Sol and Anakin returned to the star ship to head to where Lars the moisture farmer was located. Watto gave them rough coordinates and they realised that it was too far for them to walk and too dangerous to leave Padme in the ship any longer.
Padme asked questions but they went unanswered. She followed the two into the control room, trying to keep up with their frantic movements. Anakin jumped into the driver's seat and Sol took the passenger, already taking off before Padme had the time to buckle herself in. R2 whistled from the hallway and let out a scream as he slid away from the speed at which the ship took off at. A crash was heard, and they were airborne, heading for the moisture farm on the other side of Mos Espa.
Sol dared to glance at Anakin as he deployed the landing stands. His expression was hard, and his lips covered his teeth that were clenched judging by his sharp jaw. His eyes were focused on the hut in the desert, which was said to have housed his mother, Shmi Skywalker. Sol could feel the anticipation and anxiety that hung over Anakin's side of the ship. Padme remained silent after Sol took a moment to explain the simplicities of the situation, and R2 eventually made it into the control room as soon as they landed.
'How can he have sold his mother?' Padme mumbled from beside Sol, the two women following Anakin whose strides were long and quick. R2 attempted to follow the three but was told to stay with the ship by Padme. The droid let out a series of frustrated beeps, before watching Sol, Padme and Anakin descend into the sand.
'Business is business in Watto's eyes,' Sol answered in an equally as mumbled tone. They stepped into the blaring suns and from what they could see through their squints, a stiff-looking figure headed towards them from the right.
'Good evening. May I help you?' a robotic voice sounded. Sol was able to make out from the glare of the sun that it was a protocol droid that stopped next to them. With its circuits showing from the lack of coverings, the droid's arms sat in permanent bends and it's feet kicked up sand from the lack of mobility in its joints.
'Threepio?' Anakin said, his eyes washing with realisation.
'Oh, my... oh, my!' the protocol droid cheered and Padme smiled in the same recognition. 'Master Anakin! My goodness, I can hardly believe it! And this must be Miss Padme!'
'Hello, Threepio,' Padme greeted and gestered to Sol next to her. 'This is Sol.'
'A pleasure to meet you, Miss Sol. I am C3-PO, a protocol droid that was created by Master Anakin, here.'
Sol returned the droid's politeness and was surprised to hear that Anakin had created a droid; an etiquette droid at that. If the situation wasn't so serious, she would make a joke about how Anakin made a droid to teach him the manners he severely lacked. But the air was still dull, and the introduction of C3-PO had brought an anxious but new hope to Anakin. The presence of the droid he left with his mother made him hopeful that his mother was here.
'I've come to see my mother,' Anakin stated.
'Oh, dear,' the droid's voice turned low and laced with sorrow. 'I'm terribly sorry, Master Ani...'
'Threepio, what's happened?' Padme asked and C3-PO took a moment to search his programming for a sympathetic answer.
'I think we'd better go inside.'
---
C3-PO led them into the hut that opened into an underground home. The sand that would usually have caved in after being disturbed to build a home in its hold was hardened, allowing a tunnel to house Cleigg Lars, Owen Lars and his girlfriend, Beru. They had their homestead at the bottom of the tunnel, which held an eating area, bedrooms, a workshop and a kitchen.
They were introduced to Owen and Beru, who Sol thought were nice to some extent. Owen tried to be humourous with a mention of being a form of half brother to Anakin, but the Skywalker wasn't in the mood. Sol saw the way he stared down at Owen with slight disgust, but Owen didn't know Anakin well enough to read his expressions in their true lights. Padme acted as she did in politics; polite and proper to the people she didn't know. Sol followed suite, making up for Anakin's silence by stepping to be in front of him as she shook hands with Owen and Beru.
'Is my mother here?' Anakin asked after the pleasantries and Owen went quiet.
'No, she's not.'
Owen's father, Cliegg, made his presence known and Sol saw the old man in a floating chair. He had one leg, and it was bandaged heavily, showing that he had been in some sort of battle that ended in the amputation of one limb. Unlike Owen, Cliegg held a frown on his face as he shook Anakin's hand to introduce himself.
'Shmi is my wife. Come inside... we have a lot to talk about,' the man's chair moved on its own and led them into the kitchen, where Bru made cups of ardees for everyone.
'It was just before dawn. They came out of nowhere; a hunting party of Tuseken Raiders.
Your mother had gone out early, like she always did, to pick mushrooms that grow on the vaporators. From the tracks, she was about halfway when they took her. Those Tuskens walk like men, but they're vicious, mindless monsters.
Thirty of us went out after her, four of us came back. Three more are still out there looking. I'd be with them, only... I just couldn't ride anymore. Not until I heal...'
Cliegg gripped the leg he still had in pain and looked at Anakin with regret-filled eyes.
'This isn't the way I wanted to meet you, son. This isn't how your mother and I planned it. I don't want to give up on her, but she's been gone a month. There's little hope she's lasted this long...'
Sol swallowed the ball that formed in her throat. The story of Shmi Skywalker was a sad one and Sol had never even met her. Bought by Watto with her son, forced to work without pay, her son was freed and she was left behind, she was then sold to the Lars family, who freed her for a short time, before she is presumed dead after the capture of Tusken Raiders. Sol couldn't imagine how Anakin must be feeling and didn't want to look away from her cup of ardee to find out. But when he stood up from his place next to her, she was forced to see Anakin already walking away from the eating area of the kitchen.
