Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In no uncertain terms, the past year had been the best of Anakin Skywalker’s life. Yes, there had been the whole briefly-Falling-and-then-trying-to-kill-his-friends incident, but he had started going to therapy for that (and for a whole host of other things), and since that was the event that led to him killing Sidious, Anakin counted even that as a win. Then there had been the end of the Clone Wars, the birth of his children, and permission from the Jedi Council to go and live with his wife. He’d even gotten to resign from the Jedi civilly, and Padmé had recently stepped down from the Senate, meaning that they both could spend most of their time with their kids. So, yeah. A good year. An unparalleled year.

Meaning that really, Anakin figured he was overdue for some fucked-up shit to happen. He just didn’t expect… this.

He had watched Ahsoka’s other-timeline counterpart walk through the portal in the wall to what he assumed must be her universe, and then he had tried to walk out of the temple, only to find that he was standing in a circular room, where all of the doors looked the same. To make matters worse, the Force was projecting warning, warning at him so hard he was surprised he couldn’t hear it out loud. Kriff, he should have brought his lightsaber. 

The portal that Ahsoka had walked through was closed now, Anakin could see that much, but the other doors were beckoning him forward. Anakin didn’t know where they would lead, or what they would do, so he did what any sensible person would do: he closed his eyes and spun in a circle until it felt right, then opened his eyes and stared at the door he was in front of.

It didn’t look any different from the other doors, but it felt right somehow, like the Force was nudging him to go through it. Anakin was pretty sure he wasn’t going to like what he was about to find, but he knew one thing: if you can’t trust in anything, trust in the Force. So, he stepped through it confidently.

Almost immediately, he knew this was a bad, bad idea. For starters, the door he had just come through was gone. And second, and probably the more pressing concern right now? He could hear the sound of a lot of blasters going off in the near vicinity. 

He ducked instinctively, his battle reflexes kicking in for the first time in nearly a year. He was in the remains of a building that looked to have been recently vacated; there were tables with chairs knocked over and drinks spilled on the ground. He swallowed as he noticed the semi-crushed remains of a Rodian, and amended his earlier assessment: recently mostly vacated. Muttering an apology to the dead Rodian, Anakin darted over and patted him down to find a blaster and holster, which he unhooked from the corpse and buckled around his own waist. There was a little blood on it, but it would have to make do. Anakin pulled out the blaster and edged over to the door to see what was going on. 

Outside, there was a small, motley group of people holding a rough perimeter against - Anakin blinked. Clone troopers? No, the armor wasn’t right for clones, and although it was in a quasi-Mandalorian style, no self-respecting Mandalorian would wear what appeared to be plastoid armor. 

The motley group was trying to finish loading supplies into a few battered ships, several of which Anakin didn’t recognize. That, more than the not-clones, was worrying. Anakin might not know about all of the different kinds of soldiers and armor that there was to be had, but he knew ships. And it just wasn’t possible for ships as battered as those to come from a line that Anakin had never heard of. 

One of the motley group, a young woman with dark hair braided around her head like a crown, signaled, and the group fell back to the ships, evidently having gotten enough supplies onboard to make it worthwhile to take off. Anakin edged out a little more, then ducked as a blaster bolt shot through the space where his head had just occupied.

“Hey, you!” the woman called suddenly, looking right at Anakin. “Are you coming?”

Anakin looked at the woman and her (clearly inferior, at least resources-wise) group and then back at the not-clones. One of them stepped up to a young man who couldn’t be more than sixteen who had fallen down from a blaster wound and kicked him in the head. Anakin decided those were the bad guys. “Coming,” he shouted, running over. He used his stolen blaster to knock a few of the not-clones off, darting onto the last ship behind the woman just in time for it to take off.

“Everybody in?” the pilot asked. 

“Yes,” the woman said. “And we’ve picked up a local.”

“Okay,” the pilot said. “Well, local, whoever you are, if we can get out of this blockade in one piece, we’ll formally introduce ourselves, how does that sound?”

“Sounds good,” Anakin said, deciding it was better to go along with everything until he had a little more information. His head was spinning. Already, the thought had crossed his mind that he had somehow wandered into the alternate timeline Ahsoka spoke about, and he was desperately hoping that he was mistaken on that front.

The pilot expertly maneuvered, but whoever was blockading was doing a good job, and even though the woman was on the tailgun, it was clear they weren’t going to make it out without a lot of luck. 

Luckily, these people had just invited one of the best starfighters in the galaxy onboard. “Is there another gun?” Anakin asked.

“Yes, thanks. Nosegun. Up top,” the pilot responded. 

Anakin climbed up the ladder and strapped himself in. The controls weren’t anything he’d seen before, but fortunately they followed a standard design. Pretty soon, he was getting the hang of it. The pilot was good, Anakin noted. Better than most of the people he’d flown with in the Clone Wars, and that was saying something. He swerved out of the way of one of the seemingly endless flimsy little ships that kept going after them, spinning expertly until they were clear. 

“Clear to jump!” the pilot’s voice floated through the comm, and Anakin let out a breath. The stars stretched out around him, and he clambered down the ladder.

“Nice shooting,” the woman said to him. 

“Thanks,” Anakin said. “Now, do we get to introduce ourselves?”

A look passed between the pilot and the woman. “You first,” the woman said. 

Smart, though there was nothing stopping Anakin from lying. He decided that it was better not to give his full name (after all, who knew when and where he was?). “Ani,” he said.

“Do you have a last name, Ani?” the woman asked, looking at him like she didn’t quite believe he was telling the truth.

“Ah, Naberrie.” He paused. “And you are?”

The woman gave him another hard look, like she didn’t believe Anakin didn’t know who she was. 

“Sorry?” Anakin said. “I grew up under a rock.”

“Don’t worry, so did I,” the pilot said. “But now that we’ve rescued you - and yeah, that was some great shooting out there - I think there’s enough time for introductions.” He stuck out his hand. “That’s Princess Leia Organa, and I’m Luke Skywalker. It’s nice to meet you.”

Anakin’s jaw dropped. “Luke - did you say…” he began, looking between the pilot and the woman with more scrutiny. 

Luke removed his hand, and Anakin realized in his shock he’d forgotten to take it. “Yeah,” he said, his face turning red. 

“It’s - it’s great to meet you, Luke. And you too, L-your Highness,” Anakin said, the honorific tasting weird in his mouth.

Luke smiled, and Anakin felt like his heart was going to beat out of his chest. It was a good thing he was shielding, or his children would no doubt have sensed his shock already. Ironically, it was because of the twins that Anakin had finally bothered to really learn in the first place - they couldn’t get a good night’s sleep unless he was well and truly hidden from the Force. It had become a habit, one that Obi-Wan had professed his amazement over a truly insulting number of times.

“Good to meet you, Ani,” Leia said. 

“Well,” Luke said, cutting through what was quickly becoming an awkward silence, “Ani, I hate to break it to you, but the Empire isn’t going to take kindly to you shooting down a bunch of their ships. We could use a gunner like you.”

“We?”

“The Alliance to Restore the Republic,” Leia clarified. Oh, Anakin thought. That must be the Rebellion Ahsoka was always talking about.

“I - sure, why not?” Anakin said. “I hate the Empire.”

“Great!” Luke said, smiling widely at him. For someone who was fighting a war, Anakin thought, Luke trusted too easily. His heart ached.

Leia smiled. “Welcome to the Alliance,” she said, her tone warmer. 

Anakin couldn’t believe this was happening. 

Chapter Text

“So,” Anakin said, sitting back in a booth in the cramped cabin of the ship, “fill me in? I’m all in for the Alliance, but you’ll have to forgive me - I haven’t really kept up with politics.”

“Well, most of what you’ve heard is probably Imperial propaganda anyway,” Leia said. The way she carried herself was so like Padmé, her posture perfect even though she was wearing a dirty jumpsuit. “The Alliance has been around for as long as the Empire, in some way or another. Did you hear about the Death Star?”

“The what?”

“They’re calling it the most massive terrorist attack the galaxy has ever seen - which is complete garbage, by the way. The Empire built a battle station capable of destroying entire planets, but Luke here blew it up.” Her shoulders tightened like she was remembering something painful, and Luke patted her shoulder briefly.

“The Death Star destroyed her home planet,” he said gently, looking at Anakin unflinchingly. “Alderaan. They also destroyed most of Jedha and Scarif. For obvious reasons, the Empire doesn’t want people knowing about that.”

Anakin’s mind reeled. A battle station capable of destroying planets? It wasn’t possible - but you didn’t have to be Force-sensitive to tell that Luke and Leia were telling the truth.

“Currently, we’re trying to find a new base, so we’re just a fleet,” Leia said. “We’ll arrive in a few hours.”

Great. So not only were his children running a group that was actively being hunted, but they didn’t even have a base of operations. “Well, I want to help,” he said. 

Luke sat down across from him, smiling. “So what do you do?”

“I’m a pilot,” Anakin said. “Been lying pretty low for the last few years, though.”

Luke nodded. “Same for a lot of us Rebels. Don’t worry, you’ll fit right in. Can you fly an X-wing?”

Anakin had never heard of an X-wing, but he figured that it must have been invented in the last twenty or so years. “I can fly anything,” he said, leaning back. 

Luke grinned. “Well, when we get back to the fleet, I’ll show you around.” His face turned somber. “There are a couple openings in Rogue Flight - that’s my squadron. If you’re as good as you say you are, I’ll get you on the team.” 

“Sounds good.”

Eventually, Luke left to go mess around in the cockpit, and Leia told him if he wanted there were bunks to rest until they arrived at the fleet. Anakin could tell she was being polite (and probably wanted to talk to Luke about something they didn’t want him overhearing), so he thanked her and went to go lie down. A million thoughts were swimming through his mind. They had found each other, clearly - did that mean Ahsoka’s theory that Obi-Wan had raised Luke was true? Had Obi-Wan led Luke to the Rebels? How old were they? Definitely older than the sixteen they would’ve been when Ahsoka came, but they couldn’t be much older than twenty. What, exactly, did they know? What didn’t they know? Ahsoka hadn’t mentioned a Death Star. What else did the Empire have to throw at them?

His mind reeled, but more than anything, a sense of pride was washing over him. Even if they didn’t know it, they were his and Padmé’s kids, alright. Luke’s piloting skills, Leia’s aim with a blaster - and they were leading the Alliance together, even if they didn’t know they were siblings. This universe was clearly a gigantic mess (and much of it his fault), but he was so proud he didn’t know what to say. 

He thought of his kids, back on Naboo. They had celebrated their first life day just last month. Of course, they weren’t old enough to understand what it was about, but it had been a perfect day all the same - they’d even managed to convince Obi-Wan to fly in from Coruscant with Rex, which had been an added bonus. Luke, who had a grand vocabulary of seven words (“mama” “dada” “‘soka” “lala” “‘peeder” “no” “bye-bye”) had impressed everyone by using the Force to slide cake over to him after he had been told that he wasn’t going to get any more. Anakin had been delighted, and let him have the cake after that, even though it resulted in a nauseatingly-blue diaper mess in hours following.

To see Luke and Leia now, all grown up - Anakin wanted nothing more than to scoop them up and hug them and promise that everything in the galaxy was going to be okay.

But even if by some miracle they did believe he was who he said he was, there was no telling how they’d take it. If they knew Vader’s identity, they might reject him on principle, or even try to kill him to prevent Vader from ever existing. And Anakin wasn’t willing to take that chance. So he would remain Ani Naberrie and try to stick to them like stink on bantha poodoo.

Dimly, he could hear them discussing something, but Anakin tried to make himself comfortable in his bunk and content himself with not knowing. He needed them to know he could trust him, and eavesdropping was generally not accepted as proof of trust. Although, really, these Rebels were far too trusting to begin with. Desperate times, Anakin thought, but the fact that they were willing to accept him as a pilot on sight spoke to just how desperate those times were. Uneasily, he tossed and turned.

