the front, they might send someone…well, inexperienced. You know, the ones who aren’t quite up for the job of leading the war. Someone like…”
“Like me?”
Padmé and Bail both swiveled their heads. And there, in the doorway, was—
“Obi-Wan!”
The Jedi smiled wryly. And though Bail was right—he wasn’t Anakin—Padmé felt something in her chest swell anyway.
“Don’t sound too excited,” Obi-Wan said. He crossed the room, boots a light rhythm against the ground, and took the seat between them. “I understand we have quite the session ahead of us.”
Bail grimaced. “Something like that,” he said. “You might see as much action in here today as you would on the battlefield. The opposition…won’t be easily swayed.”
“And speaking of battlefields…” Padmé said. “How are you here? I thought the 212th was deployed to the Mid-Rim.”
Maybe it was her imagination. But Padmé had been trained in the art of reading people since before she knew how to read. And so she caught the way his smile went false, the crinkles in the corners of his eyes no longer warm with laughter, but merely aging him.
“They are,” he replied, eyes skirting away before finding hers again. “I was…instructed to remain behind. I’m not yet cleared for duty. At least, not the kind of duty I’m presently expected to perform.”
Padmé kept her face blank. But she remembered—how Anakin had come with his fists clenched, jaw tight, and slept the whole night with his back turned the last time he’d been home. How suddenly even Master Yoda seemed more subdued when she saw him, how Obi-Wan disappeared on solo missions that even the Chancellor didn’t know about.
But the Chancellor didn’t have the luxury of listening to hushed calls on the balcony, of Obi-Wan’s soft voice murmuring two clipped words through her husband’s comlink:
“He’s back.”
Padmé moved to her own seat at the table. On her way, she set a hand lightly on Obi-Wan’s shoulder.
He flinched.
And Padmé didn’t want to know who “he” was.
“Well, we’re glad you’re here,” Bail said, saving both of them from acknowledging the moment. “The representatives from the Spira System won’t be easy to persuade. They’re pompous, easily offended. Too trapped in their greed—”
“How kind of you to say, Senator. The sentiment, I assure you, is quite mutual.”
Bail’s face, outwardly, didn’t change. But to Padmé—and, she suspected, to Obi-Wan—his mortification was laid bare.
He cleared his throat. All three of them stood as the two Spiran dignitaries entered and took their seats on the opposite sides of the table. Their bows and smiles were obviously forced.
This would be fun.
“Well, a Jedi,” said the first Spiran—the clear leader of the two. “I didn’t know there were any of you left to spare.”
Obi-Wan’s smile was placid. But he looks…so tired, thought Padmé. Too pale. Perhaps the Jedi healers had cleared him for non-combat duty. But if it were up to her, he’d be laid up in bed until the end of the war.
Obi-Wan leaned forward at the end of the table. “I am fortunate to serve the Republic however I am able,” he said. “And today that service will, I am sure, lead to a solution that is mutually beneficial for all represented parties—as well as the refugees.”
“The refugees—” the Spiran began to argue. Already insulted over nothing.
“—are people, Representative. Just like you,” Bail said. “Now, Alderaan and Naboo are willing to provide relief supplies and services, and will begin transporting them to the planet the minute we are able. Bur first, we need your cooperation.”
Padmé’s posture was pin-straight. “And, more specifically, your airlanes.”
“Our hyperspace lanes are reserved exclusively for our tourist population. Spira is a vacation planet, Senator. People travel from all over the galaxy to escape things like traffic and the sights and sounds of war—”
“So you’re saying the privilege of the wealthy supersedes the needs of the rest?”
