Between the Shadows

Chapter 3 - Investigation

Anakin leaves the Senate building with Fives, flying back for the 501st cruiser. It's so relieving to be with him without this constant threat of his death hanging over their heads. Nothing's going to happen to him – not for now, at least.

There's obviously a much bigger conspiracy-something going on with the Kaminoans, and especially after seeing how Halli Burtoni was handling her arguments, it.... feels like she was hiding something. There's something to it and it's extremely unsettling but at least Fives is going to be fine. That's what matters most.

"Thank you for speaking up for me, General," Fives is the first to speak.

"You deserve far better than how they were treating you," Anakin tells him sincerely.

Fives shifts in the passenger's seat next to him. "General, I know what you said about not emphasizing the things I uncovered during my trial, but now that it's over, I want to keep looking into it. I know there's something more going on, something that led to Tup's death. I can't just drop it. He shouldn't have had to die." There's an underlying grief there and it hurts. Fives had turned his focus to Tup after Echo was lost. It was the one thing that kept him stable and now he lost that.

Anakin throws a sideways glance at him, wishing there was something he could do to make this better. "I want answers too," Anakin confesses, even if something twists tightly inside of him as he thinks about what Fives said about Palpatine. There's something to that – he couldn't have imagined it up entirely, even if he misinterpreted something. He needs to know what's going on. "I... I'm going to talk to Palpatine."

Fives twitches a little, tensing.

"I want to know what he has to say about what he... said. I don't understand what's happening. I've known him for years, Fives."

"I know," he agrees, sighing, "I can't understand it either, but I know what I heard."

"I don't doubt it. I just don't understand how it makes any sense."

***

Anakin goes to meet Palpatine as soon as he's dropped Fives off with his brothers. "It's good to see you, my boy," the Chancellor greets when he enters his office.

There's more security here than he's seen in a while. Because of Fives.

He hates thinking about how that even happened. Palpatine is his mentor and Fives is his friend and he doesn't want to lose either.

"It's good to see that you're alright, Your Excellency," Anakin replies quietly.

"I thought that would be why you were here," Palpatine replies, circling around behind the desk to lay a hand on his shoulder.

To think if – if the Coruscant guard hadn't been faster, Palpatine would be gone now because of Fives.

And Fives could have been gone, executed, for something that wasn't even his fault.

He wants this to just be over. It's too – too much. How does he handle his family being so at odds with each other?

"I still don't understand what happened," Anakin confesses.

"I was trying to understand what he was saying. I wanted to give him a fair say that he wouldn't get with anyone else present but then he attacked me," Palpatine replies.

Of course Palpatine would do that – give one of his boys that chance.

But something still doesn't make sense. "He says – I think he interpreted something you said to him as a threat. I just don't understand... what. Or why."