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giggles-and-freckles · 3 years

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febuwhump 5: ‘take me instead’

“This is boring,” Anakin whined, slicing through the underbrush with his lightsaber.

“Is it normally the job of a politician to keep their Jedi escort entertained?”

He turned over his shoulder and shot her a grin. “Only when she’s his wife.”

Padmé rolled her eyes at that, but laughed nonetheless. “Well, I don’t know that the Council or the Senate would approve of your idea of entertainment.”

“What are you suggesting, milady?” he asked in his most scandalised tone, hacking away at another bush. He wasn’t anxious for another scolding like an hour ago when the hem of her dress had caught on a bramble and ripped. He’d pointed out that maybe she shouldn’t have worn a dress for negotiations that required a couple klicks of walking through forest. She’d pointed out that he essentially wore a dress, too, gesturing to his knee-length tunic. “I only meant a game of I-Spy or Guess-What-I’m-Thinking, of course.”

“Of course,” she said, stepping over a particularly large branch. “But okay. What are you thinking?”

He shot another grin over his shoulder. “That this game is boring and we should find something else to entertain ourselves.”

“Ani,” she laughed, shaking her head. “You’re terrible.”

“Terribly in lo–wait.” He stopped abruptly, holding out a hand to motion for her stillness. “Something’s not right.”

“What are you–”

“I feel…” Anakin closed his eyes, willing himself to focus and concentrate. On something other than Padmé’s perfume. His eyes shot open and his lightsaber was ignited within a second. “Padmé, stop–”

He was on the ground before he could finish his sentence.

The world was upside down and pink and purple, like that time he’d drank a little too much and had to call Obi-Wan for a pick-up. That was a low moment for him, but this...this. This was something else entirely.

He lifted a weightless hand to his neck and fumbled around until he found the small, feathered needle. Iktochi poison dart. He’d only ever seen pictures of them.

Muffled yells surrounded him and he became vaguely aware of someone kicking at his hand. His lightsaber; gone. His fingers clenched as he summoned the weapon back to him, but the Force was silent. Inhibited.

The colours around him became more vibrant and his mind cleared.

Padmé.

He tried to stand up, but his joints were like noodles and he didn’t make much headway. Rough hands came to grip his shoulders. Pathetically, he tried to pull away.

“Careful Jedi,” a voice growled in his ear.

“–the girl?” another voice was saying from somewhere to Anakin’s side. He strained to catch a glimpse of the voice...a glimpse of her...but the pink and purples overwhelmed him and he could barely keep his head from hanging limply in front of him.

“No. She’s not armed.”

Ha, Anakin thought wildly. Shows what they knew about his wife. Not only was Padmé armed–she had weapons built into every layer of her clothing. And she had so. many. layers of clothing.

He’d know.

“Let him go,” she demanded from somewhere in front of him. He should be able to see her or feel her, but he can’t.

“You’re not in a position for negotiations, girl,” the man holding Anakin chuckled darkly.

“On the authority of the Galactic Senate of the Republic, I demand you let him go.”

“The Galactic Senate of the Republic? Well, why didn’t you say so?” the man sneered.

The pinks and purples began to clear again and Anakin finally saw her. She was okay–not drugged like him. Still on her feet and only being mildly restrained by an Iktochi man.

He tried to move his mouth, but his tongue felt heavy and large in his mouth.

“What is the purpose of this?” she demanded. “We are here on a diplomatic mission to meet–”

“Shut up,” the Iktochi holding Padmé hissed. “We don’t care why you’re here. We’re taking the Jedi with us...then, you can get back to your diplomatic mission, for all we care.”

Anakin tried to speak again, but his words were incoherent and garbled. Immediately, he bowled over in pain. The man with a grip on Anakin–also Iktochi, he could now see–was holding an electrostaff, still sparking with the energy that had just jolted through Anakin’s body.

“Don’t!” Padmé cried, before covering her mouth with her hand. She shut her eyes tight and steeled herself, looking as she always did when she was about to propose something to the Senate.

“No.” he managed. Tried to lunge toward her.

She stood tall and took a breath. “Take me instead.”

“Padmé...what are you–”

“I’m a Senator,” she said, her voice even and poised. “A highly effective one, in fact. Surely my ransom would be higher than one of ten thousand Jedi knights.”

“No, you–” His voice became a strangle as another current of electricity coursed through his body.

Padmé watched him with seeming indifference, but Anakin caught the way her eyes widened at his cry of pain. He shook his head violently, unable to form words. Urging her not to do this.