“I’m saying that if the Republic refuses to serve the most valuable of its people, perhaps a war is not necessary to salvage it in the first place—”
“Senators. Representatives.” Obi-Wan leaned forward, making deliberate eye contact with each of them. “Let us first hear the goals and interests of both parties. Then, we can open the floor for debate. Representative Bon, perhaps you would share with us your opening argument…”
Ah. The Negotiator at work, Padmé thought to herself, inwardly rolling her eyes. If he weren’t so damn good at it, she’d like to tell him exactly where the Spirans could stick their opening arguments…
But things did settle down. They’d all been through enough negotiations to know how to play the game—how much to give away, to barter, to trick the opponent into believing they’d struck a square deal. To not let them realize it until far too late. This wasn’t the first time Padmé mused that Obi-Wan’s talents would be put to good use in the Senate—just as he often remarked that her inner fire would make her an asset in the Jedi training stalls.
But as the discussion grew less fiery, Obi-Wan’s mediation was less and less necessary. He merely observed as Bail and Padmé stated their demands and listened to those of the Spirans, and agreements were made and broken and amended and broken again. It was tedious—this, they all knew.
An hour passed.
Another.
A document was drafted, then torn up.
Another made.
Two signatures added. Two refused.
Padmé was ready to rip out her hairpiece.
And so when they finally did have an agreement, one that both sides had tentatively declared adequate, she and Bail rushed to sign the page before something happened and the Spirans backed out again. Nothing could mess this up now, not when they were this close—when all they needed were two signatures and a stamp of officiality from Obi-Wan…
Oh.
Oh no.
Oh, Obi-Wan—
The Spirans, tragically, catastrophically, noticed at the exact same time as she and Bail. She felt her eyes widen the smallest bit. The room fell silent. Until the first Spiran representative blurted out in pure disgust:
“Is the Jedi…asleep?!”
No, no, no, no, no—
But there he was—Obi-Wan, head bobbed down so his chin touched his chest, lips slightly parted as quiet breaths went in and out. His hair flopped into his eyes like a curtain, but Padmé could see that they were closed.
And if Padmé wasn’t ready to mutter every curse word in the book—
“Ah, well, um—perhaps he just—” Bail started.
“This is an outrage! The Republic claims this to be so important, so necessary, that we must compromise our primary means of planetary income for war transport vessels, yet your mediator can’t see fit to stay awake for the entirety of the session? How important can it possibly be, then? Dare you inconvenience us when the Republic can’t bother to send a representative who sees the necessity of—”
“He’s not asleep!”
Padmé blurted the words before she could stop them, then fought the urge to slap both hands over her mouth. Oh kark. Oh kriff. Why did I—
The Spiran raised an eyebrow. “No, Senator?”
Obi-Wan’s head rolled slightly sideways.
“No,” she said, then cleared her throat. Praying Obi-Wan didn’t choose this inopportune moment to start talking in his sleep. “No, Representative. Perhaps you are…unfamiliar with the practices and…culture of the Jedi Order. Seeing as few Jedi Knights make it out to vacation in your star system, as they’re a bit preoccupied protecting the galaxy.”
The Spiran looked dubious. Beside her, she felt Bail watching her closely. His breathing sounded heavy.
“You see,” Padmé continued, pulling her words from midair. Or perhaps, somewhere a little south of midair. “Master Kenobi is practicing a sacred form of meditation. One reserved exclusively for…moments of triumph. See, he communes with the Force to…thank it…for allowing our fruitful collaboration this afternoon, here in our debate.”
“Yes!” Bail agreed. “It’s a sign of our successful partnership. And it allows the Jedi to…in a sense, bless this contract here. That is, pending your signatures, of course.”
He looked pointedly down at the document, which so far held only his and Padmé’s names.
The Spirans looked conflicted.
The Force itself seemed to hold its breath.
Until—
“I see,” said the representative. “Well then. And once we sign, he’ll…?”
“Rejoin us here, among the Living Force,” Bail said, definitely echoing some combination of terms he’d heard Obi-Wan use at one time or another. Both of them hoping the Spirans knew even less about the Force than they did. “Once he senses that the collaboration is complete.”
“Mmm,” the Spiran murmured.
The two representatives exchanged a glance.
Padmé closed her eyes.
Obi-Wan’s sleeping form took a particularly deep breath, which she prayed wasn’t about to turn into a snore, when…
“There.”
The Spiran reached out and signed the contract. They both did.
