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The fall of the Emperor and Vader comes suddenly. The galaxy reels headily.
Ahsoka Tano is suspicious.
Over the past four years she heard stories: some believed; most not. She heard a boy named Skywalker blew up the first Death Star in the name of the Alliance. There are stories he also may have dueled Vader and calls himself “Jedi.” These stories are doubtful. Skywalker died years ago. A son perhaps?
She is suspicious and seeks him out to see for herself; to put her worries to rest. She does not hope.
Her intel brings her here; this better be the right base. She’s been to other outposts and the answer’s been the same: “No Skywalker here; he’s with Command.”
She knows the Rebel Alliance was never well-funded, but what passes for a hangar bay is pretty pitiful looking. The overcast, rainy sky casts a dingy hue on everything; she imagines it doesn’t look much better in sunlight.
The deck officer points her in the direction where he thinks General Skywalker (never imagined she’d hear that again) can be found, but not before shooting a cursory glance at the lightsaber on her hip. She carries a blaster these days too. She takes no chances.
She crosses the relatively empty bay and heads towards a cluster of X-wings, all in varying states of condition. Compared to the Corellian freighter docked near the entrance, they look positively brand new.
As she ducks under a wing, a high-pitched series of chirps come from somewhere close. It’s beeping out her name and she’s bewildered. An Alliance droid knows who she is? An R2 unit that looks as banged up as everything else on the base rolls into view and her stomach bottoms out. Not just any R2 unit…
“R2-D2?!”
He whistles frantically and makes noises that she’s sure sounds like crying and she’s too stunned to move until she hears another voice.
“R2, what’s going on?”
A head pops up from the cockpit of a fighter and she knows. In a matter of moments, elation, fear, and strangely, hope bubble up in her.
This is Anakin Skywalker’s son.
Anakin Skywalker. The name still rings darkly in her mind.
R2’s continuous chatter brings her back to earth, but she’s not processing what he’s saying. R2. How did R2 find him? The chances of R2 finding another Skywalker were… actually pretty likely, if she considers the odds.
The Skywalker boy climbs out of the ship, still demanding to know what’s going on, who R2’s talking to, and Ahsoka considers him, beyond instinct.
He is Anakin’s, there’s no mistaking it; the predisposition to feel too deeply. She is torn between wanting to cry out in delight at some recognition of her old master and being acutely afraid of what he is capable.
Dealing with Anakin was like holding a thermal detonator at times. What if his son is the same? But most comforting – no, relieving – she senses Padmé’s (no one else) stable temperament in him too; the part of him that keeps him from diving in headfirst.
She supposes something good came out of the marriage.
R2 begins to roll off, chirping in the same excited manner.
“But R2, why do you need to go get them? How do you know her, why – oh forget it.” He turns to face her, bemused. “Sorry about him, I’m Luke Skywalker; can I help you find someone? R2 said he needed to get Leia and –”
She can’t bring herself to betray the slightest emotion, but cannot hesitate any longer to collect herself.
“I'm looking for you, General Skywalker,” the name ringing strangely in her ears. “I am Jedi Knight Ahsoka Tano, trained by Jedi Master Anakin Skywalker during the Clone Wars. I ask you; by what right and whose teachings you can claim the same?”
She lets out a short gasp, not realizing she spoke in one breath. Saying his name out loud is at once like opening a wound and relieving a heavy burden.
Luke, in what she recognizes as truly Anakin-like tone, lets out a disbelieving, “What?!”
More bluntly (get it through your head, won’t say it again), “I’m Ahsoka Tano; I knew Anakin Skywalker; by what right do you call yourself Jedi?” She knows she should exercise caution, given family history, but she is past measured, calculated steps.
“Reckless,” the Council whispers to her.
Luke’s face goes from incredulous to guarded; one that reminds her of someone else, of course.
Slowly, reluctantly, he says, “I inherited my father’s lightsaber. I received it from Obi-Wan Kenobi, who taught me, for a time. Master Yoda after him.”
Obi-Wan. He lived past Mustafar. He did not help her in her greatest hour of need. When Vader tried to cut her down, when the orders came for the Jedi to be slaughtered, she was utterly alone, abandoned by him. But he could give Anakin Skywalker’s son a lesson on how to wield a blade.
The indifference she’s built up towards Obi-Wan for all those years prickles.
