A/N: The following is an angsty follow-up had Padme lived. Just my take. The following dialogue in italics was taken from The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, Clone Wars series, and Revenge of the Sith scripts and novels. Of course, some of the dialogue was created and I'm sure you'll be able to differentiate. No copyright infringement is intended. Star Wars is owned by Lucasfilm and now... Disney.

If it was a world that continuously burned then she was a part of its ashes; a mythical angel that had long ago fallen from the moons of Iego...

"Are you an angel?"

A crestfallen monarch had watched democracy die.

"I pray you to help us. No, I beg of you to help us. Our fate is in your hands..."

A grieving Senator had witnessed liberty dissipate before her very eyes.

"So, this is how liberty dies with thunderous applause..."

A new mother with a womb now as barren as the unforgiving deserts of Tatooine. A seasoned wife that became restless as a fiery, caged Nexu. Though slowly, she was broken into submission under duress.

"I don't know you anymore... Anakin you're breaking my heart. You're going down a path I cannot follow. Come back..."

With durasteel as her bars, the cold void of space while shelled within the behemoth vessel of the Star Destroyer's the Devastator—her prison.

  The expansive viewport unveiled thousands of planets being traversed and brought under the Iron Fist of the Emperor. It was her very own personal torture. As if the cosmos were punishing for daring to fall for the Chosen One. Forged for a destiny to balance the Force. A love affair between a Jedi and a Senator had not been written in the stars. Now she was paying her dues.

  Once the ship descended over a planet it echoed like a death knell in her very soul, prying open the fissures left around her heart. Often she found her knees buckling, her appetite ever so delicate that the planes of her face had started to protrude, hollowing out her cheeks and losing the rich complexion that hereditarily bloomed beneath the integument of a born Nabooian.

  Her sunburst spirit had heralded an entire idyllic planet as Queen. Once it filled the halls of the Naberrie homestead as she volunteered her efforts to the Refugee Relief Movement with her father. Such a passion would ignite the same fiery drive that led to an Apprenticeship in the Youth Legislative program. Similar to the sleepless nights in her senatorial apartment as she obsessively poured over stalled or newly drafted bills in the Senate. Left fighting for the injustices in the vast reaches of the galaxy to broker a peace that would never come...

  The flames that once burned at a white-hot core for democracy, flickered in the face of darkness, slowly dying out. The profound sense of loss that wholly consumed sinew and muscle, threatened to snuff the last of her light entirely.

A lifespan simply passed in a glimpse. It was short, delicate. What meaning did it have now as she looked over the past what seemed decade—of hers?

The remnant phantom touches from the twin suns that once bloomed with life inside of her had birthed a harrowing chasm in her soul. Forever, would it remain there.

Once, the father had assumed they'd carried a daughter. Perhaps one that would leave a legacy greater than Amidala herself. Little had they known. If only she'd known. She hadn't even gotten to bond with her loves. Two, in a surprising revelation. The loss of sheer proximity post delivery gone, in the blink of an eye. Right as their names were blessedly bestowed they'd vanished—all in the name of safety.

The fragility of her state after, left her hanging on by a thread. Slowly unraveling like a spool. Her strength has failed her at a time she'd needed. At a time she could've been stowed on a transport and shipped far, far away. Given a chance to live a nomadic life in the far reaches under a fresh pseudo. To cleanse the past. To bury a ghost she no longer recognized. Contact would've been a possibility then with her two beloveds. 

But now? Never.

Yet it gave her a sliver of comfort that somewhere among the stars and planets in the far stretches of the galaxy, they existed. Rightfully kept from the insidious grasp of their father and a tyrannical Emperor.

"The Jedi have turned against me, don't you turn against me!"

It had all culminated so swiftly. The beginning of the end. A ghostly hand that had sealed her airways choking her of breath. The fire in his eyes that burned of betrayal as vividly as the molten lava of Mustafar.

"LIAR!"
"NO, Anakin!"

Time would pass in a blur. The excruciating physical and mental toll would have Death beckoning just as soon.

"There's good in him... I know there's still..."

Her words became the last of her air in a limbo between life and death.

"She's losing the will to live..."

Obi-Wan had remained by her side and for that, her anger towards him would long simmer. The Jedi had been ever determined to see her break through the barriers of the living until—finally, she'd resurfaced.  The very fate of her children had drawn her back from the cosmos. Thus, another breath she, inevitably took.

"Padmé, hold on to the love of your children... don't give up yet. They need their mother."
"Her vitals appear to be stabilizing."
"Thank the force..."

She could still picture the hard, weathered lines in his face, the delicate signs of age visible. He'd looked beyond his mature years in those hours of a twenty-five thousand year Republic crumbling. A deep-rooted pain spoke of a flayed soul. Yet the tears refused to clear away the soot and grime that soiled the haggard plains of his face. A harrowing reminder of a world lost before the final blow of his plasmic blade. The blue had never been more prevalent within those bloodshot eyes, bereaved as the lights of the Jedi burned out like fallen stars.

And the light of Anakin Skywalker, his brother in arms, became forever lost to the darkness of the Sith.