Padmé hadn’t realized she’d been holding her own breath until the tightness in her chest dissolved. But what were they supposed to do now? Wake Obi-Wan, and risk him unravelling the lie they’d spun? Leave him here and hope the Spirans didn’t question it?
But then Bail was on his feet, thinking quicker than she. “Well, we’d best leave Master Kenobi to…complete his meditation in private. It is immensely personal to Jedi, as of course, I’m sure, you know,” he said. “The rejoining of the cosmic spirit with material form, and all—”
“Oh,” the Spiran said, then recovered his poise. “Oh, yes of course. We’ll just…wait outside—”
“I think we can call this session dismissed,” Padmé cut in. “Master Kenobi can add his confirmation of the document at a later time. Thank you, Representatives, for your time and collaboration…”
She didn’t know how she got them out of the room. But in a flurry of handshakes and slightly sour smiles, she and Bail bid the representatives farewell and politely shoved them from the room. Good riddance.
“Shh, don’t slam the door,” Padmé said when they’d gone. “I hate to wake him.”
“Shouldn’t we wake him?” Bail said. “He’s a Jedi Master and a general—he probably has somewhere to be.”
“But look at him—it seems awful not to let him sleep.”
They both stood there, backs to the door, and watched as Obi-Wan’s chest rose and fell with silent breaths, his hair fluttering just slightly with each. He was slouched slightly in the chair, so contrary to his usual posture. With his face so relaxed, he looked younger. Sometimes, with the way Anakin talked about him and the way the galaxy seemed to elevate him to that of a deity, she forgot that he was just 36. On his face now was an expression of peace she’d scarcely seen on him.
Padmé crossed the room, again sitting down in her seat beside Obi-Wan. Bail followed, hovering a step behind, and watched as she reached out a hand.
“Obi-Wan.” Her palm lightly landed on his upper arm, and squeezed. “Obi-Wan…?”
The next few seconds were a whirlwind.
He jerked awake. The chair was tipping back from the sudden movement, and Padmé found her arm slapped down as Obi-Wan stumbled upright. He gasped. Eyes wild, in a way she’d never seen. At least not on him—a wild Rancor, maybe.
Never him.
The chair struck the ground as it felt, and the sound made him jump.
“Whoa, there,” Bail tried for jest. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Master Kenobi—”
But the joke didn’t land. Obi-Wan stood there, cornered between the two of them and the overturned chair, a hand on his chest. Eyes wide.
“I’m—I’m sorry,” he said, finding Padmé’s eyes. “I suppose I…don’t remember…where are the Spirans?”
“Taken care of,” Padmé answered. “We have ourselves an agreement. You were instrumental in the victory.” She smiled slightly. “Well, for the first part.”
He shook his head, and she lost his eyes. “I’m sorry, I don’t know how—”
“Maybe you should have a seat,” Bail said.
“I’m fine. I should go, I—”
But he didn’t move for the door. Padmé felt her eyes narrowing, realization dawning. This wasn’t just an exhausted man, fallen asleep in a meeting. He looked more than tired.
He looked…scared.
“Obi-Wan,” she said gently. “Catch your breath. Please.”
She reached out a hand again. This time, he didn’t flinch away.
Her eyes found his briefly. They righted the chair, and sat back down.
Obi-Wan ran both hands down his face, exhaling—a rare moment of vulnerability, Padmé thought. For a few long moments, no one spoke. Just gave him the space to collect himself, while Bail paced the room and she gently squeezed his forearm on the table.
When his breath was steadier, Obi-Wan leaned forward. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me,” he said. “I don’t even remember drifting off, just—”
His voice chopped abruptly off.
“Just what?”
His face was darker now. He shook his head. “I haven’t been sleeping well, that’s all. And I suppose I’m so used to sleeping on a battlefield, that I startled awake. Preparing to fight. My apologies for the start.”
But he hadn’t looked like someone preparing to fight.
More like preparing to run.