She notices Luke does not say Anakin’s name. She realizes, with a pang, he too has one gloved hand, nor is it the hilt of his father’s lightsaber at his side.
She wants to ask him about the alleged duel, if he knows who Vader was (of course he does), if that’s how he lost his hand, how much it hurts to know Vader is lurking in the recesses of his mind.
She treads on more neutral ground, “How is Obi-Wan? Still devoted to the rules?”
“Dead, by Vader’s hand.”
Later than he’d intended then.
No discussion is without baggage, untarnished by Anakin’s choices. The past twenty-four years of the galaxy are written by Vader in blood, as far as she’s concerned. Obi-Wan is dead and she can never ask his advice or gently tease him again. She expected she’d never see him again (don’t cling to hope), shielded herself against the reality, but the finality hurts.
She supposes she should inquire about Yoda next, but her mind goes to Padmé and their last meeting.
“And your mother? We were all so close and… she protected me from Vader once.”
Luke’s reserve breaks; sadder. “I was raised out of sight by my aunt and uncle on Tatooine; I never knew her. She died years ago…” He looks at her. “It seems like all she did was protect us from him.”
The litany of dead grows longer. Padmé stood her ground against a man seasoned Imperial officers would not cross; threw her son to the farthest reaches of the galaxy. It is unbearable. She wonders what price the aunt and uncle paid for harboring Darth Vader’s progeny.
With sudden realization, he adds, brighter, “But there is someone who you could talk to about her!”
Before she has a chance to respond, R2 reappears nearby, followed by a wookiee and a woman who reminds her of Padmé. Her eyes trick her; she must be trying to will Padmé back into existence. The wookiee catches her attention next. Ahsoka’s past is more present than it ever has been.
Disbelieving, “Chewbacca?!” She hasn’t seen him in at least a decade; she’s lost count of the years.
He roars in delight.
“This is what you’ve been doing since I last saw you? I thought you were thinking about going into ‘shipping’!”
Chewbacca chuckles knowingly. Smuggler turned rebel soldier. One illegal activity leads to another in Ahsoka’s experience.
In spite of everything, she actually feels somewhat cheerful. Skywalker seems steady, and R2 and Chewbacca are here. The search hasn’t been for nothing.
Luke butts in, “I’m not surprised you and Chewie have met, he knows everyone, but how do you know R2?”
Half smiling, “Old war buddies.”
She is going to explain, but the woman stands at the edge of their group, with a slightly wary expression. Luke notices the woman’s hesitancy and eagerly pulls her forward. Taking Luke’s hint, R2 and Chewbacca retreat, leaving the three of them alone.
It only takes one good look to see she’s found someone she wasn’t expecting to meet. She isn’t just seeing Padmé.
This is Anakin Skywalker’s daughter.
This is who Luke wants her to speak to.
“Master Tano, this is my sister Leia Organa. Leia, this is Ahsoka Tano. Master Tano was Ana – our father’s student years ago.”
“Just Ahsoka. I never made it to master, at least not by Council standards.”
The look on Leia’s face is hard to read, but it is one of a person who weathered much harsher storms than meeting someone from her long-lost father’s past.
How had she not heard of a daughter? Where had she been? (Organa – Alderaan – dead.) How had she only heard of a son a few years ago? They simply hadn’t existed; had she been too wrapped up in her own war to care? To want to care.
And yet they stand before her; equal parts mother and father.
It makes her feel light-headed.
Luke, still waiting for a response from his sister, says, “She knew our mother, she could tell us more about her, more than you remember…”
He stops when he sees her face. She is chewing her lower lip, dangerously on the verge of crying and Ahsoka’s heart goes out to her.
Leia has some memory of Padmé, unlike Luke, but she was snatched away from both of them. Padmé may have been like a mothering, older sister to Ahsoka on occasion, but her recollections will be pitiful to what they should have had. With Padmé and with Anakin.
The rain hammering on the roof is the only sound. Distantly, the clatter of tools. They both lean against fighters’ ladders; a natural proclivity, as their father’s children; or too much time strategizing on the fly. Ahsoka remains in the same spot. Leia speaks for the first time.
“If you came to talk about her, I’m afraid I don’t remember much about my – our – mother. She served on my father’s advisory council; she showed me the occasional kindness, but I didn’t really know her. She died in an off-world ship accident when I was young. My father told me she was my real mother years later, but that was the only time we spoke of her afterwards.