“The offer will not be on the table indefinitely,” she said sharply, with all the composure of Senator Amidala. But Anakin knew her. Panic. She was panicking.

“No,” he croaked, before another shock brought him to his knees.

Her voice pitched the slightest bit higher. “Your answer?”

Anakin felt the bounty hunter tense at his side. The Force went static as the Iktochi man considered his options. If this was any other situation, Anakin would roll his eyes. Iktochis were, generically speaking, some of the most self-serving, deceptive scumbags he’d ever encountered.

Padmé huffed impatiently, her posture stiff and erratic. “Fine, if you–”

“Wait,” the Iktochi growled. “You would willingly...trade places with this Jedi?”

She nodded shortly.

“Why?” he said, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“You can continue to senselessly question me or you can accept my offer and let him go.” She peered at Anakin and a sliver of her cool countenance fell. “I know this Jedi. He will not go quietly with you. Take me instead.”

“Padmé, no–”

“Foolish girl,” the man sneered. “Your Republic will not come for you.”

“I don’t think you understand the state of the galaxy,” she said evenly. “We’re at war. The Republic will do anything.”

The Iktochi holding Anakin hesitated again, then grunted in frustrated acceptance. “Here,” he shifted behind Anakin, grabbing something from his waist and throwing it to the man holding Padmé. A rope. “Tie her up and take her to the ship.”

Anakin took the distraction as leverage and slammed his shoulder into the man’s side. His movements were still clumsy and spastic, but he hit his mark. The Iktochi hissed in pain as he fell to the ground and Anakin took his moment, running at Padmé’s captor.

Her eyes widened as he ran toward her. “Anakin! No! Don’t–”

He collapsed to the ground in a heap, his body shaking as current after current of electricity was shot through his body from the blow point on his lower back.

“Say goodnight, Jedi,” the bounty hunter rasped above him, before stepping on his flesh hand. Anakin heard the bones in his fingers snap before he felt it. He picked his head up to look at Padmé.

She was scared, he could tell. She opened her mouth, words forming on her lips. He strained to hear and see–

The Iktochi swiftly kicked him in the head and his world went black.

febuwhump 2021 prompt list

#febuwhump2021 #anidala #in which padme is just as big an idiot as her husband #but its like...with good intentions #ya know???#I always think about that episode where she trades grievous for ani #GRIEVOUS #who has been said to be a key part in changing the tide of the war #but she just–lets him go #for anakin #so DONT TRY TO TELL ME her priorities arent just as messy when it comes to duty and love #anakin skywalker #padmé amidala

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eleutheriana-archive · 7 years

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Idk if you have addressed this, if you have I'm sorry! But in your verse where padme lives (bless that verse), during the time where the senate hasn't been dissolved yet (between III-IV) what's padme's posture about the Empire? Does she think they should convince the senate & look for a pacific way out of it or does she think a peaceful solution is no longer possible? I know she's a diplomat but was curious considering it failed before? (even tho it was different kind of conflict)

also continuing that line of thought! now I’m curious about what has changed in her between that time? have her beliefs change, her ideals, her personality?

ask me questions about my character // literally never not accepting

i actually have not !! and i’m so !!!!! at this entire question like honestly you are speaking my love language right now i’m so !!!

i’m probably going to answer the second question you sent before the first one because it provides a better sense of background for her conscious choices in this verse, especially regarding the empire. so ––– what has changed ? the first big one is, truly, anakin. anakin has changed. it’d be easy to pin the big shift in padmé’s characterization on the moment her husband snaps on mustafar and completely loses himself to vader and tries to kill her, but that’s….not where rebel padmé started.

to say padmé didn’t see vader coming is a total and absolute lie. she had hoped it wouldn’t happen, but padmé’s not an idiot. her marriage was FULL of warning signs, and there were canonical incidents where she genuinely did not feel safe around her husband, and even insisted on time apart. and i think padmé justified a lot of that on things like the war and the secret they were keeping, which, the first of which she assumed would be temporary, and the second of which, i think padmé always really blamed herself for ? it wasn’t her fault they were keeping this secret ––– after all, anakin was the one to suggest this option, even if she was the one to follow through. they’re both guilty here. ––– but i think she takes responsibility for it. she’s the older one. she’s the wiser one. she’s the responsible one. she’s the level headed one. she should not have been blinded by her feelings for him; she should have shut him down and insisted on space between them and let it go. so by the time we get to mustafar, padmé’s pregnant, she’s devastated, but she’s prepared. she makes a last ditch effort to call her husband back to the light, and when that doesn’t work, listen, i FIRMLY believe padmé went at him with a knife and i’ll probably write a bigger meta on that scrapped storyboard sequence that i’m using for mustafar BUT THE IMPORTANT THING HERE IS THAT SHE’S PREPARED TO FACE VADER. this is also important because i’m also operating under a few deleted scenes as canon here ––– namely, that padmé was heavily involved in the delegation of the 2,000. padmé had been involved in the beginnings of the rebellion well before the republic became the empire. she knew something was happening to her husband, and that he wasn’t going to let her help him or let her in. so once those things became a reality for padmé, her priorities shifted. she was pregnant. the world was falling apart. her priority was not anakin’s safety or his sanity. it was the safety of her children.

