I haven’t updated this fic in f o r e v e r I’m sorry but here it is now (two hours past my monday deadline it’s tuesday now lol but you know how it is)
here on my AO3!
She’d thought the door and door annunciator were fancy, but they were nothing compared to this.
The entry hall was beautiful, colored in deep red and neutral gray with touches of gold here and there. A shimmering chandelier hung delicately from the vaulted ceiling, and Anakin craned his neck to stare up at it in wonder. Everywhere Shmi looked, there was luxury and opulence. The carpet was thick and plush, the decorations expensive-looking, and even the air seemed somehow different.
Everything was beautiful, but it was a stiff sort of beautiful. As Shmi followed RU-N1 through the hall and into the sitting room, she thought that it didn’t feel like a real home; it was more like a very carefully-arranged set. Nothing looked comfortably worn or lived-in, and nothing appeared to be geared toward any particular taste or sense of style aside from ‘fancy’. It was oddly rigid. It was a lovely house, but Shmi certainly wouldn’t want to live in it.
Except, of course, she did want to live in it, because at the moment she and Anakin had no other place to live. She had heard Naboo had shelters and such places for the homeless and unemployed, so she was fairly sure that she and Anakin wouldn’t end up hungry on the street; but still, she would much rather have a permanent residence as soon as possible.
They climbed the stairs silently, and Shmi tried to mentally prepare for the interview as Anakin whispered excitedly about the droid. He watched it shuffle forward attentively, occasionally saying things like, “It has wires in it, Mommy” and “What does it know?” and “Is it old?”
They came to a door - metal this time, instead of fancy wood - and RU-N1 knocked twice. “There is an applicant for the maid position here, Master Palpatine,” she said. “A Shmi Skywalker. Will you see her?”
“Yes, RU-N1,” a voice called out, slightly muffled. “Send her in.”
Shmi set Anakin down on his feet and took hold of his hand. “Be good,” she whispered.
The door slid open, and the man sitting behind the desk looked up and smiled at her politely. “Please come in, Mrs. Skywalker,” he said, gesturing them forward. His eyes landed on Anakin. “And who is this little one?” he asked.
“This is my son, Anakin.” Shmi said, smoothing Anakin’s hair a bit. “He’s three.”
“Hello, Anakin,” Palpatine greeted him.
“Hi!” Anakin said, waving a little. Palpatine chuckled genially.
Shmi sat down in one of the chairs in front of the desk and pulled Anakin onto her lap. He immediately began to run his hands across the surface - it was made of laroon wood, just like the front door. Anakin had always liked smooth textures, even if he had only recently learned the word to describe them.
Palpatine straightened up and folded his hands together. “Now then,” he said, “Let’s begin, shall we? Firstly - your name is Shmi Skywalker, correct? And the boy is Anakin?”
“Yes.”
“That’s an interesting last name. Are you from Naboo?”
“No, we’re from Tatooine. We just arrived here this morning, actually.”
He perked up at that. “Tatooine?” he asked, interested. “Really. I’ve never visited the Outer Rim territories. What is it like?”
“It’s…” Shmi paused, thinking of what to say. “Tatooine is a desert planet,” she said eventually. “It has two suns, and it’s very hot and dry there. The only way to get water is for moisture farmers to collect it, so it’s considered a very precious resource.”
“Yes, of course,” Palpatine nodded. “Such intense heat must be difficult to deal with, especially if water is scarce. Is that the hardest part of Tatooine life, would you say?”
“Well, it can certainly be a difficult thing,” Shmi said. “Perhaps not the hardest.”
“Oh?” Palpatine pressed. “What would you say is the hardest part, then?”
Shmi frowned slightly. He was much more interested in Tatooine than she had anticipated - and she hadn’t anticipated much interest at all. Was it because he from the Mid-Rim? Did he have a tourist’s fascination for the Outer-Rim world?
“It’s not quite a part of the Republic; it’s only a territory, as you said,” she answered slowly. “It’s in Hutt space, and the Hutts control it. A lot of dangerous people can be found on Tatooine; bounty hunters, assassins, criminals. You need to be able to protect yourself and your family.” She hugged Anakin a little closer. “It isn’t the safest place in the Galaxy, that’s for certain.”
Palpatine looked at her compassionately. “Is that why you left?” he asked. “Because you didn’t feel safe there?”
“I never felt safe there,” Shmi said.
He bowed his head. “Yes,” he murmured. “With the sort of things that I’ve heard go on there…” She tilted her head, confused, and he elaborated. “Slavery. Widespread, and legal, and accepted … I can’t imagine. You must have been on your guard constantly, trying to keep yourself and young Anakin here from being - well.” He looked at them pityingly. “It couldn’t have been easy, living there. Even as free people.”
