FORBIDDEN ATTACHMENTS ─ star wars

LXXI. Hope For The Future

Chapter Seventy-One
Obi Wan

"Hidden, the children should be. Safer, it will be." Yoda suggests, looking around to the three of us. We are all sitting at a table in one of the rooms of the medical center, with the children a few doors down, sleeping soundly in their cribs.

I nod my head slowly, rubbing a hand over my beard, leaning back in my chair. "We must take them where Palpatine and Anakin won't be able to sense their presence."

"Split up, they should be." Yoda adds on.

"As much as I don't like it, I agree. It will be safer for both of them if they are apart."

Aiden and Padmé share a long stare, and in that stare is a silent conversation, one only a married couple can have. They both seem to be in agreement for whatever they have just wordlessly discussed, and Aiden is the one to voice their decision; "Padmé and I will take Leia. I assure you that she will be loved as if she were our own."

I turn to them both, seeing Aiden slip his hand into his wife's, smiling fully for perhaps the first time this whole day. "Are you sure about this?" I ask.

Padmé is the one to nod and reply to me; "We've wanted children for a while now, so Leia will be a welcome addition to our family. Besides, we owe it to Fallon and Anakin to make sure their daughter grows up loved."

"And what of her son? Where should we send Luke?" I ask.

"To Tatooine, to his aunt and uncle send him." Yoda replies.

I think of Jayce sleeping in his crib in the other room, think of the life that has just been taken from him. This morning he was living in a palace, he was the future king of Taris. But now he has nothing, he's the lost prince, and he has nowhere to go. Neither of us do.

"My son and I will live on Tatooine and watch over him. We will make sure he is safe and cared for, for Fallon and for Anakin."

Yoda nods his head in agreement, turning in his chair to be able to look at us all fully; "Until the time is right, disappear, they must. Hope for the future, there is. In these children, that future lies. Sense it, I do."

I sense it as well. Jayce, Leia, and Luke; three children who were never meant to be born. They were born of forbidden attachments, born into a life of secrecy and lies. And now that the galaxy has plunged into darkness, they are the only source of light. If the galaxy has any future at all, if the Galactic Empire will indeed fall one day, I sense these children will play a large part in it. Which is why they must all be safe.

"What should I tell my family?" Padmé asks me specifically. "My sister and my mother?"

"Tell then the partial truth. Tell them that Fallon and Anakin both died and you have adopted their daughter. Don't tell them about how she died or that Anakin is now Darth Vader, let's spare them of that."

"How are we going to explain all this?" Aiden now asks. "Genevieve's dead body is in my guest room and the last time she was seen was fleeing on a ship with you, Fallon, and Jayce. And since Anakin is alive, he knows you are too."

He has a valid point, I ponder on this for a moment, thinking of what we should let the public believe. After a minute a solution comes to me; "When we get back to Coruscant, call Palpatine's advisor and tell him that you arrived to find Genevieve's dead body in your apartment. Tell him that she must have snuck inside while you two were on Naboo."

"And you?"

"If Palpatine knows Jayce is alive he'll hunt him down. Everyone needs to think he and I are dead. It's safer for us both. We need to fake our deaths."