Before he realized he had fallen asleep, he heard Luke’s voice, excitedly informing him that they had arrived at the fleet. Anakin got up and stretched, walking out into the cabin to watch as they flew into a transport. The Rebel fleet, it turned out, was even smaller than he’d expected - several large transports and a few dozen ships that he could see. It didn’t even look to be the size of a single battalion. Anakin desperately hoped that this wasn’t it.

“Well, this is it,” Luke said brightly, and Anakin’s spirits sank. 

“We may not look like much, but we’ve got it where it counts,” Luke added as they walked off of the ship and onto the main transport. Anakin wondered where, exactly, it ‘counted’ - firepower? No. Numbers? Clearly not. Brilliant strategists? Maybe, if Obi-Wan were around somewhere. Tentatively, he reached out with the Force, but no, no Obi-Wan. Not much of anyone, really. Anakin frowned. Usually, the Force was bright and thick and alive, but here it just felt… empty. Anakin remembered the inhibitor chips, and what Ahsoka had said about Order 66, and barely kept himself from shuddering.

Luke was introducing him to someone, he realized in the nick of time. He didn’t catch the other man’s name, but he nodded politely anyway, hoping he didn’t look too weird. Although, maybe it would be best if he were a bit weird? No, that would just make him stick out. Probably best to stick to his own personality. So, weird? a voice in his head that sounded remarkably like Snips shot back. Anakin ignored it. Leia told them she had to go report to High Command, so she let Luke finish giving Anakin the tour.

“This is the commissary,” Luke said, showing him a large, mostly empty room with tables and chairs stacked neatly on one side. 

“This is the barracks - we’ll get you set up later, don’t worry.” They walked past the barracks quickly, Luke obviously excited to get to wherever they were going. Finally, they arrived at the hangar, where a couple dozen more ships were located.

“And this,” Luke said, walking into the hanger, “is an X-wing.”

For the first time since arriving in this universe, Anakin was floored in a good way. “Wow,” he breathed. “Are these upgrades from the ARC-170?”

Luke nodded. “Yep. Incom rolled them out years ago for the Empire, but the Imps switched over to TIEs because they were cheaper. So we liberated these babies for ourselves. Pretty sweet, huh?”

Anakin knew immediately that he liked these ships. The addition of a built-in hyperdrive to the ARC-170 had been groundbreaking for deep space battle and allowed one-man fighters to jump to and from without the need for a larger transport. But Luke’s X-wings were sleeker and looked more efficient than even the most top-of-the-line models Anakin had ever seen. True, the Rebellion’s ships were battered and had some of the worst carbon-scoring Anakin had ever seen (seriously, did nobody take care of their ships? Some of that was outrageous), but Anakin had no doubt they were good in a fight.

“Class 1.5 hyperdrive, and the strike foils give extra maneuverability,” Luke said. “But if you really want to see something special, I’ve been working on a few modifications myself.”

Anakin thought there was maybe nothing in the galaxy he wanted to see more than his son’s modifications to his ship. “Yeah, for sure,” he said, working hard to keep his tone level. 

Luke walked him over to what must be his ship (Anakin was pleased to see it looked to be among the cleanest) and popped open the front panel as well as one of the panels covering the left S-foil. “So,” he said, “a big problem I’ve noticed is that the cannons can’t shoot when the S-foils are locked because there’s a risk of overheating when they’re so close together. Of course, this means you lose maneuverability and reaction time when you’re caught unawares - in order to fight back, you’ve gotta lock the S-foils into attack formation, which can cost you.”

Anakin nodded. “You could crib radiator panels to let go of the excess energy,” he suggested. Overheating was a big problem on Tatooine, and radiator panels were a relatively cheap fix, though impractical as an add-on straight from production. 

Luke was grinning from ear to ear. “That’s exactly what I thought! You see, I had a T-16 back home, and it had the same problem with overheating, so I used radiator panels to make sure I could still run the engine in the middle of the day.” He pointed at the wiring running through the S-foil. “I nabbed this off of a TIE we found mostly-intact,” he said proudly. “That’s the thing with TIEs - their entire wings are radiator panels, so they can fire just about endlessly without risk of overheating.” He paused. “Not having a shield generator helps too, but really - those things are just cheap automatic blasters with wings.”

Anakin snorted. “I’m surprised they’ve lasted this long.”

“Well what they lack in quality they make up for in quantity,” Luke said. “Unfortunately.” He stood on his tiptoes (he was short, Anakin noticed. Like, really short. Much shorter than him) to reach the cockpit. “Here,” he said, and unzipped his jacket. “Hold this, I’ll show you something really cool.” He slipped out of his jacket, which Anakin took.

And then, promptly, dropped to the ground. Because hanging off of Luke’s belt was a lightsaber . And not just any lightsaber, but Anakin’s lightsaber. Anakin stared at it, wide-eyed.

Luke turned at the sound of his jacket dropping to the ground and followed Anakin’s gaze. Anakin swallowed. “Are you a Jedi?” he asked. He hadn’t sensed Luke using the Force much, but maybe that was all part of his shielding - Obi-Wan must have trained him, and Luke must have been a much better student than Anakin, so of course he would have mastered shielding. 

Luke turned to face Anakin and rubbed his hand on his neck a little awkwardly. “No,” he said. “Not really.” He picked up the lightsaber and held it with a sort of reverence. “My father was a Jedi though, once.” A cloud covered his face. “Before Darth Vader killed him.”

“Oh,” Anakin said. He was pretty sure that wasn’t what had happened, not if anything Ahsoka said about this timeline was true, but he didn’t say anything.

“Ben Kenobi gave me my father’s lightsaber and started to train me,” Luke continued, “but before he could get very far, Vader killed him, too.” He sighed. “And now there’s nobody left to teach me so that I can avenge their deaths.”

Anakin felt like somebody had poured cold water down his back. He had killed Obi-Wan? He had no doubt that ‘Ben Kenobi’ was Obi-Wan, and the thought that not only was he dead, but by his own hand… he stepped back. A grief he wasn’t expecting hit him like a durasteel wall. He had hoped that if Obi-Wan were alive in this timeline, he could find him and beg him to explain what was going on, but it didn’t look like that was going to be the case.

Luke was looking at him sadly. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“I - I’m fine. Just surprised. I knew him,” Anakin said. “Obi-Wan.”

Luke looked at him strangely. “He was a hermit for my whole life. Where did you know him from?”

“He was my hero growing up,” Anakin said. That much, at least, was true, even if he would die before admitting it to Obi-Wan. “I… met him, briefly, during the Clone Wars. He was a legend, you know. They called him the Negotiator.”

Luke smiled again, sadly. “Yeah. He and my father were the best duo the Republic had. The Negotiator and the Hero With No Fear.” He said it like he was parroting something someone had told him. “You said you knew Ben, did you ever meet my father? Anakin Skywalker?”

Well, there was a question. “No,” Anakin said. “I was just a little kid during the Clone Wars - I met Obi-Wan Kenobi when he landed at the shop I worked at for repairs after his ship broke down in the Outer Rim.” 

Luke nodded, accepting the story. “It sounds stupid, but - I thought I heard his voice, a couple times. Like he’s trying to tell me something from beyond.” Luke’s face turned red. “I shouldn’t have said that,” he muttered. “I’m not crazy,” he added.

Anakin had never heard of people hearing voices from beyond the grave, and privately thought maybe his son was losing it, a little, but that didn’t matter. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “We’ve all lost people. I understand.”

Luke smiled in relief. “Thanks, Ani,” he said. He gave the lightsaber a twirl without turning it on. “I don’t really know how to use this thing, but I keep it around because it’s pretty much all I have of my father. Everyone keeps telling me stories about him from the Clone Wars, but the Empire’s done a damn-near perfect job of erasing him from the ‘net, and I’ve never even seen a holo of him. So knowing I have something like this, that he actually held - I don’t know. It’s comforting.”

Anakin wanted to hug Luke really, really badly. He moved forward instinctively, cutting the motion short to end in a clap to Luke’s shoulder. “If he could see you now, with the Alliance, he would be really proud of you, Luke,” Anakin said. 

Luke looked up at him. “Thanks,” he said. “I hope so.”

“I’m sure of it,” Anakin said. More sure than Luke knew, he thought. Luke smiled. Some of the tension eased out of his shoulders, and Anakin noted that he looked so young to be leading a war. No older than he was when the Clone Wars had started, to be sure, and older than Ahsoka when she had been thrown into it at just fourteen, but still - Anakin didn’t want his kids to have to grow up on the battlefront. 

“Well, let’s eat, and then I can show you your bunk,” Luke said after a pause. Evidently X-wing time was over, though Anakin felt confident he could convince his son to show him around more when he was in cheerier spirits. He cursed himself for bringing up the lightsaber. What did he think would happen? Nothing good, that’s for sure. 

The commissary was fuller than it had been when they’d walked by it in the tour, and after they loaded up their trays, Luke plopped down next to a dark-haired human that looked to be about his age. “Hey, Wedge,” he said. “I found us a new squad member.”

“Oh, yeah?” Wedge said, his mouth full. He swallowed his food and gave Anakin a smile. “Great to meet you, newbie. I’m Wedge Antilles, Rogue Three. Where’d this son of a gun pick you up?”

“Scooped him from Garos IV,” Luke said. “Ended up saving our asses from Imps on the way out - we weren’t expecting a presence there, so we didn’t bring along a full crew to save more space for supplies, so we didn’t have anyone on the nosegun, and Ani here - whew! It was pure action. Never seen anything like it.”

Wedge leaned in closer to Anakin. “Don’t let him fool you,” he said conspiratorially. “He’s damned near the best shot in the galaxy. Anything he says is just flattery - Vader himself has it out for the kid, that’s how good he is.”

Anakin didn’t doubt it. He decided he liked Wedge a lot. Luke seemed to think so, too, judging by the color red his face was going. 

“I hear he’s the pilot who destroyed the Death Star with a single starfighter,” Anakin said back to Wedge, purposefully ignoring Luke’s face. “Probably just luck, right?”

Wedge laughed. “Exactly. Skywalker here is just filled to the brim with dumb luck. Hell, he could go out blind and still shoot better than half the squad.”

Anakin smiled. Luke looked positively mortified. 

“Ani Naberrie,” he said, holding out his hand to Wedge. “Great to meet you, sir.”

“It’s Luke you should be calling sir,” Wedge said, shaking Anakin’s hand. “We started Rogue together, but he’s the leader.”

Anakin didn’t think he could get any prouder, but just like that, he did. “Well - thanks, sir,” he said jokingly. Luke tried to hide his face in his hands.

“Come on, eat up,” Wedge said. “There’s no rest for the weary, High Command says we’re shipping out tomorrow.”

“Already?” Luke said. “I thought we weren’t slated to go for another couple days.” He frowned and took a stab at the roasted tuber on his plate.

Wedge’s voice dropped. “Yeah, I know. They’re moving it up to tomorrow because Command thinks we have a mole.” His face darkened. “Whoever he is, he better hope it isn’t me that finds him.”

Luke’s brow furrowed. “Yeah, that would explain what the Imps were doing on Garos IV,” he said. “Well, kriff. After dinner we can take the ships out to familiarize you with the controls, Ani,” he said.

“That would be great,” Anakin said. He took a bite of the commissary food. It seemed that if one thing remained the same across space and time, it was the uninspiring quality of food created en masse. Still, not the worst thing he’d eaten. He made sure to finish his plate.

After dinner, as promised, Luke took him back to the hangar and showed him over to the X-wing that would be Anakin’s for the foreseeable future. There controls were pretty standard - it helped that Anakin was familiar with Incom designs, but after a minute he got the hang of it.

“Which means all you need is an astromech,” Luke said. “I’ll go see if mine has any friends he can recommend you.” He dashed off, leaving Anakin alone in the hangar.

He smiled, bemused, at the idea that not only did Luke think his droid had friends, but he valued his droid’s opinion on his friends. It was the kind of thing Anakin did. 

Pretty soon, Luke returned, trailed by a white-and-blue astromech and a yellow-and-red astromech. Anakin did a double take. If it weren’t for the fact that that was impossible, he could swear that the droid following Luke was -

“R2-D2 says this droid won’t let you down,” Luke said, gesturing to the yellow-and-red droid. Anakin gaped.