He leaned forward slightly, gaze becoming more intense, more penetrating. “Was your family always free, or were there slaves in your ancestry?” His voice lowered and quieted. “Is bondage your heritage, Shmi Skywalker?” he asked.
Shmi felt almost compelled to answer; his eyes were deep and dark, his tone coaxing and commanding at once. “My parents and all who came before them were enslaved,” she said, even as a tendril of instinctive dread crept through her. “I am the first freeborn Skywalker. Anakin is the second. We came to Naboo so that all the Skywalkers after us will be free also.”
After an eternal few seconds of silence - which felt almost intimate, in the way a serpent looking at its still-breathing meal is intimate - Palpatine leaned back into his chair. “You have quite a story, Mrs. Skywalker,” he said. “I find myself quite moved, truly.”
And just like that, the spell was broken, and Shmi shifted uncomfortably. She felt oddly exposed, now. “Well, we don’t live there anymore. Like I said, we came to Naboo for a better life. And I’m hoping,” she said with a bit of a nervous laugh, “that it will include me working here for you.”
It was unsubtle, but Palpatine merely smiled and nodded. “On to the basic questions, then,” he said. “You’ve told me where you’re from; how old are you?”
“Thirty-three standard years.”
“And you said Anakin is three, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Do you have any other obligations that could interfere with your ability to work?”
Shmi noticed his eyes drift down to Anakin. “No,” she answered firmly.
“Do you have any previous experience in housekeeping?”
“Not professionally,” Shmi admitted. “But as a mother, I’ve had to become quite good at it. I can get stains out of just about anything.”
Palpatine laughed. “I don’t doubt it,” he said. “Now, do you have any sort of criminal record, here or on Tatooine?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Well, that’s always good to hear,” he smiled. “Do you have any records at all here on Naboo? You said you just got here this morning; did you happen to apply for citizenship, open any accounts, that sort of thing?”
“No, I didn’t do anything like that. Would you prefer I do, before you consider hiring me?”
He smiled more. “Oh, no, there’s no need to do it now. You have plenty of time. Please, don’t rush for my sake.”
“Your sake?” Anakin repeated suddenly. He looked up at Palpatine expectantly.
Palpatine seemed a bit surprised by Anakin’s interjection, but he simply said, “Yes, young man. My sake.”
Anakin nodded and began to swing his legs, looking around the room. He was starting to get bored, Shmi saw, so she opened up his little knapsack and pulled out a small puzzle cube. He took it immediately and began working to solve it.
“I see he likes puzzles,” Palpatine observed. “It’s always good for children to start stretching their minds early.”
She glanced down at Anakin fondly. “Yes, this is one of his favorite toys. He never gets tired of it.” She looked back up. “Do you have any other questions for me?”
“Not at the moment, I don’t believe I do,” Palpatine said. “Do you have any for me?”
Shmi thought for a moment. She did have questions, important ones, but she would ask this one first. “Why are you hiring a maid when you have a housekeeping droid?”
Palpatine tilted his head. “Well,” he said, “RU-N1 is an older model, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. She can be a little slow sometimes, and indelicate. I’m hoping that a maid will be able to pick up the slack. And…” he shrugged lightly. “I’d like the company. Someone I can interact with. RU-N1 isn’t the exactly the best conversational partner, and, well. What can I say.” He grinned. “I’m a politician. You know how we love to talk. And I’m what you might call a people person, besides. I simply desire someone I can truly engage with, while I’m at home.” His grin sharpened. “Perhaps even someone I can be myself around.”
Shmi nodded; that feeling of dread from earlier still lingered, but his explanation seemed fair enough. “If you choose to hire me, I’ll be taking the option of boarding here; Anakin too, of course. With that included in the pay, what are you offering as salary?”
“If you board here, it’ll be fifty thousand credits a year to begin with, and you’ll have insurance as well,” Palpatine said.
Fifty thousand a year - and in Republic credits, too - plus insurance. That was quite a bit more than she had made on Tatooine. “That sounds good,” she decided. Palpatine looked pleased. “Where would Anakin and I be staying? Do you have a guest room we would share?”
“Yes, I have multiple guest rooms, all quite big enough for the two of you,” he said. “You could pick whichever one you like. Of course, none of them have two beds, so that would have to be seen to.”
“That’s alright for now, we can share for a while. So -”
Anakin interrupted. “I’m gonna sleep with mommy?” he asked. He twisted around to look up at Shmi.
She smiled. “Yes, Ani, we’re going to share until we get separate beds.” Anakin grinned and bounced on her lap, little hands still fiddling with his puzzle cube.
