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Chapter Text

PROLOGUE

It happens in a blur, of lightsabers clashing, of the screams of the dying, of a chorus of whispering and pleading and crying voices closing in from all sides. The events of the last rotation start to mesh together, until all he can truly remember is the rage. A roaring, deep-seated rage with embers lodged so far down inside him they feel like they’ll burn forever.

And that’s fine with Vader. After all, he’s right to be angry. They betrayed him. They all did—the Senate, and the Jedi, and Mace Windu and Yoda and Obi-Wan and even Padmé—

Vader growls, pushing back the twinge in his heart he feels at the thought of his wife with a rush of fury, and uses the flare in the Dark Side to propel him as he jumps back to Kenobi’s position with a brutal overhead strike. His former master, ever the defensive dueler, handily blocks, of course, and they’re off to another deadly volley, strokes coming hard and fast. The fire roiling in Vader’s stomach bubbles up with frustration at not being able to land a hit. But, unlike when he was a Jedi—so weak, so lacking in knowledge—Vader uses it to gather more tendrils of the Dark Side around him like a cloud, just like Sidious, his Master, taught him. He relishes in the strength he feels flowing through him.

It is only a matter of time. Soon, his old master will lie broken at his feet, and Vader will have his revenge.

Just then, the boiling lava around the two duelers swallows up part of the flotsam they’re standing on, and they have to find purchase on something else, despite none of the wreckage bearing any semblance of safety. Vader can hardly bring himself to care. Kenobi launches himself onto a pole floating in the maelstrom, so Vader simply follows his prey.

Kenobi inches back from him, his face contorted with pain—not physical, but emotional, Vader can still tell from what he’s projecting in the Force, despite the fact that he can’t feel their old bond anymore. It didn’t break, so much as dissolve, swallowed up by a dark cloud from Vader’s side. As it should be, Vader thinks with a smirk. But feeling the conflict and sorrow radiating from his old master is a gift rather than annoyance, one he takes, uses to reinforce his Dark.

Let him suffer. Kenobi turned against him. He deserves to feel Vader’s pain, one thousandfold stronger.

Kenobi’s still stepping back from the fight, though, to Vader’s annoyance. “Anakin,” he starts, voice raw. “I—I can see now that the Jedi might not have been the place for you.” He grimaces. “You always felt so much,” he adds, a bit softer.

Vader’s anger surges. Kenobi doesn’t get to apologize, not now, before he’s suffered. With a wordless roar, Vader dashes back into the fight, so quick and insistent Kenobi can’t do anything but block.

Somehow, this isn’t enough to convince Kenobi to shut up, however. “Anakin, that doesn’t make the Sith the right path,” he pants between blows. “They only promise power—you’ve never been interested in that, Anakin, I know you—”

“You know me?” Vader spits. Memories flash before his eyes—his mother’s dying breath, Ahsoka’s back turned as she walked away in the sunset, Padmé’s swollen belly. “You never cared enough to know me, Kenobi,” he growls, gathering the Force with his left hand and pushing Kenobi backwards, perilously close to the lava. How dare he. Vader stalks forward to deliver a killing blow, but Kenobi pries himself upward and flips back into position, ready to block. The blades skitter into a standstill.

Kenobi has the gall to look him right in the eyes. “Anakin, I do care.”

A reflexive wall of fury rises within Vader, so potent it takes his breath away. “Call me by that name, one more time—” he chokes out.

Kenobi blinks. “Or what,” he says softly, no mocking tone in his voice as usual. Only a question. Somehow, this makes Vader even more irate.

Before he can respond, however, a giant wave of lava crashes into the wreckage, and both are tossed into the air. At some point during the struggle, they’d managed to float closer to the obsidian sands of the shore, so Vader reaches out to the Force to propel himself far enough in on the bank so as not to get scorched. As he rolls to his feet, he notices Kenobi’s done the same. Without sparing a moment, Vader rushes him with a guttural cry.

Here, with surer purchase on the ground, the duel reaches a fever pitch. Soon, Vader’s raw rage isn’t enough to keep pace, and he’s forced to focus. All of his concentration soaks into the Force, and into every minutae of lightsaber technique he’s ever learned—steps taught to him by the very man before him. Vader simmers at the thought, but is quickly distracted by a stray swipe that forces him to duck, then flip back out of range.

A quick glance at Kenobi shows that he’s in a similar situation, brow furrowed in deep concentration. Kenobi’s coming at him with everything he believes he has, now, Vader knows—all of his expertise, but with none of the emotional power Vader’s using. The rage that could make him strong. And Kenobi’s matching him anyway. Vader’s insides boil at this—he, a Dark Lord of the Sith, should be wiping the floor with his level-headed old master.

A spark of fear lights in him. Sidious would be displeased with this performance.

Growling, Vader redoubles his attack, connecting back into the simmering pit of rage he feels inside him, matching his presence in the Force to mirror the churning of the lava on the banks. He lets his fury thrash and roar, and then lets it sink down, into his foundations, to the very dark pit of the Force presence of Mustafar itself.

Vader shoots his former master a fresh glare. The old man will see Vader’s power, will cower before the wrath of a Sith. And then Vader will make him pay.

Their blades flash even faster now, all strategy forgotten in the pure instinct of skill. It’s nothing like their sparring sessions ever were. Back and forth, up and down the bank, the duel rages. The close calls increase in frequency—a millisecond here, and Vader would have lost his sword hand yet again—a millisecond there, and Vader’s saber would have pierced Kenobi’s chest.

And then, amidst the frenzy, their blades become locked once more. Vader’s teeth grits as he tries to force Kebobi’s saber back, to no avail.

“Anakin,” Kenobi pleads. “Please.”

In response, Vader uses his fury to Force-push Kenobi back and flip away to give him some distance. Then, he charges, launching himself up and over to strike Kenobi where he lies—

—except Kenobi has somehow recovered his footing, and greets Vader with a wide swipe—

—and then the world around Vader erupts into pain. His eyes vaguely register his severed legs falling to the ground, and Kenobi’s look of shock, but all Vader can understand is the agony as he falls, helpless, to the ground, the sharp glass of the sand slicing into him, the screaming pain in the absence of his limbs, and the burning, the unbearable, savage heat everywhere, boiling his flesh.

Somewhere in the haze, Kenobi’s voice reaches him. “You were my brother, Anakin,” he cries. “I loved you.”

Incensed, Vader’s able to convert just enough of his pain into boiling anger, enough to scream, “I HATE YOU!”, before the agony takes over again. He’s only vaguely aware, as time burns away into nothing, that at some point, Kenobi’s figure, blurred by the waves of heat rising from the sand, disappears. Alone with nothing but his pain to keep him company, the blackness rises to meet him, and he knows no more.

***

ROTATION 1

And then he wakes up, and the pain is gone.

Vader jumps to his feet—his feet, still there—and glances around, wildly, at his surroundings. He’s in his room. At the Jedi Temple. The Temple that he recalls burning, down to the ground, like it deserved.

Vader growls, anger rising back up to the fever pitch he’s become accustomed to. Why is the Force-damned thing still here?

And in fact, why is he still here? He should be—

—and then the memories of Mustafar come crashing back, dousing him like gasoline to the fire of his rage. The edges of his vision blur and he roars, punching the wall with his metal fist, so hard he nearly breaks through the plastisteel entirely.

Kenobi. He interfered with Vader’s plans, and then he fought him, and pretended he cared, only to maim him and then leave him, burning alive on that karking bank—

Before Vader knows it, he’s barged through the door, lightsaber lit, all thoughts other than finding and killing Kenobi vanished from his mind. He reaches his old master’s door, and, when he finds it’s locked, plunges his saber into the door and stabs at it until he’s through.

Kenobi is at his feet, lightsaber lit, when Vader barges in. The sight of him nearly reduces his mind to a static of rage, but Vader takes the anger and channels it inward in the Force to keep his vision clear. Vader lunges at him, but not before he sees Kenobi’s face of pure, unadulterated shock and horror.

“Anakin?”

Kenobi manages to gather himself just enough to catch Vader’s blade, and then parries a series of strikes in quick succession until he catches the sabers in a lock. Vader growls—there are no offensive strikes or aggression in his opponent. Kenobi’s just trying to stop the fight, the look on his face still no less surprised than when Vader came in. The nerve. As if he didn’t know—

“Anakin,” Kenobi tries again, uncharacteristic panic edging his voice. “What’s this—what are you—”

“YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID,” Vader roars, breaking the standstill in the fight and hacking in Kenobi’s direction. The other man ducks, and Vader’s saber traces sparks across the wall.

“No, Anakin, I really don’t,” Kenobi quavers. “Please, why don’t we settle down and—”

Vader sees red at the insolence. “YOU!” he growls, saber swinging wildly. “How DARE you pretend!” Vader lets his fury aim his strikes, Kenobi avoiding each one until his old master is backed into a corner, his hands up defensively—no, placatingly.

“Anakin, I don’t know what this is about, but please listen to me—”

“YOU LEFT ME TO BURN!” Vader howls, the agony of the moment coming into the forefront of his memory. He can still feel the heat all around him, searing him, and Kenobi was the reason why—

He just wants to crush him. Make him feel unbearable pain.

Vader lashes out with the Force in a blind fury, and Kenobi rises up off the ground, gasping and clutching at his throat. Vindictive pleasure starts to appease Vader, through the simple knowledge that he is now the one causing the suffering—

—and then a shock spreads through him, and his vision spirals back to black.

***

For a while, the blackness is all Vader knows. Something distant niggles at his mind—there’s something going on, just at the edge of his awareness, but his consciousness is too sluggish to make it out, preferring the peace of the still silence. Eventually, however, Vader’s hearing starts to pick out distinct voices.

“—he’s never—”

“—reason why—”

“—Force presence felt like Dooku’s—”

“—Anakin—”

Something in Vader snaps to attention, and he opens his eyes.

He’s lying on a hard, durasteel floor. In fact, durasteel closes in all around him, from every direction save one, which is sealed by a ray shield instead. Fury surges within him—he’s been put in a Jedi cell—except something feels off. His rage feels less powerful this time, like he’s unable to use it to power the Dark Side—and Vader looks down at his hands to see that he's been put in Force bonds.

Anger consumes him, vanishing all rational thoughts from his mind, and he scrambles to his feet, then body-slams into the plasma door with all his might. It repels him, of course, flinging him back and causing him to skid across the floor. The pain he feels upon impact rattles his skull, and he rises to his feet more slowly this time. He closes his eyes and tries to rub his head, only to realize he can’t, due to the tight bonds. Vader snarls and opens his eyes to glare in the direction of the plasma door.

Standing behind it, colored yellow by the translucent barrier, are the very Jedi who threw him in here.

Within an instant, Vader is pressed once more against the barrier, standing tall so he can look the Jedi scum in the eyes.

Then, movement attracts his attention from behind them, and another Jedi squeezes into their midst and reveals himself to be none other than Kenobi. Vader bares his teeth, cursing that he doesn’t have his lightsaber. He wants nothing more than to take his saber and burn that man’s flesh with it, like Kenobi did to him, and then cut off his limbs—

“Skywalker,” someone else says, and Vader snaps his attention to the perpetrator. It’s Mace Windu—and something about his presence bothers Vader, tickles at his sense of logic, but Vader’s too furious to care. “What is the meaning of this?”

Vader smirks. “I wouldn’t expect you Jedi to understand,” he sneers. They can come up with better questions than that, the filth—as if they didn’t all betray him.

“Jedi, you say, as though you are not?’ Ki-Adi Mundi intones.

What an insinuation. Vader clenches his fist. “Can you not recognize a Dark Lord of the Sith?” he scoffs. Some of the Jedi make a show of gasping, as if they did not already know.

“But yesterday you were—Anakin, when did this happen?” Kenobi finally pipes up. He shakes his head as if in confusion. “Anakin, this isn’t you. Last night, I seem to recall you behaving normally, but you woke up today and—What’s going on?” Kenobi finishes by affixing Vader with a pleading stare.

Part of Vader roils with anger at Kenobi’s address, but something else in what he said bothers Vader. Last night. None of the Jedi are acting like they know anything about yesterday—about Vader’s Fall, about Order 66—

—wait. Vader’s thoughts grind to a halt. They should be dead. He watched Mace Windu die. The Temple burned, Vader saw to it personally.

Is he somehow in the past?

Suddenly, Windu’s commlink blinks, and all the Jedi turn to it, expectant—as if they are waiting for some news. “It’s Master Fisto, from Utapau,” Windu murmurs, evidently trying, but failing, not to be heard. “We’ll interrogate him,” he nods in Vader’s direction, “later.” Windu turns to leave, the rest of the Jedi in tow, except Kenobi, who shoots Vader one last hurt, and confused, look, before leaving as well.

Vader wants to be angry, but he is just as baffled.

Utapau?

If his instincts are right, he's indeed somehow ended up transported into yesterday—a version of yesterday that looks different from the one he just lived through. Kenobi was supposed to be the one to go to Utapau to face Grievous—except, because of Vader’s attempt to kill him in the morning, the Council would have wanted to keep him around, and sent someone else instead.

All the changes are due to Vader’s actions this time around, and to nothing else.

Vader’s first instinct is to be angry. Whatever messing around the Force just did, all of his and his Master’s plans to exterminate the Jedi have just been undone. The kriffing Temple is still standing. Order 66 has not come to pass. And his Master—his Master doesn’t even know Vader is his apprentice, unless Sidious sensed his darkened Force presence from the Senate building. Cut off from the Force, Vader can’t contact him now.

A rush of fury fills Vader, and he slams his bound wrists into the plasma barrier. This is far worse. The Jedi have him prisoner, and—

—and he isn’t maimed and burning on the banks of Mustafar.

Biting down the wave of rage at the memory for the time being, Vader ponders his situation. The Force has indeed spared him the pain of such a loss. He may have inadvertently landed himself in a cell, but his Master’s plans are all still intact, and can be executed later. Except, this time, with prior knowledge to use against the Jedi, they can be put into action with even less resistance. And Vader can exact his revenge upon Kenobi, all with him being none the wiser.

All Vader has to do is figure a way out of this cell.

Chapter Text

Trying to escape the Temple’s prison is much more difficult than Vader expected. For all that he was a Jedi—actually, he was one of them just one—no, two—rotations ago— Vader shakes his head, annoyed at the thought. For all that he was once a Jedi, and thus knows most of their tricks, there is simply no strategic advantage in the galaxy that can get him through these bonds, or this Force-damned ray shield. Any chance he has to escape will have to be when the conditions of his confinement change—perhaps a transfer, or an opening left by an interrogator. So all that’s left for him to do, unfortunately, is to think.

Which is the last thing Vader has anticipated doing. When he turned to the Dark Side of the Force, finally leaving behind the Jedi ways and their weakness, he pictured his near future as being filled with action, with battle, conquest, and power—instead of being cooped up in a Jedi cell with nothing but his own thoughts.

They aren’t good company.

Vader is running out of steam, out of the roaring drive his Dark Side-fueled anger gives him, and he knows it. For a second or two, that thought alone is able to give him a spark of familiar fury—

—before it too dies out, and Vader feels like punching a wall in frustration, but he’s already done so more times than he can count, and his arms are starting to feel the consequences. All that’s left for him to do is pace. Back and forth, back and forth.

Force, if he has to stay here even ten minutes longer, cut off from the Force, from his lightsaber, from freedom of movement, he is sure he’ll burst. Of course, Vader’s been imprisoned or captured many times before, and he’s never enjoyed the feeling. But why does it feel so excruciatingly awful this time?

Last time… and all those times before that… it was part of the plan, part of a mission, and he had something to strategize about, or some sleemo interrogating him that he could annoy, or—or company.

Vader’s mind only has time to summon forth a few broken images of comrades from former war campaigns—Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, and Padmé—Padmé—before he scrunches his eyes shut and slams down a barrier in his mind, the one preventing him from thinking about all those people who he would once do anything for, but who left him, who spurned him, who betrayed him. Anakin Skywalker was weak to trust them.

In a roundabout way, the Jedi were right all along. Attachments would only ever hold you back, or bring you pain. It’s such irony that Vader almost gives a bitter laugh at the thought.

Yes, he has learned so much in these past few rotations. He found out the hard way what a former master—

—brother, Kenobi’s voice shouts, full of raw agony—

—can do. Vader’s mechanical fist tightens as he once again feels the phantom burns, slowly eating their way through him as he screamed.

Kenobi made his true colors clear. He could pretend to care about Vader all he wanted, but that didn’t stop him from leaving his former padawan in misery, roasting alive. Kenobi did the unforgivable. Vader doesn’t want to see him again, unless it’s at the other end of Vader’s lightsaber, the life slowly draining from his eyes.

Suddenly, the whoosh of elevator doors opening sounds somewhere to Vader’s right, where he knows the connection to the rest of the floors of the Temple to be. Vader pauses where he stands, rigid and listening. He tries not to acknowledge the infuriating hope he feels at the idea of someone, even a Jedi, coming to talk to him.

The soft footsteps of his visitor draw closer, until Vader’s finally able to catch a glimpse of who it is—and all of Vader’s thoughts are promptly consumed by rage as he sees that it’s Kenobi himself who has come back to taunt him. Vader snarls, his supply of fury back in full force.

For a moment, the coward doesn’t even deign to speak to him, his eyes searching, questioning. Finally, he speaks, voice almost a whisper.

“Anakin, what happened to you?”

Vader almost screams at Kenobi exactly what happened to him, until he’s stopped at the last second by the small part of his mind that remains rational amidst his swelling rage. Not only does this Kenobi not know what happened at Mustafar, but it would also be to Vader’s strategic advantage if he were to withhold that information. Yes, Kenobi ought to know the pain he caused, his betrayal of his “brother”—

—but Vader settles for sniping, “Wouldn’t you like to know,” hoping the heat of his scowl can communicate enough.

Kenobi studies him for another long moment, before his posture subtly shifts, assuming the usual air of reserved, polite dignity Vader didn’t realize he was missing until now. “Really, Anakin, I’m trying to understand,” he starts, his voice clearer, his consonants more pronounced. “Those who use the Dark Side are but blind devotees to a purveyor of empty promises. I didn’t think you were the type.”

Vader snorts. “Like the Jedi are any different,” he sneers. How rich, coming from Kenobi. The blindest devotee of them all.

Kenobi only gives Vader a raised brow—the one he knows all too well. “I fail to see how you exclude yourself from that accusation, seeing as you were one just last night.”

Gritting his teeth, Vader bites back the urge to punch the ray shield as his insides roil with fury. Vader knows exactly what’s going on here. Kenobi’s quibbling with him on semantics, catching him in the traps of his words—he’s turning his Negotiator routine on his own former padawan. Yet another betrayal. Vader’s mind whites out again, hazy with anger. He does not have the patience to deal with this.

“Enough!” Vader spits. “Why are you here?”

Kenobi looks caught off guard, his shoulders slumping almost imperceptibly. “Why am I here? Where else would I be?” Vader, affronted by yet another attempt by Kenobi to pretend that he cares, almost fits in a retort, but then Kenobi continues, his voice rising. “Anakin, this is outrageous. People simply don’t become Sith Lords overnight. Such an assertion implies training, and a master—in fact, it implies apprenticeship to the Master, and yet you have never shown any sort of inclination towards the Dark Side before—“

Vader scoffs. “Oh, really,” he drawls. “Never?”

There is a moment of silence as Kenobi lowers his eyes. Again he has the nerve to look hurt, when he was the one who didn’t care to know Vader well enough, if he didn’t see the signs. Or, as is looking more likely, from Kenobi’s weathered face, he did, and chose to ignore them, to pretend as if Vader’s moments of righteous fury would pass.

Vader knows now he was only scratching the surface of his true power then. Kenobi will never understand.

“Anakin, even when you came close to crossing the line, I believed you would come back to the right path, because you were—you are a good person,” Kenobi pleads. “Every time, it was always because…” He strokes his beard, before his eyes widen, and his gaze meets Vader’s. “Because you wanted to protect someone you love.”

Vader chokes out a short laugh, filled with malice. “Are you preaching attachment to me?” he snarls. “After all this time? How hypocritical. But that’s an ordinary thing, for you.”

Kenobi doesn’t take the bait, his eyes still firmly fixed on Vader’s. “Anakin, I won’t pretend that I didn’t notice your attachments. And—“ he sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I won’t deny that I have my own.”

This catches Vader off guard, so much that he doesn’t interrupt. He thought he’d never see the day when Kenobi admitted something of this magnitude.

“Perhaps…” here Kenobi pauses, seemingly about to continue, before thinking better of it, and pressing his mouth into a thin line. “The point is, I am not against there being another way for you, Anakin. Perhaps the Jedi were not equipped to fulfill your needs. But if that’s true, the Sith surely are not. You must reconsider.”

Vader glares. “You think I need attachments, old man? I’ve learned better. You cured me of that,” he spits out, before he can think better of it, avoid giving away too much.

But Kenobi only closes his eyes, putting on an infuriating air of sadness. “I don’t know what I have done to injure you so, but for what it’s worth, Anakin, I am truly sorry.”

Injure. Injure. Vader wants to scream. “You don’t get to be sorry!” he yells, slamming his bound hands into the ray shield, previous pain forgotten. “You—“

No, forget it, Vader is done with this bantha poodoo. He gives the barrier one more shove, hatred burning as he stares Kenobi down, before he turns his back, retreating into his cell. “I’m done talking to you.”

For a moment, there’s blessed silence, and Vader thinks he’s won out, that Kenobi will leave him alone. But then he hears Kenobi’s voice behind him say, “I still can’t pretend to know what has made you feel this way. But if you will not talk to me, will you at least consider speaking to Padmé?”

Vader feels a jolt run up his spine. For an agonizing moment, before he can stop himself, he remembers what it felt like to love her. His mind’s eye conjures up her lovely visage, brown, lash-rimmed eyes filled with concern, as she reaches to place a hand to his cheek. He wants nothing more than to lean into the touch, to lean into the love she projects through the Force—

Vader blinks, and remembers her betrayal, how she sided with Obi-Wan over him, how she brought his old master to kill him. His fury comes crashing back, but this time it doesn’t feel intoxicating, only filled with sour, aching pain. He whirls on Kenobi. “YOU WILL NOT INVOKE HER NAME!”

Kenobi still stands his ground, studying his former padawan. A small part of Vader registers that he can’t tell what sort of look Kenobi has on his face, Vader’s vision blurred with tears he refuses to acknowledge, but he can imagine it still projects that same, phony pain. Vader curls his fists, digging his nails into his palms. He’s glad he can’t see it. He doesn’t want to see it.

“Very well, then,” Kenobi says at last, voice almost soft enough to be a whisper. He turns as if to leave, but at the last second, pauses, glancing over his shoulder. “But Anakin—I won’t give up on you yet.”

Vader watches as Kenobi’s blurry form drifts back to the elevator, refusing to tear his eyes away until he’s sure the other man is gone. Once he’s been left well and truly alone, he covers his eyes with his hands and lets his knees buckle, his back sliding against the wall of his cell until he’s sunk down to the floor. He’s too tired to try and harness his emotions, so he lets them run their course. Together, his rage and pain carry him into unconsciousness.

***

It’s not a restful sleep.

Vader’s never been the sort to seek out Force visions through meditation. For one, he’s pretty sure he was never able to reach the level of deep immersion in Jedi meditation he was supposed to. Not that that’s a bad thing, now—better that he didn’t let himself be brainwashed by the feeble doctrines of the Light Side. For another… whenever Vader did have visions, they were always dire and disturbing warnings, causing him to wake in a panic, afraid for the ones he loved.

And they always came true.

The vision that finds him is, unfortunately, in the same vein. He can’t recall how it starts, but before he knows it, he’s been plunged back into the same, terrible vision of Padmé’s demise that has tortured him for months, now. He always hears her screams of pain, her face contorted in terror, and sees the cool pallor of death in her cheeks. Except—this time, the details are much clearer, unfolding as one long scene, instead of as garbled moments and sounds.

Padmé’s lying in the med bay of a ship—Vader recognizes it, actually: her Nubian yacht. She’s in the throes of labor, the pain of childbirth wrenching cries from her throat—except they seem less intense than they had before in his dreams. She seems, perhaps, resigned to the pain, her suffering quiet. Despite his determination to be angry with her, this chills Vader more than any of the visions before. It seems both more realistic, and more unlikely. He’s never seen Padmé without a certain steel behind her gaze, a bearing as though she could take on anything.

This Padmé has been drained of her backbone, of her will to go on.

Finally, the med droid reaches down and—and pulls out a baby. Vader’s would-have-been child. It’s alive. For a moment, he’s transfixed, until he makes himself tear his dream-focus away. He left behind these silly dreams, his dreams of starting a family. However, he’s still stuck in his vision, so he can only watch as Padmé spares a glance at the child, still in pain, and mutters something he can’t hear. For a moment he’s confused—why is her labor not over?—until the med droid, having set down the baby into a crib, reaches down and—delivers another child.

Twins. Vader stares in shock as the other child is ushered away, out of the field of vision of his dream. He would have had twins. A thrill of desperate longing fills him, despite himself.

Vader doesn’t have time to process this revelation, though, as the vision focuses back in on Padmé. Something’s wrong. Though she’s out of labor, her brow is still furrowed in pain, her breath coming in short gasps. Dread grips Vader. This part—it’s still the same. The Force has still considered it fit to torture him with such an image. Anger rises within him, and he tries with all his mental might to wrench his dream away, but it stays stubbornly put, forcing him to stand by as his former beloved’s strength wanes. Amidst his growing despair and frustration, Vader’s suddenly hit with a terrible idea, one that he knows, with a strange certainty, to be true.

The Force is trying to show him exactly what happened yesterday. The day he Fell. While he burned on the lava banks of Mustafar, this was the fate Padmé suffered. Stunned, Vader’s fight dies within him, and he simply watches as she takes her final breaths.

Suddenly, the scene shifts, and an inky blackness swamps Vader’s vision. At first he thinks the dreams have left him, but then the sounds of mechanical whirring fade in, and vague, dark shapes materialize to his left and his right. A source of white light appears, far away now, but coming closer as his dream swoops nearer. He’s in some sort of dark bunker. There are control panels, and med droids, and—

—and the cloaked form of his Master enters, carrying something in his arms. Vader tries to repress an initial thrill of fear at the sight of Sidious’s hideous visage. His Master has only been good to him, merciful, even, as he taught him the powerful ways of the Dark Side, so that he might increase his strength. And—Vader realizes with a start as the form Sidious carries becomes clearer—his Master saved his life.

Vader can barely recognize himself, he is so covered in burns. They run from the ends of his severed legs, up his torso, to his arms—both also stunted, quite possibly burned off—and up to his face. He has no more hair, simply mottled burns all around his head. A deeper horror than he’s ever felt wells within him, and then turns to blinding rage. This is what Kenobi did to him. His desire—no, his need to kill the bastard grows even stronger as the med droids flit around his broken form, prodding and slicing. But then they start replacing him–well, even more of him—with metal.

Vader’s anger dulls into a numb dismay as he watches himself disappear into cool, black, robotic armor. It looks heavy. No, it looks suffocating. Nothing is done to ease his pain, either, every new piece attached leaving him moaning and twitching in agony. When the machines are finally done with him, they have turned him into one of their own. Vader looks into those dark, soulless circles that are supposed to serve for his eyes, set within that lifeless, skull-like mask, and realizes that this is what he would have become. More machine than man.

For the first time, he’s truly grateful for the chance at a do-over.

As Vader watches himself take his first breath in the awful suit—a mechanical koo-hiss that makes him want to shudder—he sees his Master approach him to see the handiwork of the droids —and Sidious is grinning in glee.

Vader forces himself to remember that this is the way of the Dark Side—only power is recognized, not mercy. As a Sith Apprentice, it will be his destiny to attempt to overthrow his Master, and thus anything that would weaken Sidious’s future opponent would be a welcomed advantage. But Vader still can’t help the feeling of hurt at the sight.

Once the operation is finished, Sidious speaks up, his rasping voice no less terror-inducing than his face. “Lord Vader, can you hear me?”

“Yes, Master,” Vader watches himself answer, obedient. Then, with hesitation clear despite the mask over his face, he continues. “Padmé. Is she… is she safe?”

Vader understands the impulse. Despite her betrayal, it is hard to keep the vestiges of his former feelings for her under wraps. It is a moment of weakness he’ll especially allow this counterpart of his, after such a traumatic transformation.

But Sidious’s eyes only hold mock sympathy. “It seems, in your anger, you killed her.”

A surge of shock runs through Vader. His Master lied. He wasn’t the one—he didn’t kill her.

Why would Sidious lie? What would he have to gain from it?

And how, then, did Sidious know she was dead?

Questions continue to swirl through Vader’s mind as he watches his helmeted counterpart break through his restraints and crush a medical droid in rage. As the vision starts to fade, Vader probes at the Force, wondering if this scene, too, was one that would have truly occurred following the events of Mustafar.

A cold confirmation sinks through him, and then his consciousness returns.

Vader starts awake, spine going rigid, an action that nearly sends him toppling over, since he can’t balance himself properly with bound hands. He shifts his weight so he is leaning forward in a sitting position, breath coming fast and heavy.

He doesn’t know what to make of any of this. It should be irrelevant to him. As a servant of the Dark Side, and of his Master, he’s supposed to plan to escape, and then help his Master execute once more the end of the war and the demise of the Jedi. His own personal comfort has no place in this. Padmé has no place in this. Neither do his children. In fact, all of his former attachments betrayed him—they made the side they took clear. He shouldn’t dwell on them, or spare them any more thought, except perhaps to kill them for their treachery.

But part of him knows that he’s lying to himself, if he thinks these goals are truly where his heart lies. He can’t keep his love for Padmé buried for long, and nor can he stop himself for longing after his child—now children—and he hates himself for it.

Still alone with nothing but his thoughts, but unwilling to go back to sleep, lest the Force send him more visions, Vader rests his head back on the wall and stews.

***

Before too long, the sound of the elevator whirring reaches his ears once more, and Vader scrambles to his feet, wanting to get a good look at whoever is coming down to visit.