Artoo beeped inquisitively, asking who Anakin was. Anakin paused. Artoo was equipped with vocal recognition; if he hadn’t figured it out already, his voice would be a dead giveaway. “My name is Ani,” he said. Artoo sputtered at him suspiciously. Does not compute! Anakin, designation: enemy! 

“Whoever you think I am, I’m not,” Anakin said to Artoo. How the droid knew more than his own children, he had no idea, but Artoo had always been smart. He turned to Luke. “Your droid seems to have me confused with someone else.”

“You can understand him?” Luke said, looking at Anakin. “My binary is okay, but he uses some kind of dialect that I haven’t been able to find anywhere else. I usually just use the readout on the ship.”

“I, ah, like droids,” Anakin said lamely. “I used to work with an astromech who had a similar quirk. I can teach you, if you like,” he offered.

Luke smiled. “That would be great! Anyway, here’s R3-L9.”

Anakin patted the red-and-gold astromech on its dome. “Nice to meet you, Arthree,” he said. Arthree beeped back. Designation?

“Ani,” Anakin said. “Pilot.”

Ani, designation: pilot, Arthree beeped. Then, wizard!  

Anakin blinked. He had taught Artoo that phrase. Well, if Arthree was friends with Artoo, he was good enough for Anakin. He grinned, and looked up from the droid to Luke. “Let’s get going,” he said. 

Luke flashed him a smile to match and hopped into his ship.

Chapter Text

It wasn’t just that Anakin loved flying. It was that he lived and breathed flying. From even his earliest memories, flying made him feel free. So yeah, this universe-timeline-whatever might be really kriffed up, but fuck it if Anakin wasn’t going to have fun along the way.

Luke? Also really good at flying. The two of them looped around the fleet like maniacs, ostensibly practicing defensive maneuvering. Anakin knew better. Luke might be his commanding officer right now (and there wasn’t time to go through all of that, there really wasn’t), but he had happily informed Anakin over their comm that this was a maneuver called threading the needle that High Command technically frowned upon, and then he’d proceeded to loop up between the bridge towers, a move that left his ship barely a meter on either side.

Kriff. Luke would have loved podracing, Anakin thought. And he could do one better than just threading the needle. Anakin did it in a tailspin.

“Wow, neat trick!” Luke said. “I tell you what, I’m glad I pinned you for my squad - the others are gonna be jealous.” Anakin watched out of his viewport as Luke turned on a dime to flip back under the command ship. “Where’d you learn to fly like that anyway?”

“I’ve been a pilot my whole life,” Anakin said. 

“Yeah?” Luke’s voice crackled over the comm. “What got you into it?”

“Couldn’t tell you,” Anakin said. “It’s just always felt right.”

They did their next loop together, Luke leading and Anakin on his right tail.

“Yeah, me too,” Luke said. “I guess I was inspired by my father, but I was racing up and down the canyons back home before I knew how to write my own name.”

Either Luke was embellishing, had learned to write at a much later age than typical, or he was one-of-a-kind. Anakin was inclined to believe somewhere between the first and third option. He let out a loud whoop as the two of them steered back to base, docking neatly. Anakin jumped out and helped get Arthree out, who was beeping and sputtering madly. 

“Yeah, yeah, get used to it,” Anakin said to the droid good-naturedly. He turned to grin at Luke. “Some nice flying back there, Skywalker,” he said.

Luke ducked his head, but he was grinning to match. “You too, Naberrie. Those Imps won’t know what hit ‘em.”

“Well, with a leader like you, I’m surprised they’re still up and kicking,” Anakin said. He checked the coolant pipes and ensured all the flaps on his ship were securely shut. “Now, I hear I get a whole room to myself?”

Luke laughed, the sound cutting through the cleaning droid’s mechanical buzz. “Who told you that? You’d think with as few people as we’ve got they’d be able to make sure we’re all living in comfort, but I’m afraid well-furnished cabins for starfighter pilots isn’t high up on the list of Alliance to-dos. You’re with Rogue. We all share a barrack. It’s tight, but luckily you didn’t bring a lot with you. We’ll get you set up with a flight suit and a change of clothes, and then you can use the laundry facilities.”

“Thank the Force,” Anakin said. Instantly, he regretted it. Was that a thing people in the future said? The Jedi didn’t exist, so did normal non-Force-trained people use it like that? 

If Luke thought oddly about his turn of phrase, he didn’t bat an eye. Instead, he patted Artoo and told him he was going to go to bed for the night. Anakin followed him down the halls (they were becoming more familiar to him the more he walked down them; offhandedly he wondered if that kind of military you-have-to-memorize-the-layout-of-every-new-battleship-or-you-could-die sense was responsible for it) until they reached the barracks.

As it turned out, Luke hadn’t been lying about the barracks being tight. They were practically spartan, with six bunk beds on one side and storage space on the other. The beds themselves were decorated, with scraps of cloth and flags and stickers adorning the frames, and on the one bare wall someone had written in large letters Down with the Empire! Scattered around the message were columns of names, written small and neat. Luke walked over to it. “We’ve all written down people we’re fighting for that didn’t make it,” he said, reverently. He pointed to a section all written in the same handwriting. The names Owen, Beru, Anakin, Ben were all written down, and then Biggs in a different color. Both men stood silently for a second, staring at the wall.

“You can add to it, if you want,” Luke said. 

“Yeah,” Anakin said. About five hundred things were swirling around in his head. “Maybe later.”

“Okay,” Luke said. He handed Anakin an orange flight suit and a small stack of everyday clothes. “You’re on a bottom bunk, so you can store your stuff under your bed in drawers,” he said. “Feel free to decorate your space, but keep it neat. Pretty standard stuff, really. If you need anything, bring it up to me or Wedge and we’ll get it sorted out.” He also handed Anakin a small bag. “Hygiene supplies,” he said. “The ‘fresher and laundry are through that door.”

“Thanks,” Anakin said. 

“Great,” Luke said. “Everyone else is at a briefing for tomorrow - I’d better get over to it, too. Since you’re new, we can’t tell you where we’re going yet until we get there - don’t worry about that, it’s just SOP for newbies. We’re trying to be extra cautious because we know we have a leak somewhere.”

“Understood,” Anakin said. He smiled at Luke. “Thanks for getting me set up,” he said.

“No problem. I’ll see you in a couple hours and introduce you to everyone.”

“Sounds good,” Anakin said. Luke gave him a thumbs up and walked out.

Anakin collapsed onto his bunk. Luke’s names kept running through his head. Never mind that his own name and Obi-Wan’s were there, but Owen and Beru? That was Cliegg’s son and his fiancée. Could Obi-Wan have sent Luke to go live with them? On Tatooine? Anakin simmered. Luke shouldn’t have had to grow up on that miserable rock. Surely Obi-Wan could’ve found a nice, temperate planet somewhere outside the Empire’s grip? 

A worse thought crept into his head. Tatooine was the last planet Anakin would ever go to. Perhaps Obi-Wan was only doing what he thought was safest for the son of Darth Vader. Anakin felt hollow. He only wished Obi-Wan were here so he could talk to him, get him to finally explain things. Without anyone to tell the truth to, Anakin felt very alone.

But, he supposed, it was probably best to use this time alone productively. He took a shower, shaved, and changed into the clothes Luke had left him while throwing his dirty ones into the laundry machine. Once he felt suitably freshened up, he picked up a datapad sitting on one of the other bunks.

He hoped the owner wouldn’t mind, but he didn’t feel guilty for slicing through the password-protection encrypting the datapad. Soon, Anakin had access to the holonet, and decided it was time for one of his most dreaded tasks: research.

An hour later, Anakin had learned lots of useful things. The date, for instance, and that the not-clones were called Stormtroopers, and that Coruscant was now Imperial Center, and that the Emperor had dissolved the Senate, and that there really was practically no planet out of the grip of the Empire. 

As bad as those facts were, there were even harder truths. Anakin read an entire article from the Imperial Times lauding Darth Vader for his victory against war criminal and fugitive Obi-Wan Kenobi. He felt sick after reading that, but even worse was what happened when he searched Padmé Amidala and saw pictures of her funeral. Apparently, there was now a holiday dedicated to her memory. Anakin’s stomach curled. The last thing his beautiful, upstanding, democracy-loving wife would want was a public holiday claiming she had died helping to create a fascist state. After he read that, he shut the datapad off and laid down.

He needed to get back home to his universe, that much was certain. But until that could happen, Anakin thought, there were a few things he needed to do. First, he needed to make sure he stuck next to Luke and Leia and kept them out of trouble (or, as much as that was possible. They were his kids, after all). Next, he was going to do as much as he could to help them fight against the Empire. And then he was going to keep his promise to Ahsoka and get rid of Darth Vader. And then, for personal reasons, he was going to make sure this universe’s Sidious died as well. He would have to figure out a way to accomplish these last two tasks without blowing his cover, but he was certain he could manage it. After all, when had a patented Skywalker Plan ever gone wrong?

Anakin had just started to be in a better mood when he felt something shift, slightly. He sat up instantly, very nearly whacking his head on the bunk above him. Reflexively, he checked his shields. Still up. So whatever was going on, it shouldn’t be able to sense him.

Slowly, he reached over to his shelf to grab his blaster.

I’m afraid that won’t be necessary, old friend.

Anakin swung the blaster over to where the voice had come from, only to find himself pointing at empty space. “Hello?” he called out.

It’s been a long time.

“Whoever you are, show yourself,” Anakin said. Hesitantly, he reached out with the Force, only to feel something familiar. He lowered the blaster, now more confused than ever. “Obi-Wan?”

I didn’t believe it when I saw you get on Luke’s ship back on Garos IV, Obi-Wan’s voice continued. Even now, I do not fully understand.

“How are you… Luke said you were dead!” Anakin exclaimed. “That’s not - when you die, you become one with the Force,” he said. “I don’t understand.”

It is not… easy, but it is possible, Obi-Wan’s voice said.

Anakin sat up on his bunk and curled his knees in. “I’m sorry,” he said, softly. “I - I killed you.”

Not you, Obi-Wan said. Vader. 

“Yeah. Still,” Anakin said, “I’m sorry.” He paused. “In my universe, where I came from, none of this happened,” he said. “Ahsoka came back in time and warned us and we defeated Sidious together and had the twins and I left the Jedi Order and moved to Naboo and everyone was happy,” he said. He took a breath. “And now I’m here and I don’t know what to do,” he said. “Everything is so bad, and it’s my fault, isn’t it? If Ahsoka hadn’t come back and stopped me, that’s what I would have done.” 

You can’t blame yourself for actions you didn’t take.

Anakin nodded, only half-believing him. “Thanks,” he said. “For looking out for Luke. He’s a really good kid.”

Obi-Wan’s presence grew warmer. He is, he said. His voice had a note of pride that Anakin remembered trying very hard to get as a Padawan. 

“And Leia, too - she’s in charge of so much at only twenty.”

Both of them are growing into fine people, Obi-Wan said.

“I’m so proud of them,” Anakin said. “Even though I didn’t raise them, I’m just - I’m so proud of them.”

He felt Obi-Wan agree. I must go now, he said. But I will be with you, and the Force will be with you. 

Anakin smiled. “Thanks, old man,” he said. He put his blaster back on the shelf and had just finished folding his laundry when Luke came bursting in with presumably the rest of Rogue Flight.

“Here’s our newest member,” Luke said, walking up to Anakin with a smile. “Rogue, meet Ani. Ani, Rogue.”

Anakin grinned and fell into an easy rapport with the rest of the squad. Luke had picked good people, he thought, from the feel of them. After a few minutes of introduction and a recount of some recent heroics, Luke called everyone’s attention again.

“Alright, squad,” he said. “We ship out tomorrow at twelve hundred hours, so let’s get some sleep.” 

There was a chorus of ayes, and everyone went off to their respective bunks. Anakin slid under the blankets and was asleep within minutes.

