Edges of the World

Chapter 16

The familiar sound of her alarm chimed.

She reached to where she always left her datapad charging at night, hoping to hit the snooze function and get at least five more minutes of sleep, yet it was not there.

She opened her eyes.

The strange other her's datapad was lying on the ground where she had left it last night, tossed aside after it had shown her things far too distressing to properly deal with.

Funny, the other her used the same alarm tone she did.

She picked the datapad up, unlocking it as she did, and the screen's display reminded her that she apparently had a daily briefing to get to in an hour.

There had to be a 'fresher around here somewhere.

She was still in the same clothes she had arrived in this world in, and had not done anything for her hygiene since then either. She really needed to hop in a sonic, or else she'd pity any being that came near her.

She was hyperfocusing on minor details, she knew that, but it was so much easier to do that than deal with the enormity of it all.

Luckily for her the 'freshers, complete with sonic stalls, were well labeled in the hall, and she was able to get herself clean.

She found, among far more white dresses than she had ever imagined owning, just a few outfits she'd consider wearing. Officer's uniforms – slightly different from the one the General had worn the day before, lacking rank plaques – and a series of plain jumpsuits with vests.

She didn't really feel comfortable wearing one of the uniforms, not when she wasn't truly a member of this military force, but it would probably be best for blending in. Then again, a jumpsuit and vest combo would be the most comfortable, and would make her feel the least awkward. She pulled on one of the jumpsuits, unadorned and white, accompanying it with a tan vest. As she pressed down on the fastening strip, one of her hands ran over the rectangle of metal on the chest of the vest. It was on the chest of all the vests, in fact, and those of the uniforms, but she didn't see one on any of the dresses. It didn't look like one of the rank plaques she'd seen. She wondered what it was for.

She felt strange, dressed in something other than her usual robes. Looking at them, balled up on the bed, Leia contemplated putting them back on, despite how badly they smelled.

There had to be somewhere she could clean them, and then she could wear them again. No use wearing them while dirty, even if wearing the clothes of this strange alternate universe double of hers made her feel less like herself.

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She tugged again at the clothes she had been loaned. She had insisted on not wearing anything that belonged to her counterpart, and finally in a moment of frustration Padmé had asked if she'd be willing to wear something of hers instead. Apparently the two of them had similar enough builds to allow that to work.

The outfit she wore was not too dissimilar from the sort of thing she would have picked out for herself, truthfully. A tan jumpsuit, and a maroon vest. Practical and stylish all at the same time.

Simply knowing the clothes were not hers, that they belonged to her birth mother, gave them a strange weight, and kept her constantly aware of them whenever she moved.

The sun had not risen yet, and a pallid mist-like cloud hung over everything at this high level of the cityscape. The speeder cut through the clouds, their presence squeezing in at all sides feeling almost as suffocating as the atmosphere within the car.

Anakin drove her to the temple. He had been silent all morning. She supposed he had heard about her refusal to open up to Padmé the night before. He radiated irritation and desperation.