“In any case, I should thank you for sparing me the embarrassment,” he said. “I take it you contrived a tale for the Spirans?”
Bail laughed softly. “You could say that.”
“Well then,” Obi-Wan said. “All’s well, I suppose…”
But Padmé’s mind was churning. Startling awake, poor sleep. Hushed calls, the injuries.
Anakin hadn’t wanted to tell her. Nobody wanted to say anything. And yet—
“Is it because of him?”
She blurted the words, and found a moment later that she didn’t regret them.
He looked amused. But oh, so tired. “Is what because of whom?”
“Something’s not right,” she said. “That much is obvious. And I—I know he’s back.”
She knew her bluff had hit its mark when his face drew closed, like someone had pulled the shutters closed tight somewhere behind his eyes. He leaned back in the chair now, folding his arms over his chest like a barricade.
His tone was soft, but sharp. “That was confidential information that Anakin chose to share with you, Senator—”
“Anakin didn’t tell me,” she said. “I overheard. And...”
“Well then, how perfidious. Eavesdropping. Perhaps you’re more of a politician than I thought.”
“But I’m also your friend. Not just a politician. Not just Anakin’s…friend.” She brushed past the stumble, though both Obi-Wan and Bail clearly fought not to roll their eyes. “And I can tell that something’s wrong, and you’re more than just tired. Why are you really on leave, Obi-Wan? Tell the truth.”
Obi-Wan’s eyes traveled down, away from hers and Bail’s. They stayed there for a long moment. His next words came softly.
“It is as I told you,” he said. “I was…granted a solo mission. Not pertaining, specifically, to the Separatists. And I was injured.” His eyes flickered briefly up. “By an old enemy, one I thought I’d long since left behind.”
An old enemy. Certainly someone as formidable as Obi-Wan had plenty of old enemies.
But there was something in his face that Padmé…recognized. It had been familiar the whole time, like she’d seen it in a dream long ago. When she was a child, perhaps….
“There were rumors,” Bail said, taking a seat on Obi-Wan’s other side, now. A tone as if he knew something. “In the Senate. The Senator from Raydonia was inconsolable after a tragedy on her planet…there was a killer, she said.” He exhaled. “A Zabrak.”
Obi-Wan closed his eyes.
And she realized, then.
He’s back.
Padmé had still been dressed as a handmaiden, that afternoon on Naboo. They’d tended to their wounded, the dead, held tight to those they couldn’t bear to lose. She’d lost sight of the Jedi, then—both the Master and the apprentice.
It occurred to her she hadn’t seen the Master in quite some time.
She went back to her room in the palace to change, before it would be time for Queen Amidala to address her planet. She’d convinced Captain Panaka to allow her to do this herself—despite his insistence that it still wasn’t safe. And so she was relishing in the relative freedom to move about the palace alone, when she heard the echo from a hallway up ahead.
A choked cry.
He was there—the apprentice, the Padawan, as she’d learned he was called. Leaning back against the marble wall, head back against the stone. Hands together like a prayer, pressed to his lips as he tried to stifle the sound.
Later, there was no trace of it in his face. He stood at the funeral pyre with empty eyes and a placid expression, and she wondered if she’d imagined what she’d seen in the hallway before.
But she hadn’t imagined it. Here in front of her now, in the Senate debate room with Bail and a Padawan now grown, she stared into the same mask.
“You cannot breathe a word,” Obi-Wan said now, looking first to Padmé and then to Bail. “The Order has chosen not to make public Maul’s reemergence. On top of the war, another Sith Lord and his brother would cause mass panic.”
“The Chancellor doesn’t know?”
He shook his head. “Not to my knowledge, no. My leave of absence was said to be of a personal nature, and we left it at that. If the press got wind, the Council was prepared with a cover story.”
Bail gave a long exhale. “And you found him. Maul.”
Obi-Wan didn’t answer. And that was answer enough.
Padmé stared at the mask. “How…how is he—”
“Not dead?” Obi-Wan said. His tone was almost amused—grimly so. “Does it matter? He’s killed so many people, Padmé. Raydonia was just one incident. And he’ll keep killing. It won’t end there. Unless it ends with me.”