It’s Kenobi again, to his dismay. Vader’s lip curls as he glares at the approaching Jedi. “I thought I told you to go away!” he shouts.

Kenobi just purses his lips and keeps coming. When he reaches Vader’s cell, he stands up straight, meeting Vader’s eyes head-on, just as he did before.

“I’m not here for myself, Anakin,” he starts. There’s a pause, and his expression shifts into something unreadable. “I come with—news.”

Vader continues to glare as Kenobi reaches into his pockets to pull out—a holoprojector. Before Vader can ask what he plans on doing with it, an image flickers to life.

It’s Padmé. She’s lying on a hospital pallet, wrapped in blankets. And on her lap, she’s holding two babies.

His babies. The twins.

She delivered them, and she’s alive.

His family is alive.

Frozen as he is, gaping at the twins, he almost misses Padmé’s words as she starts to speak.

“Ani, I… I don’t know what’s going on with you right now, but… I wanted you to see them.” Her brown eyes are filled with love and concern, and Vader basks in her gaze. “I thought we’d name them together, but—” she swallows, breaking eye contact. She adjusts her cradling hold on the twins, bringing them forward. “This is Luke,” she murmurs, turning her loving eyes on the babe she holds in her left arm, before she turns to the bundle in her right. “And this is Leia.”

Luke. Leia. He drinks in the names of his children, barely allowing himself to breathe.

“Say hello to your daddy,” Padmé whispers, and her gaze drifts back to his. He sees the hope in her eyes, the worry. Come back to me, to us, she seems to say.

He can’t find the words to respond. If his family is alive, in this timeline, when he has been removed from the situation, and the galaxy has not fallen to his Master’s control…

He thinks back to his dream. Padmé delivered her children in pain, yes, but it was a healthy birth. Now that he thinks about it, he remembers feeling something unnatural in the Force, there in the ship. He recalls the pallor of her face as she weakened, struggling against some other force, even after her labor had finished—

Suddenly, he knows what had killed her. Or, more accurately, who.

Sidious had sucked up her strength to repair Vader’s own.

His emotions reel at the revelation. The part of him that is intimately acquainted with the Dark Side, the Vader part of him, wants nothing more than to rush to the Senate building, find Sidious, and kill him. You promised me the power to save her, but YOU killed her. I will burn every inch of your skin with my saber while you watch. He’ll never follow Sidious again. He shakes with hatred for his former Master.

But the part of him that still remains Anakin Skywalker, the part of him he’s been denying still exists, is slowly resurfacing, and this part of him hates only himself. He’s living the proof, right now, that if he hadn’t Fallen, gone blindly along with Sidious’s schemes, Padmé would have lived. Even if he hadn’t killed Padmé personally, the day of his Fall, his actions surely had.

It doesn’t even occur to any part of him that he is supposed to hate Padmé for a contrived betrayal. He looks into her eyes, his tears blurring her beautiful face, and all he can feel is his love for her, and his fledgeling family.

Only, he can’t be with them like this.

His focus turns back to the holo in front of him. Wiping his eyes clean of tears as best he can with his bound hands, he stares from one babe to another, memorizing their features. Luke. Leia.

Then he looks back at his wife’s face. “Padmé,” he tries, voice hoarse. “I—”

And then the grief of what he’s lost overwhelms him, and his voice breaks into a heaving sob. One sob soon becomes many, and he collapses to his knees, each choking breath wracking his body. At some point, the edges of his vision register that the holo is gone, and along with it, Obi-Wan’s burning stare. The Vader part of him wants to be angry that they left him, but instead, he only bawls harder.

He is alone again. A fitting fate for one who believed himself to be betrayed by his love, but who was in fact the biggest traitor of them all.

Sitting in his cell, he cries and cries until he has no more tears to cry.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 2

When he wakes up in his own bed again, this time, it takes a second for his sluggish thoughts to process what’s happened, but soon enough, it comes to him. It’s the same rotation all over again.

He can’t muster up enough energy to be anything more than indifferent.

Padmé, his mind whispers. Luke. Leia. You failed them.

All at once, the revelations of the past rotation come crashing back, and all of their sorrow with them. He’s so overwhelmed that, for a moment, he thinks he’s going to cry again, but then he finds he doesn’t even have the strength. Turning over in his bed towards the wall, he presses his eyes shut and buries his head in his pillow, wishing he could go straight back to oblivion. He can feel the Force thrumming through him again, a fact which should be a relief, but when he idly reaches for it—

An onslaught of oozing fear, anger, and hatred pours into him, carried along the threads of his connection to the Force. It slithers closer, seductive yet aggressive, offering him the power to assert his will. Yet, something about it reeks of wrongness, and manipulation, and—no. It isn’t right. He has to get it out—

Before he can blink, his instincts slam the Force out altogether before it can get any closer. His eyes fly open and he lurches to a sitting position, panting.

It takes him a moment to realize what he’s done. That was the Dark Side. Of course that’s what came to him first. He’s been its student, has been learning it for days.

Why has it never felt so… twisted and wrong?

Frowning, he rubs his forehead. With an almost morbid curiosity, he tries again.

Slowly and surreptitiously, he lowers the barrier he’s erected against the Force, bit by bit. Again the oily, putrid darkness slides in, and this time he can just feel its vicious sweet-talk. Come to me, it whispers. I can give you everything you want. He almost wants to agree. Yes, with power, he can—

He can—what? Padmé and his children were safe, he’s suddenly reminded. Without his disastrous intervention, without him and his Master—no, Sidious ruining everything. What does he need power for? What more does he want?

The voice of the Dark Side becomes more insistent, and suddenly, its voice morphs into a memory. His hands are bound, the space against his hip where his lightsaber usually lies too light. His insides squelch—he feels vulnerable, trapped. And then the intruding weight of a hand comes to rest on his shoulder, and he feels his body go rigid, attempting to hide a flinch. Then warm breath tickles his ear, and the sense of violation grows stronger.

“Come now, my pet,” Miraj Scintel, the Zygerrian slaver Queen, murmurs. “With you by my side, there is nothing we cannot accomplish.”

Panic floods him, and he shoves her out with as much force as he can muster. He doesn’t stop into he’s sure no tendrils of her reeking, seductive rot remain in his mind. Then, once more, he slams down the barriers in his mind until he is completely cut off from the Force.

Opening his eyes, he scrambles to his feet, idly staring at his hands.

What have I done.

Somehow, amidst the blinding hurricane of his passion, he’d managed to miss it. The Dark Side, for all its seductions—and how he hates the feeling of being manipulated, tricked, used—is nothing but another slaver. A master—literally, he thinks, with the bleakest of humor—that he chose willingly.

And look where it got him. Padmé, Luke, and Leia would have been safe if not for his Fall.

What have I done, his conscience repeats.

Sidious saw him as nothing more than a tool. One to use to execute his orders, to make dependant on him. His Master had dangled the possibility of saving Padmé in front of the freshly-christened Darth Vader, and then destroyed it, killing her and lying—just to break him, ever the foolhardy apprentice, even more, he realizes. The Dark Side feeds off of pain and anger and hatred—and what could cause those emotions in him better, than to be convinced that he’d killed his beloved?

Sidious had been grooming him as Palpatine to be his apprentice for much longer, actually, the paranoid side of his mind concludes. Ever since—Force, from the time that he was nine. Every conversation must have been calculated, to manipulate the Sith Lord’s prey closer to the Dark Side, to his goals. And—Sithspit, the war. As Vader, he remembers killing off the Separatist leaders, who had gathered on Mustafar at the orders of Sidious himself. He lead both sides—stang, he started and controlled the whole karking thing. And no one stood in his way—no one could. He was the kriffing Chancellor of the Republic—and still is—

Suddenly, his commlink beeps, interrupting his train of thought. For a moment he pauses, blinking at the flashing light. Then, he scowls and throws it at the wall, crying out in frustration.

His former Sith Master wanted—and still wants—to put not just him, but the whole galaxy in servitude. Sidious is the biggest Force-damned slaver of them all.

He sinks back into his bed, covering his face in his hands. And he followed him, out of his own volition.

A wave of self-loathing rises through him, and he feels like throwing up. What kind of monster does that make him.

Images of that fateful rotation, the day of his Fall, flash before his eyes, before they settle on the Jedi Temple, as he approaches, with the 501st at his back.

He remembers their faces, with glazed eyes. How all their voices sounded eerily the same.

Good soldiers follow orders.

They’d been robbed of their identity, of their will—oh, Force, they were slaves the whole time, weren’t they—

Before he can protest, his mind speeds ahead, and then he watches his saber carve a path of destruction through the Jedi, blood and sparks and screams everywhere, and—and then it’s the younglings, the children his saber is slashing through, the very ones that had trusted him to save them—

Bile rises in his throat, and he grabs the nearest container he can find—a basket of tools, lying haphazard on his desk—and empties the contents of his stomach into it.

He stoops over it, heaving, for a long time.

He, who is about to become a father, again, if this day goes right, murdered children.

Something snaps within him, and he stands up abruptly, beginning to pace. No. He can’t think about it. He can’t think about it anymore. It’s all too much.

How had so much gone wrong in the course of one rotation? He thinks he understands, now, why the Force reset the day of his Fall. It undid all the ways in which he completely kriffed everything up. All the multifarious, murderous, depraved ways. He’s a terrible, horrible person. If the Force wanted to fix everything, it should have just gotten rid of him. He followed a slaver, became one himself, and then used his power to kill children. Why didn’t it? Why didn’t it kill him? It would have been completely justified. Probably better for the galaxy.

His breath is coming fast now, too fast, and the walls feel like they’re closing in on him. He sinks to his knees, holding his head in his hands. It’s all too much. Everything is too much. Too much, too much—

His eyes stray to his lightsaber, back in its holster by his side. His right hand hovers near it.

Maybe he could fix the mistake the Force made.

Suddenly, there’s a loud bang on his door, and he jolts upward.

“Skywalker!” a voice barks. He recognizes it. It’s Mace Windu.

He leans his head back, scrunching his eyes shut. No no no no no, why now. Whyyyy now. He wants to scream. Windu is one of the absolute last people he wants to see. The most rigid, most hypocritical Jedi in the Force-damned galaxy, following all of their kriffing rules to the kriffing letter. And that stare, under which he can just feel he’s being judged. His breathing quickens even more, a flash of anger rising within him. Windu’s one of the people he’d be just fine with seeing dead—again—

Without warning, his mind flashes back to the rotation of his Fall, and he watches himself slice Windu’s hand off, watches him writhe with pain as Sidious electrocutes him, laughing, watches him fall out the window, his eyes wide with betrayal—

His eyes fly open, and panic floods him. Another person. Another person he’d just as good as killed—and he’s right there behind the door—

“Skywalker!” Windu shouts, and the man in question is only barely able to scramble to his feet before the Jedi grandmaster barges in, scowling.

Force, the stare is as piercing as ever. He straightens his back, trying to force down all of his emotions. For a moment, the panic rises right back up as he realizes—what if he’s bleeding everything out into the Force, and Windu can sense what’s going on? Is his shielding airtight?—and then remembers that he shut himself out of it this morning. Only partially assured, he swallows and attempts to meet Windu’s eyes.

“You weren’t answering your comms,” Windu states flatly, by way of explanation. He raises a brow. “Is there anything important you’d like to share?”

Another spark of fear lights within him, and he squelches it before—he hopes—anything can show on his face. “No, Master Windu, I—” He swallows again. “No.”

Windu studies him for an agonizing second. His thoughts are still spiraling—not now not now can’t deal can’t deal what if he finds out what I’ve done—and he has to clamp his mechanical hand over his left to prevent it from shaking. Then, Windu takes a deep, put-upon sigh. “Council meeting. Five minutes. If you want to be part of it so bad, you’ll drag your ass down there, understand?”

He nods as quickly as possible, even as his mind reels. Council. That’s right, he was part of the kriffing Jedi Council, until everything went to—well, whichever of the nine Corellian hells is the worst one. Not that he was made a Master—since none of those old buffoons would ever trust him—

He almost misses it as Windu strides out of his room, cloak billowing behind him. “Don’t be late, Skywalker!”

The door slides shut with an echoing thud.

He realizes, too late, that he’s just essentially agreed to go to—well, pretty much the last place in the whole karking galaxy that he wants to be. A Council meeting of the Jedi. As one of them—as Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker, representative of the Chancellor—

Sidious.

He chokes. This is the meeting in which he gets a summons from the Chancellor. A summons in which Sidious takes him to the opera, and tries to swindle him with his pretty lies, that he can save Padmé. The sleemo. As if he wouldn’t turn right back around and murder her.

With a cry, he drives his fist into the nearest wall, not caring if it dents. Damn it—and after everything, the Sith is still alive, still plotting. Still poised to make everyone in the whole galaxy his slave.

He wants to scream until his throat is raw. He wants to hop into his starfighter and fly straight into the nearest star. He wants to collapse right back on his bed and cry.

He doesn’t know what to make of anything anymore. Within the span of three rotations—well, according to his perspective, that is—the galaxy has been turned upside down, and then inside out, until he has no idea who is right and who is wrong. The Jedi were right, they had to be, they raised him, but then the Sith were right, the Jedi were weak, and they couldn’t save Padmé, but then now the Sith are karking slavers, and he knows that slavers are bad, they’re always bad, except who even are the slavers anymore, if the Jedi had been using the clones all along—

—Good soldiers follow orders, his mind supplies, and he shudders—

—but whatever the case, he’s been both of them, and he’s been a part of the slaving, the killing, and that makes him the worst of all of them. Except Sidious, perhaps, who still holds the strings to the Separatists, to the Republic, to the Senate, to even the Force-damned Jedi Council, though the idiots are too blind to see it. It’s all hopeless. So, so karking hopeless.

Unless Sidious were to meet his very, very timely death.

His mind latches on to it, a single beam of hope amidst the swirling chaos that threatens to drown him. It’s the only thing that’s made sense this whole morning. He doesn’t need to be a Jedi, or a Sith, doesn’t need to know where he stands to know that Sidious is a poisonous leech who can’t be left alive any longer. Sidious started the war. Sidious caused death and destruction all across the galaxy. Sidious made everyone his slave.

Sidious killed Padmé.

Yes, he's clear on this, if nothing else. Sidious needs to be removed from the situation, at all costs. To protect the galaxy. To protect Padmé, Luke, Leia. It doesn’t matter what happens to himself in the process—he doesn’t deserve to live, anyway. Better that he takes the shriveled bastard with him.

He bursts through the door and rushes off in the exact opposite direction from the Council chamber. Let the Jedi have their silly meeting. It won’t matter, after all, if Sidious has just been playing both sides of the war anyway.

He takes the fastest speeder in the hangar and is gone before they even notice.

Chapter Text

Piloting a speeder through Coruscant traffic at an ungodly speed is far more difficult without the use of the Force. He’s never quite realized just how much he relied on his Force senses before, and it’s a constant annoyance now, as he attempts to keep his—urgent pace, one that’s probably violating a hundred traffic laws. He bites his lip as he’s forced to swerve to the right, missing a head-on collision by mere inches. He would have sensed that danger coming if he was using the Force…

… but his gut still clenches in fear at the idea of letting it back in, of feeling that awful wrongness the Dark Side left in him, last time. Scowling, he revs the engines of the speeder. Not yet.

You’ll have to, if you want to fight Sidious, the rational side of his mind admonishes.

He handily ignores it, cutting a wild, diagonal path through three lanes of traffic to the shortcut alleyway he wants. Indignant cries and wailing horns follow in his wake. He huffs in frustration.

They’ll all be dead, or subjugated, if he doesn’t get rid of the poison at the heart of the Republic, anyway. They should thank him, really.

Finally, he reaches the Senate building. Allowing his speed to slow, he drifts closer—before realizing that he’d unconsciously taken his usual route to Padmé’s apartment.

His speeder slows to a halt as he stares at the balcony. She might be in one of her meetings, or she might be in there—unaware that she would give birth today. To twins. The sight of Luke and Leia, colored blue through the hologram, resurfaces before his eyes. He wants to go to her, to relish in the good news, to protect his family from anyone who would dare to bring them harm—

—a category that includes himself. He presses his lips together, tearing his gaze away. He can’t see Padmé. She doesn’t deserve him like this—he wouldn’t do it to her.

He urges his speeder, more gently this time, to a more general side entrance.

Once inside, he tries to keep his head down. He doesn’t have time for any sort of side conversation. Mercifully, few notice him today, and those who do don’t attempt to engage him past a nod from what he’s certain is his worst attempt at a Serene Jedi Face yet. Thank the Force—he’s anything but serene, and he knows it. The closer to Sidious’s office he gets, the more a jittering sort of fear threatens to rise up from his stomach and close around his throat.

Every time, he tamps it back down, resorting to the steely determination that’s carried him through countless battles by now. Sidious will be gone by tomorrow, or he’ll perish trying.

Finally, he reaches the elevator that’ll take him to Palpatine’s—Sidious’s office. The doors close him in, leaving him in solitude.

He swallows down another bubble of panic. It’s now or never. He needs to let the Force back in.

Closing his eyes, gripping onto a steel bar on the side of the elevator to steady himself, he pours his presence into his shields. He needs to be sure they’ll hold. Once (barely) satisfied, he opens his senses, by just a crack, to the Force.

As he expected, it’s the Dark that slithers forth first, but—no, the crack widens, the floodgates opening, and it rushes in far too fast to control it. Panic rises in him, which only fuels the growing Dark, and he starts to choke on the potency of the fear, turning rapidly to anger, to hate. He feels like he’s drowning in it, drowning in this hatred that needs an outlet, that’s directing itself more and more towards that vile sleemo, Sidious, who he wants to kill, to torture, to crush beneath his heel, to make the bastard feel his power, more than anything—

No, the rational part of him chokes, not this way. I can’t fight him on his own terms. If I do, he has won, and I’ll be his slave—

At that word, the fury in him explodes outward, the elevator beginning to rattle with the force of it. HOW DARE SIDIOUS! SLAVER SCUM! I’LL RIP HIM LIMB FROM LIMB!

STOP! his conscience gasps, and its voice is beginning to sound far more like Obi-Wan than he wants to admit. You must not succumb—find the Light, Anakin, grab onto anything that’s Light, and for Force’s sake, HOLD ON!

His heartbeat thuds, his panic spiking as all the memories of using the Light Side of the Force slip away, swept away by the current of the Dark. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to go back to the Light, necessarily, but now he’s losing it, he’s losing the chance he has to keep his head, his freedom, and it terrifies him. Fierfek, kark, kark, kark, what do I do, what do I do—

A memory, from the last rotation. Obi-Wan Kenobi’s visage greets him, and he has to shove away the tidal wave of fury that rears its head at the reminder of his face. He scrunches his eyes shut in concentration, focusing on the words the apparition speaks. Anakin, even when you came close to crossing the line, I believed you would come back to the right path, because you were—you are a good person. Every time, it was always because…

Because you wanted to protect someone you love.

Love.

Kenobi was right, he has to admit. In the past, his love had always been his downfall, yet… yet it was always why he came back. Because how could he fear, when he had Rex and—and Obi-Wan, protecting his back. Because how could he be angry, when he had his own padawan, Ahsoka, to take care of, to comfort. Because how could he hate, when he had a family—Padmé, Luke, Leia—Force, if he’s honest, Obi-Wan and Ahsoka, Rex, Cody, the whole karking 501st, too—to love.

His heart swells at the memories of their faces, of all the joy he felt from being together with them, back when he was still Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Knight, and pushes away the Dark, as it screams out how they betrayed him. He’ll deal with that later. Right now, he grasps on to the memories, clinging desperately to the way he feels when he recalls them. His family. He loves his family. He nurses the feeling, using it to push out the Dark, and then tethers himself to it, letting it anchor his presence in the Force. He keeps going until he feels sure that the Dark won’t rush back in.

Taking a deep breath, he opens his eyes. The Force breathes with him, a shuddering in, then out. The Dark skirts around the edges of his consciousness, still whispering its false promises, but it’s no longer trying to come in, at least. That’ll do for now. The Light… it doesn’t feel the same as he’s used to, somehow. It seems almost… more active, a living presence like the Dark was, but it soothes and comforts, and he leans into its touch.

I’m here, it whispers. It’s alright. Breathe. I’m here.

Then, there’s an intruding brush against his mental shields, and it takes him a second to realize his bond with Obi-Wan must be back. Kenobi must have felt the upheaval. His mood sours, and he quickly puts up his walls. Force damn it, would the old man just stay out of his business? He’s not ready to deal with him.

After a couple of blissful moments of quiet, he straightens, trying to get his bearings.

The elevator has long since come to a stop, it seems. During his struggle, he must have collapsed on the floor, because he’s looking out the elevator doors from quite the low angle. Embarrassed, he scrambles to his feet, brushing himself off. He creeps to the front of the elevator, looks both ways to see if he’d been noticed in such a state, finds nothing, and slips out.

As soon as he starts back on his journey to Palpatine’s office, however, the weight of his chosen mission slams into him once more, and he has to shove back a tendril of the Dark Side that slinks towards him with his fear. Palpatine. Sidious.

He’s got to stick to his purpose, he reminds himself. He’s here for a reason. The Sith Master must not be left to live, not at all costs. He doesn’t care how powerful the shriveled snake is, he’s going down—

Then, it hits him. There’s no way Sidious didn’t feel any of the noisy projecting in the Force that he just did. E chu ta, he gasps, panic spiking once more. If Sidious felt all that, he’ll know his vulnerability to the Dark, maybe even his attachments—Force—

—and some of the Dark oozes past his defenses again, mingling with his fear. He kicks it out again, frustration rising. Force damn it, he’s got to keep it together! He doesn’t have time for this!

He reaches for the Light instead, but now, it’s humming a steady warning. Danger, danger, stop, it whispers. Groaning, he gives his head a shake. He doesn’t have time for that, either.

Swallowing, he raises his awareness once more, and realizes he’s now in the hallway in front of Palpatine’s office. He bites down his fear and fixes the doors with a steely glare.

It doesn’t matter now, whatever Sidious knows. He’s not letting the Sith have reign over the galaxy any longer than he can abide it. He’ll put an end to it all now, if it’s the last thing he does.

The rational part of his mind has joined in with the warnings the Light Side has been giving him, begging him to slow down and reconsider, but finally it quiets in the face of his determination. Remember what the Light feels like, and keep holding on, the Obi-Wan voice in his head reminds him instead, and he knows it’s right. If you use the Dark, you'll be Sidious’s slave again. He’ll win.

He grabs hold of the Light, using it to bolster his shields, still ignoring its alarm. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he knows. It’s dangerous. No matter—the task wouldn’t be worth doing if it wasn’t. He brushes his right hand against his lightsaber, its presence stilling some of his trepidation. He’s got his tools to fight, he’s all here.

It’s time.

For my family, he promises, and he opens the doors.

***

He’s already off to a bad start the moment he sees Palpatine.

The Force-damned Sith Lord is sitting at his desk, far from the door—out of immediate reach—with that stupid, grandfatherly smile plastered on his wrinkled, punchable little face. A wave of pure rage barrels through him—Padmé’s killer— and he has to slam up his mental shields and give the Dark Side another shove as far away from him as possible. His mechanical fist tightens in frustration. Sithspit, he’s nearly just compromised himself, losing the element of surprise. In a gesture that he hopes isn’t too late, he doubles over to hide his face, pretending to cough.

“Ah, my boy, are you quite alright?” Palpatine’s voice intones. He grits his teeth at the sound, before giving another heaving cough for good measure.

“I’m fine,” he chokes out, racing to school his features into a reasonably pleasant expression. He unfurls himself, begrudgingly looking the Sith Lord in the eye. Sidious is drifting closer, looking the picture of mild concern.

Yeah, I’ll bet he’s concerned, his mind drawls. Concerned that his little investment might not be well enough to do his dirty work.

“Are you sure? I was told you missed a Council meeting,” Palpatine continues. “The masters did not appear very happy—though I’m sure you wouldn’t have cancelled without good reason.”

He tries not to glare—Force, how did he not see all of these blatant attempts at manipulation before—but forces his face to stay frozen. Sidious isn’t in range. He’s got to spitball it just a little longer.

He clears his throat. “Uh, yes, yes I do,” he starts. “Have a good reason. I, uh…”

Stang, he’s never been good at acting. Or lying. Or politician-ing in general. Obi-Wan always took care of that part—

His mind darkens, and he scrambles to try to keep his disgust from reaching his face. Yes, Kenobi was quite good at all of this bantha poodoo. He’d always stretch the truth, so it was never quite a lie. And they always believed him all the more. How merciful of him.

Biting down his bitterness, he follows his old Jedi Master’s example, because he’s got no better ideas. “I had a vision,” he starts, allowing some of his discomfort through to his face. “It was more of a nightmare.” All true.

“Oh, Anakin,” Palpatine coos, taking a couple steps further. He tries not to wince at the name—does it truly fit him, after everything?—but he doesn’t have time to dwell on it, as Palpatine keeps talking. “Is this a common thing for a Jedi?”

As if you wouldn’t know about Force visions, he wants to snarl. He gives himself a mental shake—focus. “Well, uh, not exactly,” he replies. “They’re sort of rare.”

“Oh?” Palpatine raises an eyebrow. “Forgive me for asking, but, should not then the Council be understanding of such extenuating circumstances?”

“Uh, I didn’t tell them,” he replies. He sizes up the distance between them—still a good six feet. If he really wants to get the drop on Sidious, he’ll have to get closer. Kark.

“And why is that, my boy?” Palpatine’s face appears to soften. “Do you not trust them to believe you?”

He clenches his jaw. Force save him—he’s losing patience. How would he have responded to this drivel before, anyway?

Probably by opening right up, like the fool he was. Ugh.

He pretends to slump, though he keeps his peripheral vision fixed on his target, and inches closer, as if in need of comfort. “They wouldn’t listen,” he complains. “Just like last time. With my-my mother.”

He hates how true it is.

Sidious’s robes billow as he makes to close the distance between them—kriffing finally. “Oh dear,” he tuts, “that sounds quite serious indeed.” Four feet. Two feet. His fingers itch for his lightsaber. “If you don’t mind my asking—”

Palpatine reaches out to place an arm around him, and his instincts scream. Kriff it, he’s not doing this any longer. He whips out his lightsaber, ignites it, and aims a stab at the vile bastard’s heart—

—only for it to be met by a red saber—Sidious’s own.

He stares at it, pulse jumping as the Dark Side licks at the edges of his growing fear. This wasn’t supposed to happen—oh, Force, no. Sidious had either been fast—or ready. Kriff kriff kriff kriff kriff—

The Sith Lord leers at him, sickly yellow eyes reflecting the crimson light of his saber as his carefully crafted mask falls away, and his tight shields along with it. Darkness oozes out like black smoke, cold and suffocating, filling the entire room, buffeting his own shields while beckoning his fear, his own Dark shadow to join it, and it’s just like before—

He tightens his grip on his saber and thrusts out his senses for the Light. There’s an agonizing moment of silence, his heart leaping into his throat, drawing more Dark fear with it—before the Light finally responds, pouring in gently. He latches onto it with as much force as he can, and tries to take a breath.

DANGER! the Light thrums. He winces and turns back to Sidious.

“My, my,” the Sith Chancellor of the Republic says, the edges of his tone sharpening into something hard and cruel. “Now, what is the meaning of this, my boy?”

The only response he gives is a glare. I’m done talking to you, slaver scum.

Then, he aims a kick at Sidious’s legs, which the Sith Lord sidesteps, releasing their sabers from the lock, and there’s a moment’s pause as the two size each other up. Sidious’s mouth twists into a sickening grin that makes his insides roil.

Fine. He’ll just have to kill the son of a Hutt the hard way.

He charges.

His first strikes are wild and forceful, powered by his rising adrenaline, but Sidious blocks each of them with smooth, yet precise, movements. As the duel slides into a steady rhythm, he realizes Sidious is letting him stay on the offensive, doing the bare minimum to keep any slashes from getting past his guard.

He growls in frustration—he’s being toyed with. Gathering the Force, he aimes a shove at Sidious, pressing his lips together when he realizes some of the Dark Side got tangled up in it. Not good, not good...

Sidious converts the backward momentum into a neat flip, and when he’s recovered, his eyes glitter as he appraises his opponent. “You said you had a vision, did you,” he starts. “Pray tell, what might the contents have been? It must have been—enlightening.”

His heart stutters. Sidious noticed the Dark Side he’d used. Sithspit, of course he’d notice. Why can’t I just keep the Dark Side the kriff away? Kriffing—

Sidious takes a sudden, inhumanly agile leap, aiming a lethal swipe at his neck that he just barely sees in time to duck. The Sith Lord takes the offensive for the first time, and he’s forced backwards as he races to block a subsequent flurry of jabs at frightening speed. He tamps down a prickle of fear at the virtuosic display. Fierfek, he never was able to watch the old man duel—and he’s an even more skilled enemy than anticipated. Kriff. His ignorance is an advantage the Sith is exploiting now. The volley ends with the sabers skittering into another lock, Sidious’s wicked grin far too close to his face for comfort.

“You must indulge an old man,” Sidious drawls. “I’m rather curious.”

“None of your business, sleemo,” he snaps. He presses his blade into Sidious’s saber, before using the force of the motion to launch into a backwards somersault. When he comes up with a slash of his saber, Sidious is already there to meet it, and the one after that, and the one after that. He can feel his scowl deepening.

“Oh, I do believe it is,” Sidious continues between blows, as if this is some sort of ordinary political meeting to him. The smug snake. The Sith’s dark grin grows. “I can feel your anger. Yes… am I to assume it’s because of something I’ve done?”

His eyes widen—kark, he’s allowing Sidious to read him too well—and tucks into a sideways roll to put some distance between himself and the Sith Lord. He swallows, taking a deep breath in and tightening his mental anchor to the Light. Remember who you’re doing this for.

“Believe me, you’ve done plenty,” he declares, jabbing the business end of his blade in Sidious’s direction. “I’m here to put an end to it.”

“Is that so?” Sidious appears, quite annoyingly, unperturbed by the threat. “My boy, surely you must be mistaken. I’m certain we can come to a better understanding.”