so that…..definitely changes her characterization a lot. and that’s not even getting into spending almost two decades living mostly on alderaan, watching her daughter grow up with another family and being separated from her son. anthia barrie is DRASTICALLY different from padmé naberrie, and that’s….kind of the point. i think in a lot of ways padmé relies on her alias and her new identity as a crutch. she can try and compartmentalize a bit better if she thinks of herself as anthia ––– it keeps her from trying to constantly ask herself what she could have done differently during the clone wars, during her marriage. at the beginning, she spent a lot of time blaming herself for not reaching out to obi-wan or the council or even bail, honestly. she felt like she had to protect anakin for a while there, and so it kept her from reaching out for help, and in turn, that made her feel like she was responsible for more than she was when things started to go to hell. but she was better equipped to handle that hell because of these things she did and did not do, so in all it’s kind of a catch 22 and it’s impossible for her to dwell on these things without going mad, so she clings to her new identity in the hopes it’ll make things easier. ( spoiler alert: it only makes things a little easier. )

so because all of this shapes her differently, her personality and her ideals have definitely changed when you look at her even a few weeks after III and especially closer to IV. she’s not necessarily colder, but she’s definitely ––– harder ? she’s still soft, still kind, but it’s a bit more buried now. where before, padmé would reach for kindness as her first response to literally anything, now, she’s quieter, less quick to offer comfort, and more apt to simply….observe. she’s significantly less trusting, and diplomacy is not something she believes will fix every problem anymore. padmé comes from an INCREDIBLY PEACEFUL PLANET, and her reliance on diplomacy in I and II comes directly from her upbringing on that planet. she protested the clone war so heavily because she saw what the trade federation did to theed when she was ruling naboo, and because of what the war was doing to people on a personal level. it stands to reason if you look on the surface, that padmé would advocate for a peaceful solution to the empire, and keep the rebellion as merely a BACK UP PLAN to diplomacy.

THIS IS NOT THE CASE.

padmé has lost everything to the empire. she never believed in true and real and irredeemable evil until palpatine crowned himself emperor and anakin became darth vader and her children were taken away from her for their own safety. i also, and this is just a personal headcanon, FIRMLY BELIEVE that imperial forces went after her family and killed ( at least ) her parents at some point after she faked her death, trying to find out what had happened to her child. when we look at rebel padmé, we have to remember that she literally does not have anything left. diplomacy failed her, and not for the first time, and every other time that it has failed, she’s resorted to violence as a last option. with the rebellion, violence is the only option. she will not rest until the empire is destroyed, and if that means she goes down with it, so be it.

i think a lot about that quote in RO where jyn says ‘a fighter with a sharp stick and nothing left to lose can take the day’ because like honestly if padmé has to go after darth vader with a knife –––– she’s done it once. she’ll do it again. her children are safe, but it is CONDITIONAL SAFETY, and it has always been conditional, which is another big reason as to why she doesn’t view pacifism as a viable strategy anymore.

there is no making peace with the empire. there is no bargaining. there is no diplomatic solution. there is the empire, and there is the rebellion. and while she’ll be calm and level headed about everything regarding the rebellion, there is no other option to rebel. padmé will not rest until the emperor is dead, no matter what the personal cost.

#honestly rebel padme is like some 'kill the girl and let the woman be born' nonsense to me and it matters a lot #SO THANK YOU FOR SENDING THIS BC IT'S REALLY IMPORTANT TO ME AND TO WHO PADME BECOMES #rcbelborn #vii. HEADCANONS. › and i hear you whispering something sweet but it doesn't move any nerves in me.#v4. MOTHER OF THE REBELLION. › from underneath the rubble sing a rebel song.

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