“I thought about asking him why she gave me up, but chose to stay close, but I never did. I thought I would never know.”
She could not hold onto both of her children, and then neither had her.
Leia sighs, “Why did you really come?”
“To see if Anakin Skywalker (not Vader) had a son.”
They all know what she cannot fully vocalize.
It is odd for Luke and Leia to have someone before them who has memories of their mother and father before the fall, she senses that. They rely solely on dim recollections of Padmé. Vader must breathe down their necks.
Ahsoka’s heart breaks in a way she didn’t imagine possible anymore.
“Well, he does. And a daughter.” Leia’s tone is firmer, more defiant than Ahsoka expects.
Luke speaks, quietly. “He died Anakin Skywalker; he came back.”
This is definitely not what she expected. For months she’s told herself: Vader is dead, Anakin long before him. It is her grim comfort.
He continues, “I had to save him. Obi-Wan and Yoda – they wanted me to face him, but they never wanted me to save him.”
The Council never did give much of a damn about Anakin, to their bitterest regret. The vestiges (oh, Obi-Wan) are no different.
“How could I kill my own father?”
Leia moves and slips a hand into her brother’s ungloved one. She says with a slightly tired edge, “It was unfair of them of them to ask that of you.”
It sounds as if they’d had this conversation before. No, not much that’s happened is fair.
“I came close to it, so close… but I couldn’t. I surrendered to the Emperor, I just let go. The Emperor was going to, no, was killing me and Anakin came back. He killed the Emperor. Our father came back. His last words were about us.”
War and death were Vader’s province; protection and life were Padmé’s… and Anakin’s.
Ahsoka’s whole body shakes.
Buried deep beneath the armor and the hate, there was a man she loved as a brother. Her memories are always going to be marred, but they brought him back. Anakin Skywalker’s children saved him. Reason cannot fathom it, but love can.
For the first time in twenty-four years, Ahsoka Tano buries her head in her hands and cries, Jedi detachment stripped away. She has been so afraid of caring.
Caring, in her experience, only leads to misery. Obi-Wan cared too much, whether or not he would admit it. Anakin cared too much, he told her time and time again.
A hand on her shoulder steadies her and makes her look up. Luke and Leia are both teary-eyed, and surprisingly, smiling weakly.
Yes, the good in Anakin Skywalker is solid and standing before her.
They remain silent as Ahsoka’s tears subside. She realizes, without seeking it, she has been brought into their fold. There is a familiar comfort to it.
The soldier is at ease.
Their silence is broken by chatter, beeps, and growls. R2 and Chewbacca return with a swaggering man, and, Ahsoka isn’t surprised anymore, a protocol droid who could only be C-3PO.
Luke and Leia move quickly to wipe away their dried tears. Ahsoka supposes she should too, for dignity’s sake, but doesn’t.
The man saunters up to Leia. He is all teasing and laughter with a mixture of smugness that Ahsoka is sure would have driven Obi-Wan crazy.
“Heard there was some kind of party going on out here without me?” Nodding in Ahsoka’s direction, “Captain, sorry, General Han Solo. Gotta remember I’m respectable-like now.”
This man is such an ass. Well, if he likes flashy titles, “Ahsoka Tano, Jedi knight.”
“So you’re like these two? Having conversations I can’t hear?”
Chewbacca barks an explanation at her. This was who Chewbacca tried smuggling with?
Ahsoka snorts, “No wonder you joined the Alliance, Chewbacca.”
Han stands open-mouthed as Chewbacca, Luke, and Leia burst into laughter.
“You sound like us when we first met him. You should have heard us –”
“Junky ship, terrible pilot, no, there are stormtroopers that way –”
“The money will be worth it –”
“Hey! If I recall correctly, it was a rescue mission to get you, your Highness!”
Luke rolls his eyes. Leia swats at Han, who responds by bending over and kissing her on the top of her head. Their laughter still echoes throughout the hanger bay.
3PO, ignored for far too long, huffs, “Well everyone here seems to know who this Ahsoka Tano is, but I certainly do not and I don’t think it’s fair! R2, I demand an explanation!”
R2 acquiesces. Poor 3PO. Memory wiped, although, it was for the best – he certainly would have said too much, knowing him.
She senses another presence she has not felt in a lifetime. She is sure if she looks out the corner of her eye, she will see her old master, but she does not need to confirm.
She knows.
Ahsoka looks forward.