And there it is. Of course Sidious is going to try to turn him into his personal lapdog again. His chest tightens with rage. “Not a chance,” he retorts, before charging once more, forcing Sidious to catch a brutal overhead strike with his own saber.

The Sith Lord simply cackles in response. “Such power!” he crows. “Surely, you must feel it. Your anger makes you strong.”

And that’s the problem, isn’t it. He knows how intoxicating the fury of the Dark Side is. He’s never felt so powerful in his life. But-but he knows the moment he lets it in, he loses control, and he becomes its slave. He won’t serve it. He won’t.

Gritting his teeth, he twists his blade out of the lock and advances, slashing viciously. “I.” Slash. “Will.” Jab. “Not.” Slice. “Be.” Whirl. “Your.” Strike. “Slave!” He lands a kick to Sidious’s stomach, slamming him against his own desk, but the Sith halts a potential killing blow before it can land. He glares down at his old Master, close enough to feel the heat of the sabers on his face.

Sidious has the gall to chuckle once more. “Yes, you can be so much more. Never have I seen so much potential—my apprentice.”

He snarls, digging his knee further into Sidious’s gut. How dare he pull this again. “I am not yours!”

Sidious simply smirks—and then a wave of cold, Dark power crashes into him, sending him sprawling across the room, landing with a painful thud. No sooner has he scrambled to his feet does Sidious greet him with another furious volley of strikes. Forced on the defensive, he can’t do anything but parry. He scowls in frustration. Force damn it, he just wants to land a kriffing hit, make the old man bleed, for what he’s done to him, for what he’s done to Padmé—

“Good, good!” Sidious leers. “Such spite! Use it! Use your anger!”

He starts, a chill running down his spine. Anger. He’d let himself get angry. He extends his senses into the Force, and shivers when he feels a vortex of Dark slowly creeping in, consuming the Light in his Force presence. His heart leaps into his throat. Stang, no, he's got to calm down—

Something slams into him, sending him crashing into a window, his lightsaber clattering away in the opposite direction. He crumples to the floor, groaning. He’d paid for his distraction—he can’t afford to have this problem, not now. Padmé. Family. You love them. Love. Focus on that. Focus!

“Yes, yes,” Sidious is saying, his footsteps drawing closer. “What a fine apprentice you’ll make, Lord Vader.”

He freezes.

Lord Vader, the clones, the mind-controlled clones with no kriffing choice called him, as they stormed the Jedi Temple with him and killed everyone, killed younglings—

He’s standing up, blade ignited and in his hand, before he even knows what he’s doing. How dare he.

He may not deserve to be Anakin Skywalker any longer. But he’ll be damned if he ever answers to the hideous title Sidious gave him again.

He throws himself back into the fray with a guttural yell, the blue flash of his saber filling his vision. He’s never serving Sidious again, never, he won’t be controlled by a slaver, a shriveled piece of bantha poodoo deserving of nothing but being fed to gundarks, a vile worm who murdered his wife, who he wants nothing more than to stab right in his vicious, sniveling face—

His saber meets air, and he realizes Sidious is sprawled on the floor, some feet away from him, his lightsaber rolling away from his reach. He stalks closer to finish the job.

Sidious lifts his head, smirking. “Excellent work, Lord Vader,” he purrs, before rising to his feet, posture confident, as though he’s completely in control of the situation.

And he is, the realization hits him like a bucket of ice water. This is exactly what he wants. He’s played me.

The Force rages Dark all around him.

His lightsaber slips out of his hands, and he sinks to his knees. No. I can’t become Vader again.

The thought is just enough to call a sliver of Light to him, one he grabs on to, clinging to its warmth. Help me, he asks it once more.

I already have, the Light replies. You didn’t listen.

His eyes widen. The warning. Danger. He’d thought the Light was simply reacting to the presence of the Sith Lord, alerting him to what he already knew. But the Light—the Light was warning him of the danger within himself.

I’m sorry, he thinks. You’re right. I wasn’t ready. I’m still too Fallen. I’ll—I’ll listen now.

Then get up.

Grasping his lightsaber, he lifts his head and staggers to his feet.

Sidious is sneering at him. He doesn’t have his lightsaber, but he doubts that matters. “Why have you turned to such weakness, my apprentice,” he scoffs. “You must embrace the true power of the Dark Side.”

His features slide into what must be a shaky version of a cocky grin—once his trademark, during his career as the Hero With No Fear. “Been there, done that. It just wasn’t doing it for me.”

Sidious smirks, circling him like the vulture he is. “Oh, I’m afraid I must disagree. You have so much anger, so much hate!” He clenches his fist. “Do not refuse such strength!” All of a sudden, there’s a strange pulling sensation within him, and the Dark bubbles up, forceful and insistent. It's like the Dark suddenly has a mind of its own, too. Eyes widening, he gives it a shove back, pushing until he’s sure it’s gone.

“Sorry,” he replies, trying to keep his breathing even. “No can do.”

Sidious’s eyes darken. “Tell me, then,” he says, an edge of danger creeping into his voice, “how the Jedi would serve you better. They are fools who fear your power.”

He winces inwardly—Sidious’s words have hit too close to home, this time—but he can’t afford to think about that now. He’s got to stand his ground. “It doesn’t matter what they think of me,” he mutters, his mechanical fingers clenching and unclenching on the hilt of his lightsaber. He clears his throat. “I don’t have to be a Jedi to know I’m never joining you.” He ignites his blade, settling into his preparatory stance. He’s trying again, and this time, he’s doing it on his terms.

There’s a pause, as Sidious eyes him. There’s another strange yank of the Dark within him, and he clamps it down. He will. not. budge.

“Very well, then,” Sidious says. “Such a pity.”

And then lightning shoots out of Sidious’s hands.

The Light cries out in warning, and he’s just able to angle his blade to catch the initial onslaught. He grits his teeth, arms trembling, as Sidious’s laughter rings in his ears. The sparks arc up and down his saber, growing brighter and wilder—there’s just too much of it, in too close a range—and then a fork slips past, connecting with a savage sting. He cries out, trying to keep his saber hand steady, but it’s convulsing with the rest of his body, as more and more lightening slips past his guard, until it’s pouring in from every direction, sparks of pure agony, and he sinks to the ground, twitching and screaming his throat raw. As his vision blurs, his senses unable to process anything but pain, he wonders if this is it—if he’s failed for the last time.

At least the galaxy will finally be rid of me, a bitter voice in his mind thinks. Even if I couldn’t take down Sidious, at least there’s still one less Sith on the loose.

I’m sorry, Padmé.

He fades into oblivion.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 3

And then, his lungs take a heaving, shuddering breath, and he hurtles into awareness, gasping. His eyes dart around. What—where—how—

His bed. The plastisteel walls of his room. Morning light coming through the windows. It’s the same day again. He’s alive. He—

He just died. Force, he just died. His breathing quickens, and he holds his head in his hands, terror pressing down on him from all sides. Sidious killed him. Just like that—like it was nothing. He didn’t stand a chance, oh Force, how is he going to get rid of the Sith now—

He sits up, his full body shaking by now. Force, why does it have to be him. He’d almost rather he never woke up. It’s impossible. He wants to save everyone, fix everything, but it’s impossible. Sidious is too strong. He himself is too Fallen. The Jedi Council—well, they still have their heads too far up their asses to get anything done, but that’s nothing new.

The galaxy is karking doomed.

He heaves a sob—or it is a laugh—and falls backward onto his bed. Hopeless. He feels the Light Side of the Force tremble in concern, and he just wants to scream.

You said you’d help me, he reminds it. Look where it got me. You should have let me die.

The Light is quick to respond, this time. NO, it fairly screams. Then it fades, the impressions it gives amounting to something like must keep going, and then… some sort of attempt to provide comfort?

He brushes it aside. Gee thanks, he tells it, before he realizes what he’s doing—actually, what he’s been doing, and a hysterical laugh bubbles past his lips. Look at him, he’s talking to the kriffing Force itself. Oh, goodie.

Just then, there’s a buzz at his door, and he freezes. Wow. And the prize of Worst Timing in the Galaxy goes to—oh, whoever the kriff that is. He curls inward, staring resolutely at the wall. Maybe if he ignores them, they’ll go away—

“Anakin!” Obi-Wan Kenobi’s muffled voice calls, followed by a forceful nudge at his end of their shared Force bond. He winces away, a million emotions swirling through his head at the arrival of his old Jedi Master—anger, relief, pain, love—hate. Force, this is even worse than he could have expected.

Sithspit, not now, not kriffing now—

The door slides open—curse Kenobi for having a key code—and just like that, his old Master is in the room, at the very moment in which he’d most like the entire galaxy to kindly kriff off.

“Anakin, what’s wrong?” Kenobi starts, sounding mildly out of breath. “The Force—I didn’t mean to intrude, but—”

“Go away,” he mutters, still refusing to look Kenobi in the eye.

There’s a pause, and Kenobi’s footsteps creep closer. “Please, Anakin,” he says, more quietly. What I just felt from you was—most unsettling.”

Unsettling. The master of the understatement strikes again. “I bet it was,” he retorts.

There’s a sigh. “Anakin—”

Suddenly, his patience runs out, and he whirls around to glare daggers at Kenobi. “I said go away, didn’t I?” he snaps.

A flicker of hurt flashes across Kenobi’s features, before he settles into a familiar longsuffering look. “If that’s what you wish,” he says. He turns and retreats to the door.

Feeling some of the tension go out of him, but still with a knot of unease he doesn’t want to examine, he turns over, affixing his stare back at the wall. What a lovely start to the day—

“There’s a Council meeting in ten clicks, by the way,” Kenobi’s voice announces, dispelling his thoughts. “Do be sure you’re there.”

Force, he’d forgotten. One absolutely great perk of living the same day, over and over again. “I’m not going,” he grunts.

There’s a moment of silence—he must have caught Kenobi off guard. “Anakin—”

His annoyance spikes, and he lifts his head to look Kenobi in the eye. “I don’t care what any of them say. I’m not going today.”

It takes a couple of seconds of staring for Kenobi to get the memo. His old Master slowly shakes his head. “Whatever this is about, I do hope you remember that your duties do not stop because you shirk them. It would be wiser—”

“Damnit, just GO!” he cries, stifling the urge to throw a pillow at Kenobi, like he did as a padawan. That’s what the lecture is making him feel like, at any rate. A stupid little over-emotional padawan who can never do anything like he’s supposed to. Sit. Stay. Behave. Bad padawan.

Kenobi lowers his head, and the door slides shut behind him.

He turns back to his wall.

Yes. What a wonderful morning. Just him, his thoughts, and the crushing weight of failure.

Ten clicks later, his commlink blinks, and he uses the Force to crush it without sparing it a second glance.

Half an hour later, Kenobi prods at their shared Force Bond again, and he slams the connection closed.

Two hours later, he rolls out of bed—only to use the ‘fresher. He takes his time, pointedly refusing to look in the mirror. When he’s done, he sinks right back into bed.

The memories of the day of his Fall keep running through his head, and this time, he can’t keep them out. He doesn’t try, really. It’s fitting for him to be tortured by the screams of younglings he slaughtered, by Padmé’s face of betrayal as he choked her—even by the angry slashes of his lightsaber as he aimed for the kill against Kenobi. The steam of hatred he feels every time he recalls the bitter end of that duel is sputtering out, bit by bit, as he remembers just who Kenobi was trying to kill. A monster in the thrall of the Sith. As the destruction he wreaked on his family, his friends, and the galaxy plays on repeat, he can’t help but think—who can blame Obi-Wan?

Just when he thinks his mind is out of material, though, it starts to rewind, back to the days before he Fell, when time still ran forward. Slicing through Dooku’s neck. Threatening Trench. Beating Clovis to a bloody pulp. Brutalizing Bariss. Intimidating Fox. Nearly killing “Rako Hardeen”—before it turned out to be Obi-Wan himself. Force-choking informants. Hints of burning lava and hatred from the dreams he calls Mortis. Torturing Poggle.

Slaughtering Tusken Raiders.

It’s all the same—it all felt the same, he starts to realize, his horror growing. Like roaring rage. Like a sick sort of power. Like the Dark Side.

Was there always so much poison in him?

He thinks he gets it now. Padmé’s tear-streaked face as she begged him to stop, Obi-Wan’s look of hurt and betrayal as he left him on the banks of Mustafar, Ahsoka’s steel-toned voice as she greeted him, even Mace Windu’s ever-disapproving eyebrow. They only left him, stopped trusting him, because he merited every single bit of it.

The Light Side throbs in sorrowful sympathy.

When, at last, he falls asleep that night, and then wakes up on the same day yet again, he spares barely a thought to decry the fact that he’s still trapped, and then rolls onto his back, staring at the ceiling until his eyes unfocus.

It becomes a sort of routine. Wake up. Stay in bed until Kenobi either comms, or comes knocking, and snap at him until he leaves. Bust his commlink. Lie there until he can’t stand it anymore. Fix a droid somewhere in the junk of his room, then burst it apart with the Force. Only leave the room to use the ‘fresher. He’s not even eating, because he knows it can’t kill him, since he keeps on waking up, right as rain, the same karking day—although part of him is still starving himself just in the off chance that it might actually work.

It doesn’t.

He kind of hates the part of himself that’s relieved when he doesn’t die.

***

ROTATION 8

“—there does happen to be a Council meeting in ten clicks, and I wouldn’t have figured you’d forget, Anakin,” Obi-Wan scolds him, right on script.

Right about now is usually when he tells Kenobi to shove off, more forcefully this time. And then, Kenobi’s supposed to give him an infuriatingly concerned glance, followed by the patented ‘shirking duty’ lecture again, and then he’s supposed to shout at him to go away, damn it, and then Obi-Wan is supposed to do exactly that, with nothing more than a mournful backward glance.

Suddenly, he hates the script. His temper whooshes out of him, and he sits back down on his bed, cradling his head in his hands.

Obi-Wan takes a step forward amid the silence. “Is there something wrong?”

He lifts his head, looking Obi-Wan in the eye. His old Master has that look of concern back on his face. While Vader had dismissed that look as false, back when he was rotting in his cell, he’s had some time to clear his head. Just enough to feel Obi-Wan’s worry in the Force, despite how shuttered he’s keeping their bond, to know it now to be genuine. Obi-Wan cares about him—as little as he might deserve it.

He also happens to know, though, that if he says nothing now, Obi-Wan won’t pry further, though he’ll still worry over him for the rest of the day. Jedi aren’t good at talking about feelings, after all. No, instead, they let them fester, let those feelings eat them up inside until they burst. Himself included—as perhaps the worst offender of all.

Maybe it’s this thought that drives him to break script.

“I died.”

Obi-Wan’s brow furrows. “What?”

Force, that was probably the worst place to start. He rubs his eyes and blinks, trying to think of how he can possibly put all this into words—

“We’ve always guessed the Force can do a lot more than we’ve seen it do. Right?” He spares a glance up at Obi-Wan, who still looks puzzled, waiting for him to go on. He sighs. “Well. um. This is going to sound crazy, but…”

There’s a few moments of silence as he wracks his brain—and then, suddenly, it just comes pouring out. “I made a mistake. A big one, a few days—well no, technically, it was today. But the Force restarted it. Today, I mean. So, I’ve been re-living the same day, over and over again, um… for over a week, now. I mean, I even died once, and woke back up on the same day again, so there doesn’t even seem to be a way out. It’s probably for the best, though…”

He checks Obi-Wan’s face again. There’s alarm there, but still no small amount of confusion. He winces. Yeah, he could have said that better…

“What are you saying?” Obi-Wan murmurs, half to himself. “Why—what did the Force—”

His heart sinks. He can’t sugarcoat this.

“Time travel,” he blurts. “Obi-Wan, I saw the galaxy fall. And it was my fault. The Force sent me back, and I think I have to re-live the same day until I fix it.”

A heavy silence falls on the room, and he can do nothing but simply watch Obi-Wan’s eyes widen in shock and horror. “Oh, Anakin. What have you gotten yourself into?”

“Worse than the usual mess, I suppose,” he says, letting out a mirthless chuckle.

A shadow of a frown flickers across Obi-Wan’s face, and he starts to pace, stroking his beard in a familiar expression of concentration. “The galaxy fell—what do you mean by that?”

“Just what it sounds like,” he sighs, gaze falling to his lap. “It fell to the Dark Side. You know about the Sith Master, right?”

Obi-Wan’s footsteps take a sudden halt. “Darth Sidious.”

“And I assume you remember what Dooku said.”

“Sidious, controlling both sides of the war from the start…” He looks up to see Obi-Wan’s hand falling away from his beard. “You saw the culmination of his plan.”

“A Sith Empire.”

“And you know who Sidious is,” Obi-Wan continues, realization dawning.

He swallows, knowing nothing good can come from the information… yet he can’t keep it quiet. “Palpatine. Sidious is Supreme Chancellor Palpatine.”

He watches Obi-Wan’s face for his reaction… and it’s nowhere near as surprised as he somehow half-expected it to be. He feels a bitter pang in his chest at the confirmation that he was far more gullible than the rest, to have been so thoroughly fooled.

“Palpatine…” Obi-Wan echoes. “Blast. And he’s perfectly positioned to start a Sith Empire, you say.” He can only nod. Obi-Wan rests a hand on his forehead. “This is far graver than we thought. The Council must hear about this—we need to capture him—“

Kriff, no! Rising to his feet, he clutches Obi-Wan’s shoulder and turns the man to face him, ignoring Obi-Wan’s shock and discomfort at the sudden touch. “No, it won’t work. Not the Council.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes narrow, and he shifts subtly to evade his grasp. “Anakin, surely you can’t—“

“You still don’t know everything! We can’t involve them—“

“He needs to be brought to justice—“

“How do you think I died?”

There’s a moment of silence, and Obi-Wan stills, eyes wide and questioning.

Huffing in frustration, he turns away from Obi-Wan and starts pacing himself. “I tried confronting him. And yeah, I went alone, which was stupid, but Obi-Wan—you don’t understand. The whole time, he was just toying with me. He only let me stay alive as long as he did because—“ He stops for a moment, a thrill of fear igniting at admitting to Obi-Wan the reason why. Damn it, after everything, he still cares, so much, what the old man thinks of him…

He gives his head a shake and resumes his stalk about the room. “And before, on the first day. Mace Windu tried to arrest him. Brought a team of no less than four expert duelists, and you know what? They all died. Windu too, though of course—“ of course, I helped with that. He runs a hand through his hair, then stops, turning to face Obi-Wan. “If you try now, you’ll be killed or worse. Plus, you don’t even know the half of his plan.”

“What is this plan, then?” Obi-Wan prods.

He bites his lip, trying to shove down his growing annoyance. Obi-Wan has just heard that he’d died, that he’s been trapped in time by the Force, and all he wants to know is all the crap that Sidious is up to. Not that he’s wrong to, of course. It is the most important part. But where does he even start? It’s so much…

“The clones,” he mutters. Of course. That’s how Sidious took the galaxy, the first time. As long as he holds the trigger to the chips, he has the key. The key to it all. He can swoop in at a moment’s notice…

“The clones? What about them?” Obi-Wan asks, and he’s startled from his train of thought. Right. He needs to explain… oh, Force.

“Obi-Wan, do you remember Fives?” he starts slowly, realization pouring in.

“Yes, I believe so…” Obi-Wan frowns. “What are you saying?

“Obi-Wan, Fives was right.” He palms his forehead. “Palpatine must have done something to him to make us think he was crazy… but he was right. About everything. The inhibitor chips in the clones—” the slave chips, he thinks, and he wants to vomit all over again— “they contained a series of orders. Ones that the clones would be forced to obey, against their will, if activated. Just like kriffing droids.” He glances at Obi-Wan’s face, and is grimly pleased to note his horror and disgust. “I don’t know what all the orders are, but that day, Sidious activated one.” He closes his eyes. “Order 66. A command to kill the Jedi.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes are wide with shock once more, and he sinks onto the bed, still staring up at his former padawan.

“I don’t know how many Jedi were killed, but it must have been nearly all of them. The Temple burned.” I saw to it myself. “All Palpatine had to do was claim they were traitors to the Republic, and they all just bought it. Then, he had all the Separatist leaders killed—” had me kill them— “ended the war just like that, and declared himself Emperor, and there you go.” He flops onto the bed next to Obi-Wan, suddenly numb. “One evil, brilliant plan to take over the galaxy. Kriffing foolproof.” And all that plan needed to be complete… was his own involvement. Darth Vader. My fault.

The tears are threatening to come back, now. When he tells the story like this… he can see it for the tragedy it truly is. One with him as the starring, traitorous villain.

“We need to prepare,” Obi-Wan’s voice declares, grim, and he nearly jumps at its sudden strength. Obi-Wan rises to his feet. “You need to report all this to the Council. Anakin, when does the attack happen?”

He stares up at Obi-Wan’s determined face. He thinks—oh, right.

“Obi-Wan, it’s not happening today,” he says, voice soft and tight with pain.

Obi-Wan looks perplexed. “What?”

He tears his gaze away, blinking back the wetness behind his eyes. “Sidious was waiting. For… for the right moment.”

“And what would that be?” Obi-Wan is probing at him with the Force now, but he still can’t bring himself to let him through. His instincts scream at him to stay quiet, to hide his guilt, his pain… to let Obi-Wan still believe he was good, so he’d still care about him.

He brushes it all aside, swallows, and meets Obi-Wan’s eyes. “For me. He wanted me as his apprentice, this whole time.” He tries, and fails, to stabilize his breathing. “He waited for me to… to Fall and join him.”

Pain fills Obi-Wan’s face. “Anakin…”

“And I did,” he chokes out, voice barely a whisper. “I told you, it was my fault. I went to the Dark Side—I killed them—I—” A sob breaks him off. “And I’m trying so hard to come back, but—but—”

Suddenly, all he wants is for Obi-Wan just to understand. He couldn’t care less about Mustafar, about the years-long unspoken rule they’ve had, always stopping just when things get too personal. He wants the comfort of his Master.

On impulse, he lowers his shields, and lets Obi-Wan through.

His Force presence is still pretty messed up, and he hasn’t been able to bring himself to do anything about it, these past few days. He clings to a core of the Light, so that he can stay himself, but all around him swirls the Dark, threatening to creep back up to join the shards of it still embedded deep within him. The Dark reaches for him even now, hungering after his despair, and part of him is still disgusted by it, but the other part of him knows it would be so easy to reach for it once more and let it all back in.

He lets Obi-Wan see it, all of it, lets him hear his wordless plea. Please, help me.

For a moment, all he can feel from Obi-Wan is shock, pain, and concern—but before long, Obi-Wan seems to recover, and his comforting, familiar presence fills his end of the bond. It feels like peace, and stability, and strength, and he lets it wash over him, feels his own Light thrum happily in response. He recognizes the feeling for what it is—love, for his Master, his brother, and nurses it until it grows in strength, filling him up as the Dark retreats to the very edges of his consciousness. Tears flowing down his face, he gives Obi-Wan a grateful mental embrace, right back—and then follows it up with a physical one, which catches Obi-Wan quite off guard at first, until he concedes and relaxes into it. For the first time in days, the Light pulses with life again. Safe, happy, it seems to whisper.

“Thank you,” he murmurs. “Oh, Obi-Wan, I’m so sorry.” How could he have ever hated his Master, tried to kill him?

“I—I forgive you, Anakin,” comes the response.

He feels a jolt of surprise, and hope. “You don’t even know all that I did—”

“I forgive you,” Obi-Wan repeats, more firmly this time. “I may not know everything that happened, but it’s clear now that Sidious’s manipulations were thorough. It is our task now to counter them.” He pulls away to look him in the eye, a shrewd look on his face. “We need to get you to a mind-healer.”

His stomach does a flip. Whatever he was expecting, it wasn’t—this. “What?”

Obi-Wan’s gaze softens. “Anakin, from what I’ve felt just now, it’s clear there are Sith compulsions buried in your mind. It’s imperative we remove them.”

He clenches his mechanical fist, his insides roiling with disgust. Yet another violation. “Oh,” he says, voice strangled. He knew Sidious had messed with his head—but this was on another level.

He feels a hand on his shoulder, and turns back to Obi-Wan, who’s looking at him in concern once more. “You have already come so far, Anakin,” he soothes. “It’s rather a marvel you’ve already purged so much Dark. There are few records of a Jedi recovering, as you have, from the Dark Side.”

Are we sure I’m still a Jedi? he wants to say, but he just presses his lips together.

Just then, Obi-Wan’s comm blinks, followed swiftly by his own. “That would be the Council meeting,” Obi-Wan says, seeming almost surprised. He snorts inwardly—he’d never known his Master to forget a meeting like this.

Obi-Wan slowly turns to him. “I—we aren’t finished with this conversation,” he starts. “But—we—”

“—need to go?” he finishes, unable to keep out some of the caustic tone from his voice. “Don’t worry, it’s not much. Grievous has been located on Utapau, blah blah blah, and they’re going to send you and the 212th to deal with it. Meanwhile, I get the fantastic job of informing the Supreme Chancellor. Our very own Darth Sidious. Who is going to take the opportunity to try to manipulate me. It’s the same every single day.” He turns away from Obi-Wan. Just once, he thought he was more important than the karking Council. Just once.

A beat. “Anakin—”

“Just go. Not like I’m going anywhere. I’ll just be here, same old issues, when today repeats itself. I’ve got all the time in the world. You won’t remember, of course. Off capturing Grievous, for the tenth time in a row—”

“Anakin.”

He looks over his shoulder, hesitant.

“I’m informing them we’re busy,” Obi-Wan says, voice placating—and he wants to be annoyed at the tone, but somehow, he isn’t. “We’re going to get to the bottom of this—as much as we can, before the day resets, as you say. The Council can wait.”

He suddenly feels guilty. “Obi-Wan—”

“No, this is important. I believe the Force is telling me to stay.”

The Force, huh, comes the bitter thought, before he can stop it.

“But it’s not just the Force,” Obi-Wan interrupts, meeting his eyes. “It’s because I want to.”

He feels a spark of hope. Obi-Wan indicates such feelings, ones that might be considered close to attachment, so rarely. Overcome, he can do nothing but nod.

The Light thrums once more. Happy. Together. Safe.

Chapter Text

They’re nearly halfway to the Halls of Healing when Obi-Wan’s comm blinks—again. He fights the urge to roll his eyes. The Council just won’t let up, will they? he thinks, and he’s about to say as much when Obi-Wan halts, a look of surprise on his face.

“It’s Ahsoka,” Obi-Wan says, and all his thoughts grind to a halt.

Ahsoka. He barely spared a thought to her, those first days trapped in time—but once he had the chance to think, he could hardly stop thinking about her, wondering if she was alright, what with Maul and the siege of Mandalore, or berating himself for the various ways he’d failed her. And now, she’s right on the other end of a comm—like she was, the whole time—and he doesn’t know what to say.

Obi-Wan glances at him, the question “Can I answer this?” conveyed seamlessly without words, and he can only nod, shell-shocked, before the holo pops into existence.

It’s a military call, that much is clear from the setup with the holomap, and he doesn’t know whether to be annoyed or relieved. But Ahsoka’s there, and so is Rex.

“Master Obi-Wan,” she says in greeting, giving the intended recipient of the holo a cordial nod, before turning to face him, eyes widening. “Anakin.”

She sounds so happy to see him this time, is all he can think. He has to swallow in order to find his voice. “Ahsoka.” He turns to the face of his clone captain— commander , now—and above all, trusted friend, and is almost overcome once more. “Rex.”

There’s somewhat of an awkward pause, but before anyone can salvage it, the holo picks up the form of Bo-Katan Kryze, who starts in on business without so much as a pleasantry. Battle lines, field reports, strategies. He zones out a little, trying not to feel impatient—none of this will matter when the day resets, anyway—though he feels a little guilty, seeing that none of them know it won’t matter, and that they’ll have to do it all again. 

“There are a small number of firefights still happening in Sector 11,” Bo-Katan concludes, “but for the most part, your clones—” indicating Ahsoka— “have been as effective as promised. Still, this could all fall apart if we don’t get Maul in custody quickly. We must capture him before he escapes.”

“He mentioned a name,” Ahsoka muses, frowning. “Darth Sidious.”

His stomach lurches, and he takes an involuntary step back. From the corner of his eye, he can see Obi-Wan’s eyes drift to him, before he turns back to Ahsoka.

“Who is this Sidious?” Bo-Katan pipes up, giving the Jedi a questioning look .

Oh, just the evil Sith Lord poised to take over the galaxy with me as his pet. He and Obi-Wan exchange glances, and he bugs his eyes a little, trying to convey that he could use a little help on this one. Well… he knows, yes, that he does have more knowledge about Sidious, technically, but…

Obi-Wan seems to catch his meaning and swiftly takes over. “I do not know much, but I will share with you what the… Council suspects.” He cringes inwardly. True, from a certain point of view…

The droid bearing the holomap takes this overture as its cue to move away, and Obi-Wan shifts himself closer. “Darth Sidious is the Sith Lord who orchestrated the Clone War and played both sides of it from the beginning. I first learned the name from Count Dooku, who implied Sidious was his Master, one firmly ensconced within Republic leadership.”

Ahsoka brightens a little. “Do you know where Dooku is now? Maybe we could get more information out of him.”

“That chance has been… lost,” Obi-Wan says carefully, and he has to bow his head to hide his grimace. That duel with Dooku feels like so long ago, now, but every time he remembers, he feels more and more embarrassed that he let Sidious goad him into offing the Count. Before, he regretted it because of his anger, the Dark Side that he’d drawn on, but now there’s a strategic reason Dooku should have been left alive. Could he have been any more of an idiot?

“Why?” Ahsoka prods. 

“Because Count Dooku is dead,” Obi-Wan admits, mercifully keeping his gaze off of him. 

He starts to hope he’s been left off the hook—but then Ahoska’s brows start to knit together, and he just knows that she’s going to pry the full answer out of them. After all, he taught her not to let anyone keep her in the dark. She’s not going to remember any of it when the day resets, of course—but he can’t stand driving even more distance between them, even temporarily, which is what will happen if he lets this drag out. So, despite his shame, he decides to spill.