When he woke up, the day cycle had just begun, and the chronometer on the wall read six hundred hours. He stretched and changed into fresh clothes before deciding to wander around and see if there was a gym anywhere. If he was going to be part of the Rebellion, it wouldn’t hurt to get a more rigorous exercise routine back up and running.

He exited the bunker and asked the first person he came into contact with where he could find a gym. He was directed down a hallway he hadn’t been to before, at the end of which was a relatively small training center, around which ran a track. 

At first, Anakin thought he was the only one there, but he realized quickly that wasn’t the case. Luke was there too, in the very back. 

He was holding his lightsaber, unlit, and going through the stances of Shii-Cho, Anakin realized. His form was miserable, but he was sweating hard and had a determined look on his face. Anakin jogged over.

“Early riser?” he asked.

Luke, startled, put the lightsaber back on his belt. “Oh, hey, Ani,” he said. “Yeah, always have been. I had to wake up with the sunrise back home, and the habit’s stuck.”

“Oh? Where are you from? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“Tatooine,” Luke said. “It’s a little dustball out in the Outer Rim, in Hutt-controlled space.”

Well, that confirmed Anakin’s theory. “You don’t say,” he said carefully. “I grew up there too, but I moved out when I was still a kid.”

“Lucky for you,” Luke said. 

Anakin didn’t comment on that. “What are you working on?”

Luke grimaced. “Lightsaber forms. Stuff that Ben taught me, but he didn’t get very far. I only know the very basics.”

“Anything I can do to help?”

“Unless you happen to be experienced in training Jedi? I don’t think so.”

Well. “I’ll leave you to it, then,” Anakin said. He left Luke in his corner and began to run a few laps around the room to warm up.

After he’d run for a while and done some light workouts, he called over to Luke again. “Hey,” he said, “if you don’t mind, would you practice a few hand-to-hand moves with me?” Maybe he couldn’t teach Luke lightsaber forms without blowing his cover, but he could make sure his son knew how to defend himself.

“Yeah, sure,” Luke said. He took off his belt and lightsaber and set them down next to the mat. 

As they began, Anakin realized Luke was using the Force without knowing it; he ducked a hair before most people would know there was a punch coming and seemed to predict when Anakin was about to feint or misdirect him. That was good. Anakin upped the intensity a little, trying to see if Luke would match him, and was pleasantly surprised. 

After they finished, both of them breathing hard, Luke said, “you know, you fight like one of the guys here that gave me a few pointers.”

“Who’s that?” 

“He’s an old clone trooper named Rex. He fought next to my father,” Luke said proudly. “He’s off on a secret mission somewhere, or I’d introduce you. But some of the moves you did - they just remind me of him, that’s all.” He gave Anakin a quizzical look. “Did you ever work with Mandalorians? That’s who trained Rex.”

Anakin tried to take this new information in stride. “Uh, yeah,” he ended up saying. 

“That’s cool,” Luke said. “Thanks for the spar - I’ll see you at breakfast, yeah?”

“Sounds good,” Anakin said. He watched as Luke picked up his belt and lightsaber and left the gym, finally leaving Anakin with an empty room.

The floor dropped out beneath him. Rex was still here? He didn’t remember Ahsoka saying that, or if she had, she’d forgotten. An idea began to form in the back of Anakin’s head. He trusted Rex with his life. Rex could help him, make sure someone would watch out for his kids if he couldn’t. 

Still stunned at this new information, Anakin threw himself into an intense workout - running, bodyweight moves, weights, everything, ending with a series of open-handed katas. He was just finishing when the back of his neck prickled, and he paused mid-kata to turn around and see Luke standing in the doorway.

Luke was looking at him in amazement. “I, uh, left my towel here,” he said. He gave Anakin a strange look. “You were going easy on me,” he said with finality.

“I - no,” Anakin lied.

“Well, you shouldn’t,” Luke said. “I can take it.”

“How about a rematch once we get back from this mission, then?” Anakin asked.

Luke grinned. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Luke left and Anakin finished his workout. He went back to the barracks and took a shower and wandered down to the commissary at the more reasonable hour of nine. Luke was there along with Wedge and some of the other Rogues. Anakin walked up to them and plunked his tray down.

“Nervous to ship off, Ani?” someone asked him. 

Anakin shook his head. “Bad luck to be nervous for the first flight, right?”

Wedge slapped his shoulder. “That’s right!”

Anakin was nearly finished with breakfast when he heard someone shouting outside in the hangar. He turned to Luke, who had a very wearied expression on his face.

“What’s going on?”

Luke stood up. “It’s Leia and Han. I’d better go see what I can do to stop it.”

Anakin dumped his tray and followed Luke to the hangar. “Who’s Han?”

Luke grimaced. “He’s a smuggler. Nice guy, but he and Leia have somewhat of a love-hate relationship.”

As they neared the hangar, Anakin could hear their conversation.

“You know Jabba’s got a price on my head, Princess, if I don’t take whatever job I can find I’m a dead man,” a man (Han, Anakin assumed) was saying.

Leia glared at him. “I’m sure a man of your talents can find a job that doesn’t involve smuggling for known Imperial sympathizers!” she said. “Those weapons are going to hurt people, Han! For once I wish you could see a bigger picture than yourself!

“Well I’m here now, aren’t I?” Han asked, spreading his arms in disbelief. “Ready and willing to put my life on the line for the Alliance to Restore the Republic!”

Leia threw up her hands. “And yet,” she said, “when you were supposed to be back in time to go to Garos IV, you’re mysteriously out of contact -”

“On Nar Shaddaa! It’s called the Smugglers’ Moon for a reason, your Highness, it wasn’t as though I could contact you over any old comm -”

“You wouldn’t have been there in the first place if you hadn’t decided to take the job! You told me you were going to the Sinta system -”

“They’re close by -”

Both people froze as Luke and Anakin walked into the hangar.

“Luke!” Leia said, falsely chipper. “And Ani! Great to see both of you. Good luck today! Now, I’d better go tell Command that our favorite part-timer has returned.” With that, she walked brusquely out the hangar. 

Han stared after her, a smile starting to form on his face. “What a welcome,” he said, turning to Luke and Anakin. “You’d think she’d be glad to see me alive and well after the frankly desperate messages she left trying to contact me, but no, as soon as I arrive, it’s ‘you aren’t allowed to act like your own person.’ Anyways,” he said, sticking his hand out to Anakin. “I’m Han. Wookie trying to fix the coolant over there is Chewbacca.”

Anakin wasn’t really sure what to make of Han, but he shook the hand. “Ani,” he said. “I’m new.”

Han gave him a long look. “You know,” he said, “I could’ve sworn I’ve seen your face before, somewhere.”

“I don’t recognize you,” Anakin said.

Han shrugged. “Maybe not, then. Well, hotshot, welcome to the Rebellion, or whatever.” He held up a hydrospanner. “My coolant tank is blasted, so unfortunately I have to go work on that.” He nodded to Luke. “See you around, kid.”

Luke nodded and Han disappeared back into his ship. It was a pretty beat-up looking freighter, but Anakin knew looks could be deceiving. Sometimes, of course, they weren’t (there really was no denying that despite his and Ahsoka’s modifications, the Twilight was a barely-held-together scrap pile), but Anakin wasn’t about to give the ship a hard time until he’d had the chance to fly it.

Anakin finished his breakfast and tidied his bunk before pulling on the orange flight suit he’d been given and going to meet Luke, Wedge, and the others in the briefing room for a last-minute overview.

“It should be pretty simple,” Luke said. “We’re escorting one of our transports to Vandor. There’s been increasing Imperial presence there, and some of the smaller towns and villages along the northern mountain range of the main continent have been starved out because they refuse to comply. Our mission is pretty simple: make sure the transport ship can get the supplies to the ground and back. I’ve given you all the coordinates of our jumps; it shouldn’t be more than a few hours’ flight one way. Is that clear?”

A chorus of yes filtered through, and Luke grinned. “Alright then, Rogue. Let’s fly!”

Anakin double-checked everything was in good shape on his ship and helped get Arthree into the astromech slot. He slid into the cockpit and waited for Luke’s signal.

Pretty soon, they were off.

The hyperspace flight was boring, though Anakin passed the time talking with Arthree. He learned that Arthree and Artoo were both the property of Senator Organa until being donated to the Rebellion. The droid had learned a lot from Artoo, it turned out, including some of his more obscene turns of phrase. 

The mission began to go wrong as soon as they dropped out of hyperspace. Some Imperial presence had been expected, but nothing like what they encountered - two star destroyers and countless TIEs were waiting for them, even predicting the hemisphere they were dropping out facing. 

Through the comms, Luke immediately ordered everyone to lock their S-foils into attack position (and Anakin realized just how dangerous it was to have guns that didn’t fire when the S-foils were locked) and take evasive action. The mission was still a go - they were going to try to get around the planet and take the transport down closer to atmosphere. Half of the squad was going to break off to divert the TIEs while the other half continued escorting the transport.

Anakin kept his position on Luke’s right wing as Luke led the diversion attack. They nailed TIE after TIE, but it was clear they were outnumbered and outgunned.

The transport cleared the atmosphere and Anakin hoped they could drop the supplies and leave, but the two star destroyers flew down to where the transport had gone down and began pummeling it with fire.

“All wings, focus attack on those destroyers!” Luke’s voice crackled. Anakin shot over, flying close to one of them on a strafing run.

“Hit the bridge towers,” he said. “The shields will hold, but it’ll screw with their instruments and make it harder for them to maneuver to follow us.”

They did. Anakin registered as two of their ships got shot down, and he grimaced, pulling up hard to zoom over to the other star destroyer.

After several nerve-wracking minutes, the transport ship came up, flanked by four of the six fighters it had gone down with. 

“All fighters, jump to hyperspace when clear,” Luke said. Several did so, but those that remained with the transport couldn’t get a clear shot.

Anakin dove back into the action. He reached out with the Force, making sure his shielding stayed up, trying to feel the thoughts of whoever was on the bridge of the untouched destroyer.

Almost as soon as he did, he felt an icy presence slam against his shields. Anakin reeled back. The presence tried again, but Anakin’s shields held, and he flew directly at the bridge, spinning and trying to cause as much damage as he could. His plan worked, and several of the TIEs blocking the transport’s path diverted over to him. Anakin made short work of them, and at last the transport and its escorts were able to jump.

It was just Anakin and Luke left. “I’m ready to jump when you are,” Anakin said over the comm.

“All clear. Let’s go.”

Anakin waited a split second to sense Luke’s presence warp into hyperspace and then jumped himself.

When they arrived back to the fleet, the mood was somber. Nine of the twelve wings had made it back, and the transport was severely damaged. Leia was there waiting for them in the hangar, looking concerned.

“What happened?” Leia said. “We didn’t receive your report on-planet.”

“They jammed our long-range transmissions,” Luke said. “One thing’s clear, the Empire knows our moves.”

Leia pressed her lips together. She leaned over, closer to Luke, and Anakin used the Force a little to overhear what they were saying. Yeah, eavesdropping was wrong and all that, but Anakin had a suspicion he needed to hear what was being said. 

“It’s not random,” Leia murmured, low enough that only Luke should have been able to hear. “There’s a pattern. The Empire isn’t just targeting Rebel missions, they’re targeting Rebel missions that you’re on.” 

A jolt of dread ran through Anakin, and he thought back to the Dark presence he’d felt on the star destroyer. Vader was after Luke, Wedge had said. 

Well, too bad. Vader wasn’t going to know what hit him.

Chapter Text

Pretty soon, it was common knowledge that there was a mole somewhere. High Command was doing background checks and all communication devices were being checked for outgoing transmissions. None of it was working; Anakin suspected that whoever the mole was, they knew what they were doing. The Empire likely had a network of intelligence ready so that any information the mole got through was bounced around enough to lose its trail before making its way to their grasp. 

In a strange way, the mole was making it easier for people to trust him, though. Nobody as new as Anakin had access to the kind of information the mole was leaking, and it would have been a stupid move on the Empire’s part to send in a second informant when the Rebels were undoubtedly close to discovering the first. So in a backhanded way, Anakin was getting more responsibility than he wanted. 