“On that note,” Palpatine said, “would you like to see the guest rooms and select the one you'll be staying in?”
“Yes,” Shmi said, standing and shifting Anakin to her hip.
“Excellent,” he smiled. Then he opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a datapad. “The tour will give you time to look over the list of duties you'll have.” He handed it to her and said, apologetically, “I’m afraid RU-N1 will have to show you, I have quite a bit of work to do.”
“Uh-huh!” Anakin nodded happily. “They - they - I like ‘em!”
“How nice,” Palpatine said indulgently. Then he called out, “RU-N1, come in here.”
The door slid open behind them and the droid came shuffling in. “Yes, sir?” she answered in monotone.
“Take Mrs. Skywalker and her son to see the guest rooms. Give them as much time as they need to choose which one they want, and bring them back here once they've decided.”
“Yes, sir.” RU-N1 turned to Shmi and gestured to the hallway. “This way, please.”
Shmi once again followed the droid through Palpatine’s house. She wondered if was always quite so chilly in here, or maybe it was just her being used to Tatooine’s oppressive heat. They passed a few large windows, and looking down at the datapad she saw that cleaning them would be one of her ‘twice a week’ responsibilities.
All of her jobs were listed in order of how often she would have to do them: mopping the floors and changing the bedsheets were once a week. Washing the windows and weeding the small flower garden and taking out the garbage were twice a week. Doing her own and Palpatine’s laundry (including ironing), cleaning the bathrooms, and vacuuming the carpets were every other day. Wiping down and dusting all surfaces, cleaning the kitchen, doing the dishes, and sweeping the floors were every day.
It was more housework than Shmi was used to doing, but one thing she wasn’t unused to was hard work. She would exceed Palpatine’s expectations, she told herself firmly. She would perform all of her duties perfectly and keep this house sparkling, and she would make sure that every day she’d have time for Anakin. That was her real duty, the one that mattered most.
RU-N1 stopped in front of a door and opened it. “This is the largest guest room, and the only one located on the second floor. Please feel free to step inside and look around.”
“Your voice is funny,” Anakin told her. RU-N1 said nothing.
Shmi went in, marveling at the luxury of the space; a huge window on the far wall stretched almost floor-to-ceiling, flooding the room with so much natural light that Shmi doubted she’d ever have to turn on the artificial lights on before dark. The four poster bed was large enough for two grown adults, so she and Anakin wouldn’t be crowded, and a silk canopy hung above it. A medium-sized desk sat opposite the bed, with a lamp and a small data-chip rack. Peeking into the bathroom, she saw that the shower was also a bathtub. An actual bathtub, the kind you filled up with water and soaked in as if you were royalty. She was relieved to see it also had a sonic shower setting, something far more familiar (and far less wasteful, she thought to herself, even though she knew Naboo could afford to use water like that). Bathing with water just seemed too strange to her, too extravagant. Too much.
The room was lovely, and as Palpatine had said, more than adequate for the two of them. She went back to RU-NI. “This room is very nice. Can I see the others?”
“Of course. This way, please.” This time they went back down the stairs, and when they reached the bottom she put Anakin down and held his hand as they walked; he was getting heavier, her growing boy.
The second, third, and fourth guest rooms were much like the first. They were each smaller than the last, but only a by a little bit, and some details changed like the size of the window and what kind of bed the room had, and the fourth one had only a shower and no tub, though it still had a water setting. Overall, despite how nice they were, Shmi didn’t see enough of a difference between them to feel drawn to one over the others. She should probably just choose the largest one, but she couldn’t help thinking that was selfish; that was probably the one Palpatine had guests stay in the most.
“Anakin, what room did you like best?” she asked.
He butted his head into the side of her thigh for no reason. “Can I - can I up on the beds?” he asked back.
“I don’t think we should jump on the beds here, Ani,” she said smiling. “But which one is your favorite? Did you like the first room best?”
“Yeah,” he said.
To test this, she asked, “Did you like the second room best?”
“Yeah,” he said again.
“Did you like the third room best?”
“Yeah.”
By now she grinning. “Did you like the fourth room best?”
“Yeah.”
Anakin did this quite a bit; ‘yeah’ was his favorite answer way to questions. Unless the question was ‘did you make a mess?’ or ‘Ani, do you like play with the sand?’ The answer to the last question especially was always an emphatic ‘no!’
“Well, RU-N1,” she said to the droid, “I guess we’ll take, um… the third one.”
“Very well,” RU-N1 replied. “Let us inform my master of your decision.”