“I killed him,” he blurts, and Obi-Wan jerks his head towards him in surprise. “There was a duel. It… wasn’t my finest moment.”

Ahsoka blinks, momentarily shocked, but then cocks a hip, a corner of her mouth quirking upward. “Really? You’re not proud of winning a duel with Dooku?”

He knows he’s supposed to splutter and defend himself, but stars, she’s teasing him again, and it’s the best thing he could have hoped for. He opens his mouth, but no sound comes out.

Obi-Wan steps in to cover him, thank the Force. “This is why Maul has become a potentially vital asset to us. If you can capture him, he may be able to provide the missing pieces of the puzzle that is Darth Sidious.”

True, Maul may have been vital, had he himself not shown up with all his knowledge on a silver platter. He feels his brows start to furrow. Is Maul all that worth it anymore?

“Then send me more men,” Ahsoka demands, back to business.

“I’m not certain reinforcements will be able to aid you in time,” Obi-Wan replies. “Besides, I do not believe a greater wealth of troops will help to capture a Sith Lord. Maul is—wily.”

“Then what about either of you?” she fires back. 

He glances at Obi-Wan. He’d love to help, honestly, but… 

Obi-Wan’s face tells of agreement, and he angles his body back towards the group. “May we speak to Ahsoka alone, for a moment?”

Bo-Katan narrows her eyes, but doesn’t argue, and stalks off. Rex gives his general a nod, and Ahsoka an encouraging smile, before he, too, is gone. 

Once Bo-Katan’s out of earshot, he folds his arms and gives Obi-Wan a questioning look. “Are we really still going to need Maul?” he whispers. 

Obi-Wan raises a brow. “Anakin, if you are to build a strategy against someone like Sidious, you need to examine all angles. Maul may still yet have information even you do not.”

He sighs. Obi-Wan’s right, of course.

“Ahem,” Ahsoka juts in, and the two turn back to face her. She has her hands on her hips. “You said you wanted to talk to me.”

For a moment, there’s silence. Then, Obi-Wan clears his throat. “There’s been a… development back on Coruscant.”

Ahoska purses her lips. “What kind of development?”

“The kind that’s really a huge disaster,” he sighs, nipping Obi-Wan’s delicate dancing around the subject in the bud before his former padawan can get too annoyed. “Um… so we know a lot more about Sidious than we just told you.”

“Really?” Ahsoka says, glancing between the two of them. 

“Yeah.” She looks back at him, expectant, and he’s overcome by how grown-up she looks—the length of her lekku, the lightsabers at her hips, the authority of a commander in her bearing—but at the same time, she still looks just like the little padawan he met on Christophsis, to him. She always will.

“Ahsoka, I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “And I’m so proud of you. Please—please remember that.”

She tilts her head, eyes widening slightly in apparent confusion and alarm. “What?”

“Anakin and I have discovered some time-sensitive information, regarding the capture of Darth Sidious,” Obi-Wan puts in. “Telling you more would unfortunately require more time than we have. However, anything you might get out of Maul about his plan would help us immensely.”

“I—ok,” Ahsoka frowns, lowering her eyes, before straightening and staring him in the eye. “But I need you to be careful. Both of you,” she adds, nodding towards Obi-Wan.

He knows the loop will reset anyway, no matter what—but he vows to be careful, just for her. “We’ll try,” he says.

Ahsoka arches a brow, her eyes teasing. “But Master Yoda says—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he smirks, before remembering what’s ahead of him, and feeling his face fall. “But try is about the best I can give you, this time.”

She still looks worried, but her posture relaxes slightly. “I’ll let you go, for now. But promise me you’ll give me updates.”

He bites his lip. She won’t remember, by the time he could…

“We will,” Obi-Wan assures her anyway, and after receiving a nod in response , they cut off the connection.

There’s a couple of beats before he says, “Well, I suppose we’d better get on with fixing my screwed-up head,” and they continue on their way.

***

The Halls of Healing have never been a place he’s glad to visit—injury is such a pain, and he hates being out of the action. (Obi-Wan wouldn’t admit it, but he totally feels the same way.) This time, though, he tells himself he’s willing, since he just wants any trace of Sidious left in his head out.  However, all Vokara Che has to do is greet them, official-looking datapad in hand— 

“Master Kenobi, Knight Skywalker. What seems to be the matter?”

—and he already wants to bolt.

Obi-Wan places a hand on his shoulder—curse him for being so perceptive—and steps forward. “It appears to be a bit of a special case—may we have a word with you in private?”

With ever the calm healer’s manner, Vokara doesn’t bat an eye, simply nodding and leading them off through several corridors. Amid the stifling silence, his anxiety only ratchets up, and he spends most of his concentration on trying to clamp it down. It’ll be better to get this over with, after all.

Finally, Vokara lets them into a small, closed-off room and slides the door shut, ensuring total privacy for her patients. “What have you come to discuss with me, Master Kenobi?” Vokara starts.

Obi-Wan’s eyes slide over to him, and fortunately seems to gather his discomfort and unwillingness to speak. “We have uncovered a… most distressing situation. You are aware of the Council’s suspicions regarding Darth Sidious, are you not?”

Vokara’s usual unflappable mask falls a bit with this, and she sets aside her datapad to look Obi-Wan in the eye.. “I have heard that he is the Sith Master, suspected to be here on Coruscant.”

Obi-Wan grimaces. “Oh, he is here, indeed.” His eyes drift back to meet his, and his stomach does a small flip of dread. Are they telling her everything?...

“Somehow, without our knowledge, Sidious has managed to place Sith compulsions within Anakin’s mind,” Obi-Wan says, and he relaxes a little. So they aren’t going to go into the time loop, and Vader, and everything else associated with it. He can’t help but be relieved they won’t have to re-hash it. “We discovered them this morning, and thought it essential that we remove them at once.”

Vokara’s eyes widen. “Sith compulsions. I had assumed those were legend.”

“As did I, until now,” Obi-Wan agrees, voice grim. “It seems clear to me, however, that with Sidious we are dealing with a much greater evil than we have seen in millennia. We must not underestimate him—and, unfortunately, I know what I sensed.”

“You seek a mind-healer, then,” Vokara says, and she brings up a hand to her chin in thought. “Honestly, I know of no one at the Temple qualified for something of this magnitude. There is no precedent. I believe the best we can do is for me to handle the case myself.”

He shuffles his feet. Great. Vokara will end up having a reason to think even less of him than she probably already does.

Vokara strides to a corner of the room and brings out three cushions. “I would like to start with meditation, so that I might have a better sense of what I’m dealing with.” He gives her a stiff nod of acknowledgement. “Master Obi-Wan, you may leave if you wish, but in this case…” She studies him, and he tries not to shrink back from her gaze. “You would also be welcome to stay.”

He catches Obi-Wan’s eye. Force help him, he doesn’t have the dignity left to pretend he doesn’t want his Master’s support. Please, he asks, both with his eyes, and through the Force. 

Obi-Wan gives him an almost imperceptible nod, before turning back to Vokara. “I think I’d better stay, for the time being,” he replies.

“Then please, sit,” Vokara says, handing them the cushions and settling down herself.

Swallowing, he follows Vokara’s lead and sits. Guided meditation. Something he absolutely loves —lots of sitting still, and messing around in people’s heads, with the Force so intense all around him, giving him so much information at once, that he wants to crawl up into himself and shut all his senses off, and… ugh. He tries not to fidget while first Vokara, and then Obi-Wan, slip into a meditative state, The Force in the room thrumming with power with their entry. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, knowing it’s now up to him to join them. Forcing his muscles to relax, he goes still, before retreating into his mind.

Here’s the thing: the problem with meditation, for him, was never actually that it was difficult. In reality, the opposite is true—it’s far too easy, too easy to melt into it, losing all sensation of himself except for the Force, and everything that it encompasses, all at once. It’s so hard to find the balance, to remain enough in himself and his own consciousness to retain his identity. Every time he ends up plunging too deep into the Force, he comes out terrified that someday, he’ll lose himself completely. As a padawan, he tried to tell this to Obi-Wan, and to the other Masters teaching him, but they never really got it, always telling him that he was perfectly alright, and that the Force was the safest place for a Jedi to be.

So eventually, he just… started avoiding meditation. He can do everything he’s supposed to, as a Jedi, without submerging too deep into the recesses of the Force, anyway. Whenever the Masters asked for him to do something involving meditation, like searching for young Force-sensitives, he simply dipped into the Force in small bits, until he got what he came for, and then that was that. And, okay, he uses a light meditation on the battlefield often enough so he can sense incoming blaster fire, and he frequently does the same to refresh himself while going through katas or repairing the Twilight… but that’s really it. So, there’s a reason why he’s trepidatious about going into the Force this deeply, and with Obi-Wan and Vokara Che, too. It’ll be the most he’s let himself blend with the Force in years.

Suddenly, he’s struck by an unpleasant thought—perhaps this was the reason he connected so well with the Dark Side. To use the Dark, Sidious taught him to meditate on a strong, Dark-affiliated emotion—something that remained completely his, so he always felt in control, never afraid he’d surrender his individuality while opening himself to the Force….

He shudders. All the more reason to try again, to distance himself from his bad, Dark habits.

 With another deep inhale, he begins, focusing on becoming aware of every part of his presence in the Force. He tries not to wince at the shards of Dark still within him—they’ll be gone soon, he’s here to fix that—and concentrates on the Light, coaxing it out and letting it fill his consciousness. Unlike the last time he tried this, however, the Light startles him by reacting with what feels like a joyful leap, followed by an impression of reassurance— I’m here, with you, safe, it seems to say.

Uh… okay, thanks, he thinks, still a little unnerved by the Light’s recent active presence. It’s a little embarrassing to be talking to the Force…. but it’s far better than feeling afraid, he has to admit, so he moves on. With the Light, he reaches beyond the edges of his own Force presence and makes a connection with the larger Light in the Force itself, and feels it flowing through him. With every breath, he opens his borders more and more to the Force, blending his awareness with it, until he is on the same frequency as the universe itself—

Too deep, his subconscious yelps, and a pang of fear shudders through him as he jerks backward, out of here—

Wait, listen, the Light admonishes. He freezes, sifting through the Force to figure out what it means—

Oh. Oh. At the edge of his shields, a tendril of Obi-Wan’s familiar, peaceful presence brushes up against his mind, requesting admittance. Panic forgotten, he opens their Force bond, letting the feel of his Master keep him from becoming unmoored within the vastness of the Force. A million whispers sweep by, bringing tidings from all corners of the galaxy, but he clings to Obi-Wan’s presence and lets them pass him by.

After what feels like a couple of minutes—though he can’t tell, since time passes differently within the Force—he feels as though he’s stabilized enough. Vokara’s presence hovers just to his left, and he knows that in order to make this work, he has to let her in. Focusing on his shields, he slowly lowers them enough to give her entry. 

At first, the feeling of someone unfamiliar inside his mind almost ignites enough panic to wrench him out of meditation once more. The longer Vokara is there, however, the more he’s able to acclimate himself to her. She feels a little like Obi-Wan, and yet not, her calm, businesslike presence still and unobtrusive. 

Hello, Skywalker, Kenobi, the impression of her voice rings out in his mind. If you don’t mind, I would like to take a preliminary look around.

Already, the messing around in his head is starting. His anxiety resurfaces, causing his embarrassment to rise, too, knowing both Vokara and Obi-Wan can feel it. 

I am sorry, Skywalker, Vokara says, and he can feel that she means it, at least. I simply intend to locate the compulsions, so we know where they are before we attempt to extricate them.

Steeling himself, he sends her an impression of his assent. For a moment, Vokara’s presence withdraws into itself. Then, she begins to expand outward, slipping into the recesses of his mind.

Images and sounds flash before his mind’s eye. A sandstorm. Padmé’s laughter. Tatooine’s twin suns. His mother’s face. The sound of a ship powering up to enter hyperspace. The meadows of Naboo. The underside of his starfighter as he makes repairs. Ahsoka’s padawan braid. Vokara’s presence never stays very long in one place, meeting little resistance as she slips through his mind like the current of a stream. He barely has time to feel any protest at what she sees.

Vokara’s presence then takes a turn deeper into his mind, and the fragments of memory suddenly become more aggressive. The murky darkness of Umbara’s trenches, with the hailstorm of blasterfire whizzing by his ears. His lightsaber melting through durasteel. Mustafar’s rivers of lava churning. A sound of clashing lightsabers grows louder, and he watches a blue lightsaber meet blue—a sparring session with Obi-Wan—and then his blue presses against Dooku’s red, and then it’s blue on blue once more, straight out of the nightmare of his memories of Mustafar, and he can feel his fear explode through his Force presence, causing the vision to spin and churn—

—and then he only sees a blank gray. He can feel Vokara’s presence prod further, but she is repelled. An overwhelming sense of relief fills him, and he somehow has the impression that something terrible nearly happened, but was averted. The gray lingers, before Vokara rises up to the surface of his mind and the visions cease.

Surprised, it takes a second for him to regain his bearings. He probes his end of the bond with Obi-Wan, who sends him a quick impression of reassurance, and then locates Vokara once more, no longer buried within the layers of his mind. It’s over, for now. He feels some of the tension he didn’t know he’d begun carrying during Vokara’s mind-search release.

I believe I have located what you describe, Master Kenobi, Vokara informs them, an undercurrent of worry permeating her words. The compulsions were there, but I could not reach them. Skywalker, I believe you managed to create a temporary block, preventing the Sith presence in your mind from gaining control. This is why I could not go further.

What now, then, he asks her.

Vokara’s presence gives off discomfort, and he inwardly cringes, preparing for the worst. Unfortunately, I need you to remove the barrier, she says. I need to reach the compulsions in order to remove them. 

Alright, I’ll try, he agrees, despite his creeping dread. She probably knows best, right?

Master Kenobi, I may need your help, Vokara adds. These Sith compulsions could prove to be dangerous.

Are you certain we should try this yet? Obi-Wan puts in, and he feels some relief at his doubts being voiced. 

I have, on occasion, removed impositions from the minds of Jedi, Vokara responds. These compulsions feel quite similar to me. Though they might prove difficult, I simply need the access to them in order to do my work.

  There’s a pause, and then Obi-Wan says, Very well. Let us proceed. However, he can still feel his Master’s unease.

Sweet Force, he hopes this works.

Skywalker, I need you to recall the mind-block, Vokara starts. Can you picture it? Do you remember how it feels?

He knows immediately what she’s talking about. The blank gray wall, the one that stopped the dark visions, the fear. The one that felt safe.

He feels a twinge of dread. If that’s it, he really doesn’t want to remove it—but then again, it’ll be better to have the compulsions out of his mind altogether.

I would like you to locate it, and then imagine going to it,  Vokara continues. Master Kenobi and I are going to come along with you.

The other Jedis’ presences draw in closer to him, and despite his trepidation, he calls up the image of the blank barrier. Somehow, he remembers how it felt when Vokara brushed up against it, remembers where he felt it in his mind. He lets the memory pull him down, deep into the recesses of his thoughts, as memories flash about him, until it’s right in front of him once more. This time, he can sense the darkness behind it, attempting to seep out from behind all its edges.

Remove it, Vokara said. He stares at it, barely holding back the tide of the Dark. He can feel how thin, how fragile it is, and he knows it would be altogether too easy. 

This isn’t going to work, he just knows it. Force damn it, he doesn’t want to let it back in, not if he can help it—

But he wants the Dark out, doesn’t he?

Before he can think about it too hard, he decides to rip off the bacta patch, so to speak. Gathering himself, he embraces the mental wall in his mind and then imagines it crumbling to dust. 

Immediately, a tide of Dark ooze comes rushing forth, like a flood through a crack in a dam. He can just barely register the Light thrumming with warning— wait, danger! —but the Dark is too strong, and within moments, he feels all his protests and fears swept away, suppressed and choked down. It’s the most terrifying thing he’s ever felt, until it’s not—instead, there’s a twisted pleasure in it, an intoxicating boost in power and pride and delicious hatred—

—until the dam is fully broken, and Vader is back to himself at last.

He takes a jaunting probe around, feeling the pitiful, trembling presences of Light within his mind. They’re shocked, horrified, weak.

Vader lets the mental equivalent of a cruel smirk thrum through him. So, they thought they could root around in his head? Well, no time like the present to turn the tables.

He’s about to plunge his Dark into their minds when Kenobi’s presence suddenly flares, the Light a blinding sensation to his Dark sensibilities, and then Kenobi’s gone. Vader’s just about to chase after him when a sudden pain shudders through his physical body, and Vader knows no more.

Chapter Text

Vader is enshrouded in darkness. A sickly red-green mist envelops him, permitting him no visibility beyond wherever he is now. It curls around his ankles in languid, almost affectionate spirals, but seems fit to let him continue his trek. To where, Vader doesn’t know. In fact, he has no memory of when he’s started.

Vader pauses. The mist sweeps past his face, bringing with it an acrid tang that makes his eyes water. The vision has realistic details, he’ll give it that—but he knows how to recognize a dream. 

A dream. Unconsciousness. Vader’s memory recovers, and with a great, roaring, fury, he realizes what this means. Kenobi and that sanctimonious healer must have somehow managed to get the drop on him and knock him out. In fact, he can feel that, while he was out, their presences have breached his shields and are in his mind.

How dare he?! Vader inwardly rages, and wasting not a moment, he gathers the Dark Side, extending his senses to cast them out and propel himself into consciousness—

—except suddenly, his presence hits a sort of wall that reeks of the Light, bouncing him back with an equal force, and Vader’s dream-body is blown backwards, off of his feet and into the ground with a hard thud. 

For a moment, Vader simply blinks in shock, his anger spitting and stuttering. How—his weaker, Light opponents couldn’t possibly think to contain him—

He closes his dream-eyes and tries, once more, only to crash into the Light-forcefield again. It repels his senses still, and his dream-body skids painfully backwards along the rocky ground. 

Vader’s eyes fly open, and he curls his fists. A prison. The Jedi have seen fit to make him a prisoner in his own mind. He howls, hurling all his might against the mental wall once more, only to be met with the same result. He tries again. And again. And again. The only thing Vader has to show for it is his rising fury.

The mist around him curdles, as if dancing to its tune. 

Baring his teeth, Vader vaults to his feet and storms off in a direction—any direction, for all he cares. (Though Vader does not allow this admission to reach conscious thought, he knows that, even though all that he sees and feels right now is just a mental construct, it makes him feel better when he is active... on the move, as Obi-Wan always said. ) The mist is just as thick, however, and the black ground gives him no clues as to where his vision has placed him—

—that is, until Vader almost marches straight into a pit of lava. 

Vader’s reaction is immediate and visceral, memories of Mustafar slipping past his guard and sparking a jolt of terror that he feels down to his bones. Vader reels backward, off balance. 

Giving himself a mental shake, Vader gathers his bearings as quickly as he can and clamps down all vestiges of Mustafar from his mind. He glares at the lava, his breath quickening. He can still feel the violating presences of the Jedi, somewhere past the thrice-damned shield they’d erected, rooting through his head. They did this. They trapped him here, in his mind. They put this lava here, just to mock him. Vader’s vision blurs, his mind whiting out. They did this—

Suddenly, there’s a pulling sensation that rips through his entire being. The ground shakes, knocking Vader backwards and onto the cold rock. Lava hisses and spurts, and he watches as the geysers grow—

The whole scene before his eyes blinks and shudders, like a holoscreen. Vader’s stomach flips—the lava is still so close to him, how can he defend himself against it if he can’t see it—

—but Vader’s pleas go unheard, and his vision fills with a completely different scene. He struggles, tries to move his dream-body—but all its sensation is completely gone, and all he can do is let himself become enveloped by the vision. 

It takes him only a moment to register where—and when—he is. Chancellor Palpatine— Darth Sidious, his mind can now never forget—looks down towards him as he sits on a couch in his office. This is from when Vader was nine, fresh off of becoming a padawan at the Jedi Temple. 

Master, Vader thinks, automatically. There’s a twinge of terror, but also revulsion, at the sight of Sidious’s visage, but it is immediately squelched, shoved out of Vader’s mind with a speed not his own.

“Master–uh, Chancellor sir, do you think the nightmares will go away?” he hears his nine-year-old voice ask.

Palpatine smiles, his hand reaching gently down towards Vader’s face. It’s the perfect, grandfatherly façade, as always—but then, as Sidious draws nearer, his eyes warp and change, the pupils contracting into the shape of a snake’s as the color deepens from yellow to orange to red. I don’t remember this, Vader thinks, with a growing spike of fear. 

“My dear boy,” Sidious drawls. “ They’ve only just begun.”  

A dagger of pain, frigid beyond ice, suddenly pierces into Vader’s childhood mind from where Sidious’s fingers trace along his temple. It plunges into him, crashing into the foundations of his being, and then takes root, growing at a blinding pace like a poisonous weed. And indeed, it is poison—it seeps through his mind, attacking the pieces of himself and latching onto them, inserting its tendrils inside, and growing, growing until there’s nothing it has left untouched. Whatever violation Vader had thought he’d felt at the Jedi rooting around his mind, it’s nothing compared to this. This isn’t only violation, it’s agony. Panic sets in. Get out, get it out! he wants to scream. 

A thought reaches him, even through his desperation as the infection within his nine-year-old mind spreads. Sith compulsions. That’s what he and the Jedi—Obi-Wan and Vokara Che—were getting out, before—Force, the compulsions had taken over, hadn’t they? 

He gives a mental gasp, feeling as though a sudden fog has lifted in his mind. 

E chu ta. He’d Fallen again. All thanks to the power of the compulsions. And this memory— this must have been when it happened—

—and then the vision flickers. He feels a sensation like the snapping of a rubber band ripple through him, and then he is shoved back into his dream-body, chest heaving as he struggles to get the sensation of air back into his lungs. He whirls his head around. The mist has cleared somewhat, leaving him able to see the lava more clearly. Except now, it’s placid, the surface barely registering movement. He scrambles to his feet. He has to… 

Has to… what?

Vader pauses, and tries to recall what he’s doing, what the urgent thing that’s still causing his heart to beat and his fingers to tremble is. Something happened. He knows it.

He… doesn’t remember. Whatever it was, whatever happened in the last few minutes—he has absolutely no memory of it whatsoever. 

Vader grits his teeth, fury rising. It must be the Jedi—they must be tampering with his head . Letting out a wordless yell of frustration, he searches his surroundings for a way out, a lead, anything. The lake of lava lies past him to his left, but to his right, he can just begin to make out, through the mist, a wall of the same dark, jagged rock that is under his feet. 

Even through the haze of his anger, Vader’s mind thinks back to his experience with Force visions. 

All physical objects within a dream are the key to something within the mind. Meaning: maybe, if he blasts through this wall, he will simultaneously break the Jedi’s prison and be able to chase them out of his mind. 

Without a second thought, Vader runs to it, gathering a whirlwind of the Force, and shoves at the rock wall with all his might. To his delight, it trembles. 

Course of action chosen, Vader gathers the Force once more and continues to blast. 

***

It’s slow progress. It takes him an age to loose the first large slab, and by then he is sweating, his dream-body aching from the effort. But he does it. The slab topples over with a slam, the wall giving a satisfying groan in response.

And then—something from the other side reaches his ears.

I fear he will not relent until he has broken through , a voice says. Vader starts. Kenobi. He swiftly places his ear to the wall.

The sound of Kenobi’s chuckle rings through the air. Anakin always was a stubborn one. 

Then we must be swift, the healer Jedi responds. Come, help me with this one. 

There’s a pause, before Kenobi finally responds—but it’s muffled, unintelligible. He strains to listen further, but the voices float further and further away, until he cannot hear them at all. Vader growls. He punches the wall with his mechanical fist, and then returns to his work. 

(He does not remember it, but there are several more tugs that run through him, several more earthquakes that rattle the foundations of his mind. Each brings with it a new memory of Sidious placing a layer of Dark roots within him, the secret confines of the Chancellor’s office preventing anyone from ever knowing. It happens when he’s still a child. Before the war starts. After he’s knighted. And each time the visions flash before him, he remembers, with growing horror, that he’d just been wrenched back into the Dark Side, and each time, he’d been powerless to stop it, hadn’t even remembered to struggle. But whenever Obi-Wan and Vokara Che tug at the roots Sidious has planted, they tug back. And each time, Vader is none the wiser, beyond memory gaps that only serve to fuel his rage.)

With time, and the dogged persistence that is born out of his fury, Vader manages to create a tunnel in the wall as long as he is tall. As he rears the Force back for strike after strike, he can sense that he has barely a foot left to go. The thought pleases him, and so he continues to pound, and pound, and pound—

A great tug that courses through him, so strong he is brought down to his knees, his breath knocked away. Behind him, the chamber of rock that is his prison rumbles visibly, the rock rolling in waves, the lava spewing up in towering plumes. Before he can even move, slink back into his tunnel for protection, his consciousness is ripped from his dream-body, and all his missing memories pour into him once again. It is as though he was drowning, and can suddenly breathe. The shadow of Vader drips off of him into oblivion, but he knows it will be back. It has always come back. 

He attempts to mentally shake himself off. While he has this time out of Sidious’s grasp on his mind, he must be alert for something, anything that can help him. He braces himself for the fresh vision of Sidious’s violation of his mind—

—but it does not come. He is still drifting, unmoored, through a black void. Foreboding fills him. Whatever is coming this time, it can’t be good. He continues to brace himself—but still nothing comes.

And then he hears it. At first, it is only a sinister whisper, but then he feels the sensation of drifting towards it, sucked in by its mesmeric pull, and it begins to grow louder and deeper. It’s Sidious’s voice, chanting words in the language of the Sith that, by all rights, Anakin Skywalker had never learned, had no reason to know—but yet, he understands, somehow, as they echo down to his core. The Sith Code.

Peace is a lie. There is only passion. Through passion I gain strength. Through strength I gain power. Through power I gain victory. Through victory my chains are broken. The Force shall free me. Peace is a lie. There is only passion. Through passion I gain…

The words rise in volume, reaching an unbearable fever pitch, so loud he can barely hear himself think. His senses scream for respite, but he has no ears to cover. Please let it end, please let it stop—

And, all of a sudden, it does.

And then he is tossed into free fall. 

His vision warps and spins, as the sensation of hurtling downwards through space and time picks up speed, wind rushing around him. Flashes of memories greet his eyes. The faces of his slave masters, their lips curled into a snarl with the promise of punishment. The first time a blaster bolt was ever directed at him. Himself, disarmed and helpless, before Count Dooku. And, most terribly, glimpses of his dream-visions in which first his mother, then Padmé, died. His stomach, or his sensation of it, drops, fluttering wildly, his breath shortening as the memories overwhelm him, the raw, gnawing feeling rising as the universe seems to spin faster and faster, out of control. And then Sidious’s hissing, chanting voice echoes through his mind once more.

You have fear, Sidious rasps. You will feed your fear. You will give in to your fear, and when the time comes, you will be mine .

The visions continue to come, relentless, one after the other. His fists clenching. The tip of his lightsaber, pointed at the Father of Mortis’s throat. Clovis, cowering as he raised his hand for another punch. And then it's a parade of the people he’s choked with the Force. At first they’re all enemies, Separatists, but then it’s Padmé, and Obi-Wan, and younglings—

All the while, Sidious’s voice continues. You will have anger. You will feed your anger. You will give in to your anger, and when the time comes, you will be mine.

The images plunge into the day of his Fall. He watches himself kill, over and over and over on loop—Separatists, Jedi, padawans, younglings. Then it’s Mustafar, his voice screaming I hate you! , echoing on repeat. All his worst hits, everything that has been circling through his mind for days. Now, more than ever, he wants to wrench himself away, spare himself the pain of his guilt—

—and then the visions slow down, and suddenly, he’s watching something in real time. At first, he wants to burst in relief—until he realizes which memory it is.

The day he massacred the Tusken village. 

His lightsaber blade cuts through body after body, the anguish of his retrospective guilt doing nothing to slow it. You will have hatred, Sidious’s voice chants. He is an angel of death, indiscriminate between fighters and civilians, adults and children. You will feed your hatred. The cold frost of the Dark Side hovers around him like a cloud. You will give in to your hatred, and when the time comes, you 

will

be

MINE.

As Sidious’s hiss shudders through him, the visions wink out into blackness again. There is silence for only a moment, but then the cold poison that he has come to identify as the taint of the compulsions begins to swirl and rise, rushing through him in roaring waves, and he is barely able to resist for a panicked-filled moment before they drown his senses, the black filling him to the brim. The Dark brings with it the delicious taste of wrath, the dark fuel Vader had been craving, missing, and with its vast power he bucks and rears—

The sound of rock shattering fills his ears, and then his consciousness rockets back into awareness.

And then, back in the real world, Vader opens his eyes.

Seeing Kenobi and Che seated before him, Vader wastes no time in lunging for them, which is how he learns he is tied to his chair, his arms behind him in handcuffs—though not Force-blocking bonds, because, of course, he needs to be still connected to the Force if they are to tamper with his mind. Vader growls and twitches his fingers, gathering the Dark Side into a whirlpool.

Kenobi’s eyes are wide with shock—as if he didn’t expect Vader to be able to break out, the fool. But he seems to recover in time to lurch out of his chair and tackle Vader to the ground before Vader is done breaking the cuffs. 

Vader snarls and struggles. Che rushes to his side, reaching her hand for his forehead. Oh no you don’t. Vader jerks his head back, hitting something of Kenobi’s with a satisfying thud.

“Hold him!” Che cries.

“What do you think I’m trying to do?” Kenobi ekes out between grunts of effort. Vader only struggles harder, but a hand suddenly forces his head down to the ground, and before he can retaliate, Che’s fingers connect with his temple.  

Vader’s vision goes black, and he goes into the sensation of freefall once more. He expects to find himself hurtling back toward that foul prison within his own mind, but mid-fall, there’s a wrenching pull, and he gasps in a gulping breath as the compulsions are shoved down again, taking his Vader persona down with them. His dream-self jerks, sideways, and then is tossed into another vision. 