He should have remembered how much kriffing deskwork it took to run a war. When Leia had asked for volunteers, he’d signed up immediately, hoping he would get to have more of an inside look at what the Rebellion was doing and figure out how to get his daughter to trust him, but she’d just smiled and handed him a stack of datapads containing financial reports that needed filling out. 

He was glad, of course, to get to spend time with his daughter, even if it meant he was temporarily her secretary, but sweet Force was it boring. Anakin was currently looking through a receipt for proton torpedoes that looked like it was coming from - was that Hondo Ohnaka? Anakin frowned and gave the report another check to make sure the numbers added up.

“Hey, Leia?” he asked, walking over to her desk and handing the report over. “Are we sure these numbers are correct?”

Leia glanced up from whatever she was working on to skim the report. “It looks good to me,” she said.

Anakin frowned. “I’ve, ah - worked with Hondo before, and he usually takes a bigger cut than this. Are we sure this isn’t someone using his name as a cover?”

Leia looked at the numbers once more. “No, that’s his usual.”

“Alrighty,” Anakin said, heading back to his desk. He didn’t comment on Leia’s use of usual to describe Hondo, though he wondered what had possessed the pirate to sell for such a low price. Desperate times, and all that, but Anakin’s memories of the pirate were all uncomfortably tinged with kidnapping and threatening his friends. Sure, they’d relied on him once or twice, but labeling Hondo as an ally was still going a good deal further than Anakin was willing. Reluctantly, he marked the receipt as correct and tapped the datapad to send him the next one. 

After another couple hours, Anakin was convinced his brain was going to start leaking out of his eyes. The worst part was that he wasn’t even getting to read interesting reports and find out what the Rebellion was up to. So far, the most interesting thing he’d learned (other than that Hondo was giving the Alliance a remarkably good deal, which still didn’t make sense to Anakin) was that someone had double-counted the money allocated for starfighter helmets. He’d brought the discrepancy up to Leia, who had tried to see if they could change it, but the order had already been placed. The Rebellion, it seemed, would have no shortage of helmets for the time being.

When Leia finally asked if he wanted to get lunch, Anakin couldn’t have been more grateful. They walked together into the commissary, where Luke waved them over to where he, Han, the Wookie Han had identified as Chewbacca, and several others were sitting. 

Han gave Anakin a look as he came over to sit down. “Her Highness has you doing deskwork, huh?” he asked.

“I volunteered,” Anakin replied.

“Don’t worry, Han,” Leia said sweetly. “I would never presume you could read well enough to help us on that front.”

Han sputtered. “I’ll have you know I am very good at reading,” he said, then crossed his arms at the comment. Leia raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.

Luke looked between them. “Can you two declare a truce, already?” he asked. “It’s been nearly a ten-day since Han got back and it’s been nothing but bickering, and those of us who happen to enjoy your company are finding it difficult to tolerate.”

Leia pursed her lips. Han reached over and picked up one of the pieces of fruit she had on her plate. 

Leia made a quickly-aborted move as if to grab the fruit out of Han’s hand, then settled for crossing her arms and glaring at him. Han gave her a shrug, then looked around the table for support. “What?” he said. “I’m trying to be friendly.” He gave Leia a smile. “Thank you for sharing, your most high worshipfulness.”

“Han, please,” Luke said. 

Han adopted an injured expression and turned to Luke. “Not you, too, kid? I’m just trying to show our most exalted royal how to be polite and share with her less-fortunate guests.”

Luke rolled his eyes. Chewbacca said something (Anakin didn’t know Shyriiwook well enough to understand) and swatted Han’s head. Han turned to him. “Ow! Is nobody here on my side?” He turned to Anakin, giving him an expectant look.

“Ani, you don’t have to say anything,” Luke said, exasperatedly. He turned to Han. “This is why nobody else in the Alliance wants to be your friend, you know.”

“Well, the next time the Alliance comes begging for my help, I guess I won’t give it, then,” Han said. 

Luke sighed. “Please. Can we all just eat and not get into an argument?”

Chewbacca said something that Anakin understood just enough of to know it was an agreement. 

The group had just managed to go for their fifth minute without arguing (Anakin had kept track via the wall chronometer) when klaxons started blaring. 

Leia and Luke cursed simultaneously. “I have to get to Command,” Leia said.

Before they could go anywhere, though, the ship rocked. “We’ve been hit,” Han said, grimly. All trace of joking was gone from his voice. “Can you make it to the hangar bay? If not, the Falcon is docked in the secondary hanger. She’s closer.”

Luke sprinted out of the commissary. “Our path over there is blocked,” he said. 

“Okay. Meet me there as soon as you can,” Han said. He glanced at Anakin. “You, too.”

Anakin nodded. The transport was a swarm of activity. The commissary was crowded on one end of the transport, and the blast had triggered closed the blast doors, preventing anyone not already on that side of the ship from getting to the main hangar. 

Anakin rushed to the barracks along with Luke. He grabbed his blaster and unplugged Arthree from the power dock, noting that Luke did the same with Artoo. They made it back to Han’s ship and loaded everything inside. Han was already sitting in the cockpit with Chewbacca, getting the takeoff sequence ready.

“A little help?” Leia asked, muffled, from the outside. Han dashed over to the entrance.

“Oh, we are not bringing Goldenrod along,” Han’s voice filtered through the ship.

“He can be useful,” Leia insisted. Briefly, Anakin wondered who Goldenrod was, but he was quickly distracted by a TIE fighter swooping down and attempting to blow up the hangar.

Clearly not in the mood to argue, Han said “fine,” and hurried back to the cockpit. “Alright,” he said. “I’m on the main gun, Luke is on the tail. Everyone else, try to find something useful to do.”

Luke was telling Wedge through his comm that if anyone’s ship was still under repair they could take out his. Anakin listened to the reply - it sounded like just over half of the squadron was able to get to the hangar. Both his and Luke’s ships were being taken out since they were in good condition.

Han took the ship out of the hangar and into the fray.

Outside was a mess. There were Star Destroyers and TIEs everywhere, and despite the valiant efforts of the Rebel ships, it was clear they weren’t going to be able to win this fight. Which meant that they had to find a way to run away.

Anakin frowned out the viewport. There was something familiar about the way the Star Destroyers were set up, but he couldn’t quite place it. He reached out again with the Force, but the icy presence he had felt before was missing. Anakin only hoped that it stayed that way.

The Millenium Falcon shot through two of the Star Destroyers, flipping so the disc-shaped ship barely cleared the hull of one of them. Anakin felt Luke’s satisfaction as he gunned down another TIE.

Leia was engaged on her comm, speaking with High Command.

“Once we get out of this, we need to split up until we catch the mole,” she said. “It’s too dangerous for the entire fleet to be in one location.”

“I agree,” a voice filtered through. “We’ll be able to break through shortly, their forces are failing at point seven.”

Anakin frowned. That wasn’t right. A force of that size shouldn’t have such an obvious weakness, and especially if he was the one leading it - 

Kriff. The pieces suddenly fit together, and Anakin realized what was about to happen. “Leia,” he said, strangled, bursting into the room she was using to make her calls.

Leia looked up at him sharply. “Ani?”

“I know what the Empire is trying to do,” Anakin said in a rush. “It’s a variation on a strategy from the Clone Wars - it was never formally adopted because it requires precision hyperspace jumps, and only a very talented pilot can do that.” A very talented pilot who had access to the Force and was more than a bit reckless. 

“That opening at point seven - it’s not an opening, they’re trying to corral your ships. Then someone is going to jump out of hyperspace from nearby and you’ll not just be trapped, but unable to fire without hitting your own ships.”

Leia gave him a hard look. “How do you know so much about Imperial tactics, Ani?” she asked.

“I spent a long time studying Clone Wars battle plans. Trust me, you need to get those ships moving away from that sector now.”

Leia gave him a wary look, but she turned on her comm. “Abort,” she said. “It’s a trap. Divert away from point seven.” She looked up at Anakin. “The Falcon is going to help clear another way out.”

Anakin sagged in relief. Leia gave him a critical look. “So what’s your plan?”

Anakin rushed back to the viewport, where he could see the Alliance ships backing away from their supposed exit. “We’re going to need to split their forces,” he said. “Send a group of fighters over to point one and point four. The Empire won’t be expecting us to hit them there, so they’ll be disoriented - I’m willing to bet they’ll have to wait to hear from their command ship. If those ships can get through, they can use the Destroyers’ size against them - those ships are hard to maneuver. Fly right next to them and the others won’t shoot because they’ll be worried about hitting one another.”

Leia nodded and relayed his suggestions through to Command. “What about us?” she asked.

Anakin frowned. If he was leading the attack, and he could sense that what he wanted most was on one small ship - and that he wanted it alive, as he undoubtedly did Luke - “we’re going to take the bait,” he said. “Direct us to point seven.”

Han, when explained the plan, didn’t like it and didn’t believe it was going to work. “You know, I may be a good guy, but I’m really not the -” he grunted, shooting another TIE, “- self-sacrificing type.”

“Vader isn’t going to risk blowing us up because he wants Luke alive,” Anakin reminded Han. “And your ship is distinctive.”

“You know,” Han said. “Has anyone considered that maybe you’re the spy, leading us into this trap as bait and then going to get a great deal out of it when we get captured?”

Leia looked at Anakin sharply, and Anakin curled his fist. “I’m not a spy,” he said. “I’m trying to save your kriffing skin.”

Han made a derisive comment, but didn’t object any more as Chewbacca flew them to the gap in Imperial forces.

As Anakin predicted, another Star Destroyer materialized out of hyperspace, nearly on top of them. Chewbacca swerved abruptly to avoid hitting it. 

Anakin reached out with the Force. The icy presence he had felt outside Vandor was back, and again it began an assault on Anakin’s shields. Who are you? the presence seemed to demand. Anakin stumbled back like he’d been hit. He winced and steadied himself on the wall of the cockpit. Leia looked at him with alarm, and Anakin wondered how in the hells she wasn’t feeling it too. Ahsoka taught her well, he guessed, but - even if she had been actively trained not to use the Force, surely she felt something. 

“Headache,” Anakin grunted. He looked out. “Convert power to the rear shield generators. We’re going to make him chase us.”

Chewbacca did so, and the Falcon swooped out and around the Star Destroyer. 

“No way that whole ship follows us,” Han said. “We should either be helping out or jumping away.”

And yet, the Star Destroyer was pivoting towards the Falcon. Han cursed. “Chewie, now would be a great time for some fancy flying,” Han said.

Chewbacca agreed, and started making a run for it. The Star Destroyer was gaining, but even after they took a hit to their shield generator, it was clear the Imperials weren’t shooting to kill.

Again, Vader’s presence lashed out, and Anakin rebutted it. The Falcon sped forward. Anakin was impressed; the sublight engines were definitely aftermarket to be going at the speed they were. He’d have to ask Han about it once they got out of this mess. 

Leia joined them in the cockpit. She turned to Anakin. “Your plan worked,” she said. “Half of the transports as well as the main command ship are away.”

“Great,” Han ground out. “Now, if we can just figure out a way to get this massive Star Destroyer off our ass, we can count it as a victory.”

“Don’t jump until the rest of the ships have cleared,” Leia said. She had a hard look on her face. “Vader knows this ship and he knows what he’s after. Ani’s right, we have to be the diversion.”

“Bait, more like,” Han muttered. Leia shot him a look.

Chewbacca said something, and Han looked over at Anakin. “We’re clear to jump when ready,” he said. “As soon as we’re done playing tag.”

Anakin looked to Leia, who checked with Command. Most everyone had left, they said. Leia turned to Chewbacca. “Jump,” she said.

Chewbacca pulled a lever, and the ship jolted roughly into hyperspace.

Luke returned to the cabin from the gun he’d been on and sat down heavily on the booth surrounding a dejarik table. 

“Good shooting, Skywalker,” Han said. “Glad to have you back in the Falcon.”

“Thanks,” Luke said, sounding miserable.