“You can’t take all the blame for—”
“It’s not taking blame, it’s honesty. And I can’t sleep properly until—until—”
His voice flickered out, and he did too—like a candle flame in the wind. He leaned back against the chair, eyes cast down.
And the mask dropped.
Padmé and Bail stared off in different directions. The room felt hollow suddenly—with the three vacant chairs across from them, it seemed another lifetime that the Spirans had occupied them. Padmé found that the signed contract had scarcely entered her mind. The victory tasted sour, now.
“I know…” Padmé began, “that we may not understand. I only encountered Maul once. And though he took something from me, he didn’t take everything. Not like he did from you.”
Obi-Wan opened his mouth as if to argue. But the words died there with an empty puff of air.
“But I do know what it’s like to feel responsible. For everything, and everyone, that you lose.” She pushed back the images—Cordé, Versé, a billion faceless more. “And I think the hardest part about the mourning is feeling like you can’t—like you don’t deserve to grieve, or recover, when you’re the one still standing. The one, perhaps, who shouldn’t be.”
Her breath shook. Across the table, she could hear that his did too.
“But you are still standing. And you do have work to do. So that’s all the more reason that you must grieve and heal and recognize that it isn’t your fault,” she continued. “Your goodness does not cause the evil. But your goodness can stop it. So long as you don’t forget it’s there, within you.”
He didn’t speak for a long moment. Just nodded, looking somewhere far away. Another planet, maybe. Another lifetime.
“Thank you, too, Senator,” he said at last. “For your goodness. For both of yours.”
And for a moment, he wasn’t the young Padawan she’d seen in the hallway on Naboo, nor the one standing by the funeral pyre. He was not the war general nor the Jedi Master, not the deity or hero.
He was a man. And he was her friend.
Obi-Wan leaned forward again, exhaling. “In any case, I am sorry about the negotiation. I was sent to aid the process, not hinder it. I don’t think falling asleep is an effective mediation technique.”
“At least you don’t snore,” Bail said, with a small smile.
Obi-Wan huffed a weak laugh.
They stood from the table, collecting their datapads and straightening the chairs. Padmé squeezed Obi-Wan’s arm as he passed, then following he and Bail out into the Senate hallway. She thought she caught him smile.
“Thank you both,” Obi-Wan said once they’d reached the end of the corridor. “Both for your aid to the Republic…and to me.”
Bail smiled. “And you for yours,” he said. “Say, if you’re up for it…I’d say a bit of celebration is in order. We did get that contract signed, after all. I have a bottle of Corellian whisky at my place with our names on it.”
Padmé laughed. “We do have a committee meeting in a few hours, remember. Perhaps not the best time to be intoxicated?”
“Oh, on the contrary. Now that’s a meeting that’ll really put you to sleep. Obi-Wan wouldn’t last a minute…”
They started down the hall again, laughter and voices stark against the drab Senate halls, and Padmé suggested that instead of the whisky, they stop by her place for a cup of tea.
Obi-Wan smiled. “I can’t imagine anything better.”
She put the kettle on when they’d arrived, and from the kitchen, could hear Obi-Wan and Bail’s soft chatter. It was nice to hear voices again—too often, the space felt hollow. There was a certain freedom to living alone—most of the time, anyway. But also, a certain loneliness.
Padmé set the tray of teacups down on the table, sitting on Obi-Wan’s other side. They each raised a mug in the air.
“Cheers,” said Bail, clinking both of their glasses, “to a successful endeavor.” Then, he smiled at Obi-Wan. “And, a sound sleep.”
Their laughter was soft, now. And so, too, was the conversation that followed—first, she and Bail and Obi-Wan. Then, just she and Bail.
Because, on the couch between them, Obi-Wan had slumped back against the cushions. Lips slightly parted, puffing soft air.
Asleep.
Padmé found Bail’s eyes. Smiled.
They covered him with a blanket and, this time, let him stay that way.