Reeling from the sudden stillness, it takes him a moment to survey his surroundings. Sidious’s office, once more. Sidious is hunched into a corner, the window glass shattered and gone—

—Sidious’s face. It’s deformed and smoking. He feels a sensation like his stomach dropping.

It’s the moment. The one in which he chose, and chose wrong. 

Sidious strides toward him. “You’re fulfilling your destiny, Anakin. Become my apprentice. Learn to use the Dark Side of the Force.”

“I’ll—do whatever you ask,” he hears himself choke out. No, don’t do it! he begs himself in vain. It’s all too much. The guilt is threatening to swallow him. He struggles against the vision, but it holds fast.

“I pledge myself to your teachings,” his voice is saying. 

“Good,” Sidious cackles. He steps closer, dark delight plain on his features. “The Force is strong with you. A powerful Sith you will become. Henceforth you shall be known as Darth... Vader. ”

There’s a sound like the snapping of fingers. Then, suddenly, there’s a surge of the Dark Side, and, with growing horror, he recognizes the sensation of the compulsions Sidious laid within his mind overtaking his past self. It happened before—it happened at the start. Sidious’s echoing rasp, chanting the Sith code in the old language of the Sith, returns once more, and what happens next he can only compare to an information download, from a holocomputer terminal to a droid. Sith tenets, codes, philosophies, methods. He looks on, a trapped observer within his past mind, in shock.

It had never even crossed his mind to wonder, how his new Sith Master could have taught him so much in one rotation, on the fateful day of his Fall. Vader had simply accepted all of the new knowledge as though it had always been there. And, he’s only beginning to see now, it was. It was there, built up over the years, lying dormant within his mind. 

But none of this absolves the guilt he feels. After all, he felt the fear, the anger, the hate all on his own. He let the Chancellor lure him in. He pledged himself to Sidious first.

There’s another tug that shudders through him, signaling that Obi-Wan and Vokara Che are still at work, attempting to remove the compulsions’ roots. He can feel the resulting tremors shaking his foundations. But instead of subsiding, like all the ones before, the earthquake grows. Still trapped within his vision, he feels a jolt of fear. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

And then he is plunged back into a physical representation of his body, back in the rocky prison, just in time for the rock beneath his feet to drop out. 

His heart leaps into his throat as he begins to plunge downwards. What used to be the rocky floor is cracking and falling away, leaving only a dark void that he is currently hurtling towards, away from whatever light was left. Dark smoke rushes past him. In the corner of his mind, he registers both Obi-Wan’s and Vokara Che’s Force signatures flare with alarm, before they suddenly wink out, expelled from his mind. Before he even has time to panic, he hears it.

What have we here, Skywalker? Sidious’s sinister rasp says. 

His stomach flips, and his eyes widen as the maelstrom of Sidious’s Dark presence in the Force opens up at the other end of the black void. This isn’t a memory anymore. Sidious is here, right now.

Now this, I had not foreseen, Sidious continues, slight frustration coloring his voice. The Jedi discovered more than I anticipated. But no matter. We shall clean up this little… breach in intelligence. Won’t we, Darth Vader.

The void suddenly disappears, and without warning, he crashes into a twisted thicket, thorns scraping at his limbs until he lands at the bottom with a bone-shattering crunch. He cries out, his vision swimming at the pain, but finds he can’t move, tendrils of the dark vines having tethered him in place. Not a moment later, the poisonous feeling of the compulsions rising to take control starts up again, and he chokes with the force of them. He can’t breathe.

No, NO, he screams, though nothing comes out of his mouth. I won’t! Never again!

Sidious’s voice chuckles, patronizing. Enough of this silliness, my boy. Come to me.

The thorny tendrils tighten around his ankles and wrists, the acrid smoke of the dark blinding his senses. He squirms, lungs bursting. Sidious is too strong. He’s always been far too strong—

But Sidious had to ask, he realizes, with a sudden burst of clarity. He had to ask for me to give in.

The memory of himself when he Fell in the Chancellor’s office returns to him. I pledged myself, and then the Dark took hold.

I had to give the Dark Side permission.

The Force is still accessible to him, here, even with Sidious’s suffocating, gaping Dark all around him. Holding to the memory of the Light, he draws up all his strength, and, with a defiant roar, snaps the bonds first around his hands, then his ankles, and begins to climb. 

I deny you, and your teachings, he declares, both to Sidious and to himself. The thorns scrape at him, and his limbs, with some bones in his dream-body evidently broken, throb with every movement, but he grits his teeth and continues. The vision warps, and suddenly he is underwater, in a dark swamp of murky water, but he swims on.

This is foolishness. You cannot escape me, boy, Sidious scoffs.

The vision switches to a Tatooine sandstorm in the night, and the black vacuum of Sidious’s presence opens behind him, sucking him backwards. He nearly falls backwards, but uses the Force to steady him and push him onwards. The sand lashes at him, a million tiny needles of pain. His footsteps sink and slide, the sand refusing to give him purchase, but he continues to try. 

Sidious’s voice gives a wordless growl, and then, suddenly, he’s not in a sandstorm anymore.

He’s swimming through pure lava.

It’s Mustafar all over again, but worse. Fire lights every nerve ending. He can’t think, can’t feel anything past agony. It’s an eternity of pain within a single moment, until something pierces his consciousness. It’s the Light, its active presence embracing him like a long-lost child.

I cannot ease your pain, it tells him. It will hurt to give up the Dark.

The Light is far from wrong. If this vision were real, he’d be long dead, ten times over, but here, he will not die—the pain will not stop. At any other moment in his life, he would have turned back and given in. He would do anything to escape the pain. But now? He’s tired. Tired of the Dark Side. He’s seen the worst it has to offer. He’s seen everything he has to lose, and that he will continue to lose if he lets it back in. He's seen all his shame, everything he's done wrong, over and over and over again—and it hurts, it hurts to let himself see all the terrible things he's done for what they are—but it would be far worse to lose his sense of shame, to become a monster again. He must accept this guilt, the regret that will haunt him for the rest of his life.

So be it, he tells the Light. Feeling it so close now, he wraps himself with it, and, in a slow, agonizing motion, he takes one burning arm and plunges it forward. Then, another. Then, another, until suddenly, he collides with something solid. Relief shudders through him as he pulls himself up, gasping, onto its bank. 

What do you think you’re doing? Sidious asks him.

He doesn’t dignify that with a response. He’s done with Sidious in his mind.

He grasps the Light, his lifeline, and lets it fill him, flow through him, down to his core, to his foundations, his heart. He grows his presence until it dwarfs Sidious’s rot within him. And then, with a roar, he casts Sidious out.

The earth beneath his feet snaps in two, and then he is tossed back into consciousness.

He opens his eyes, panting. A hand settles over his shoulders, steadying him, and he tilts his head upward to see Obi-Wan, peering at him in concern.

“Anakin,” he asks. “Are they gone?”

He probes at his presence in the Force, digging through it, trying to find the shards of Dark that had accompanied him, concealed, for so long. He feels only Light, though not without what feel to him like scars, barely-healed spaces where the Dark used to reside. Around him, the Light hovers close, caressing him. He can still feel a vestige of Dark that will come to him if he calls it—but only if he makes that choice, lets the negative emotions overtake him of his own accord.

Tears prick at his eyes. He nods. Obi-Wan’s face lights up in relief, and for the first time since he can remember, Obi-Wan initiates a hug. Overcome, he can do nothing but cry softly. From the corner of his eye, he can see Vokara Che watching them, brow slightly furrowed, but she says nothing. 

Eventually, Obi-Wan begins to draw back, his posture stiffened once again, and he reacts in kind, ashamed that he must have overstayed his welcome. Obi-Wan lowers his head, his expression changing into an expression he knows all too well. It’s his Anakin, I have something to say to you that I know you’re not going to like face. He bites his lip, and waits for it.

“Anakin…” Obi-Wan starts, then sighs, scratching at his beard. “What we saw…”

His eyes widen, despite himself. The visions—did Obi-Wan experience them too?—

Obi-Wan’s eyes still do not meet his own. “That village… on Tatooine…”

His blood runs cold. Obi-Wan saw. He saw. He knows what I did—

“Promise me,” Obi-Wan is saying. “Promise me you’ll tell me again, when the loop is over. “Promise me.”

“Why?” he manages to whisper. He still can’t tell what Obi-Wan’s reaction is, and it’s paralyzing him, killing him—

“I do not want you to bear that guilt alone,” Obi-Wan murmurs, and the air whooshes out of him. He feels like he will cry again. Of course Obi-Wan does not condone it, he would be disappointed if Obi-Wan did—but Obi-Wan still accepts him, somehow. Perhaps, on top of all that he’s already confessed to this loop’s Obi-Wan, that should not be a surprise, but it is, and he’s overcome by how little he deserves it. 

And yet… having to tell Obi-Wan again is the last thing he wants to do.

Obi-Wan reaches out and grasps his flesh hand, before looking him in the eye. “Promise me,” he repeats.

His guilt wins. “I promise,” he whispers. 

Obi-Wan nods, his relief evident, and helps him to his feet. Together, they turn to face Vokara. Obi-Wan’s about to speak, but she beats him to it.

“I would like to keep Knight Skywalker under observation, for now,” she says, and his heart sinks a little. “This case is most unprecedented, and I cannot ignore the revelations it has taught us about the Sith.” Vokara glances between the two of them, her expression solemn. 

He winces inwardly. He’d have rather she didn’t see any of that, but he supposes she deserves at least some explanation. “I understand,” he’s about to reply, when—

The Force screams a warning, and suddenly, Sidious’s massive, black presence appears on his radar, as though he’d simply come out of thin air. The temperature of the air plummets, and he only has the time to yell, “Run!” when the window in the room shatters, and Sidious sails into the room, black hood on and both red lightsabers ignited. 

Beside him, Obi-Wan recoils, before taking out his lightsaber and assuming a defensive pose. Vokara attempts to do the same, but Sidious lashes out first, lifting her with the Force and choking her in his grasp. 

“We have loose ends to tie, my apprentice, ” Sidious says. Suddenly, he understands why Sidious is here, and he kicks himself for not realizing sooner. Of course. Vokara and Obi-Wan know too much. Karking sithspit.

He rushes toward Sidious, hoping to free Vokara by distracting his attention, but Sidious merely snaps her neck with a flick of his wrist and catches his blade with one of his own. He watches, bile rising in his throat, as Vokara’s body collapses to the floor.

Sidious reaches out his other hand in Obi-Wan’s direction, and, in panic, he frees his saber from the lock and swipes wildly at Sidious’s arm, but without even looking, Sidious defends each stroke, unfazed, while he raises Obi-Wan, choking and struggling, off the ground with the Force. 

No, no, no, not Obi-Wan, not him, his mind screams, and he reaches for the Force himself to attempt to break Sidious’s hold. Obi-Wan sways in the air, pulled by an invisible tug-of-war. 

Sidious frowns, and gives Obi-Wan one final toss in the Force, causing him to fall to the ground, gasping and rubbing at his throat. Sidious turns his glare instead to his would-be apprentice, reminding him that he’s the one Sidious really wants. While he’s relieved Sidious has let Obi-Wan go, Sidious’s gaze on him brings a whole new level of terror.

“Your insolence will not be tolerated,” Sidious says, and then he’s hit with a whirling barrage of strikes he is barely able to defend himself against. Against his will, his mind flashes back to that ill-fated duel he’d initiated on the second loop. He wasn’t strong enough then, and he isn’t strong enough now. Kriff kriff kriff—

He barely lasts five seconds before Sidious exploits an opening and kicks him to the ground. He wheezes, the wind knocked out of him.

From the corner of his eye, he sees Obi-Wan rush towards Sidious. His panic kicks up a notch. No, don’t! he wants to cry, but he doesn’t have the breath—

Obi-Wan meets Sidious’s first few strikes, and he relaxes, marginally.

Fear, he suddenly realizes. He’s given into fear. He gives his Force presence a hasty once-over, but miraculously, the Dark has stayed back.

He needs to keep it that way. 

Gathering the Light, he rises to his feet and, with a yell, joins the fight.

Two against one works, briefly, but he quickly realizes that the fight isn’t going their way. Sidious isn’t toying with them, like he was that time before. He’s truly fighting to kill—or, at least, to kill Obi-Wan. Him, Sidious wants to keep alive—to put the compulsions back. Apparently, unlike last time, Sidious considers him still worth the trouble.

He tries to take a steadying breath. Focus, focus—

—and then Sidious kicks him away once more, and he sails directly into the wall. He feels himself crumple at the blow. 

He listens for every crash of lightsaber on lightsaber, praying that the sounds will continue, as he attempts to lift his head and shake himself off. Gritting his teeth, he struggles to his feet, and raises his lightsaber, preparing to throw himself back in—

Time seems to slow down as one of Sidious’s blows crashes into Obi-Wan’s saber with so much force, Obi-Wan’s knees begin to buckle. Sidious follows up with another blow that knocks Obi-Wan’s lightsaber out of his hand. Before Obi-Wan can recover, Sidious reaches out his hand and hits him with Force lightning. Obi-Wan cries out in pain. 

“Obi-Wan!” he shouts. He takes a flying leap, aiming to put himself in between them, to take the lightning himself, but Sidious sees. Before he lands, Sidious spins and plunges his blade into Obi-Wan’s heart. 

The Force screams—or maybe it’s him, or both; he can’t tell. He catches Obi-Wan as he falls, his mind a whirlwind of denial. It’s one of his greatest fears—watching Obi-Wan die. 

And then Obi-Wan whispers, “Remember, the reset,” and he comes back to himself. This is not the end. It will not be the end.

He turns his head to Sidious, who is looking on in glee. Sidious hasn’t been fighting to kill him this time—because he is looking to capture, to violate his mind once more. And, while Sidious is evidently relishing in his pain, as Obi-Wan breathes his last breaths, he will not wait to strike for much longer. When Sidious fights him, he knows he will not win. And then, all his work will be undone.

He turns back to Obi-Wan, his body now lifeless, and attempts to retreat within his mind, to detach himself from everything that has just occurred. He knows what he has to do. He can’t let himself think of anything else.

He grabs his lightsaber, deactivated on the ground beside him, and places it over his heart. Then, he ignites it.

Sidious howls in rage. There is a moment of pain, and then the day is over.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 9

His eyes flutter open, and he takes a deep, gasping breath in.

He does a hasty glance around. White ceiling, blank plastisteel, droid parts strewn everywhere—his room, at the Temple. The reset pulled through. (And he knew, logically, that it would, but…)

He presses his hands to his eyes and sinks back down onto his bed. He tries to clear his mind, think of anything except what just happened, but it doesn’t work. Phantom pain still twinges in his chest as he holds Obi-Wan’s face, draining of life, Sidious cackling in the background…

He gives his head a shake and practically leaps out of bed. He’s okay. He’s fine. He’s done this before—seen terrible things, died, and come back. In the end, all that isn’t what matters. He needs to take the win for what it is. Sidious didn’t get back in his head. He’s back in the Light now.

(Then why does the Force feel so empty to him, right now?... and why does it still feel so jarring every time anyone calls him Anakin Skywalker, his name?...)

There’s a buzz at his door. “Anakin?” Obi-Wan’s muffled voice calls. 

He freezes. Right on cue.

He’d almost forgotten how, every morning he wakes up like this—(shattered, and reeling, and lacking emotional control)—Obi-Wan feels it, and comes knocking. 

Obi-Wan. He’ll have to see Obi-Wan, so soon after…

“Anakin!” Obi-Wan’s voice prompts him, again. Obi-Wan’s lifeless body flashes before his mind’s eye, but he squeezes his eyes shut, forcing the image down, before walking to the door to let him in.

The door slides open, and there Obi-Wan is. Obi-Wan attempts to initiate a conversation, but he doesn’t hear any of it.

His breath hitches. Obi-Wan’s breathing, he’s alive. 

There’s a hand on his shoulder, and he starts. “Anakin, are you quite alright?” Obi-Wan asks, a mild frown upon his features.

He’s suddenly hit by a fresh pain of loss. This Obi-Wan doesn’t know about the loop, about what happened. This Obi-Wan isn’t the one who saw the worst parts of him, and still forgave him.

And this Obi-Wan will never know. “I’m… fine, Master,” he replies, averting his eyes—but then catches himself. He may not be ready, willing to go into it all again, but… this Obi-Wan still does care. It doesn’t feel right anymore, brushing any version of Obi-Wan off. “Or,” he amends, “I guess, I will be.”

Through their shared bond in the Force, he can feel Obi-Wan’s concern lessen slightly. There’s silence for a moment, and Obi-Wan rubs his hand on his shoulder, before drawing his arm back.

Then, Obi-Wan says, “There’s a Council meeting in ten clicks,” and it’s like being slapped across the face. No matter what he does, the farce plays on. The damn loop never lets up. His nostrils flare, and he turns on his heel. He stomps to his drawers and starts rummaging in them for—well, nothing, really, he just needed something to do with his hands—and then freezes when he feels Obi-Wan’s flash of hurt in the Force.

Oh. Obi-Wan doesn’t know he’s not mad at him. 

He turns around. “I’m sorry, Master, there’s—something I have to do.” That much is a lie—he has no idea where he’s going—but Obi-Wan will understand what he really means. “Give my apologies to the Council.”

Obi-Wan’s frown looks more confused than perplexed, now. “Anakin—”

“It’s just this once,” he says, and tries for a small smile, to break the tension. 

Obi-Wan studies him, for a moment—and then, it works. Obi-Wan sighs, just a smidge too dramatically to be serious, and replies, “Well, I can hardly imagine they’ll be surprised.” He waits just long enough to gauge his former padawan’s reaction—(whose smile is far more genuine, now)—before sweeping out of the room, shutting the door gently behind him. 

And, just like that, his irritation is gone. The Force glows softly, chiming in tune with the swell of affection he feels for Obi-Wan.

He turns back to his clothes drawer, and sobers. Right. So, he’s not going to the kriffing Council meeting, but… what is he doing instead?

The answer comes quickly. Or… well, it’s a half-answer. Anything but staying here.

He kicks the drawer closed and heads for the hangar. 

***

Less than ten clicks later, he’s zooming through Coruscant traffic, the wind whipping through his hair. The Force flows by him, heightening his senses, quickening his reflexes, smoothing the passage of his speeder through the air. He has no destination in mind, so he plays a little game with himself—he urges his speeder wherever traffic is lightest, wherever the least other vehicles will get in his way. He manages to get himself lost in record time like this, but that’s part of the challenge—as soon as he’s lost, he relies on his wits and the guiding instinct of the Force to get himself un-lost. Then, when he recognizes where he is again, he does the whole thing all over. 

Is he accomplishing anything important, by this? No. But, in this world, piloting is the thing that makes him feel most alive . 

He supposes he needs that, after… all of that. Yesterday.

Or, well, today. Just a different today.

He can’t stop himself from thinking about how nearly Sidious came to undoing everything. Last rotation was, technically, a victory, but it doesn’t feel like it. He’s one step closer to recovering himself, maybe, but he gained nothing with Sidious. That was three Jedi, this time. Three against one, and Sidious dispatched them all like they were nothing.

If his feeling is correct, and the key to ending the loops is defeating Sidious… is he going to spend the rest of eternity trapped in time?

Sounds rather lonely.

The alley he’s been following spits him out into a wide boulevard, one he knows well. He’s completed another cycle of the game. Instead of continuing onward, however, he lets his speed drop and brings his speeder to a halt on a nearby rooftop.

There are few places on Coruscant where the view is any good, especially considering that only the top level, reserved for the luckiest folk, has any chance at a view whatsoever. And then , of course, said rich people at the top all want to have the view, so they build their buildings higher—which, in an ironic turn of events, ends up evening them all out, so no one has it. Not for long, at least. Perhaps it’s a fluke, then, that this particular section of this boulevard has had an unbroken view of the horizon as long as he’s known about it.

His eyes roam over the skyline. Small specks, representing ships, flow in and out of the atmosphere. The sun shines above, bright as ever, while he can make out the shadows of a few weather-control satellites, drifting over the horizon. And, directly in front of him, lie the distant forms of the Jedi Temple and the Senate building. The two central poles of his whole existence. 

His gaze lingers on the latter. Sidious lurks within, still plotting and conspiring and generally being Sith-y, but… but even now, Sidious is still not the first person he thinks of, when he sees the Senate building.

No, that honor belongs, as always, to Padmé.

His stomach lurches. He’s been avoiding her. He knows he’s been avoiding her—and their children that will come today, too. Up until now, his excuse, loop after loop, has been that he was too Fallen, that his touch is poison. He’s still conflicted about that last bit, but the first part… well, he’s back now. He’s in the Light now.

So, shouldn’t he see them?

A part of him really, really wants to. Padmé has been his confidante for so long. He never has to hide anything with her. He could speak everything on his mind, and she wouldn’t demand all the context she knows is missing, wouldn’t interrupt. She’d just listen.

But the other part of him feels queasy, because the last he saw of her in person, he choked her. And Luke and Leia… he’s not sure he deserves to meet them, even still. They deserve Anakin Skywalker, not… whoever he is. He won’t be perfect, and that isn’t enough. He has to be the best father he can be to them. He cannot bear for them to see his wounds, his temper. He will pass on none of his flaws to them. 

And then there’s something else. Padmé, and Luke, and Leia—they represent something. Something like the big bantha in the room.

They are family. They are attachment. 

If he tries to be Anakin Skywalker, the Jedi, once more… 

Of course, the first couple loops, it was true that the thought of his family helped bring him back to the Light. But that may have just been a stopgap measure. Now that he’s really going to try to do the Jedi thing right this time...

What place can they have in his life?

He stares, unseeing, at the skyline for a moment more, and then he lets muscle memory take over. The speeder floats off the roof, out onto the boulevard, in the direction of home.

He guesses he’ll find out.

***

There’s no response after his first knock. Then his second, then his third. 

He frowns. That’s unusual. He knocks again.

“Just a minute!” Threepio’s voice calls, finally. He sounds harried. Especially since he follows that up with a few “Oh dear”s and an “Oh, goodness me.” 

At long last, the door opens. “Hello Threepio,” he says.

Threepio, in an uncharacteristic move, stares at him, silent. 

“Uh… Threepio?” he tries.

“Oh my,” Threepio says, finally. Then he turns and calls behind him. “Mistress Padmé, it appears we do not have to call him after all.”

A tingle runs down his spine, and he barges past Threepio. This sounds an awful lot like—

Padmé peeks out from behind a doorframe. She’s leaning on it, ever so slightly, for support. 

It’s happening now.

She smiles. “Ani, did you know?”

He rushes to her side, taking her other arm and laying it around his shoulders. He helps her to the balcony, just as Artoo swings by with her personal ship. All like they’d planned.

“No, but I guess the Force did.”

***

The labor lasts hours, once they’re set up in the medbay of Padmé’s Nubian yacht. Well, of course it does—it’s labor—but the wait is still unnerving him. The visions that haunted him for months still plague him every time a contraction hits, and she grips his hand and cries out… 

He has to fight to remind himself of the truth behind those nightmares. They had only warned of what would happen when he Fell. When Sidious murdered her, all to manipulate him. That didn’t happen on any of the next loops, when he didn’t Fall. At least, not that he knows of.

It didn’t. It won’t.

He grits his teeth and turns back to Padmé, brushing a stray hair out of her face. “You’re still doing great,” he tells her. She gives him a weak smile in return. 

Paranoia still itching at him, he probes the Force around her once more, searching for the telltale vortex of Sidious’s Dark.

The only Dark that he finds is the thread inching ever closer to him. Fear. It senses his fear.

His eyes fly open. Kark. Guilt itches at him. If his children are born around a miasma of Dark, it’ll be him that’s the taint, and not anyone else. Of course. 

He swallows and lowers his head. Well, now that he’s trying to be a good Jedi again… time to do what good Jedi do .

Slowing his breathing, he empties his mind, preparing for meditation. Then, he opens himself—just a bit, so he doesn’t get lost—to the Light Side.  

Unlike his experiences within the Force the last couple of rotations, nothing much truly happens, besides the Dark shrinking away as soon as his breathing is under control. The current of the universe flows through him, but it passes him by, leaving only a few unintelligible whispers here and there. After a few minutes of searching, listening for something, trying , he frowns and withdraws mostly into consciousness.

At that exact moment, another contraction hits. And, with it, the Force roars to life. 

He nearly jolts out of his connection to the Force completely at this, but something in it brushes at the edges of his consciousness, soothing, telling him to stay . He follows it, follows it deeper. It directs him to his side, to Padmé. He feels an instinctive swell of love as he senses her quiet, steady light in the Force, though at this moment it’s rippling with turmoil. Not sparing a moment, he brushes up to her and sends as much calming love to her as he can. She may not be on the Force-sensitive spectrum, but surely he can help this little bit.

As soon as he does so, the Light seems to burst into focus. He starts in surprise, but the beauty of it makes him stay. Padmé’s presence feels clearer, many new shades of character taking form in the Force. He draws closer, entranced… and then he detects it.

This light has less form, but it’s growing brighter by the second, slowly detaching itself from Padmé’s presence. It’s closely followed by another.

Those… those are his children. 

He returns himself to his physical body, though still leaving himself open to the Light. As he sits, holding Padmé’s hand, tears prick at his eyes. 

When the med droid tells Padmé to push, his fear is long gone, and he can only smile. Luke and Leia. They’re coming.

The next many minutes are a blur. Excitement seizes him and, realizing that he might be able learn something now that could help make things go even more smoothly on day that the loop finally ends, he splits his time between supporting Padmé and shadowing the med droid, holding things for it, asking it questions. He’s pretty sure that, if it had more extensive personality programming, it would be annoyed with him by now, but he can’t slow himself down. All the while, he tracks the progress of the twins, and Padmé, with the Force. Her light remains healthy, strong, while theirs grows ever brighter. 

And then it’s time. He braces himself and Padmé with a cushion of the Light while she gives one final push—

—and then the first baby is born. The light of its presence that he felt before is nothing compared to now—the baby can only be called a supernova in the Force. The med droid delivers it, proclaims it a boy, and hands it to him.

“Luke,” he whispers.

Luke is red and small and looks up at him with blue, considering eyes. He feels a twinge of curiosity from Luke’s mind as Luke stretches out a tiny hand, then another, and kicks his feet.

Leia comes right behind him, the light of her presence bursting powerfully into existence. Unlike Luke, she takes one look around her and begins squalling. The med droid gives her to him, and then, just like that, his arms are full of two babies. He caresses Leia’s temple, sending her a calming pulse of the Force. She gurgles, as if in protest, but then quiets.

He’s overcome. She trusts him, unconditionally. She does not know any better, but somehow, her faith makes him feel worthier.

The twins babble. Their Light hums in harmony. 

Gently, he brings them toward the head of the bed, where Padmé lies, exhausted but smiling. He shows her Leia, then Luke. When she brings up their names as suggestions, he smiles and tells her they’re perfect. Just like them. Then he decides to tell that to the babies themselves.

I love you, he says through their rapidly-forming bond, sending them all of the bursting joy and affection and pride he feels for them.

The babies coo, and the Light sings in response, and—and suddenly, it all makes sense. 

The precise meaning of attachment must have been slightly lost, twisted, over the centuries. As practitioners of light, what the Jedi are really supposed to avoid is the kind of love with too much of oneself in the way. Too much fear, too much neediness, hovering too close. He knows exactly what that looks like—all his life, he’s been the textbook example.

But holding Leia and Luke now, the Light has never felt this strong. He feels the innocent love they have for him and Padmé, and Padmé’s pure, motherly love for them, and the clean, pure love they evoke out of him, until it’s one tight-knit cycle of just love, and the Light Side echoes back the rightness of it. Love, true, unconditional love, isn’t to be avoided. It’s the heart and soul of the Light Side of the Force. 

The evening stretches on. He feeds the babies. Padmé, her strength recovered a bit, finally gets to hold them, before she gets some much-needed rest. Holding Luke and Leia in his arms, he paces by the porthole, watching the stars in hyperspace streak by. The loop will reset, soon. He doesn’t have much time left.

He glances back down at his children. “Thank you,” he whispers to them. He knows what he’s fighting for, now.

He will build a better version of himself. He will protect his family. He will make a galaxy that is safe for them to live in.

He is Anakin Skywalker, and he will fight for them until his last breath.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 10

Anakin awakes the next loop with the phantom weights of the twins in his arms. He presses his eyes shut, tears threatening to fall at what his time-prison has just taken from him. Taking a deep breath, he indulges in the memory one moment longer, before he rises and begins to ready himself for the day. 

He will be able to meet them for real, watch them grow, when he wins. He will.

All the more reason to get started. 

Anakin had the time to think about his next step, just a little, before the day reset last night. Though he’s always preferred action to waiting around… his disastrous confrontations with Sidious so far have finally scared him into trying to find another way. He supposes he has to work with the advantages he does have. And, thanks to the whole time-bending construct he’s stuck in, his biggest advantage is information. Knowledge. Anakin can investigate with impunity, stick his nose into everything, because only he will ever remember what happened. (He’s hoping, once he gets out of all this, Obi-Wan will be proud. Obi-Wan always taught Anakin to go in informed… even if it usually fell on deaf ears.)

So today he’s following the first lead about Sidious that he can think of (also thanks to Obi-Wan, two rotations ago). Darth Maul.

(And, okay, maybe Maul isn’t the only reason. Anakin would really like to see Ahsoka, too. But sue him. And anyway, the Light just pretty much told him it was 100% okay—no, even preferable—to have a family last night, so hah. )

Anakin sends off a comm message to the Council informing them that no, he’s not coming to their meeting, before they can bug him about it. He hops in the Twilight II, swings by Padmé’s apartment to pick up Artoo—attempting to ignore the heart-wrenching twinge of longing he feels for her and the unborn-again twins—and sets his course for Mandalore.

And then… he has to wait. 

Anakin collapses backwards in his chair. Ugh. He’d forgotten how far away Mandalore is. 

Artoo wheels up next to him. <So, you said you’d explain later,> Artoo whistles. <It’s later.>

Anakin gives Artoo a sheepish smile. “I guess you’re right, buddy.”

<Of course I kriffing am.> Anakin snorts, and Artoo rocks from foot to foot, chortling. Anakin gives him a playful flick on the head. “Watch it.”