Han walked over and slapped Luke’s shoulder. “What’s up? In case your comm was broken, we just won, or something like it.”

Luke looked up, determined. “No,” he said, “we didn’t. We wouldn’t have been attacked at all if it weren’t for me.”

“Don’t give yourself so much credit, kid,” Han advised. “You aren’t the only one the Empire would love to get their hands on.”

“Yeah, but I’m the reason they’re putting so much effort into it,” Luke said. “We know Vader isn’t going to rest until I’ve been captured - and probably publicly executed for treason, too,” he said bitterly. 

“Well,” Leia said, “then Vader will have to get used to not resting.” She put a hand on Luke’s other shoulder. “The Rebellion isn’t going to give you up,” she said. 

“It sure would make things easier.”

“No, it wouldn’t,” Anakin said. He looked at Luke, who was sitting with his shoulders hunched over. “You think they would stop once they had you? I hate to side with Han, here, but they aren’t going to be satisfied with just you. The Empire isn’t going to stop unless they’re defeated or they’ve stomped out every last trace of resistance. Your death would just demoralize people. At best, you’d turn into a martyr - at worst, a symbol of the Empire’s power.” Anakin didn’t realize how heated he was getting, but he pressed on. “Think of that wall back in the barracks. None of your squad wants your name to be added to it. You’re a great pilot and an asset to the Rebellion, but you’re a great leader and a great friend, too. Don’t forget that.”

Luke looked up at him, seeming a little shaken by his words. Anakin felt the rest of the people in the cabin staring at him, too, but he just crossed his arms. “I may not have been part of your group for long, but I can tell you - rebellions need people like you, Luke. You give them hope.” Anakin let his last sentence hang in the air.

In the silence that followed, Artoo beeped from the corner. Anakin smiled. “Artoo says he would be pretty upset if you turned yourself over.”

Luke smiled shakily at the droid. “Well,” he said, “wouldn’t want to upset Artoo, would we?”

Leia was looking at Anakin strangely, though she didn’t say anything out loud. Anakin sat back in his seat. 

“Well, what a lovely speech,” Han said. “Now, if anybody wants something useful to do, the coolant filter still needs some fixing. Chewie and I could use an extra hand.”

“I’ll come help,” Luke said immediately. Han raised an eyebrow at Leia. 

“You two go have fun with your mechanics,” Leia said. “I have to stay in contact with Command to see what we need to be doing next.”

“Right-o, princess,” Han said. He turned to Luke. “Come on, kid, engine room’s this way.”

“I know where it is, Han,” Luke said. “You need help fixing something or another on this ship every time I’m in it.”

“Not every time,” Han said as the three of them went deeper into the ship. Chewbacca said something, and Han took on an offended air. “No, not every time! And that wasn’t my fault,” he added.

Leia waited until it they were out of earshot before turning to Anakin. She gave him a long look. “Alright,” she said. “Who are you, really?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you.”

“Ani Naberrie,” Anakin said. 

Leia narrowed her eyes. “Ani Naberrie, pilot extraordinaire who’s stayed completely out of politics these last few years and yet knows about Hondo Ohnaka’s going rates as well as has extensive knowledge on Clone Wars battle tactics and how they might be used by Imperials? Forgive me if I’m a little skeptical that you’ve told us the whole truth.”

Anakin sighed. As much as he did want to tell Leia the truth, he doubted she would believe him. And from what she had said about Vader, he gathered it wouldn’t be a pleasant scene even if she did. “You’re right,” he said slowly. “Ani Naberrie isn’t my real name. But I swear to you, I have no love for the Empire, and I want to help the Rebellion as much as I can.”

“I believe you,” Leia said, surprising Anakin.

“You do?”

She nodded. “I wouldn’t have let you work in my office if I thought there was even the slightest chance you were a spy. I trust you because Luke trusts you, and Luke’s a Jedi, or going to be. He has good instincts about people.” She paused. “I’m not going to force you to tell me who you are, but if you ever want to talk, I’m here,” she said. “Believe me, I know what it’s like to feel like your entire life has been taken away from you.”

Anakin looked up at her sharply. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just a guess.” Leia stood up. “I have to make a call to Command to figure out our next move. You should go help the boys with the engine. I’m sure they could use your assistance, master Jedi.”

Anakin blanched. He opened his mouth to rebut Leia’s claim, but she was already walking away.

Chapter Text

“Leia!” Anakin called out, jogging a little to catch up to her. “Leia, wait!”

She paused and turned. “Yes?”

Anakin stopped in front of her and lowered his voice. “How did you know?” he asked. 

Leia blinked. “I - well, it was a guess,” she said. “I wasn’t completely certain. But there’s the way you fly, and Luke told me you met General Kenobi, and - well, there are a lot of reasons why someone would want to hide from the Empire, but there aren’t so many that would want to hide so much that you wouldn’t know anything that was going on.” She paused. “The real reason I figured it out was in the battle.” Leia’s tone hardened. “When that ship came out of hyperspace. You could feel him, too.”

Anakin drew in a sharp breath. “So you did sense Vader,” he said. 

Leia crossed her arms. “He’s been in my head,” she said bitterly. “Whatever he did, it means I can… tell when he’s around, sometimes. Luke says it’s because he used the Force.”

“Well, kind of,” Anakin said. “I mean, yes, it’s because he uses the Force. But you can sense him because you have it, too, not just because he’s been in your head.” He frowned. “Like - do you ever just sort of know when Luke is about to turn the corner to see you?”

Leia frowned. “I… I suppose, maybe.”

Anakin smiled at her. “It’s because you both have it. The Force, I mean.”

“I can’t sense you, though.”

“Well, I have shields,” Anakin said. “Like you do, though maybe you don’t realize you have them. Yours are even better than mine.”

Leia sat down. “When I was younger,” she said, “there was a woman who came and taught me how to shield my mind. She said that anyone could do it to prevent a Force-user to read their thoughts. I figured it was important if I was going to be a Senator.”

“Well, yes,” Anakin explained. “Everyone can do it, to some degree. But a Force-sensitive is able to make much stronger shields than most. Yours are so strong not even I could get through them.”

Leia smiled a little sadly. “Vader couldn’t, either,” she said. 

Anakin felt a rush of pride. “Good,” he said.

Leia looked at him hesitantly. “If you don’t mind me asking,” she said, “how old were you when the Clone Wars ended? I’ve met a couple Jedi before - maybe you knew them.”

Anakin shifted uncomfortably. Even untrained, Leia might be able to sense a lie. “I’d… rather not talk about the Clone Wars, or anything like that,” he said. 

“Of course.” She paused again. “Will you tell Luke? I haven’t told him my suspicions. Ever since General Kenobi was killed, he’s been looking everywhere for someone to teach him about the Force.”

That, at least, Anakin could do. “I’d be happy to,” he said. “And I can train you, too, if you want it.”

Leia smiled. “I think I’m better with a blaster than a laser sword, but thank you.” She stood up. “Now, I really do have to call Command. There’s a stop we might have to make along the way in a few hours, and I need to make sure we’re a go for it.”

“Got it,” Anakin said. They both paused as they heard the unmistakable sound of Han swearing. “I’m going to head down to the engine room and see if I can be useful. It seems like they might need some help.”

Leia smiled, and Anakin wandered off in the direction of the clanging and swearing.

He knocked on the door of the engine room before opening it to see Han and Chewbacca apparently arguing over something while Luke lay on his back, only his legs visible as he worked on the underside of one of the coolant tanks.

At his entrance, Han spun around. “Ani!” he said. “We’re having a bit of trouble. Tin-can over here says the Falcon says the coolant tanks are leaking, but we can’t find the leak.” He gestured with a hydrospanner, and Anakin followed his gesture to a gold-plated protocol droid. 

Anakin gaped. It was one thing seeing Artoo, but was that - ? It couldn’t be, Anakin decided. Lots of protocol droids looked the same; it could just be a similar model.

“Captain Solo,” the droid said, “I assure you there is a leak, the ship was quite clear on the matter. In fact, if we don’t find it, I calculate the chances of overheating and being forced out of hyperspace are extremely high -”

“Yeah, Threepio, we get it,” Luke’s voice filtered out from under the tank. 

Anakin crossed his arms. “That’s - ah - interesting droid to have,” he said. 

Han gave C-3P0 a long-suffering look. “I can never get him to shut up. He’s Leia’s, and, y’know, I can’t just get rid of him because there’s only so much of her home she’s got left,” he said with a grimace.

A little bit of childish pride crept up in Anakin. “Seems like he’s useful to have around, though,” he said. “I mean, to talk to the ship.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Han said. “Not gonna be that useful if we explode into a million tiny pieces in the middle of deep space.”

Point taken, Anakin walked over to the access point for the coolant tanks. “Have you determined the leak is in this room and not from a burst pipe somewhere?”

From under the tank, Luke answered. “Yeah,” he said, muffled. “If a pipe had burst, we’d already be in bigger trouble. It’s gotta be that something’s not connected around here.”

“Okay,” Anakin said. He knelt down by the second tank and felt around. Gently, he reached out with the Force, trying to determine where the leak was. He frowned and crawled underneath it. There were several frayed wires, and he touched one with his mechno-hand experimentally. No zap of electricity. 

“Hey,” he called from underneath. “I think the problem’s that this tank isn’t being told to pump anything out,” he said. “There’s a bunch of dead wires down here.”

Chewbacca said something, and C-3P0 immediately translated. “He says that that’s what he suggested at the beginning, Captain Solo, and - respectfully, sir, that you are a - great buffoon for not checking it earlier.”

“Shut it, will ya? I understand what he’s saying,” Han muttered. He knelt down next to Anakin. “Frayed wires, huh? I think there are some spares in a storage unit somewhere. Be right back.”

Luke slid out from under the tank. Most of his face and upper body were coated in engine grease, and he frowned. “I can’t believe you figured that out so quick,” he said to Anakin. “I didn’t have to get this greasy after all.”

Han returned triumphantly with a bunch of wire that looked as though it had seen better days, and Anakin looked at it in disbelief. “This is all you’ve got?”

Han gave him a look. “I’m a wanted man, Naberrie,” he said. “Not exactly as though I can go stop by the nearest spaceport and load up, is it?”

Han may have been a wanted man, but it wasn’t exactly as though wires were hard to come by. Anakin didn’t say anything as he knelt back down. “Normally,” he said, “we’d have to turn the engine off for this, but since we’re in the middle of hyperspace I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“You don’t say?” Han said sarcastically. He grimaced. “I’m not real keen on getting electrocuted, though.”

“I can do it,” Anakin said. Grudgingly, he pulled his glove off to reveal his mechno-hand. “It won’t conduct, don’t worry. It’s come in useful for mid-flight repairs before.”

Han tossed him the ball of wires. “Alright,” he said. “Be my guest.”

Anakin slid back under the tank and began the process of reconnecting the dead wires with the new ones. Several were stripped, and several seemed frayed beyond repair, but after a few minutes Anakin had it up and running. He slid back out. “Fixed it,” he said.

“Oh, hooray!” Threepio said. “The Falcon says the coolant tanks are back online and working!”

Relief washed through the room. Luke grinned. “Alright,” he said. “I get first dibs on the refresher.” Nobody objected to that, so he wandered off. 

Anakin pulled his glove back on and buckled it. Han gave him a look. “Thanks for the help,” he said. “You know, if you ever get tired of the Rebellion, we could use you on the Falcon full-time.”

Anakin laughed. “Not likely,” he said. “I’d make a terrible smuggler.”

“Suit yourself,” Han said. 

Anakin wandered back to the cabin. Leia was still on her call, so he walked into one of the adjacent rooms and laid down on a bunk, thinking. About Leia’s guess, and what he would tell Luke, and how he could conceivably pretend to have been - what, twelve, at the oldest when the Clone Wars ended? He was twenty-six, but he could maybe pass for early thirties if he had to. 

He heard an electronic ping, and leaned up against the wall. The room he was in backed up to the bunk, he realized. Luke’s voice filtered through, very muffled.