It was another silent walk back through the house. Shmi wondered if RU-NI was always so flat and toneless; most people preferred to have their personal droids display at least a little warmth and personality. Maybe it just because she was new.
“Mrs. Skywalker has selected the eastward-facing guest room on the first floor,” RU-N1 informed Palpatine as they re-entered the study.
Shmi sat back down in the chair in front of the desk, once again putting Anakin on her lap. “So… is there anything else?”
“You read the list of your responsibilities?” She nodded, and he said, “Excellent. Then I believe all that is left is to get you and Anakin here settled in. How long will it take you to bring in all of your belongings?”
“It - it shouldn’t take long at all, I don’t think,” Shmi said, caught off-guard. He was ready for them to move in already? This was better than she could have hoped for! “We brought very little with us; everything not in our knapsacks here are in a few small bags I left at the spaceport.” The Theed spaceport had storage lockers that they would keep personal items in for up to three days while new arrivals to the planet found lodgings, something Shmi had been relieved to find out.
“Wonderful, you can pick those up and be back in time for your first night,” Palpatine said with a smile. “Your first month will be a trial period; if I like you and the work you do, things will continue on. If I decide to let you go, I’ll pay you for the month’s work and let you remain here for up to a week while you find someplace else.”
Shmi blinked. She hadn’t been expecting a trial period. But it was no matter, she told herself. She would be staying here working for much more than a month, she was sure of it. Anakin poked at her arm and gave her back the puzzle cube, which he was finished solving. She put it back into his knapsack and stood up with him in her arms.
“Alright,” she said. “I suppose I’ll just… go collect our things and be right back. Goodbye, for now, Mr. - I mean, Senator Palpatine. And thank you.”
“You’re more than welcome, Shmi Skywalker,” he said kindly. “RU-N1, show her out,” he called. RU-N1 opened the study door for her and did so, leading her back to the fancy front door.
“Goodbye, RU-N1,” she said to her. “We’ll be back soon. Ani, say bye to the droid!”
“Bye!” he said, waving cheerfully. “I like you!” RU-N1 tilted her head slightly, but said only, “Goodbye, Shmi and Anakin Skywalker.”
They were back at Palpatine’s house in less than two hours, and after Shmi had gotten them settled into their room and laid Anakin down for a nap - he needed it, he’d had quite a day so far - she spent the rest of the afternoon and a good deal of the evening following RU-N1, watching and learning what would be expected of her. She also learned the house rules: no inviting guests of her own to the house, no coming and going all throughout the night, no loud music, no pets, if she takes a book of off a shelf in the library she must put it back where she found it, she responsible for preparing meals for herself and Anakin, and she must inform RU-N1 when she has finished with the day’s work. The rule that stood out the most to her, though, was the rule that she was not allowed to clean Palpatine’s study. RU-N1 would take care of that, apparently. It was a little odd, but perhaps Palpatine simply had personal items or even official documents - he was a senator, after all - in his study that he didn’t trust her around alone. Whatever the reason, Shmi certainly wasn’t going to complain about having one less room to clean.
She went briefly back to their room to wake Anakin up from his nap after about two hours. She turned on the medium-sized holovision to a children’s educational program and told him not to leave the room except for an emergency, then returned to following RU-N1 until it was almost time for dinner.
“Master Palpatine has ordered me to prepare your evening meal tonight,” RU-N1 informed her. “Please return to your room, and I will be along with your food shortly.”
True to her word, RU-N1 delivered a small roast bird and several vegetables along with a pitcher of clear, cold water and two tiny nut pies soon after. Shmi and Anakin savored the feast - well, Shmi savored it. Anakin, though she could tell he enjoyed it, spent the meal trying to put as much in his mouth at one time as was possible. They both, however, fully appreciated the water.
RU-N1 returned to take their dishes and after their evening routine it was time for her and Anakin to go to bed. As they snuggled together under the thick, luxurious covers, Anakin played sleepily with her hair and Shmi thought about their future. This was going to be perfect for them, she thought. This was the beginning of their new and wonderful life on Naboo. Nothing would go wrong.
She believed it fully, ignoring the persistent coil of unease that tugged at the edge of her sixth sense, and fell asleep, eager for the next day.
(if you stare right at the center of it and let your eyes unfocus a little it looks kinda like Maul??) anyway here's Palpatine's mask take two, with a hooked nose (which was fuckin hard to draw btw) and a horned crown that's sorta lame but I think is a step in the right direction. thoughts/feedback/critiques please!!
been thinking about designs for Palpatine’s masquerade mask… I know it’s kind of plain and ‘demon horns for the bad guy’ isn’t very original but hey gotta start somewhere
(if you give me feedback I’ll tell you a Bonus Fact!)