Artoo ignores him. <You changed your mind about joining mini-pilot. Why?>

“Uh…” Anakin contemplates trying to explain a time loop to a droid. Artoo understands logic, the tangible things he sees. The Force… isn’t exactly that. For Artoo, it has always been a little more difficult to explain. 

Anakin settles for a different piece of the truth. “I missed her, Artoo.” He sighs. “I missed her so much.”

<I did too,> Artoo beeps.

“Snips went and grew up without us,” Anakin continues. “She… she shouldn’t have had to do that.” But the Council didn’t believe in her, trust her…

Oh, okay, so he definitely shouldn’t be this angry at the Council. That doesn’t seem like the new better-Jedi thing he’s trying to do.

Artoo nudges Anakin’s foot, causing him to start. “Ow.”

<You were taking too long to compute,> Artoo informs him. <What are you thinking?>

Anakin cringes. “It’s just…” He works his jaw. “The Council kriffs everything up. They made Ahsoka leave, they were wrong about what attachments mean, they didn’t notice the Sith Lord right under their nose…”

<Wait, what Sith Lord?> Artoo splutters.

Oops. “Uh…” Ah, screw it. He doesn’t see how there could be terrible consequences for spilling to Artoo. “Chancellor Palpatine. Turns out, he was a Sith the whole time.”

Artoo lets out a mechanical sort of screech, and goes into a rapid series of beeps. <Palpatine, Ani’s friend, but Palpatine Sith. Sith evil. Sith enemy. Computing, computing…>

“Yeah, I know, right,” Anakin says, commiserating. 

Eventually, Artoo seems to finish processing that new piece of data. He swivels his optic sensors once, twice, then turns them back to Anakin. <Never liked the bastard.>

Caught off guard, Anakin guffaws. “Oh, Artoo, what would I do without you?”

<You’d get yourself killed,> Artoo declares, with utmost certainty.

Anakin chokes on air, then coughs. “You have no idea how true that is, buddy,” he mutters. 

He turns back to the dash of his ship and watches the stars stream by.

***

Unfortunately, the Council doesn’t let him off the hook that easily. First Obi-Wan comms him, and then Mace Windu. Even when he’s taken off and is no longer on planet, they want to reel him back in to do their spy-on-the-Chancellor job… one that, fine, Anakin can see now was actually a good idea. But they have no way of knowing that at this point, Anakin’s been there, done that, and going back into Palpatine’s presence is just about the last thing he should be doing right now. 

However… he may have been able to word his message differently in order to get them to leave him alone. Perhaps telling Obi-Wan part of the truth—that Anakin’s looking into Maul as a potential lead for information about the Sith Master—wasn’t the greatest idea, because now they won’t stop questioning him.

(“So, Skywalker,” Windu presses. “You’re telling me that, without prompting, you assumed the search for Darth Sidious as a top priority, and decided to pursue Darth Maul based on something you remembered about him when you encountered him in childhood?”

Anakin cringes inwardly. “Would you believe me if I said the Force is leading me here?”

Windu glowers at him.

Anakin sighs. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”)

But, eventually, he manages to get them off his back—probably because they simply tire of dealing with him, and have more super-secret-important-Council things to do. Breathing a sigh of relief, Anakin turns to Artoo. “Yeesh, glad that’s over with,” he says.

Artoo only has time to beep his assent before, all of a sudden, they drop out of hyperspace.

Anakin jolts. That’s never good. It’s too early for them to have already made it to Mandalore, so there’s got to be something wrong—

But then he takes a closer look at the Twilight II ’s new surroundings. He’s just dropped out above a desert planet, surrounded by a Republic fleet. No, not just any Republic fleet—those are his ships, mingling freely with Mandalorian vessels—

Anakin blinks, and hurries to check the nav computer.

The coordinates match. Mandalore. As the realization hits, Anakin suddenly becomes aware of the strange feeling in the Force all around them, a sudden release of power like a coiled spring snapping.

Artoo seems to have run his checks and come to a similar conclusion. <Hey, quick question, what the kriff?> Artoo bleeps.

Anakin falls back into his seat, letting himself bounce at the impact. “Uh… don’t worry about it, Artoo,” he says, trying to make his voice sound light. “I think it’s just the Force messing with me.”

Artoo splutters. <This is not logical. The Force? Since when can the Force bend spacetime? Does not compute!>

“Oh, it can bend spacetime, alright,” Anakin mutters, but he isn’t allowed any further time to process the Force’s new weirdness, because then they’re being hailed.

“Cargo shuttle, identify yourself,” a clone’s voice demands.

Anakin gives himself a shake, before pressing the button to patch himself through. “This is General Skywalker, requesting permission to land.”

“G-general Skywalker!” the clone echoes. He sounds—rightfully—pretty taken aback.

Internally, Anakin commiserates with the clone’s surprise, but outwardly, he says, “Yup, that’s right. Last-minute change of plans. You boys miss me?”

The joke swiftly puts the trooper at ease, and the protocols and clearance codes are then sorted out within minutes. As he departs for the surface, the communications officers also inform him that they’ve notified “the Commanders” of his arrival. Anakin lets himself smirk at this. Clearly, promoting Rex has done nothing to affect his mens’ opinions of where Ahsoka belongs in the military hierarchy. They’ll just honor both of them with the title. 

It’s not at all according to proper protocol. He couldn’t be prouder. Of Rex, Ahsoka, any of them.

In no time at all, the Twilight II arrives at Sundari’s docks. As he surveys them, Anakin is hit with the memory that this is where Obi-Wan (reluctantly) admitted the first Twilight met its untimely end. Even now, the thought brings with it no small amount of exasperation. 

This time, I’ll be around to watch her, so she’ll be safe, Anakin vows—before logic reminds him that it doesn’t matter if she’s blown up this rotation, since she’ll be right as rain the next loop.

He pauses, and surveys his precious hand-built project, feeling a little derailed. Well, still. This is Anakin’s ship, and he’ll protect her the best he can, reset or no reset. Just like Artoo, and—

—Rex and Ahsoka. The two come into view from the front porthole, walking alongside Bo-Katan Kryze. A grin lighting up his face, Anakin dashes out of his seat and down the gangplank, before remembering that running out to meet them would raise a lot of eyebrows, and all that would end up wasting time, not conserving it. 

Still, Anakin decides not to stop himself from giving Rex, who’s walking in the front of the small group, a full-on hug as soon as Rex reaches him. 

“Uh, General,” Rex greets him. He sounds just as caught off guard as Bo-Katan and Ahsoka look.  

“ Commander Rex,” Anakin smiles, pulling back and giving Rex a friendly punch in the arm. Rex, seemingly recovering a bit, smiles back. 

Then Anakin turns to Ahsoka. Suddenly, he’s reminded of the fact that she’s been slow to warm up to him since she’s returned. He really wants to hug her, but he’s not sure she will want that.

Still, he draws close. “Ahsoka,” he says.

Ahsoka studies him for a moment. Gradually, her face softens. “Anakin,” she says back. Then, she turns to lead the group away from the docks and into the city.

Anakin takes the win for what it was, and falls into step beside her, Bo-Katan, Rex, and Artoo right behind them.

“You know, I wasn’t expecting you for at least half the day,” Ahsoka starts, hints of amusement coloring her voice. “Obi-Wan made it sound like you’d just left.”

Anakin sobers a bit at the reminder of the latest way the Force has been messing with time. He supposes it’s in his favor that he arrived in time to do something here on Mandalore before the day reset—he hadn’t exactly thought that through before he left—but it’s still rather creepy. 

“I, uh, left when they were all still asleep,” he says. Before Artoo can even think of reacting to the lie, Anakin shoots him a sideways pleading glance. The Force’s time-warping would take way too long to explain. Artoo spins his head around, the Artoo-certified version of an eye roll, but, fortunately, says nothing.

“So you snuck out, huh,” Ahsoka teases, a corner of her mouth lifting upward.

Anakin only gives her a shrug, and she huffs out a small laugh. “Well, I can’t say that I’m sad to see you here. Maul still remains at large. I could have used more men—” and here she gives him a sharper look—”but I guess you’ll have to do.”

Anakin remembers this from her holocall a couple of loops ago. He can’t exactly tell her that dragging the rest of the 501st with him would waste time he didn’t have, but he feels bad anyway. Still… “There’s never enough men, Snips,” he settles for saying.

Ahsoka doesn’t look too pleased at this, but seems to decide to let the matter go. “Well,” she sighs. “I guess you’ll want to be briefed on the situation. We’ve secured most of the city proper, but Maul and his fighters have fled into an underground tunnel system. I encountered him there, but he escaped.”

So she’s seen Maul. “Tangled with him, already, huh?” Anakin prompts. 

“Not for long,” Ahsoka replies. 

“Did he say anything about what he’s doing back here? What his goals are?”

Ahsoka gives him an appraising look—maybe it’s because asking questions like this isn’t usually Anakin’s style (whoops). “He… well, as we’d expected, he wanted to lure Master Obi-Wan here. But… he mentioned you, too.”

Anakin’s breath catches. “Me?”

“Mostly, he was just annoyed I was there instead,” Ahsoka continues, seeming not to notice Anakin’s reaction. “But Maul also seemed… distracted, at least partially. He spoke of the Republic and the Confederacy as though they were both about to end, and then he mentioned a name, someone who he said would rule the galaxy instead. Darth Sidious.”

Force, Obi-Wan was right. Maul seems to know an awful lot, even perhaps what came to pass on Anakin’s doomed first day before the loop. The galaxy fell to Sidious, then… and Maul knew beforehand?

It takes Anakin several seconds to realize Ahsoka is staring at him, waiting for an answer he hasn’t given. He swallows. “Did he elaborate about Sidious?”

Ahsoka frowns. “No. Obi-Wan seemed to know something, though.” She glances around, then lowers her voice. “He said the Council suspects that Sidious is the unknown Sith Master, the one who both Maul and Dooku answered to. Obi-Wan also says he may have orchestrated the whole war for his benefit. Is all that true?”

All of that is true, far too true. “Yeah,” he confirms, but doesn’t elaborate. Anakin’s chest tightens as he’s reminded of just how much information the Jedi knew beforehand, and still didn’t put together. No wonder Sidious played them all for the fools they were.

"What else do you know so far?” Anakin asks, shaking his thoughts off to continue the brief.

“Nothing more from Maul directly, but an hour ago, we discovered that C Dock had been attacked. One of the only survivors, Sterling, said that Maul took Jesse. He planned to search his mind for information about me.”

Anakin’s fists clench. Maul is still as dangerous as ever. It’s hitting Anakin that all of this will have to play out without him, on the final day, the day the loop ends, since he can’t be in two places at once. He’ll have to be on Coruscant in order to kill Sidious. But Anakin has no idea how this battle has gone during past rotations.

Maul killed Qui-Gon. Maul has almost gotten to Obi-Wan. If Maul had gotten to Ahsoka…

No, he would have felt it if she died. Anakin’s certain of that. But what if she’d been destined to be captured, or to perish on the day after? —

Bad things happen when you let fear take over, Anakin, he tells himself. Shoving the thoughts down, he clears his throat. “Thanks for the briefing, Ahsoka. What’s next?”

Ahsoka stops in her tracks, and peers at him, expression impassive. “You’re the general,” she says, voice neutral.

“And I’m not the one who’s already done a brilliant job with the invasion,” Anakin replies. “I trust your judgment, Snips.”

A slow smile spreads across her face. “Alright, then.” She turns behind her to face the whole group. “Bo-Katan, you captured Prime Minister Almec when you secured the palace. Can you take us to him?”

***

Anakin does not like Prime Minister Almec. The man’s given them very little information so far, except that he’s a slimy bastard. They already knew Maul was worried (about Sidious’s plan, not that Almec knows that part), and that he wanted Obi-Wan. 

But, when Almec says, “There was somebody else he was interested in,” the atmosphere in the room thickens.

“Who?” Ahsoka asks, tone flat. She obviously isn’t amused by Almec’s games, either.

“If only I could remember the name…” Almec smirks.

Anakin grits his teeth. He nearly barges forward to give the guy a piece of his mind—

—but Ahsoka beats him to it. “Bo, help him remember,” she says, voice imperious.

Snips is really taking charge . Vindication and pride spread through him—but then come to a sudden halt as another part of his conscience realizes that roughing up a prisoner might not exactly be the real Jedi way to do things. And he knows who Ahsoka got that from. 

But we don’t have much time, the first part of him argues back. It’s more efficient. And plus, doesn’t the bastard deserve it?—

Almec backs away as Bo-Katan advances, his glib demeanor completely gone. Finally. The buffoon’s going to spill everything now—

The Force cries out a warning, and then Almec is shot twice, once through each shoulder. 

There’s instant chaos. Bo-Katan rushes after the sniper, muttering something about “Saxon”. Ahsoka runs to Almec, and orders Rex to get a medic. Anakin is right there with her, on Almec’s other side. 

“Maul had a vision. A dream,” Almec chokes out. He doesn’t look like he’ll make it. “The name came to him.”

“Who?” Anakin and Ahsoka ask, simultaneous. Ahsoka grabs his shoulders. “What name?” she presses further.

With seemingly the last of his effort, Almec turns to Anakin. Somehow, even as his head lolls, he manages to make eye contact. “Sky… walker.”

And then Almec slumps over, and Ahsoka and Anakin are left to stare at each other. The former in surprise. The latter in shame. 

It’s looking likelier and likelier that Maul knows. Knows what Anakin was supposed to… and did, at least before…become.

Unable to meet Ahsoka’s eyes for any longer, Anakin streaks off in the direction of the ongoing chase for the assassin, but the action is over faster than he can be of any help. Maul’s soldier escapes.

***

Anakin busies himself, along with Artoo, with directing minor troop movements and cleanups in the aftermath of the skirmish. Though it’s a dull task he usually avoids… Anakin is hoping to avoid having to talk to Ahsoka if he keeps himself busy. Unfortunately for Anakin, Ahsoka both knows him too well and is trained far too well. She locates him quickly, and then, since they have an audience of troopers, she uses the deadly weapons of Social Norms and Inescapable Military Protocol to trap him into coming with her. All told, she thwarts his evasion attempts within the hour.

Ugh. She definitely learned that one from Obi-Wan.

(Artoo gives Anakin a sarcastic salute as Anakin leaves. He has to stop himself from sticking his tongue out at the droid in front of all his men.)

Ahsoka cuts right to the chase as soon as they’re walking in private. “Anakin,” she starts, watching him keenly. “Back in the cell with Almec…”

Anakin keeps his eyes ahead of him. 

“You… you weren’t surprised,” Ahsoka continues. “About what he said.” A beat. “If I’m remembering correctly, you’ve never properly met Maul. But he was talking about you, and you aren’t surprised.”

Anakin quickens his pace, mind reeling as he tries to figure out a way out of this. Ahsoka won’t remember next rotation, so it’s pointless to tell her—

Ahsoka grabs his hand, and Anakin reflexively halts. “Anakin, please. You know something. Tell me what it is.”

He studies her. Her eyes are filled with concern, genuine concern. Force damn it. It’s like with Obi-Wan all over again–he can’t seem to deny anyone for long.

“Ahsoka, it’s… complicated.” How does he put this… it’ll probably be better to be vague. “A lot has been going on in the past few days… a lot that has to do with Darth Sidious—”

Just then, Ahsoka’s commlink beeps. With a look of exasperation, she picks up. “Rex?”

From what Anakin can gather from the chatter on the other end, both of them are needed to meet with Bo-Katan and the other Mandalorian superiors, effective immediately. 

Ahsoka glances at him, one eyebrow raised. “We’ll talk about this later,” she says, before they set off in the direction of the royal palace. 

It won’t be for long, but Anakin has just been given a respite. He should feel relieved… and he mostly does… but part of him does wish she knew. 

It’s interesting. Anakin’s been so used to keeping secrets, keeping things inside. His marriage to Padmé, all his non-Jedi-like feelings…the Tusken massacre. It’s surprising him, then, just how addicted he’s gotten in a very short time to having the people closest to him actually know. When they do know, they don’t do what he always feared, condemn him, push him away. Instead… they support him. 

The Light pulses in response to this, and he stumbles where he’s walking. Ahsoka glances back in concern, but Anakin waves her off. Luckily, she seems to buy it.

So, the Light wants to chat again. Well, he has a couple of choice things to say. Retreating into his mind, Anakin opens himself to the Force.

Oh, so sharing is a good thing, apparently. How wonderful. A bit hard to do when they’ll never remember because I’m stuck in a time loop.

The Light pulses again, this time with an impression that feels like sorrow, but peace. As in, perhaps it pities his struggles, but it sees absolutely nothing wrong with its course of action. 

Anakin shakes his head. He supposes that the Good Jedi thing to do in this situation would be to feel grateful for all that the Force has done to help him… but he’s not a Good Jedi yet. Fine. If you’re not going to be helpful, then—

WAIT, the Light cuts him off, with a powerful swell that stops him in his tracks. An image appears before his eyes—that of a tall, red-and black-skinned man. It’s been years, but he still remembers. Maul. 

Prepare, the Light commands, and then Anakin is wrenched back into reality.

He blinks. Ahsoka is walking with Rex and Bo-Katan ahead of him at this point. He jogs to catch up, earning him a sideways glance from his former padawan, but their conversation continues. Something about Bo-Katan getting uncomfortable with the Republic’s occupation, nothing important right now.

Prepare. The Force only warns if it’s urgent. Anakin extends his senses, and sure enough, he detects it. The presence of a Darksider.

“Ahsoka!” he cries, pushing his way to the front of the group, as they turn the corner into the throne room. “He’s here—”

“Indeed I am,” a voice drawls, and everyone pivots, at once, in the direction from which it came.

Maul. 

Chapter Text

When Anakin encountered Maul at the tender age of nine, he didn’t remember much of Maul as an individual. For so long in Anakin’s mind, Maul loomed as the representative of the Sith, of the deepest evil; Anakin remembered him more for what he represented than for who he was. He does recall that Maul was tall and imposing, with a sort of dramatic gravitas that made him impossible not to notice. 

Seeing Maul now, it barely seems he’s changed a bit. Maul’s lounging on the throne like he owns it, Jesse tied up by his side. It’s almost like Obi-Wan never cut him in half.

'Prepare?' You didn’t give me any time to prepare, Anakin snipes at the Force. His hand drifts automatically towards his lightsaber, before he stops himself. Wait. He’s supposed to be here to gather information from Maul. Meaning, the goal is to talk, not fight.

Anakin sees now he underestimated how hard that would be, now that he’s face to face with the Sith Lord that killed Qui-Gon. All he wants to do is rush the bastard. 

He settles for scowling.

While Anakin is forcing himself to stay his hand, Bo-Katan has no such qualms and takes immediate action, leaping forward and shooting at Maul. Anakin looks on approvingly. Unfortunately, Maul diverts her shots and gets her in a Force hold within seconds.

“My lady, is that any way to treat your rightful ruler?” Maul intones in a smooth, melodious bass. Anakin’s mind hones in on the sound. Maul must not have spoken when Anakin saw him last, because he would have remembered that voice. It seems almost larger-than-life. Chilling, and appropriately dark, but expressive. Humanoid. 

Maul continues to hold Bo-Katan aloft, barely rising from the throne even as he does so. Anakin supposes Bo-Katan is about to be a goner, but then Maul releases her, and she crashes to the ground. Ahsoka and Rex rush to her, and Anakin jogs by their side, keeping his eye on the Sith. 

And then, Maul returns Anakin’s gaze. A chill runs through him, despite himself. Maul’s eyes are those of a true Sith—yellow and burning with hatred.

“Skywalker, is it?” Maul says, voice carefully casual—but as Anakin watches, Maul’s posture subtly shifts, tensing. So, at the very least, Maul knows Anakin poses a threat. Good. Anakin can’t tell, however, if he’s thrown Maul off at all by his sudden arrival.

“Darth Maul,” Anakin replies. He’s not able to keep the contempt out of his voice.

Maul’s gaze lingers on Anakin a moment more, sizing him up, before he shifts his focus to Ahsoka. Anakin’s brow starts to furrow. He doesn’t like that considering look Maul’s giving her.

“And now, as a show of good faith, I return your comrade in arms to you,” Maul says, still watching Ahsoka. He waves a hand, and Jesse’s cuffs fall away.

Anakin’s caught off guard by this one. Wait, what? What is Maul playing at here?

Jesse’s no less skeptical. The man looks exhausted, haunted. 

“Run along, there you go, back to your brothers,” Maul prompts. Finally, Jesse staggers to his feet and does as Maul says, apparently not willing to push his luck.

Rex catches him. “Are you alright, Jesse?” he asks. 

“I’m sorry, Commander,” Jesse mutters. “I couldn’t help it. I told him everything.”

Ahsoka places her hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay,” she assures him. Then, she straightens. “Rex, get him out of here.”

Smart. Anakin’s relieved they won’t have to worry about either’s presence here. A battle with a Sith Lord is no place for a non-Force sensitive. 

“General,” Jesse nods to Anakin, and he offers a nod back, along with what he hopes is a reassuring smile. 

Anakin and Ahsoka turn back towards Maul, but just then, the windows rattle as a series of explosions rock the city outside. A new attack.

“Oh, one of you might want to deal with that?” Maul drawls. Anakin grits his teeth at the Sith’s infuriatingly cocky tone. 

Ahsoka pivots to Bo-Katan. “You should go,” she urges. “Your people need you.”

Maul rises and begins to walk forward. “Don’t stay on my account, we’ll be fine,” he says, with a dismissive gesture.

Another explosion sounds off. “Go,” Ahsoka says. With a frown, Bo-Katan finally listens, shoving on her helmet and running out of the room. As she leaves, Anakin and Ahsoka exchange glances. 

I have no idea what this sleemo’s up to, but I don’t trust a bit of it, Ahsoka’s face tells him. 

Right on, Snips, Anakin tries to communicate with his own look. Be on your guard.

But, when they glance back at their opponent, he’s turned his back on them and is staring out the window at the ongoing battle. It’s like Maul is determined to do exactly the opposite of what Anakin expects him to. Granted, however, Anakin barely remembers anything of Maul’s personality or preferred strategies from all those years ago, so it’s not like he had much knowledge to go on.

So far, Maul is not making Anakin like him. He can tell this Sith likes to play mind games—like master, like apprentice, Anakin supposes. It probably makes Obi-Wan a good opponent for Maul. Anakin can imagine them attempting to talk circles around each other.

Anakin, however? Anakin hates mind games. 

“Look at them,” Maul says, softly enough that it sounds almost as though he’s talking to himself. “So blissfully ignorant.” 

Anakin clenches and unclenches his mechanical fist. 

“Care to tell us what this is all about?” Ahsoka cuts in, unamused. “Or would you rather save it for the Council?”

“Oh, no, you are the one I wish to speak with,” Maul says, finally turning from the window to her—but then he shifts toward Anakin. “You, however. I had thought not to expect you by now.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Anakin shrugs, though inwardly he tenses.

“Oh, no, no, on the contrary,” Maul replies with a dark smile. “This bodes well. It seems the Force has given me a gift.”

Ahsoka stiffens, and her hands slide towards her lightsabers. “What are you saying? What do you want with Anakin?”

Maul continues to pace, as if he hadn’t heard her. “Dooku, Jinn, Kenobi, Skywalker, Tano. Masters and apprentices. Quite the lineage, but not unbroken.” He whirls on his heel to look at them. “There were cast-offs—” here he looks at Ahsoka—“and betrayals.” Maul meets Anakin’s eye at this last phrase. “As there will be again, very soon.”

Anakin clenches his fist tighter. Don’t let him get under your skin. Let him keep talking, so you find out what he knows.

“The future is not as certain as you think,” he retorts.

“The future.” Maul shakes his head. “The future. You think you have time. The time has already passed, the time of the Jedi and the Republic has already passed.”

So far as you know. “That’s what you want us to think, isn’t it?”

Maul scowls. “It is not a matter of want or think, Skywalker, there is only what is or what is not. Only fools hold on to relics of the past.”

“It sounds like you’ve given up, then,” Ahsoka cuts in. 

Maul gives a small, mirthless chuckle. “You have no concept of what you’re dealing with.”

“Darth Sidious?” she fires back, without missing a beat. A corner of Anakin’s mouth quirks upward. Right on, Snips.

“There is no defeating his Plan, Lady Tano. If you seek to maintain the Republic, you will waste your time chasing shadows.” Maul creeps towards her, eyes sharp like a hawk’s, circling his prey. Anakin’s jaw clenches, his instincts setting off alarms once again at the way Maul studies her. 

“Were you not cast out of your order?” Maul asks.

Anakin doesn’t like where this is going. Before he can interrupt to drag Maul back to the point, however, Ahsoka answers. “I left voluntarily.”

“Yes, but you were motivated to leave by the hypocrisy of the Jedi Council.” Maul pauses. “Not everyone has the integrity to make such a choice.” His eyes slide briefly to Anakin, in a way that’s surely intentional, before returning to Ahsoka. “We were both tools for greater powers, for our masters .”

Anakin’s blood boils, and his restraint abandons him. “I don’t use people, only Sith do that,” he growls. Ahsoka folds her arms. 

“Jedi this, Sith that, always a binary,” Maul muses. “Never any nuance. ”

“Oh, so you’re no longer a Sith then, hmm? Then what is all this?” Anakin cries, waving his arms all around him. Part of his conscience tickles at him to calm down, stop escalating the situation, you can’t get information out of Maul if you antagonize him, but Anakin is deaf to its pleas.

Maul whirls to him. Anger gathers around him in the Force, and the temperature seems to drop by several degrees. “All this,” Maul seethes, “is my plan to lure in you. ”

Anakin freezes. From the corner of his eye, Ahsoka does the same.

“Of course, I had hoped you would bring Kenobi as well, but you’ll do.” Maul turns back to Ahsoka. “Whatever allegiance you feel towards your master now, you will not feel it soon. Sidious will see to that. He has long been groomed for his role as my master’s new apprentice.”

“You lie!” Ahsoka spits. Such faith in him. Faith Anakin doesn’t deserve.

Shame wraps around him, choking him, as Ahsoka and Maul continue to argue. He has to set her straight, own up. He knew this was coming, but suddenly, the whole prospect seems worse. Somehow, it was different when Padmé learned about the Tusken massacre, when Obi-Wan on a past rotation learned of all Anakin had done. Ahsoka was his student. She was supposed to look up to his example. For her to see how Anakin has failed her… it’ll hurt. It will hurt so much.

But, despite his swirling emotions, the more rational part of Anakin’s mind surfaces as he registers something about Maul that surprises him. Maul doesn’t bear allegiance towards Sidious. No, Maul’s trying to get Ahsoka to turn against Anakin, because Maul assumes Anakin will still become Sidious’s apprentice. Therefore, Maul sees Sidious as the enemy. Which makes him… somewhat on their side. 

Anakin takes a sharp breath in. Prepare. Suddenly, he knows what the Light was trying to say. He thought it meant to prepare, because Maul was about to be there… but no, the Light had another meaning. It always does. 

Anakin came in trying to get information out of Maul, but he had assumed it would be the interrogation of an enemy. Maul still is an enemy, in many ways, but… in this moment, he is an ally. And oh, how Anakin has always hated having to make nice with the bad guys. How he’s always hated the phrase, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.  

But Anakin has no choice. Maul won’t talk until Anakin treats him like an ally.

He has to be prepared to bare some of his secrets to get some in return.

“Snips, he’s not lying,” Anakin says. His voice is soft, reluctant, but both Maul and Ahsoka stop in their tracks.

Ahsoka is shocked, like Anakin expected. Maul is also surprised, but his face is already changing into a sneer of victory. Anakin lowers his head and stares at his feet.

“You were wondering what was going on,” Anakin continues. “Well, to put it briefly, the Force… showed me some of the future.” That’s a half truth, but one that’ll do for now. “I… Maul isn’t wrong. Sidious did want me as his apprentice, and I did exactly what he wanted. I Fell, and the galaxy fell with me.” He lifts his head to look at Maul. “I will not allow myself to go down that route. You are Sidious’s enemy, and so am I.”

Maul starts forward, but his steps are cautious—as though Anakin is now more of a threat. His visage is twisted into a suspicious frown. “Sidious does not leave loose ends. He has already revealed himself to you.”

Anakin holds his ground. “Not willingly, he hasn’t.”

Maul chokes a laugh. “He expects me to believe you?”

Anakin feels his irritation rising, and he attempts to swallow it down. “ I didn’t come here to argue with you. I came to you because I wanted to know more about him. So we can defeat him.”

But Maul’s no longer looking at Anakin. “He wishes me to be off my guard, to discover what I know, before his new apprentice kills me,” he mutters, stroking his chin. Then, without warning, he ignites his double-bladed saber and twirls it in a deadly circle. “Then tell Sidious I will not be fooled by his petty tricks!”

Before Anakin can get so much as a word out in protest, Maul launches himself at him, and the chance to talk is lost. As Ahsoka joins in and the first few strokes begin, Anakin is struck by the thought that it’s been years since he’s fought in a duel not to win, or to kill, but to end the fight. Even through his frustration and disappointment, he wonders if there’s a chance the Light is proud of him.

***

It turns out that between the two of them—Anakin, who he supposes did recently defeat Count Dooku, and Ahsoka, who he’s extremely proud to see is sharper than ever, despite her hiatus—Maul goes down more easily than he expected. Both are on the same page about capturing, not killing, but when it comes time to secure Maul, they pause. A stun blaster, Anakin realizes, would have come in handy. (Jedi don’t carry blasters, but sometimes, Anakin wonders if they should.) Anakin doesn’t like the calculating look in Maul’s eyes, though, even prone on the floor beneath Ahsoka’s foot—so he resolves the issue with a good old blow to the head, knocking Maul unconscious.

Ahsoka raises an eyebrow, and Anakin shrugs. A corner of her mouth quirking upward, Ahsoka draws her foot back and retracts her lightsabers.

For a long moment, both stare, breath still heaving from exertion, at the body on the floor. The thrill of victory fading, Anakin’s disappointment pushes back to the surface. Maul didn’t believe him. Anakin’s willing to concede that, fair, perhaps he wouldn’t believe himself—but somehow, it feels like a blow, to his confidence, to his new plan.