Obi-Wan had been reluctant to leave her very side in the medical facility moon base of Polis Massa. The grieving Jedi only departed after the frail Grandmaster Yoda expressed the urgency of their perilous situation. He'd ardently vowed her son would be safe, cradling the golden-haired child Luke to his breast as if it were his own. While Bail Organa of Alderran with all the sincerity of a dear colleague, promised that her daughter Leia would be in trusted care with his wife, Breha.

   Then Padmè was left to mourn deeply over the all that had been lost in a matter of hours. Forced to remain on the medical slab to recover from a near fatal delivery.

   Obi-Wan had requested she make contact through her ally, Bail Organa as soon as she was stable enough. Whether it had been to seek solitude with him or Bail, she would never know. The cosmos hadn't given her a fighting chance when the time came to flee.  Hunted down before she'd been able to take the Nubian skriff off the moon base. She'd just set her coordinates into the navicomputer for the Outer Rim territories—

He'd come as the epitome of fate the universe had drawn her.

  When reality eclipsed that he'd survived, the relief had been very, very short-lived.

  How long had it been now?

Days, months, years? Time seemed so much different, the cycles droning on and on while stowed away on this force-forsaken ship; the embodiment of her personal hell.

The R4 droid that patrolled her private corridors remained a poor substitute in comparison to the snarky domed astromech R2-D2. To her knowledge, R2 and C3P0 were safely secured with the Organas.

  Very few clone troopers remained from the era of the Clone Wars as more stiff imperials were hand selected from Imperial Academies .

  Resigned to waste away as some pretty possession was not something she'd ever dreamed for her future. Isolated and forgotten. Not a soul to confide in. Due to stringent security measures her former handmaidens were just as inaccessible. Not that she'd chance risking their lives.

Anyone who dare shadow her husbands path were brought under his merciless hand. Dead. Or soiled themselves the minute his cold presence permeated the halls, swiftly cut down by the blood-red plasma of his blade.

This was expected in the times he returned from his Master's bidding which left his moods quite foul. Death became his signature and cleared stations, quick.

  Being the wife of the Imperial Supreme Commander and Right Hand of the Emperor was lonely. Unbearably so. A constant rotation of guards prevented attachments.

It made her lips pull down in disgust. The bitter resentment sharpened the blade of her ire intended for Palpatine. Darth Sidious. Oh, how he'd fooled her with his patronly persona when she'd once been Queen and then a senator.

  He'd fooled them all.

  The mastermind that orchestrated an entirety of events that led to the culmination of the Clone Wars. Of every war. Every battle that scarred a planet. Every single life that had been taken. It was his fault, all of it. Including the Trade Federation siege where hundreds had been lost.

He'd always been right under their nose, of the very Loyalist Committee he'd formed and she'd been on the board of. The whole time he'd left her dangling as a puppet from the very strings he'd enacted as the puppeteer.

If only they'd formed the delegation of 2,000 sooner that were opposed to his rapid growth in power. How foolish they'd been! The regret soured her stomach and never abated.

And each time he returned.

The man that had once left their apartment at 500 Republica, was not the being that materialized out of the thick fumes off Mustafar.

Reduced to a machine and less of a man. A vocoder to breathe simple speech, he was forced to exist in a bacta tank while hooked to a breathing apparatus that she'd once viewed with horror. Her beautiful Anakin. The golden warrior that had once stolen her heart, had been eroded down to a servile cybernetic. A stark contrast to the former Jedi once revered as the 'Hero with No Fear'.  The compassionate man she'd fall for in a meadow framed by her homelands waterfalls. The fierce Jedi who once fought for peace and justice.

"Well if it works..."
"You're making fun of me."
"No, I'd be much too frightened to tease a Senator."
"You're so bad!"
"You're always so serious. Always carrying the weight of the universe on your shoulders..."

The declaration of her confession once was a matter of life and death.

"Don't be afraid."
"I'm not afraid to die. I've been dying a little bit each day since you came back into my life."
"What are you talking about?"
"I love you."
"You love me? I thought we had decided not to fall in love. That we'd be forced to live a lie and it would destroy our lives."
"I think our lives are about to be destroyed anyways..."

Her only beloved promised to her forever. The passionate lover in the quieter moments in the face of defiance they'd stolen, even in the years following the Clone Wars...

"Anakin?"
"Yes, my love?"
"Please, promise to always come back to me."
"I promise you... Padmè Naberrie Skywalker, I will always come back."

He loved her so ardently that his possessive jealousy could rattle her

"You could've killed Clovis, Anakin!"
"I know... I'm sorry."

Once he'd been a hopeful father...

"Every second I was thinking of you. Protecting the endless, nameless Outer Rim settlements became torture. The battles were easy, the longing became unbearable... I've never been so happy as I am at this moment."
"Ani, I want to have our baby back on Naboo..."

Now he was a phantom that haunted her waking nightmares whenever forced to look upon that face.

  "I'm still here, Padmè, listen to me—"

"No, listen! I can never love a man like Vader. I will always stand for democracy and for all that is good!"