“Hey, Wedge,” he was saying. “Hope you got out okay. I think we’re going to have to make another stop before we can rendezvous. Leia got a call that there’s info that needs to be picked up, and we’re the only ship headed in that direction.” Luke sighed. “When you can, update me on Rogue. Ani’s with me, so don’t worry about him, but we got out before I could tell how many of us made it.” There was a pause. “Miss you,” Luke said.

Anakin was so absorbed in listening to Luke’s message that he didn’t notice Artoo sneaking up on him until the astromech zapped him. Anakin whirled. “Hey!” he whispered. “Stop that, I’m trying to concentrate!”

Not good protocol! Artoo beeped. 

“Shut up,” Anakin hissed. 

Not good protocol! Artoo beeped again. He extended his arm again threateningly.

“Fine!” Anakin said. He crossed his arms and moved away from the wall. “I get it, I’ll give Luke his privacy. What do you want?”

Anakin, designation: enemy! Artoo beeped. 

“I know, buddy.” Anakin sighed. “I’m not Vader, though. Something happened - I’m from a different universe, or something, I think. For me, the Clone Wars ended just over a year ago, and the Empire never happened.”

Does not compute!

“Yeah, not for me either.” Anakin put a hand on Artoo’s dome. “I’m going by Ani, if that helps differentiate things for you.”

Artoo let out a soft beep, then rolled closer to Anakin and turned on his holoprojector. A slightly grainy image sharpened, and Anakin drew in a sharp breath. It was Padmé, and she was sitting on what looked like the couch in her apartment on Coruscant. Even in the hologram, she looked tired. Ani, she said, come home soon. There’s something I need to tell you. I love you. I miss you. Be safe. The image cut, and Artoo whistled lowly.

Anakin looked down. “I miss her too,” he said. “I mean - she’s not dead, not in my universe, but here -” he sighed. “I just want to tell her about our kids, you know? She should have gotten to see them grow up. She would be so proud of them.” Anakin patted Artoo’s dome. 

Ani, designation: friend, Artoo said. Not an enemy.

“Thanks,” Anakin said. 

Inform Luke and Leia! Artoo beeped. 

“I - not yet,” Anakin said. “I don’t know how they’ll react.”

Shaavit! Artoo beeped. Inform!

Anakin raised an eyebrow. “They might be upset,” he said. 

Artoo rolled forward and thumped into Anakin’s leg. “Ow,” he said. “Fine. I’ll tell them after this mission Leia needs us to do is finished. That make you happy?”

Affirmative, Artoo beeped. 

Anakin rolled his eyes. “But if they get mad, you have to stick up for me, okay?”

Artoo beeped a wishy-washy response, and Anakin shot him a look. 

Later, once everyone had had the opportunity to take a shower and was gathered around the cabin, Leia announced the plan. “We have an informant on an Imperial outpost nearby,” she said. “He has information that we need to get out and to command. We weren’t the ones originally supposed to take on this mission, but we ended up being the only ones headed in this direction, and we’re worried about the Empire finding out our network, so we need to act quickly.” She turned to Han. “Do you still have Stormtrooper armor around here somewhere?”

Han raised an eyebrow. “Oh, no way am I playing dress-up again. That stuff is uncomfortable and hot, and makes me look like an idiot.”

Leia looked at him coolly. “You don’t need Stormtrooper armor to look like an idiot, Han,” she said. “Now, do you still have it or not?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Han said. “It’s in a storage compartment somewhere.”

“Great,” Leia said. “This shouldn’t be difficult, but we’ll need someone to go aboard the outpost and recon with our informant. I can’t give out his name, but he’ll give us directions to his location once we’re onboard.”

“Hold up,” Han said. “I only have the one suit, you know. We can’t all be strolling along.”

Leia shot him a look. “We aren’t,” she said. “Ani’s going to go.”

Anakin looked up at her. “Me?”

“Luke’s too short,” Leia said matter-of-factly. Luke looked a little disgruntled, but didn’t deny it. 

“Okay,” Anakin said. “So what’s the deal?”

“We have landing codes,” Leia said. “Nobody will recognize the ship until we get there. It’s not a very large station, so we should be able to get in and out before the Imperials send backup.” She grimaced. “It’s not the most solid plan, but we don’t have the luxury of waiting for a new one.”

They neared the outpost and Anakin donned the armor. Han hadn’t lied; it was uncomfortable and didn’t seem to be particularly blaster-proof, and Anakin was a little too tall for it to fit totally correctly. Still, he tugged on the helmet. “How do I look?”

“Just like an Imp,” Han replied. He looked at Leia. “We sure these codes are good?”

Leia nodded. “They better be.” They dropped out of hyperspace, and the intercom buzzed. 

“Unidentified vessel, transmit codes immediately,” an officer’s voice crackled.

Leia leaned towards the intercom. “Transmitting now,” she said, and sent them. The group waited anxiously. 

“Confirmed. Please continue to hangar bay four.” 

Han maneuvered the ship to the hangar Leia indicated, and Leia turned to Anakin. “They’ll catch on pretty quick,” she said. She handed him a comm. “Download the information and get back here as soon as you can.”

“Got it,” Anakin said. The Falcon touched down, and he walked into the outpost with Artoo. Immediately, he was met by a pair of officers.

One of them looked up skeptically at the Falcon. “Where’d you get that?” he asked.

“Uh, commandeered it,” Anakin said. “My ship broke down.”

“Surprised you made it this far with that. Looks like a piece of junk,” the man said.

Anakin nodded. “It handles okay,” he said. “I got here, didn’t I?”

“Guess so,” one of the officers said. He let Anakin walk past, and once Anakin was in a hallway, he looked at his comm. A small map of the outpost popped up with a red line showing his path. Easy enough. Anakin followed the line, nodding at Stormtroopers he came across. He stopped in front of a door.

Leia had shown him the pattern to knock - a short tap, a long tap, and another short tap. There was no response at first, and Anakin waited and knocked again. 

The door hissed slightly as it opened, and Anakin walked inside. It was a data center of some sort. The door closed behind him, and he took off his helmet. “Alright, plug in,” he told Artoo.

Something clanged behind him, and Anakin whirled to see an older-looking man standing there with a shocked expression. He barely had time to open his mouth to ask what was wrong before the man was practically crushing him in a hug. 

“Er,” Anakin said.

The man stepped back. “General,” he said, and snapped to attention. Anakin’s jaw dropped open. 

“Rex? ” he asked, barely believing it. “You’re… old,” he said lamely. 

“I'd say the same about you, but you don’t look a day older than you were the last time I saw you,” Rex said. “Which, by the way, I have half a mind to punch you for. I thought you were dead,” he said. 

“Ah,” Anakin said. He swallowed. “Um, well. Actually, you know what? It’s a really long story.”

Rex raised an eyebrow. “Don’t think I won’t change my mind about the punch,” he said. 

Anakin sighed, relenting. “I may have… come from a different universe,” he said, awkwardly. Rex gave him a flat expression. “And before you ask, no, I don’t know how or why or anything. But, um, in my universe, the Empire never happened.” He gave Rex a grimace. 

“Wow,” Rex said. “You know, they told me they were sending in a last-minute team, but they sure as hell didn’t mention any of that.”

“Well, yeah,” Anakin said. “That’s the other thing. Um, I haven’t told anyone?” At Rex’ expression, he held up his hands defensively. “It’s just - my children,” he said. “I don’t want to freak them out.”

Rex nodded. Then - “Hang on,” he said. “ Children? As in, more than one?”

“Um, yeah,” Anakin said. “Luke, who you already know, he told me about you.”

Rex smiled. “He’s a good kid,” he said. “Hell of a pilot, told him he was just like his father.”

Anakin grinned. “Yeah, he’s amazing, isn’t he? He was showing me some of his X-wing mods, and I was pretty impressed.”

“So go on. You and the Senator had two kids?”

“Yeah,” Anakin said. He paused. “Wait, how did you know it was Padmé?”

Rex gave him a long-suffering look. If there was any doubt in his mind as to the identity of the man, it vanished. “Please,” he said. “Don’t insult my intelligence. You had me stand guard on secret calls with her, remember?”

Anakin grimaced. “Yeah. So, it turns out it was twins! Luke and Leia.”

Rex’ eyes widened. “The Princess is your kid?” He took a step back. “Yeah,” he said, “I can see it, now. She doesn’t like being told what to do, either.”

Anakin grinned. “I know. I promised Artoo here that I’d tell them after we finished this mission.”

“Well, I hope I can be there for that conversation,” Rex said. 

Artoo beeped, and Anakin checked the computer. “He’s done,” he said. “Let’s move out."

The two of them started back to the ship with Artoo. It was taking every ounce of patience Anakin had to refrain from talking, but he did. They were nearing the hangar when suddenly Anakin froze, a sense of foreboding crashing down on him like a wave. He turned to Rex. “Something bad is about to happen,” he said. “Run.”

They ran, Artoo trailing behind (did the Organas get rid of his rocket boosters? Why the hell would they do that?). Anakin’s comm beeped. 

“Hurry,” Leia’s voice came through, sounding panicked. “We’re detecting ships coming out of hyperspace.”

“Almost there,” Anakin replied. Not caring who saw, he used a little bit of the Force to speed Artoo along. The droid sputtered a protest, and Anakin glanced sympathetically over his shoulder. 

They were in sight of the hangar bay when a ship hurtled towards them. It looked like a TIE, but clearly had both a shield generator and a hyperdrive, as well as modifications Anakin hadn’t seen on the TIEs he’d looked up on the ‘net. Fuck, he thought, with feeling. 

The TIE’s hatch opened, but Anakin knew who it was going to be before the figure stepped out. He sprinted to the hangar, using the Force to practically throw Artoo over to the Falcon. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like he and Rex were going to make it in time. 

Vader stood before them, his lightsaber out and unlit in his hand. He looked towards Anakin, then back at the Falcon. Anakin skidded to a halt, trying to gauge his options. Without a weapon, his chances against Vader were not good. Maybe, he thought, he could take his helmet off and surprise Vader into enough time? He turned to Rex, who was staring resolutely at the helmeted monstrosity of a Sith.

Vader stepped closer to Anakin and Rex. He held up his hand, and both men were suspended above the ground, clutching their throats. 

A cry came from inside the Falcon, and Anakin cursed. Luke came running down the hatch, saber drawn. He lit it up and stood behind Vader. “Put them down,” he said, his voice remarkably steady.

Vader dropped Rex and Anakin. Anakin collapsed to the ground, gasping for air. He tried to shout, but he couldn’t, not in time. Luke was standing in the opening stance for Shii-Cho, sort of, holding his saber far too tightly and with his feet too flat. Vader looked at him critically, and let out something eerily reminiscent of a laugh. “You would fight me, boy?” he intoned. His voice was deeper than Anakin’s own, and sounded artificial. A respirator hissed steadily. 

Luke didn’t reply, just stood in the ready stance. Vader tilted his helmet. “Very well, then,” he said, and he lit up his own saber, shining a brilliant red.

Chapter Text

Anakin watched with horror as Vader closed the distance between himself and Luke, baring his blade down. Luke made a clumsy parry, but had to step backwards. From beside him on the ground, Rex looked at him, and Anakin swallowed, wincing at the pain. He looked up again as Luke made a wild swing that Vader deflected easily.

Vader was barely trying, but it was clear Luke was out of his depth. Anakin cursed this universe’s Obi-Wan - seriously, the least the man could do was teach his son how to defend himself! With enormous effort, Anakin struggled to his feet, still having trouble breathing properly. 

“Get away!” Luke yelled frantically. “I’ll hold him off!”

Anakin couldn’t see Rex’ expression through his helmet, but he imagined the man was giving him a look. He reached out his hand and pulled Rex up. 

Anakin leaned close to his friend. “On my mark,” he murmured. Vader’s back was to them, and Anakin was still shielding - he’d have a chance at surprise, but only one. Beside him, Rex nodded. 