“Anakin…” Ahsoka’s voice starts, and he tears his eyes away.

“I… later,” he says.

Her gaze lingers on him, but then she acquiesces with a nod. 

***

The battle ends soon to Republic victory, but Anakin has long learned that an end to the fighting doesn’t mean an end to the chaos.

Lingering fires still burn around every corner. Medics dart to and fro. Prisoners are subdued and marched into custody. All the while, civilians mill about at the edges, mourning their losses. Anakin finds himself wondering what it’s like to be one—unable to fight, only to watch as everything goes to shavit. Helpless. 

Perhaps he can relate more than he used to.

He and Ahsoka have been separated by the hubbub so far, Ahsoka busy with Bo-Katan, directing troop movements. As he’s given himself a lower rank in this campaign, he does the same, only on a smaller scale. A couple of times, Rex absently almost issues orders to him—before stopping short and balking when he realizes who he’s talking to. Each time, Anakin waves him off and does exactly as requested, chuckling at Rex’s bug-eyed face. 

It’s understandable that Rex is thrown off. Anakin can’t remember the last time he didn’t insist on being the center of the action.

It’s strangely calming to be less invested.

Unfortunately, it’s also given him too much time to think. He still can’t shake his shame that Ahsoka now knows of his former destiny as Sidious’s apprentice. And he regrets not talking to her earlier, because every minute that goes by allows for her to ponder what Maul said, to draw her own conclusions… and, likely, none of them are good. 

So he’s relieved, despite himself, when the post-battle hubbub seems to smooth out into something more manageable, and Ahsoka separates herself from Bo-Katan to seek him out.

Wordlessly, they decide to retreat into an empty gunship. Anakin settles into a seat across from her, and they shut the door on any potential listening ears.

There’s an awkward silence for the first minute or so. Anakin has figured it’s best to let her start, ask the questions, but Ahsoka waits so long he’s about to say something, just to prompt her.

Ahsoka beats him to it. “What Maul said… what you said to him…”

“It’s true, Snips,” Anakin murmurs.

She frowns. “Even that… He said Sidious… groomed you.”

“That too.”

Ahsoka fixes her eyes on him. “How?”

He doesn’t hold back, this time. He tells her everything. 

Or—everything but the part about the loop. He sticks to his Force vision story instead (phrased to be true, from a certain point of view). Somehow, it almost seems cruel to let her know she’ll have to go through this whole karking battle day after day after day, even if she won’t remember it. But he withholds nothing else. Not Palpatine, not the younglings, not Padmé and the twins. When he’s done, just like when he told Obi-Wan, he feels lighter, even though he knows this conversation will have to happen again.

But he knows now it’s something he needed to do, and it’s from the way she’s looking at him. Like Obi-Wan, she doesn’t reject him, either, and his relief at the revelation is immense. Though, it isn’t an entirely comfortable look. There’s pity in her gaze, more than any student should have towards their teacher.

Anakin supposes that his right to the title has diminished drastically, anyway. He has so much he’s attempting to learn himself that he can hardly say he has the right to teach anyone.

“So that’s why you were playing nice with Maul,” Ahsoka says, presently. “I had half a mind to check if you’d gotten a case of the Geonoshian brain worms.”

Anakin gasps in faux offense, grateful for the attempt at levity. “Hey, I know when to strategize!”

Ahsoka folds her arms in challenge, before both of them break, chuckling softly.

There’s another silence, but then Ahsoka rises from her seat, settling instead into the one next to him. Then, with only a small hesitation, Ahsoka wraps him into a hug.

Anakin’s heart melts. “I’m sorry, Snips,” he whispers.

Ahsoka shakes her head, from where it’s buried into his shoulder. “It’s all that sleemo’s fault. I can’t believe it. All this time…”

“I know,” Anakin says.

They stay like that until their commlinks blink, forcing them back out into the action.

***

Anakin stands, keeping vigil, outside Maul’s cell in the brig of the Star Destroyer. Behind the ray shield, Maul, his wrists cuffed, sits slumped, still unconscious. (Anakin refused Bo-Katan’s ancient Jedi-emprisoning contraption—for all he liked the idea of Maul being absolutely secure, Maul would probably be even less amenable to sharing if he were confined like that.) Outside the brig, troops pass through the hallways periodically. It’s nothing like the chaos of earlier.

It’s calm. Too calm.

Anakin can’t help but wonder if the battle ended this way, too, the first time. He certainly hopes Ahsoka defeated Maul all on her own, but… even so, it wouldn’t have mattered when the moment came. The moment he Fell, and, on its heels, Palpatine activated Order 66. 

A clone passes behind him, and Anakin feels a shudder run down his spine.

No matter what, Ahsoka would have been surrounded by clones.

Anakin gives his head a shake and turns back to Maul, still eyeing him for signs of consciousness. Nothing yet.

Because Maul is not fully secured (for a Force user, that is), someone has to stand guard. Ahsoka volunteered to do the job, but was pulled into a meeting with Rex. However, Anakin’s secretly grateful for this—he’s not sure how much time he has left in the day. (The Force’s constant messing with time has left his internal clock thoroughly kriffed. It hasn’t even given Anakin the courtesy of being consistent—earlier today is a prime example of that, but so was his Fall, the more he thinks about it. The fact that it all blurs together in his head now doesn’t help, but he’s realizing too much occurred, all in succession, for it to have been just one day on which it happened. But the loops hereafter have been confined more closely to one rotation. Anakin hasn’t measured exactly how long they last, though. Maybe he should.)

Anyway, he’s here for a reason. Despite his earlier failure, he has to try further, see what he can do before Maul forgets, and they all have to do everything over again.

After what feels like hours, Maul stirs. Anakin watches, letting him rouse himself and take stock of his surroundings. He’s efficient in the way he does so, reminding Anakin of all the soldiers he knows, of Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, himself. Maul has seen much of war, too.

Maul’s eyes latch onto Anakin’s, and he narrows his eyes, but says nothing.

So, apparently, it’s up to Anakin to speak first. Maybe Maul’s reticent because he’s still convinced that Anakin wants to interrogate him on Sidious’s behalf, though Anakin still can’t figure out what he thinks Sidious would gain from that. Anakin stifles a sigh. 

“So, you were Sidious’s apprentice, once,” Anakin starts. “I never caught what made you change your mind.”

Maul leans back slightly. “No pleasantries, Skywalker?”

“We’re well past that, don’t you think?” Anakin smiles, in a way that feels more like the baring of teeth. 

There’s a pause, as Maul studies him. Then: “I gave Sidious his answer already, apprentice. I am no fool.”

Anakin turns to the side so Maul can’t see him grit his teeth at the dig. Already, they’re back in the same rut as before. 

“Alright, so you’re still convinced I’m on his side. Got it.” Anakin keeps an eye on Maul through his peripheral vision. “Can you help me understand how that’s supposed to work?”

Maul just glares.

Anakin turns back to face him. “No, really. You’ve felt me in the Force, I still use the Light. Why would I do that if I were Sidious’s student?”

Maul lifts his chin and chuckles. “Do you really expect me not to know how the Dark can deceive the senses? I was his student first, Skywalker.”

Huh–so there’s a specific way Palpatine managed to keep himself from discovery all these years. Anakin keeps his excitement at having learned something hidden. “Alright, how about this: why am I here, of all places, then?”

Maul seems to decide silence is the better option.

“Because, you forget, I’ve seen the future, too. You know what happened after I submitted myself to him—in the vision?” Anakin hastily adds. “Palpatine executed Order 66, right then—”

Maul stands suddenly, causing Anakin to go silent. “You know his name.”

Anakin tries to brush off the foreboding feeling that, all of a sudden, his control of the conversation has vanished. “Yes, that was part of what I saw,” he says, slowly.

A grin grows on Maul’s face, and he gives a cold laugh. “You betray yourself, apprentice. No being can learn of the Master’s name before he reveals himself.”

“You make him sound all powerful.” Anakin feels his brow furrow. Maul has to know of a weakness, something. Sidious isn’t a god. He has to be defeatable.

Instead of answering, Maul turns and begins to pace. It’s his whole work-the-room routine, as though he were still free, instead of locked in a cell. Anakin’s sense of foreboding increases, and he conducts a quick check of all the safety measures in place, but finds nothing amiss.

“Perhaps I underestimated you, Skywalker,” Maul says, voice thoughtful. “Perhaps you truly do speak of yourself, and seek to know how to defeat him, so you may take his place.” He gives Anakin a sideways glance at this. “Thinking like a true Sith, already. I must commend you.”

Anakin huffs through his nose. Karking—Maul was so close to the truth. “That’s not it, either,” he bites back. 

“And still, you cling to your story,” Maul continues, as though he were deaf, or something. “More deception than I had expected, from one so… straightforward.”

“You’re right, I hate liars.” Anakin knows his temper is starting to flare, but he doesn’t have time for this , damnit. “Which is why I’m not lying.”

Maul ignores him. “And more ambition, too.”

Anakin punches the ray shield. “Damn it, Maul just listen —” 

Suddenly, the Light swells, chiming with a note of warning. Anakin steps back in surprise, then takes a breath. Whatever this is, he needs to listen. He shuts his eyes and opens himself more fully to the Force.

Almost time, he’s able to make out, and then the Light fades.

Anakin’s eyes fly open. No, no, no, Maul has to talk, now!—

He whirls back to Maul, pressing both hands to the shield. “Sidious’s weaknesses. What. Are. They.”

Maul turns slowly, his expression almost amused. “And how am I to know you will not be a crueller master than he?”

Even as Anakin’s frustration threatens to boil over, he’s suddenly struck with an idea. The Force. Use the Force.

Even though it goes against all his instincts, he lowers his mental shields, just enough for Maul to sense his intent. “Search your feelings, and listen to the truth in what I say! I am not Sidious’s apprentice. I seek to destroy him, and the Sith, and to preserve the Republic. We have a common goal.” 

There’s silence for a moment. Maul’s eyes are closed, and Anakin watches closely, heart pounding, as Maul’s presence in the Force brushes up against his. Then, all of a sudden, Maul draws back, shaking his head slightly as if rousing himself from sleep.

Maul meets his eyes. It’s a different look that Maul’s giving him, now—and Anakin realizes, in triumph, that Maul’s gaze has finally lost its edge of suspicion. Instead, it holds something closer to... respect.

“So be it, Skywalker,” he says. “Let me out, and I’m sure we can come to an arrangement.”

It’s like Anakin’s been sucked into space, the ground unmoored beneath his feet. He wants to scream. “You don’t understand,” he presses. “There’s no time—”

“Let me out,” Maul repeats—

And then the Force twists, and the day resets.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 11

Anakin jolts awake, springing out of his bed at the Temple. He growls to himself, frustration burning through his veins. Why does it have to be Maul? Why does he have to be the only lead? Just when Anakin thought he was getting somewhere, the kriffing self-serving Darksider just has to show his true colors. 

Without prompting, Anakin’s body begins to go through the motions, tearing through his room as he readies himself for the trip. Sithspit, Anakin hates Maul, hates this whole situation. He hates the Force, too—why did it insist on tearing him away just as he might have found a way to get Maul to talk? The Force has found it plenty fine to mess with time in other instances, so why couldn’t it have helped Anakin this one time?

Before he knows it, Anakin has hopped in the Twilight II once more, picked up Artoo, and set his course back to Mandalore. He nearly forgets to get the Council off his back, but when he does remember, he gives them a false excuse that will hopefully quell any questions instead of inviting them, like last rotation. He isn’t in the kriffing mood for that. 

Anakin collapses backwards in the pilot’s seat with a heavy sigh. Artoo wheels towards him. <What’s going on?>

The similarity to yesterday grates at Anakin. “Nothing,” he grunts. 

Artoo swivels his head, peering at Anakin in an obviously skeptical way, but then seems to decide not to push it. Anakin’s grateful for the space. He’s already not looking forward to explaining himself twice to Ahsoka and Maul… (Actually, he’s not looking forward to anything to do with Maul, but he’s aware that he’s got no choice in the matter. Or, well, there is a choice, but the other choice is giving up on his only lead, and that’s not happening.) 

Alright, so… Round 2. First, capture Maul, since Anakin will feel far better with the interrogation on his terms. Then… cozy up. Yaaay. 

The Force decides to help in the same way it did yesterday, the fickle thing, causing poor Artoo to bust a circuit, again. The boys are surprised but happy to see him, again. He greets Rex and Ahsoka, again. Her reception is lukewarm, again. Anakin tries to ignore the way that squelches down his heart like boots on a Geonosian brain worm.

Then Ahsoka asks Bo-Katan to take her to Prime Minister Almec (again), and Anakin physically stops short, because it’s somehow only getting to him now that he doesn’t have to follow yesterday’s path. He already knows Ahsoka’s schedule for today. Interrogate Almec. Chase the assassin. Conduct more meetings and make more plans… get ambushed by Maul in the throne room. 

Anakin can just skip to the Maul part. He knows where Maul will be. And he doesn’t have to get Ahsoka involved, this time… avoiding not only the danger to herself, but, perhaps more importantly, having to go through those awkward revelations once more.

Ahsoka’s speaking to him, Anakin begins to realize. “Anakin. Anakin. ”

Anakin snaps himself out of it and gives her a forced grin. “Snips, I’m going to go check on something. You can go ahead with your interrogation without me. Don’t worry. I trust you.”

Her expression might remain closed-off, but Ahsoka still manages to convey that she’s skeptical of Anakin’s excuses. However, the Ahsoka of this rotation does not press him. Anakin doesn’t know whether to feel relieved or disappointed. “I’ll comm you when we’re about to start the next meeting,” she says, and then she’s turning and walking away from him, strides confident, her army following.

“Keep an eye on her, Artoo,” Anakin says, and the droid beeps his assent and follows as well.

Anakin allows himself a moment more to watch, and then makes for the palace.

***

This plan would have worked wonderfully, Anakin muses as he stares at the very empty throne room,  if Maul somehow stayed in one place the whole day. Stayed put, like an idiot who isn’t trained in evasive tactics. An idiot Maul most certainly is not. 

No, the idiot in this equation is Anakin. Without question.

Anakin groans and rubs his face. This is not his day. He’s distracted, sloppy. Anakin reeeeally wants to blame it on Maul, but he shouldn’t, and it would be a bit of a stretch anyway, so.

Ok. Regroup. If Maul does not appear at the palace yet during the course of this day, where could he be?

Anakin runs through some of the neighboring areas to Sundari’s palace in his mind, calling up some of the holomap images he studied during the strategy meetings. It takes him a few minutes before he realizes… he’s got another option.

Anakin knows Maul will be here, sometime. He could just… wait for Maul to arrive.

Anakin heaves out a guffaw. How silly that would sound, in any context but his own. But Anakin has nothing but time on his side. Rotations upon rotations upon rotations of it.

So, vowing to record the hour Maul appears for future reference, in case all this goes wrong again, Anakin dismisses the holo with a wave of his hand and leans back against a grand pillar by the entrance. His eyes drift towards the ceiling, taking in the elaborate scrollwork and glasswork that went into creating this space.

Before too long, Anakin bores of architecture appreciation and starts doing some warm-up lightsaber katas. He follows habit, at first, his favored Djem So forms taking precedence—but his heart isn’t in it, something itching at him beneath the surface.

Anakin frowns and pauses where he is, deep in a lunge, saber blade outstretched.

Without thinking too hard about it, he starts doing an exercise from Soresu. His body is a little awkward at first, but before too long he’s settled back into it. It feels refreshing, invigorating, like splashing into a pool of cool water. Then he rewinds it back even further to Shii-Cho, and after that, a smattering of exercises from the other forms. Anakin has to concentrate harder on getting these katas right, but the process relaxes his conscience, makes him feel more balanced. Probably because this method of training is more balanced—it’s more disciplined, better for overall technique.

Why has he been neglecting his other forms, again? 

…well, several reasons, maybe. Lack of time amidst the war, lack of routine, tiredness. And… because it would mean losing a decade-long argument with Obi-Wan, started eons ago by Whiny Padawan Ani, who, as whiny padawans do, railed against anything repetitive, boring, and involving discipline. But—and Anakin gives a rueful smirk at this thought—Obi-Wan doesn’t have to know he won. Anakin can do his well-rounded training in secret.

…though, wouldn’t hiding it be, essentially, conceding that Grown-Up Jedi Knight Anakin still thinks exactly like Whiny Padawan Ani?

Anakin sighs, sheathing his blade, and mops his brow with a loose end of his robes. Force, trying to be a mature person is hard.

He takes another glance around. Still the same grandiose, echoey, empty room. Anakin then extends his Force senses, prodding the area for any vacuums of Dark. Nothing.

…what if Maul already went here, saw Anakin, and decided to switch tactics and wait somewhere else?

Anakin worries for a moment, but then scoffs. If he were Maul, he wouldn’t do that. An enemy alone, without backup, is all the better to attack. The only reason Anakin can come up with for why Maul might wait until the others arrive is… theatrics.

Wait. But Maul seems to love his theatrics a great deal. Maybe it is possible that Maul would wait just for a more complete audience…

Oh. Or Maul would wait for his simultaneous attack on the 501st, which would serve as a tactical cover and distraction for him to be able to fight Ahsoka without interference.

Yeah. That.

Sithspit, Anakin really is off his game.

Ahsoka comms him then, and he begs off of her meeting with an even worse excuse. ("Your foot got stuck in a grate? Really, Anakin?) Then, it's back to the silence.

…Maybe, Anakin muses, he should try hiding, so as to maybe catch Maul off guard and capture him more easily. Assuming, that is, that Maul hadn’t already come by and noticed Anakin first. But, if Maul did decide to scope out the throne room before his attack…

Anakin debates himself in circles for a few more minutes, and then decides.

One hour and twenty-seven minutes later, when Maul finally bothers to show up with a limp Jesse in tow, Anakin is crammed inside, of all things, a garbage can. His limbs have long since gone numb; he’s only just about managed to convince himself that he loves the smell of trash, actually; and his only thought for the last twenty minutes, perhaps, has only been if he should just call it a day and leave the cursed bin already. So, Anakin finds himself so caught off guard at Maul’s appearance that he nearly jerks his body in a way that would shake the trash can—surely alerting Maul and ruining the whole point of this stupid gambit. Biting back a curse at the near-miss, Anakin carefully stills his body. He reels in his presence in the Force, too, hoping he’d been shielding it well enough that Maul hadn’t noticed his surprise.

Maul, for all he seems to love the sound of his own voice, does not talk to himself, or to Jesse. Instead, he deposits Jesse uncaringly in a heap at the foot of the throne, and then glides slowly to the panoramic windows. He peers at the stained glass in solemn silence, as though they hold the secrets of life. Even without an audience, Maul exudes drama. 

Anakin rolls his eyes so hard his ocular muscles hurt a bit once he’s done. 

As the minutes pass by, Maul just keeps staring out the window, the quiet sound of Jesse’s labored breathing the only noticeable noise in the room. The poor soldier’s plight makes Anakin’s skin itch to get him to a medic, and he quickly realizes the flaw in his trash-can-surprise-attack plan. Maul would have to come closer in order for Anakin to effectively take him by surprise. (And, for that matter, Anakin’s muscles would have to be a whole lot less numb in order to move quickly enough, too.) But Maul just keeps staring, and staring, and staring. 

Anakin bites back a groan, his flesh arm beginning to shake from its awkward position. Should he just climb out and abandon the plan?

For the first time since the time loop started, Anakin allows himself to think: Well, there’s always tomorrow.

And then he interrupts Maul’s perfect, brooding tableau by using the Force to strike him with a flying garbage can lid.

Maul doesn’t exactly yelp, but it's a near thing. Anakin grins at his results as he clambers slowly out of the trash.

“Why, hello, Maul.”

“General!” Jesse rasps.

Maul, recovering quickly, narrows his eyes. “Skywalker.”

Anakin makes a show of brushing off his hands, as if he were walking away from an epic-looking explosion instead of a trash can. As he is closer to Jesse than Maul, he reaches the man first, untying him and telling him to move, get out of here now. Jesse complies as best he can, staggering all the way. Maul just blandly watches him go.

“So, shall we get this over with?” Anakin says, voice dripping with false enthusiasm.

Maul refuses Anakin’s handy suggestion and begins to circle him slowly. “I was not informed you would make an appearance here.”

“Plans change.”

“But not without reason, no,” Maul replies smoothly. “Tell me, Skywalker, does your Master fear the new world I will bring?”

They both know what Maul’s really fishing for. Master, as in Kenobi, or Sidious?  Anakin can feel his nerves fray a bit at being under Maul's suspicion once more . “As much as I dread whatever that would look like, I’m sure it couldn’t be much worse than Sidious’s ‘new world.’”

That finally gets a reaction, and within a split second, Anakin is staring down several feet of red lightsaber. “And what would that Plan entail, apprentice ?”

Anakin grits his teeth. “If you’re so determined to believe that I’m Sidious’s new favorite plaything, can we just get to the part where we fight, and I capture you so we can have a real conversation about it?”

Maul blinks. Anakin doesn’t wait any longer for a response and dives into a forward roll, igniting his own saber as he goes. Maul is just barely able to whirl around and parry Anakin’s subsequent strike in time. However, Maul is no slouch of an opponent and retaliates without missing a beat, aiming the other blade of his saber staff straight at Anakin’s neck.

Anakin’s veins hum with the excitement of a fight, of something to do that feels purposeful .

Seven minutes later, Maul is unconscious on the floor, and the feeling fades.

***

Anakin feels a little bad skipping out on the battle cleanup this time, but, once he and Bo-Katan Kryze have Maul set up in the brig of the Star Destroyer, he manages to impress upon her the importance of this interrogation. Or, more likely, she simply decides that arguing with Anakin at this juncture is a waste of her time. An excellent choice, really.

As Anakin slides into the chair opposite the ray shield, an uncomfortable weight of pressure settles over him. As soon as Maul wakes up, the clock is ticking. Everything Anakin does or says has to count.

Suddenly, everything about the way he’s behaved today feels downright childish.

Just because everything’s repeating doesn’t mean none of it matters.

Anakin heaves a sigh and rubs his face. The ray shield hums softly.

Finally, Maul rouses. He surveys his surroundings just as he did the rotation before, settling into the same silent glare. Anakin has no intention to play verbal games, so he cuts right to the chase. “I’m not Sidious’s apprentice. I can prove it to you.” Then, with an internal grimace at being forced to be vulnerable towards his enemy, Anakin lowers his shields.

There’s a fraught pause, and Maul, for once, seems nakedly shocked. Then, he closes his eyes, and Anakin manages to keep his presence in the Force (mostly) steady while Maul’s own presence brushes up against his. This time, Maul lingers. Several moments pass, and Anakin wonders if he plans to take Anakin by surprise, and force himself into Anakin’s mind—

Maul’s presence flexes, Anakin flinches, and his shields slam back up. Before they do, Anakin thinks he might have sensed from Maul a touch of condescending amusement. 

Straightening, Anakin opens his own eyes and makes himself meet Maul’s eye contact. After several long moments, Maul, without lowering his gaze, melts into a reclining pose against the cell wall, a sharp smile upon his face.

“So, the Jedi proves himself to be a slave to the Light,” Maul drawls. “I fail to see the relevance.”

“Don’t play coy,” Anakin snaps, before pressing his eyes shut at the mistake. He takes in a subtle breath, steadying himself. “I know you despise your old Master,” he tries again. “And I know you believed me to be his next apprentice. I have had a series of visions that showed to me what would have happened in such a future. I seek instead to stop it. And I believe you can help me.”

Maul examines him like he’s a mildly fascinating species of worm from the jungles of Felucia. After a moment passes, he speaks. “You seek my help.”

“You were once his apprentice—” too, Anakin doesn’t say— “and you are his enemy. You must know a lot about him, and you also are motivated to go against him. So yes, I seek your help.” As much as Anakin hates it.

Maul seems to know Anakin hates it, too. He makes a show of glancing down at his cuffed hands, then around his cell once more. “Such agreeable accommodations for an ally.” 

“Appropriate accommodations for the one who attacked my men.”

“And yet, it is you who attacked me .” Maul clasps his hands and leans forward slightly. “Only content to seek my aid once you have me captured. I cannot help but ponder why that is.”

Because I couldn’t have lowered my shields and survived if you were free, you sleemo, Anakin retorts internally. 

Maul gives a cold laugh. “If such is the nature of the partnership you offer, I must decline, Skywalker,” he jeers. “To deal with an enemy, you must grant something in return. Have you learned nothing from your Master?”

At least, this time, he’s referring to Obi-Wan. “If you are as well acquainted with my Master as you say, you would know he’d never teach something as unwise as that.” Anakin rolls his shoulders back. “To deal with an enemy is to manipulate them as much into your favor as you can. Which you are doing, at this very moment.”

Maul’s smile grows, as if to concede the point. “Such an eager student.”

This isn’t the direction Anakin wanted the conversation to go, he suddenly realizes.  He pinches his brow, before realizing the Obi-Wan-ness of the gesture and snatching his hand away. Maul simply watches him in vague amusement. 

“You have less bargaining power than you pretend,” Anakin starts, thinking hard about Maul’s current position. “Your army has surrendered. You no longer rule over anyone. And you understand how little time we have until the culmination of Sidious’s plan. In order to defeat, or at least mitigate, the Fall of the galaxy, you are in need of allies and resources, of which you currently have none, and quickly. ”

Maul raises an eyebrow. “Is this how you intend to endear yourself to me?”

“I know you have seen some of what I have seen,” Anakin continues, ignoring him for his own sanity. “There will be so much suffering. Billions will die, and worse, be enslaved. Nowhere will be safe. Any Force user outside of the Two, Sidious will slaughter and hunt down until none are left.” Plenty of this is conjecture, Anakin knows, but he has the sense, from his brief spate as Sidious’s servant, that his gut feeling is not wrong.

But Maul’s eyes are flashing, and Anakin realizes he has made some sort of mistake again. “You betray yourself, apprentice ,” he hisses. “No being can learn the ways of the Sith, unless the Master himself revealed them to you.”

The part about the code of Two, Anakin understands. Is Maul really so paranoid that he can't accept the Jedi know something about his precious Sith tenets? He huffs a sigh. “You have felt my presence in the Force. I do not use the Dark.”

“Do you really expect me not to know how the Dark can deceive the senses?” Maul scoffs. Anakin feels a flicker of annoyance at yet another repeated phrase from yesterday.

“There can be no deception if my shields were down. ”

“And yet the Dark has made its mark upon you, Skywalker,” Maul retorts. “It always leaves its traces, its scars upon the soul. I had assumed you to have drawn from it in the past sometimes, hypocritical like any Jedi, but now I know I was mistaken. You have followed the Sith.”

Anakin curls and releases his mechanical fist, attempting to release his frustration into the Force. Now what? he asks the Light, as he tries to draw a beam of it into himself like he’s been practicing, to bolster his shields with its strength and steady his nerves. 

But his attempt doesn’t quite take, and the Light doesn’t give Anakin a response. 

Fine. Maul wants no bantha shavit, all of a sudden? He’ll get no bantha shavit.

“Okay then. You got me. My vision was more literal than I said. I didn’t just see my Fall, and the Fall of the galaxy. I lived it. I did Fall. But I came back. The Force brought me back.” Anakin huffs a bitter laugh and sinks back into his chair, letting his eyes rest, out of focus, upon the ceiling. Maul doesn’t make a move to interject. “Yeah, I didn’t think you’d believe me. It’s not very believable. But that doesn’t make it false.” Anakin finally chances a glance at Maul. Maul’s face is inscrutable. “ Search your feelings ,” Anakin tries at last.

Maul doesn’t take Anakin’s advice for several seconds, as the two continue to stare each other down. Then, finally, Anakin can feel Maul stretch out with the Force. “I Fell, but I came back. The Force has brought me back to fix it,” he repeats. The Force rings with the truth of it.

Maul withdraws his senses immediately, and stares at Anakin. His mind looks, just maybe, like it’s finally got something to think about behind the controlled calm of his face.

“So, one former apprentice to another,” Anakin says. “Help me defeat Sidious.”

The silence stretches out between them. Then, after what feels like an eternity—

“I accept,” Maul says. “If you let me out.”

Anakin’s irritation flares, and it’s all he can do not to spring out of his chair and walk away. Maul must sense this, because his lip curls.

What, truly, does Maul expect? It’s not like Anakin can go along with that demand. For all that Anakin needs his information, Maul is still one crafty, vicious sleemo. No matter if Maul were to help by answering Anakin’s questions, once free, Maul would no doubt go back to his Sith-y ways. He would collect some of his Mandalorian warriors and would proceed to start more wars, kill more people, induce more chaos. It would be highly irresponsible of Anakin to let—

Wait. All the damage Maul could do would be undone by tomorrow. Does Anakin truly have a reason to refuse?

No, no way, Anakin chides himself. 

But, do you have any better ideas of how to get Maul to talk?

A minute ticks by, before desperation wins out.

“Fine, then.” Anakin digs out the drive hidden in his robes—a key that must physically be inserted to open the ray shield, an extra preventative measure against a Force wielder—and lets the shield drop. Maul rises to his feet slowly, his gaze ever cool and assessing. Anakin is suddenly filled with the sensation of being trapped in the same room as a rancor.

“I’ve kept up my end of the deal,” he says, swallowing the feeling down. “It’s time for you to tell me what you know.”

Then the Force cries out a warning, but it’s too late: Maul uses the Force to simultaneously cast Anakin into the cell and extract the key, slamming the ray shield down upon the cell. Fury takes Anakin, and he rushes the ray shield, pounding it with his fists and yelling curses upon Maul’s name.

“I will never trust another apprentice of the Master,” Maul sneers, and then he leaves, just like that.

***

ROTATION 12

When speaking in terms of time loops, the third time is decidedly not the charm. Instead of charming, it’s downright grating.

<So, you said you’d explain later. It’s later.>

“Cargo shuttle, identify yourself.”

“General.”

“You know, I wasn’t expecting you for at least half the day.”