"Now you sound like those against the Emperor and that, I cannot allow. They are the enemy—"

"Listen to yourself, Anakin! You're sounding more and more like a dictator which goes against my very—"

"That man no longer exists. Don't you dare talk down to me like Amidala. Here I am respected as a Supreme Commander and Lord—"

"I am not one of your troopers! I can never and will NEVER love a Sith. I will only ever love Anakin, my Anakin. The one who I fought with side by side. The man I married in the Lake Country. That is not you; I don't care to know who this... shadow of you, is."

"In time you will as more order is brought to the galaxy. You'll see I did this for us."

"I'll never be for the Empire, Anakin. I was outspoken about the Chancellors' emergency powers. I fought my entire life against such tyranny. It's become obvious, I can't wait around just to see a glimpse of the good in you, anymore. I've already lost everything; my children and now my husband—"

"In time you'll come to love me again, Padmé I know it. And maybe in time, we can try again for children once I'm—"

"NO! I will never bear another child if it means keeping them from your Master! I've nothing left to give you. Just let me go, Ani!"

"Never, till death do us part, my love."

"I won't stay here, Vader."

"Is that a threat?"

"... I am not one you'll ever command."

"I swear to all nine Corellian hells, Padmé. If you dare attempt to leave me, I will raze the very fabric of the galaxy to bring you back."

"... You're scaring me."

"Good. All of this was done for you. I won't lose you, Padmé. Consider my guards on full detail until I return..."

She took a breath, a single tear clear as crystalline trailing down a gaunt cheekbone. Limp, brunette curls spilled over one bare shoulder as she looked down. Limber fingers framed a heart shape against the satin, ebony dress that hung off her spindly frame. A preference to the elaborate gowns showcasing the mascot colors of the Empire. Placing her palms just under her ribs she whispered a silent, Nabooian lullaby gleaned from her days as a youngling.

Her twins would be one standard year now.

Splaying her fingers against the cold, polymer glass, she articulated the words in her native tongue as she hummed softly. Arranged in a flowing linear fashion from left to right, she wrote across the chilled surface. A bittersweetness echoed in her voice as the last words were ushered, leaving the Naboo's capital flower drawn under the hieroglyphics of a sun. Just as detailed as the palace tiles displayed in the Royal House of Theed.

The symbolization of Luke and Leia.

It was the only hint she allowed of their present existence, knowing the prints would fade. Any physical evidence kept he'd find and lead to questions she'd dare not venture. Sharply adept in the Force, he would instantly sense the mental barriers she'd slam into place. This alone raised his hackles and unleashed that beast from within him. While Anakin knew how to temper his emotions, Vader's mercurial mood swings would set off his temperament.

"I love you my twin darlings... wherever you may be." She had a sneaking suspicion as to where Leia might've gone, but Luke remained a mystery. It was best that way of course. In her heart of hearts, she trusted Obi-Wan wasn't far, picturing the resigned silent guardian watching over her son.

It brought a shred of comfort.

Just as a precaution, she added a few nightly prayers for her sons protector. Just as well, the remaining Jedi and their sympathizers, as word of a burgeoning Rebellion spread.

Cupping her hands around her elbows, Padmé involuntarily leaned towards the viewport, subconsciously yearning to be held in the physical arms of a man long gone. He could stave off the cold  that leeched to her bones. A warmth Vader could never bring in spite of all the luxurious gifts he showered her with.

Away from the cold void of space, she could picture her family's veranda with the dinner table set under the Nabooian sun. The decadent aroma of shurri pies her mother Jobal baked her love into. Ruwees strong embraces that spoke of a doting and proud father. Sola's subtle, calloused hands cupped around Padme's with coded, sisterly squeezes. Ryoo and Pooja's laughter would saturate the halls followed by the excited trills of, "Aunt Padmé! "

Not even her own family knew she lived.

Once when she'd been ready to retire Amidala, she's planned to live in the Lake Country. To fill her own home with children, family dinners, and simple life in the countryside. She and Anakin used to talk of this once the Clone Wars ended. She'd been ready to step down as a senator when peace resumed to live her remaining days with family and the life she'd earned—no longer burdened by secrets.

Yet in an instant had it all been taken from her.

Now, she simply lived for her children. It was the power of a mother's sacred vow to always protect her children. And she would too in whatever capacity she could to ensure her children would never be held in the same captivity. Free from being twisted by the dark sides influence and from the Emperor's clutches.

Evidently, as the years passed her strength would wane while forced to watch the Empires' ever-expanding grasp on the galaxy. But then there were moments when a rare smile would blossom with hope. As word of the Rebellion gaining ground, circulated.

Gradually age would take a toll as the fight against the Sith raged on and on and on. Only when she was finally at peace did her eyes begin to dim to glimpse the realm beyond.

As the once regal Queen finally took her last breath, the cosmos forgivingly accepted her into the stars. Finding her a place to shine in the galaxy once more.

In those final hours she was laid to rest amongst a sea of flowers, a jappor snippet tucked within her placed hands to commemorate a timeless love held for the man long past.

While the machinations of a monster that was once he, roared at the injustice of fate and raged on.