'Where are you going?' Sol asked after him.
'To find my mother.'
'No, Ani!' Padme cried as he continued to walk without looking back.
'She's dead, son,' Cliegg announced with a heavy voice. 'Accept it.
Anakin stopped and looked at the man who had freed his mother from Watto. He thought that she had found a new life with Cliegg, one that was better than being a slave. A wife to a moisture farmer wasn't the worst fate of a woman on Tatooine, but Anakin couldn't live with travelling from Naboo, with a senator, risking his and Sol's position in the Jedi Order, just to leave at being told that his mother was probably dead.
'I can feel her pain, and I will find her. I know she's alive.'
With that, Anakin turned with a jolt and left to take the stairs up to the surface. Sol turned to Padme, their eyes meeting with the same pursed lips and same desire to go after him. But they knew he wasn't to be persuaded, and it would be futile to try and stop him. But their collective worry was too much to bare, and when Anakin disappeared over the hill of the surface, Sol slipped out from behind the table and pushed herself off the bench.
'I'll go after him,' she said over her shoulder and left her cup untouched. C3-PO arrived at the table as Sol left, turning to communicate some nonsense before saying 'oh!' when he realised that she was in a rush. The droid, the Lars family and Padme watched Sol run to the staircase and fly up to the surface.
'Ani!' she called once she made it onto the sand. 'Anakin!'
He was already on the Lars family's speeder. Sol ran to cross the distance between the hut and him, sand kicking up from her boots as she did so. She had never experienced the hardship of running in sand and hoped that she would never be in a dire situation where she would have to run for her life through the terrible granules.
'Just wait a moment!' Sol yelled over the roar of the speeder's engine, which weren't as high tech as the ones she knew on Coruscant. Without much thought, Sol stepped in front of the speeder and forced Anakin to look up from the controls. With her hands out in front of her and with wide eyes, Sol looked at Anakin who tried not to grumble something nasty.
'You're going out into the desert where Tusken Raiders are everywhere. You've got no plan and no supplies-'
'This has nothing to do with you, Solaris. Get out of the way.'
Sol was taken back by the venom in Anakin's voice. He had turned off the speeder at some point, allowing her to hear the ferocity of his words. Sol had the mind to warn Anakin of the anger that she could feel through the Force, as it was strong enough to worry the Jedi Council if they too had felt it. But she assessed the situation in an instant and knew any mention of the Order could set Anakin off into an unexpected tirade. Sol knew Anakin wouldn't hurt her, but there was no telling of what he could say or do that could hurt her emotionally.
'And what happens if you don't come back?' Sol tried a different approach. 'What happens to me and Padme, huh?'
Anakin stared at her over the handles of the speeder. His thoughts were clouded but were clearing when his ears tuned into the cool winds that blew and at the sound of Sol's voice. The suns were beginning to set, and the sky darkened to a periwinkle blue. Sol was bathed in the lights of dusk and the way her skin looked in the late hour made Anakin's mind clear to the point of listening to her.
'What happens if we leave you on Tatooine, not knowing if you're living or dead, and go back to the Order without you? What happens to me?' Sol didn't realise that she was actually hurting at her own words.
She could already see Master Kenobi's face when she exited the ship without Anakin by her side. The disappointment in Master Yoda's face would ruin Sol and she would be out of the Order before a trial could be held for her suspected murder of Anakin Skywalker. Padme would try to plead Sol's case, but it would be futile, and Sol's future would be over.
'I know that it's your mother, but you have to think of yourself and the ones you came here with. What happens to Anakin Skywalker and his team if he dies?'
Sol took a shaky breath as she finished the speech that was so moving, it could have been rehearsed. She knew she shouldn't be feeling the fear of losing someone, as it was a sign of attachment. Even if she and Anakin didn't get along, they were partners, and had a chemistry that worked to reach common goals. They had successfully gotten the senator off of Coruscant and into Naboo as refugees, and even travelled to the outer-rim without much harm. They were a team, whether they liked it or not.
Thinking she had gotten through to Anakin, Sol took steps down the side of the speeder. She eyed the man who watched her move, his eyes looking at nothing else but her. The anger his face once held was gone, and his tan skin beamed in the setting of the suns. Feelings swirled inside Sol at the realisation of how she would feel if Anakin didn't return from the desert, and she hoped that it wasn't obvious that she was conflicted inside. These weren't the feelings of a Jedi, but she was beginning to believe that it wasn't such a bad thing.
'Sorry, Sol, but I have to do this.'
Before she could react, Anakin turned back on the speeder and shot off. Sol was left in the kickup of sand that was left in his wake and stood with her mouth gaping and eyes wide in betrayal. Anakin's figure grew small, and Sol's heart raced in her chest. She couldn't believe that he had just tossed aside everything she had said, and in doing so, invalidating the feelings she expressed through her tangent.
'What happened? Did he leave?' Padme's voice came from behind Sol, but she didn't turn to look at the senator. She only stared at where Anakin disappeared with a bad feeling brewing in her stomach.