“Skywalker.”

And so it goes. Everyone repeating themselves, like freshly-wiped droids. Sue Anakin, if he isn’t very personable in response.

Anakin arrives at the throne room to capture Maul at the appointed time. For once, Anakin’s déjà vu works in his favor, giving him an added edge. Anakin defeats Maul with a sense of perhaps too much satisfaction. 

And then, they’re back in the brig. 

As Anakin waits for Maul to come to, he goes over what he’s learned. Tell him you’ve seen visions of the future, but not the actual truth. Lower your shields for him to sense that you aren’t Sidious’s apprentice, but never let him find out that you actually were once. Never mention Palpatine’s name. Never mention any part of the Sith Code. 

Most importantly, he meditates on the Light, trying to purge his annoyance and frustration. If he wants Maul to trust him, he knows he can’t hold on to those feelings. But they keep gnawing at him, persistent, and Anakin feels the subtle barrier he’d sensed forming yesterday between him and the Light still in place. Maul wakes before Anakin has managed to take it down.

Well, Anakin’s got no choice now but to commence.

“I have seen a terrible future, a vision the Force tells me you have shared,” Anakin starts. “A future in which Darth Sidious took over the galaxy, with my own self as his apprentice.” Anakin tries to impart the genuine pain he still feels at that fact. “I know you consider Sidious your enemy, and that, as his former apprentice, you must have information that can be used to stop him.”

As usual, Maul is skeptical. He leisurely sizes Anakin up, before letting out a snort. “You betray yourself, apprentice ,” he mocks. “No being can learn of the Master’s Plan before he reveals it.”

“So, wait, you think the only way I would know any of Sidious’s plans is if I’m his apprentice ?” Anakin says, humoring him.

“Sidious does not allow such details to slip his grasp. I tire of your lies, apprentice.”

“Surely Sidious can’t control everything. You know as well as I do the power of visions of the Force.” Before Maul can attempt to refute that, Anakin plays his next card, dropping his shields. “Sidious is not my Master. Search your feelings, you know it to be true.”

Once again, Anakin is forced to put up with the unsettling feeling of Maul probing his presence in the Force, but eventually, Maul is satisfied, and he withdraws. Maul cocks his head slowly. “How interesting,” he purrs. “Perhaps I underestimated you, Skywalker. I had not thought you would deign to seek aid from an enemy.”

Anakin ignores the jab. “If Sidious is the enemy, we must seek all the allies we can.”

Maul does his pointed glance-around. “Such agreeable accommodations for an ally.”

Anakin presses his eyes shut. Don’t get mad. Don’t get mad. He forces himself to give Maul a slight smile. “Perhaps we could work on that.”

Maul just gives him one of his assessing looks. “My, my, then you must be desperate indeed.”

And yet again, Anakin has made a mistake. It must have been suspicious of him to acquiesce that quickly. Stang. 

Maul chuckles and leans back against the cell wall. “Darth Sidious. For so long, the galaxy was content to slumber. To while away their petty lives, all while the Sith Master spun his great Plan. And then, all of a sudden, you appear here, in a desperate hurry.” Maul gives Anakin a wry smile. “The newest replacement, on a silver platter. Tell me why I should help you, when, for your precious galaxy’s sake, it might be best to simply kill you.”

“Because you know we are running out of time, and you are currently imprisoned without your previous influence, power, or resources. If you want to make a move to stop Sidious, you need me to do it.”

Maul’s expression does not change. “Very good, Skywalker. And yet, this does not change the fact that, if you are not Sidious’s apprentice now, you certainly may yet become so.”

“Never,” Anakin spits, vehement, without missing a beat. This is the one response he does not have to measure.

“Hmm,” is all Maul says in reply. He stretches his shoulders slowly, like a tooka ready to spring.

But seconds tick by, and Maul doesn't elaborate. Anakin finds himself at a bit of a loss. He can’t tell if this is progress, or if Maul has already decided against him.

“What are Sidious’s weaknesses?” he tries asking.

Maul grins. “I see no reason to respond, if it gets me nothing in return.”

And there it is again. “I know you want to be let out.”

“That is my main condition, yes.”

“But it would be foolish of me to let you go free before you’ve answered any questions. If I let you out first, you can simply decide to escape without holding up your end of the bargain.”

“Indeed,” Maul says, tone faintly bored, as if Anakin isn’t living up to his expectations of witty repartée, and he would like Obi-Wan back as his verbal sparring opponent, please and thank you. “So, we are at an impasse.”

Anakin grits his teeth. “I am not willing to accept an impasse. ”

“Oh?” Maul drawls, his gaze drifting.

Think. What can you do? Can you offer Maul something other than being let out?

His lightsaber, maybe.

“I’ll be back,” Anakin says. Then he marches out of the room to get Maul his Force-damned saber.

***

When he comes back, Anakin has the saber staff in hand, obtained by… well, sneaking behind Ahsoka and snatching it with the Force when she wasn’t looking, to avoid questions. He already has the key out, too, so Maul can’t see where Anakin keeps it. 

“Turn around,” he orders. Maul raises an eyebrow. Anakin prods the hilt of the saber forward, as to say, hurry up. “Go to the back corner.” With a final patronizing look, Maul complies. 

Anakin takes a breath, then lowers the ray shield, tosses the saber into Maul’s confinement, and puts the shield right back up.

Maul doesn’t try to escape this time. He turns around lazily as his saber staff rolls right up to his foot. He watches it for a moment, an amused smile on his face, and picks it up.

Anakin doesn’t like the chills the scene gives him. He folds his arms. “You’ve been given one part of my offer, which is as follows: you get your lightsaber first, you answer my questions, and then I let you out.”

Maul raises a condescending eyebrow. “That hardly sounds fair, don’t you think?”

“Fair?” Anakin expels a sharp breath through his nostrils.

“Being let out of my cell is hardly a guarantee that you’ll allow me to go free.”

“I think you sell yourself short. You can manage just fine on your own.”

Maul seems particularly amused by this. “Why, with such a fine cell guard as yourself, I must disagree.”

Ugh. Anakin really hopes this works, because he feels like he’s going to need a long session in the ‘fresher to wash away the taint of giving in to Maul’s stupid demands. “Fine. You have my word that I, and only I, will not give you chase.” He levels Maul with a glare. “That will be my only compromise.”

“The word of a Jedi,” Maul muses, in a tone that reveals how much he really thinks that’s worth. Then he sits back down, looking for all the world as if he were alighted upon a throne, and not the floor of a cell. “Very well, then.”

Anakin smiles, daring to let himself hope. This could be it. This could really be it.

“What are Sidious’s weaknesses?”

Maul just smiles.

“He has none.”

And Anakin has had enough. So this time, he really does scream.

Chapter Text

ROTATION 13

Anakin’s quarters the following morning take the brunt of his fury. Droid parts fly. The walls are scorched. Metal buckles inward from the weight of the Force. Anakin distantly remembers to keep the Dark Side back, but beyond that, he doesn’t have enough energy or will to stop himself. All told, the place becomes soundly unlivable within about five minutes. (Something Anakin can afford to do, when everything will be as before within a day.)

Anakin’s too engaged with his… cathartic preoccupation to expect what he should have expected: like in many a rotation before, Obi-Wan would sense his roiling, uncontrolled emotions and intervene. 

A handful of smart raps sound upon the door. Anakin freezes, and a now-destroyed mass of metal clatters to the floor. For a moment, the only sound is Anakin’s own heavy breathing.

“Anakin, I know you’re there,” Obi-Wan’s voice calls. “Do open up—”

Anakin marches to the door and slams the button to open it, flings himself through the threshold, and closes it again within the space of a heartbeat. He still isn’t quick enough to hide what he’s done, however, as Obi-Wan’s eyes widen with the glimpse he sees. Oh, kriff. Anakin freezes in place, his insides warring over anger at being interrupted and shame at his lack of control. It’s a familiar position to be in, from his padawan years, but this is, undoubtedly, the most physical damage Anakin has ever done to his quarters in a rage. Only because this damage will be undone by the loop, of course, but Obi-Wan doesn’t know that.

Obi-Wan doesn’t say anything for several seconds, before taking a subtle breath in. “Do I have the privilege of knowing what that is about?” he intones.

“No,” Anakin says.

Obi-Wan frowns.

Anakin winces instinctually. Forcing himself to lower his hackles, he sighs. “I’ll sort things out, don’t worry about it.”

This is still not good enough to quell Obi-Wan’s worries, from the look on Obi-Wan’s face, and Anakin knows it as soon as he’s spoken. Actually, Anakin does have half a mind to talk to him, craving Obi-Wan’s patience and paternal touch.

But there’s a problem. A Zillo Beast in the room, if you will. Just one look at Obi-Wan right now reminds Anakin of his current problem: Maul. Obi-Wan knows Maul. Maul has chosen Obi-Wan as his personal obsession-slash-arch-mortal-enemy, after all. Obi-Wan would be a good resource for trying to figure out Anakin’s next step.

A good resource, if Anakin were patient enough at the moment.

Growling under his breath in frustration, Anakin turns and walks off.

“Wait—Anakin!” Obi-Wan’s voice calls, undoubtedly taken aback. “There’s a Council Meeting in ten clicks—”

Anakin does not go to the Council meeting.

Instead, Anakin spends the rest of the loop at his favorite underground pod racing track in Coruscant. 

***

ROTATION 14

Anakin still wants nothing to do with Maul, obviously, but something about Mandalore draws him right back in. Sheer stubbornness, perhaps. 

He sighs as Ahsoka and Rex walk into view, lukewarm and guarded once more. Deciding to play along so as to make things go more smoothly, he allows them to repeat the military information he’s heard several times already, like canned dialogue from a holo game. As he nods along, his eyes drift towards Rex. The newly-crowned commander is stolid and professional. Anakin notices this time that he lets Ahsoka take the lead—perhaps in a subtle effort to support Ahoska’s reconnection with her former master. Anakin feels a spark of appreciation for the man.

It occurs to Anakin that he hasn’t seen much of Rex lately. It would be kind of nice to get the chance to catch up.

So, as the group is en route to the Prime Minister Almec failed interrogation attempt/assassiation, Anakin falls into step beside Rex and attempts to engage him in casual conversation.

“So, Rex, how are things going these days?”

“Well, General, sir, the campaign is being as difficult as we expected. The Mandalorians are–”

“No, I mean, how are you, Rex?” Anakin clarifies. He flashes Rex a smile that says relax, we’re friends. Friends can chat.

Rex gives him a practiced look, the one that says, You are still my superior, sir, protocol exists for a reason, but then his lips quirk slightly. Rex may be a dedicated military man, who was a little awkward at first about veering off topic into personal matters, but he has spent years of campaigns with Anakin. That can do wonders to loosen up a person. “Ah, I’m alright, I suppose, sir.”

“Promotion treating you that well?”

That gets a small chuckle out of him. “A shiny new title doesn’t change much about how things get done. That’s the important part.” He nods at Anakin. “But I am grateful nonetheless, sir.”

“It was a long time coming,” Anakin smiles. “I’m willing to bet that the men think so, too.”

“Thank you, sir,” Rex says, bowing his head. From others, that motion might seem rote, bland, but on Rex, Anakin has never doubted its genuineness.

As they walk on in silence for a few minutes more, Rex and the other clones keep in protective step beside him. It’s an understated expression of care that touches Anakin as he thinks on it. No matter Anakin’s own combat capabilities as a Jedi, his men would still protect him with their lives. 

Unless their will were taken away from them.

Anakin misses a step at the reminder, and Rex shoots him a look of concern. Before Rex can say anything, however, they arrive at Almec’s cell. Almec refuses to be helpful, he gets shot, he says that disturbing bit about Anakin himself, yadda yadda.

Anakin avoids Ahsoka’s questioning eyes by continuing to follow Rex.

Rex, who, on the first day of the loop, must have been forced to turn on them all. Who may have even turned his blasters on Ahsoka.

***

“Do you miss Fives?” Anakin blurts as the squadron of troopers to which Rex has just issued orders walk away.

Rex, who has been frowning at his datapad, still drawing battle plans, looks up in surprise.

Rex has been rather tolerant of Anakin’s unusual behavior thus far, considering that Anakin has been doing comparatively little to help in the middle of an active military campaign. Sure, Anakin’s been directing troops as well, but clearly, Anakin doesn’t need to be here. Rex has ignored this fact so far, allowing Anakin to follow-not-follow him around, but this finally must have forced his attention. He sets down the datapad.

“Where’s this coming from, General?” he asks softly.

“It’s just been on my mind,” Anakin says. 

Rex’s eyes seem to unfocus a bit as he stares into the distance. Anakin doubts that, in his mind, he’s seeing the crystal spires of Sundari.

“He was my brother. One of the best. Not a day goes by when I don’t miss him. Sometimes…” Rex’s shoulders seem to droop a smidge. “I wonder if we’d be doing better in this war, if he was still here. Losing less men. Getting closer to the end.”

Anakin hums in response, and allows Rex a pause for thought. Then he braves voicing what he’s really here for.

“You ever think Fives was right?”

Rex’s head immediately swivels to Anakin, and their gazes meet. Rex gives him a good, hard look. Anakin doesn’t waver in return.

Finally, Rex sighs and lets his eyes drop. “Yes.”

Anakin inhales as he processes this information. All this while, Rex has been operating as usual, directing scores of men, while suspecting his highest officer of the Grand Army of the Republic of treason. And, while suspecting that there might be poison planted right into his head, and that of all his brothers.

Rex’s sabacc face is damn impressive. And it shouldn’t have had to be, had Anakin been a more trustworthy friend to come to. Anakin’s heart breaks a bit.

“I’ve always wondered about the chips. We all do, even if none of us say it. It’s… unsettling, to say the least, that there is something… planted in our heads, and we’ve got no idea what.” Rex glances at Anakin in a subtle gesture probably meant to gauge Anakin’s reaction, to make sure he’s not going to be punished for the dangerous words he’s speaking. Anakin gives a tiny nod in response.

“Well…” Rex sighs. “I issued a grievance report to the Republic. Nothing came of it. Tried to find my chip with one of the med droids, once. See if it could be taken out.” Another anxious glance. “It didn’t work. Didn’t even show up on the scan, like it wasn’t even there. But I did some more research.”

Rex picks his datapad back up and closes the distance between them, allowing Anakin to peer over his shoulder as he searches on it, evidently looking for something. Finally, he finds the file he was looking for. 

“Right here. It’s a statement from the Kaminoans to the Republic, containing the contract details for the GAR’s purchase of the clones.”

“How’d you get access to that?” Anakin inquires, tone teasing.

Rex gives him a longsuffering look. “We both know the answer to that, sir, but need I remind you of the times you’ve done the same?”

Anakin quirks a grin.

Rex turns back to the datapad. “There is only information about the chips in the fine print. The long-necks claim they’re for ‘regulating sub-optimal personality aspects of the template,’ which is bantha shavit and we know it—excuse my language, sir—but they reveal that there’s more information. But it’s heavily encrypted ‘for maximum security,’ and only located on Kamino’s internal servers.”

“Kamino,” Anakin repeats. He mentally groans. Figures the long-necks would be that cagey. 

“Yes,” Rex says. 

There’s another pause as Anakin mulls this information over. The Kaminoans have the key to all of this, but they’re keeping it tightly hidden. Anakin will have to pay them a visit sometime, perhaps after this whole mess, to make sure the clones can go free—

–except, Anakin realizes with widening eyes, Sidious still has the ability to activate the chips at any time. Anakin doesn’t put it past Sidious to activate it when cornered. And if Sidious did activate it, even if he were to be killed thereafter, the damage would be done.

“General?” 

Anakin works his jaw. “Sorry, Rex, just thinking. It’s a lot. It could be really bad.”

“I agree,” Rex says quietly.

Anakin has one last thing he wants to ask—morbid curiosity, perhaps—and it’s possibly only the knowledge that the day will reset that gives him the courage to do it.

“If Fives was right,” he starts carefully, “and what happened with Tup was a feature, not a bug. If you were forced to kill the Jedi.”

Rex understands, and presses his lips into a grim line. Then he answers, “If you had to kill me to survive, kill me. I mean it, sir. But if you could ever find a way to free my brothers, I’d be more grateful to you than you’d ever know.”

“It won’t come to that,” Anakin vows. “I’ll find those long-necks, and I’ll get those chips out. ”

Rex gives him a grim smile, as though he appreciates the thought, but that he doubts it’ll work.

Anakin’s ire goes up a notch, and the Kaminoans earn themselves a place on his kill list. Scratch Sidious and Maul, they’re going down—

But when Ahsoka calls them in, meaning the fight with Maul is about to happen, Anakin’s murderous planning—ahem, train of thought—derails, and he waffles over his next move. Should he join them, or should he leave it be?

On one hand: he doesn’t want to have to see Maul’s stupid face for another century, at least.

On the other: Ahsoka is in danger.

Anakin has left Ahsoka alone plenty of loops before this one.

He wasn’t on the same planet during previous loops, whereas now, he is, and can therefore do something about it. Maul is about to fight Ahsoka. He could kill her. Or capture her, and then kill her. Or capture her, and torture her, and then kill her—

Anakin finds himself at the throne room as scheduled. He gives Maul a sound thrashing, and he takes far more pleasure in it than he should.

“Anakin, wait!” Ahsoka cries as he exits the throne room without a word. 

He doesn’t wait. He’s out of the Mandalore system before the day even resets.

***

ROTATION 15

Maul can go kriff himself. Anakin has a better idea of what to do with his time now: get the karking slave chips out of his legion’s heads. 

To do that, he’s got to get to Kamino. Anakin’s only play is to hope the Force will pull its same time-warping trick to get him there on time. 

Fortunately, the Force delivers. The deceleration of the Twilight II as it exits hyperspace feels like a sigh of relief through to his bones.

Artoo, as always, screeches in bewilderment. Anakin lets out a sound that’s somewhere between a chuckle and a sigh, and mentally rehearses his plan as they descend towards the rain.

Oh, the rain.

Before the day of his Fall, Anakin always found something about Kamino gave him the creeps. He thought at the time it must have been the rain. Pouring down in sheets, making everything cold and dark and ugh, Anakin thought sand got everywhere, but so did the damp. As much visceral hatred as his memories of Tatooine inspired in him, he must have been accustomed enough to the desert climate that its exact opposite, Kamino, was absolute torture. Anakin thought he must not have been built for living under rain and clouds.

Now, Anakin wonders if his intuition had been picking up on something, because now that he has a proper justification to hate the place, he finds his distaste is even worse. Buckets of water pelt down in sheets of sterile gray. Shinies just out of the clone factory mill about the deck—if marching in ever-straight lines can be properly called milling about, that is. The only semblance of light in the place is shining dimly from the square windows of the sprawling complex. 

Something metal bumps into Anakin’s leg. <Stop your lollygagging,> Artoo scolds, and Anakin realizes he’s just been sitting in place, even though they landed several moments ago.

Groaning, Anakin extricates himself from the pilot’s seat and takes the plunge into the downpour, making a half-hearted attempt to shield himself with an arm draped over his head. It doesn’t work, of course. Anakin can’t rattle off his clearance codes fast enough, before finally, he’s allowed inside.

Not that the blindingly colorless halls of the cloning complex are very welcoming, to put it mildly. He gives his robes a vigorous shake, allowing them to splatter water everywhere. With that, he begins a purposeful march in the direction of Shaak Ti’s office, Artoo following.

It’s both a good thing and a bad thing that Master Ti isn’t currently on world; he probably wouldn’t have a hard time convincing her to help him, were she here, but “picking up some classified files for the Jedi Council” has so far been an easy enough excuse for him to pull off, made easier by the fact that no Jedi is here to question him. For once, Anakin’s stupid promotion to the Council is coming in handy.

Once they’ve arrived and the door is firmly shut, Anakin gets right down to business. “Artoo, can you access the Kaminoan doctors’ servers from here?”

<If we’re talking the legal way, then no. But I do not calculate you mean the legal way.>

“No, I don’t, Artoo. Can you access them the other way?”

Artoo, who has long since been installed with heavy-duty slicing hardware, lets his head spin, in the astromech equivalent of an eyeroll. < Duh.> He plugs himself into the terminal. There’s some clicking and rotating as he works. Finally, Artoo withdraws and gives a dissatisfied bwoop.

<There is an entire sector of the base that is cut off from the rest,> Artoo explains. <I cannot even find the controls to the blast doors there.>

“Great,” Anakin grouses. “So, it’s sneaking in, then.”

<When is it not?>

Anakin shrugs to concede the point. Then, he lets Artoo lead the way to the restricted area.

They’re only about halfway there when they run into a long-neck.

“Excuse me, Master Jedi, but this area is off-limits to outsiders. What is your business here?” She sounds so affronted, it’s like Anakin spat in her caf.

“Jedi Council orders,” Anakin starts. “We, uh…”

The muffled sound of Artoo’s uh-oh beep fills the silence as Anakin wracks his brain, realizing he hasn’t thought his bantha shavit excuses through quite enough…

And then a light goes off in his brain. When there’s no such thing as tomorrow, what does it matter what he does today? What need does he have for stealth?

A slow grin grows on his face.

Within moments, the Kaminoan doctor is soundly knocked out, and Anakin is dragging her limp form behind him, in case he needs to use her biometrics to access their cache of secret shavit. He feels almost like skipping, his veins filling with an invigorating buzz. This is going to be so much easier than he thought.

Artoo, for his part, doesn’t agree.

<What the kriff are you doing, you worm-brained nerfherder??> Artoo practically screeches at him.

“Shh, it’ll all work out,” Anakin hums. 

<What do you mean, it’ll all work out? What, are you high on spice? Organics have been known to malfunction on—>

“I assure you, I’m in my right mind—”

<Like kark you are! You—>

Artoo rams himself directly into Anakin’s shin, and he yelps. “What was that for?”

Artoo fixes him with the Artoo certified version of a death glare. <It’s left, not right, you kriffing idiot,> he beeps.

“Gee, thanks for the warning,” Anakin grumbles. Shaking his leg out a bit, he follows Artoo’s lead nevertheless.

Finally, they reach the room Artoo suspected to contain the isolated server. As usual, the trusty droid is right on the money. Anakin’s instincts were on the money, too, as there’s a biometric fingerprint scan involved that Anakin is able to handily—(heh, handily)— bypass with the help of his passed-out long-neck.

But because things can never be easy, this is, of course, when alarms start blaring. Doctor Long-Neck’s absence must have just been discovered.

Since Anakin’s already inside the system, he’s not too concerned (unlike poor Artoo). Not even when the lights turn to red, and the blast door outside the room descends with a clang, effectively trapping them inside.

Anakin simply calls up the holocomputer’s file screen, inserts his special slicing drive, and starts digging.

<WHAT ARE YOU THINKING??> Artoo blares. <I CANNOT COMPUTE ANY SCENARIO WHERE THEY DO NOT CATCH US IF WE DON’T LEAVE RIGHT. KRIFFING. NOW!>

“Shh, I know it looks that way to you,” Anakin says absently. Gene editing software… Jango Fett genome sequencing… development stage plans… Anakin finds himself sobering as the file titles begin to get worse. Decommissioning and reprogramming. Reprogramming? Bioengineering for compliance. Compliance?

Just then, Artoo rams into his leg again, and this time, it feels as though he’s crushed a few toes. “Ow!” Anakin whirls on Artoo. “Cut it out!”

<IS YOUR PROCESSOR DAMAGED?>

“For the last time, no! Don’t make me shut you off!”

Artoo freezes, and Anakin belatedly realizes this is something he has never, ever threatened to do.

The alarms still blare, the blue cast from the hovering holoscreen clashing with the flashing red emergency lights.

Anakin swallows down sudden dryness in his throat and returns to the files. He scrolls through to the end and finds nothing about chips.

Perhaps the information is buried beneath some of the more stomach-turning files… Force, these kriffing Kaminoans. Treating people like droids. Anakin has half a mind to find somewhere to vomit. Nothing sentient, including droids, deserves to be treated like this.

He chances a glance at Artoo. The droid remains still, his viewport pointing the opposite direction.

Anakin shifts his weight between his feet, back, and forth. Then, he opens the next file.

It takes a few more frankly horrific reels of information for Anakin to find a file titled Biochips. (It happens to be beneath Bioengineering for Compliance, if that reveals anything about their true purpose.) Anakin has to forcibly shove images of the sand, Watto, and violation away as he stares the words down.  

He taps it. Chip schematics hover before his eyes. Steeling himself, he swipes past them. He must be close to how to get them out or stop the orders…

But, no sooner has he scrolled to the part of the dang thing that might have what he’s looking for than the blast doors creak open, revealing an angry-looking squad of Kaminoan high guard.

<Kriffing told you so,> Artoo bleeps in a tone equivalent to a mutter.

Shots blaze towards him, and Anakin grits his teeth at the interruption. Drawing his saber, he redirects each blast so quickly each opponent is on the ground within seconds. Artoo lets out another strangled protest, no doubt mired in worry over the political consequences Anakin’ll never face for this. Anakin grabs onto the blast doors with the Force and yanks them back down. They slam shut with a shuddering CRASH.

Anakin turns back to the holo and starts reading.

It’s then that his blood really starts boiling.

The Kaminoans designed these things to be especially difficult to remove, so much so that most medical scanners can’t pick them up. There are multiple levels of failsafes engineered within them to prevent clones from regaining their own kriffing will.

And Order 66 is… well, Order 66 out of over a hundred.

Anakin’s lungs start to constrict as he realizes the sheer magnitude of the stranglehold Palpatine has over the galaxy with these orders. All the Jedi, wiped out in an instant? It could be only the beginning. Entire populations of planets, gone. Entire species, gone. The clones could even be commanded to all commit suicide. There’s an asterisk next to this order, leading to a footnote that simply reads: Trials have been conclusively conducted to ensure effectiveness. Biochip will override organic self life-preserving instinct. 

As in, they’ve already killed people like this. Anakin can feel his fists curling. All he can think about is Rex. Force, this could be done to his friend. 

And then he sees Order 23. A command to kill the senators—

Padmé. 

Sidious could decide to have Padmé killed, in only an instant. He could do it any time he kriffing wants.

The temperature in the room drops a degree, and the windows start to rattle. It’s this noise that causes Anakin to blink. All of a sudden, he feels what he’s done. 

He’s called upon the Dark Side, for the first time since he’s been rid of the compulsions in his head. He’s called upon it for the first time all on his own.

Shame floods him, and Anakin chases the Dark away as fast as he can. It only retreats languidly. Anakin tries to access the Light to fill up the gap it left in return, but is only met with a trickle. These are his consequences for neglecting to meditate, to bolster back up his connection to the Light these past few rotations, Anakin realizes. He pushes harder, grasping desperately at the positive, not negative, aspects of his love for his wife and unborn children. He must focus on his love, not his fear—

Finally, the Dark has been forced out past his shields. Anakin drops to the ground, clutching his head. His hands tremble.

<Pilot,> Artoo wails. In his peripheral vision, Anakin can see the silver and blue of the droid’s body as Artoo wheels closer. 

“I’m sorry,” Anakin says. And then he can’t stop saying it: “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry—”

There’s a banging on the door, and he’s reminded of his limited time. 

Force, can't a man have a mental breakdown in peace?

Anakin lays a tentative hand on Artoo’s head. Artoo doesn’t move, and allows Anakin to use his body to haul himself up, slowly and shakily.

Shoving everything down, he returns to the holo. How Anakin wishes he could just copy this, read this later, but the file wouldn’t remain on the drive past a day. He can only rely on his own memory.

Eventually, he finds the section titled Activation. Anakin breathes in sharply through his nose as a glance reveals that it’s airtight. Palpatine has ensured he is absolutely the only person able to activate, or deactivate, the chips. 

Suddenly, there’s a slight rising feeling in his chest, so slight Anakin would have missed it if his battered Force-senses weren’t currently on high alert. He squints his eyes shut and latches on the the feeling, attempts to focus it. It takes persistence, some shuddering deep breaths, but finally, the intuition breaks through.

The Light’s telling him to look at the broadcast mechanisms and frequency information on those chips.

Immediately, Anakin feels as though he can breathe a little easier. Of course. Now that’s a real lead.

As it turns out, the clone’s biochip activation frequency is a heavily encrypted, modified model of a personal comm channel. Impenetrable at first glance, yes. But a second glance reveals its flaw, typical of Sidious’s arrogance: though modified, this comms model is the most common version in the galaxy. Meaning: any slicer who can tie their shoes would be intimately familiar with the program. 

And, Anakin would like to think he can tie his shoes, thank you very much. So he can slice this. With just a little tweaking, he can slice this.

Anakin closes his eyes and lets out a tight laugh. 

The banging on the blast doors intensifies, and he sobers, refocusing on the program details of the comm channel. He can’t take this with him, so he has to memorize it. Anakin reads it over, and over, and over again. Artoo warbles nervously.

Finally, Anakin is able to repeat back the specs with his eyes closed. Letting out a breath, he dismisses the holo with a swipe of his hand and removes his slicing drive from the terminal. There’s a groan next to him as he does so, and he does a double take.

Oh. He’d forgotten about the Kaminoan he’d knocked out earlier. A Kaminoan, who is about to be rather un-knocked out.

Anakin rectifies that, and pockets the drive.

<Can we go now? > Artoo tries.

Anakin gives him a weary smile. “Yeah, okay, buddy. Hold on.”

A minute later, Anakin is running from friendly fire, Artoo jetting by his side and cursing all the while. Clones swarm them in every hallway they zoom through, but fortunately, their blasters are set to stun. Meaning, Anakin can redirect the fire right back at them without any feelings of guilt. Mostly.

Anakin is not as surprised as he perhaps thinks he should be when, as he reaches the landing pad, he discovers the Twilight II in flames and sliding, groaning, into the sea. What usually would cause him to go, well, frankly ballistic, now only gives him a sense of beleaguered irritation.

His ship will be back tomorrow.

Instead, Anakin steers them towards the nearest hyperdrive-containing shuttle and takes off. 

Artoo has just a handful of complaints to unload upon him as they make their way to nowhere. It’s hours before, at last, the rotation resets and puts Anakin out of his misery.