There were several Stormtroopers standing guard, but none of them had fired. Maybe they were waiting for orders, or maybe they were afraid of accidentally shooting Vader - Anakin didn’t know, and he didn’t intend to find out. Carefully, he and Rex edged around the side of the hangar until they were equidistant to Vader and Luke and the Falcon. Anakin sucked in a breath as Vader nearly landed a blow, but Luke ducked in the nick of time. Rex put a steadying hand on Anakin’s shoulder. 

Anakin stepped forward and closed his eyes, trying to imagine himself as a lightning bolt about to strike. He waited until Vader was turned away from him again, and then he dropped his shields, calling two of the Stormtroopers’ blasters to him at the same time. 

He tossed the blasters to Rex, who caught them and began to fire on the Stormtroopers, who had finally decided it was time to pay attention. At the display of the Force, Vader had whipped around, and Luke, too, was staring at Anakin with a confused expression. 

“Luke,” Anakin said, “get in the ship and go.” He let a hint of Force suggestion into his words; it wouldn’t be enough that Luke wouldn’t have a choice, but it would help speed things up.

Vader turned towards Anakin and Rex, his saber leveled. “Who are you?” he asked, his tone demanding. 

Anakin smiled. “I thought you’d never ask,” he said. Luke had turned to the Falcon but was watching the scene with wide eyes. Anakin held out his hand and called Luke’s saber (well, it was Anakin’s saber, technically, but no matter) to his hands. “Luke, go,” he said again, and took off his helmet. 

If Vader had been angry before, he was downright furious now, and bore down on Anakin harshly. Anakin deflected his first strike and returned it, feeling the hum of his lightsaber beneath his hands for the first time since he’d arrived in this Force-forsaken universe. He smiled at Vader. “Surprised?”

Vader didn’t say anything, just rained down blow after blow. Anakin deflected them, though he had to admit it was more difficult than he thought it would be. In his periphery, he was aware of Leia running down the Falcon’s ramp and grabbing Luke, forcibly pulling him back into the ship. Anakin, for his part, tried to push Vader further away. 

Behind him, Rex continued to blast Stormtroopers, and Anakin was reminded of more situations than he’d like to admit where it had been the two of them against unbeatable odds. Rex must have had the same thought, because after Anakin Force-pushed Vader back a few meters and reached out to deflect a bolt away from hitting Rex, the clone turned to him and said, “just like old times, General?”

Anakin grunted in response, narrowly avoiding a piece of piping Vader had flung at his head. The Falcon had taken off, and was carrying Artoo and whatever information Rex had so badly needed to get out, and Anakin tried to remind himself that that was the important thing: Luke and Leia were getting away. Vader doubled down, and Anakin marveled at just how freakishly strong his evil counterpart was. A few strikes later, and the question was answered when Anakin managed a glancing blow to Vader’s left forearm, revealing not flesh and blood but sparks and wiring. Anakin raised his eyebrows. 

“Who took off that one?” he asked, trying not to show how much effort this was taking. “Must be embarrassing to be a Sith Lord and have people going around left and right slicing off your limbs.” 

Vader Force-pushed him backwards, and Anakin tumbled down. “You are not possible,” Vader said, stalking towards him. Anakin got up and jumped to the top of Vader’s modified TIE, which was standing next to him. He panted down at the black-suited Sith.

“Through the Force,” he said, “all things are possible. Or don’t you remember Obi-Wan’s teaching?” With a Force-enhanced leap, he launched himself from the roof of the TIE to meet Vader’s blade in an overhead strike that sent pain lancing through his right arm. 

Vader stepped closer, and Anakin was forced backwards. “Is that what you are?” Vader asked. “Kenobi’s revenge?”

Anakin didn’t really know what he was talking about - had Obi-Wan made some sort of threat before he died? It didn’t seem very in-character for the man he knew, but nearly two decades of living on a desert planet could harden a person. “Yeah,” he said, deciding to go with it. “You could say that.”

Vader raised his saber. “Then you will die, just as he did.”

Anakin rolled out of the way just in time, using his lightsaber to cut through one of the supports on the TIE’s left wing. It didn’t collapse, but it probably pissed Vader off, which was what Anakin had been trying to do. 

“Good luck with that,” Anakin said. “I’d say we’re evenly matched.”

“I am not weak as you are, Skywalker,” Vader growled, stalking towards Anakin. “I have achieved my full potential.”

“Really?” Anakin said, parrying a blow just a split second before it would have connected. “Because it seems like I’m the one with more arms and more friends,” he said. With a grunt, he struck at Vader’s left flank, forcing the Sith into a brief saberlock. “And I’ve tried the Dark side,” he said, his voice low enough that it was a threat, “and trust me, it doesn’t end well.” 

Vader pushed him out of the lock. “Perhaps we are evenly matched,” he said. “But your old friend isn’t.”

Anakin watched as Vader reached out and tugged Rex over to him with the Force, throwing the man’s helmet to the side and putting his saber under his throat. If he still had any friendly feelings towards Rex, they didn’t show themselves.

Anakin stood, frozen. “Put him down,” he said, raising his saber.

Vader laughed. “Do you think you can kill me before I can kill him?”

Anakin snarled. “You’ll kill him anyway if I stand down,” he said.

Vader’s mask was expressionless, but he leveled it to Anakin. “No,” he said. “He has information that would be… useful to me. Stand down, and I’ll make sure he survives long enough to be interrogated as a traitor.”

Anakin simmered. “I’m sure you know Rex,” he said. “He would rather die than betray what he believes in.”

“But you don’t want him to have to, do you?”

Anakin looked at Rex helplessly. Rex gave him a short nod: permission, but Anakin couldn’t do it. He deactivated his lightsaber.

Vader signalled several Stormtroopers over, and pushed Rex over to them. He turned to Anakin. “Pathetic,” he said. “Your care for your friends is an easily-exploitable weakness.” He took Anakin’s saber and clipped it to his belt, then roughly put what Anakin realized were Force-inhibiting binders on his wrists. “I have overcome such things.”

“Have you?” Anakin asked as Vader gripped his arm and began leading him away. “Or do you carry Force-binders around with you wherever you go?”

“I do not see the relevancy of that.”

“They were for Luke, weren’t they?” 

Vader’s hand on Anakin’s arm tightened. “What,” he said, “do you care?”

Anakin paused, turning to look at Vader so his face was a hand’s breadth from Vader’s mask. “He’s my son, too,” he said, his voice hard. 

Vader stared at him for an unreadable second - without the Force, Anakin couldn’t get the slightest idea of what he was thinking - and gripped Anakin’s arm harder, pulling him along. Anakin refused to wince.

“Bring him along,” Vader said to the Stomrtroopers holding Rex. 

Rex gave Anakin a look, and Anakin gave him a slight shrug. They were marched through the hallways of the outpost until they came to a lift, which they took down several floors. Once they exited, they were taken to a small, bare room. Vader turned to the Stormtroopers. “Leave us.”

He followed Anakin and Rex inside the cell and sat down opposite them. “Now,” he said, “you are going to tell me everything you know about Luke Skywalker.”

Chapter Text

Anakin leaned back against the cell wall, edging a little closer to Rex in the process. “No, I’m not,” he said, staring at Vader with what he hoped was a cool, even gaze. Anakin had learned that the best way to get your captor to accidentally reveal information that might be useful to you was to aggravate them to the point of anger. It was, unfortunately, also the best way to get yourself tortured while being held captive, but, well. Anakin hoped that wouldn’t be the case here. He frowned. Would it? Surely Vader knew Anakin wasn’t going to go around spilling his secrets. Well. More of his secrets, anyways. Anakin closed his eyes. The lack of the Force made the small cell feel even smaller, like the walls were seconds away from caving in at any given time. 

“Yeah, what’s the kid to you, anyway?” Rex asked beside him, defiant as ever. Anakin’s eyes popped open. So Rex hadn’t been listening to his and Vader’s conversation. He glanced over at his friend, worriedly.

Vader was silent for a long pause. “He is my son,” he said, “and I have a right to know about him.”

It took Rex about half a second to put the pieces together, and Anakin watched as his friend’s face went through about thirty different emotions in the space of it. Shock, horror, anger, fear - Anakin couldn’t decide what, exactly was the current expression, but it certainly wasn’t good. “You mean,” Rex said, clenching the edge of the bench he and Anakin were sitting on, “you’re -”

Anakin put his bound hands on Rex’ shoulder, aiming to steady him, but his friend didn’t seem to notice. Rex surged to his feet, looking down on Vader and pointing at him with a shaking hand. “How could you?” he asked. “When I heard what happened to the 501st on - on that day - I thought you were dead,” he said, visibly holding back his anger. “I wish they had killed you,” he said. 

Vader looked at him without moving a muscle. “Are you finished?” he asked. 

“No!” Rex practically snarled. “I - me and Ahsoka mourned you! All this time, I thought you died defending the Republic, and now I learn you helped bring it down!” Chest heaving, Rex sat back down, abruptly. “My brothers and I had a chip in our heads that forced us to turn against the people we trusted most,” he said bitterly. “You did it without a second thought.”

Hesitantly, Anakin put his hands again on Rex’ shoulder, relieved when his friend didn’t brush it off. Rex was staring at his clenched fists, and Anakin didn’t need to feel his emotions in the Force to know how livid he was.

“The Jedi were traitors,” Vader said, seemingly unaffected by Rex’ words. “As, I can see, are you.” He paused, and Anakin glared at him. “Now, we will discuss my son.”

“He’s no son of yours,” Anakin spat. “He hates everything that you stand for.”

“And he loves everything that you do?” Vader stood up. “You aren’t strong enough to protect him. All you do is fail. The only way to ensure his safety is with me.” He looked down at Anakin. “Whatever you are, some kind of… specter given flesh, sent from beyond the grave to torment me, you will not succeed. I am more powerful than you ever were, and I will succeed where you did not.”

Anakin flinched. Unbidden, the memory of his mother dying in his arms came to him. Anakin remembered that feeling all too well, the feeling of sheer and utter helplessness to what was happening. He remembered that same feeling when Sidious had Padmé, and the rush of the Dark side, calling him to act. Telling him it was the answer, that only with that power would he be able to destroy Sidious and save his wife. 

“I already succeeded,” he said. “In my universe, I killed Palpatine, and Padmé lived. My children lived. And we’re happy,” he said. 

Vader reached out his hand, and Anakin found himself held against the wall. “You dare speak her name?” Vader asked. “What you say is impossible.”

Anakin winced. Vader’s power was crushing him, slowly. “Search - my mind,” he ground out. “Find out the truth.”

The pressure eased somewhat. “You lie,” Vader said. 

“No,” Anakin ground out.

Vader paused, then reached out with the Force, pushing his way up against Anakin’s shields. Anakin dropped them ever so slightly, pulling up a memory. He had to be careful - should he even think about Leia too strongly, Vader might learn the truth, but this, he could show. 

The memory was from about a month before Anakin stepped through the portal. Rex had stayed for an extended visit after coming to Naboo to watch the twins during Padmé’s sister’s wedding, and Obi-Wan had stopped by to visit after an eventful meeting with representatives from Taris who were considering rejoining the Republic. Leia, Anakin recalled, had been taking a nap, and Ahsoka’s counterpart was still away hunting Maul.

They were all seated around the table in their kitchen, eating dinner. Luke was in his highchair, waving around a piece of fruit in his hand and delighted to be the center of attention. 

See? Ahsoka had been saying, he’s very smart. Lukey, who am I?

Soka! Luke had said happily, banging on the tray in front of him. 

And who’s this? Ahsoka had asked, taking Rex’ hand and making him wave at the toddler.

Rex! Luke had said, delighted to answer more questions that he knew.

And who’s this grumpy old man? Ahsoka had asked, this time waving Obi-Wan’s hand.

Luke had looked at Obi-Wan for a long second. Been! he settled on.

Anakin had laughed as Obi-Wan took on a slightly offended air. Obi-Wan, he had pronounced carefully, looking at Luke. 

Luke smiled. Been!

Fine, Obi-Wan had said. We can settle on Ben. That’s an old nickname, after all. 

Anakin had snickered. I don’t know, he had said. I kinda like Been. 

The memory dissolved, and Vader ripped out of Anakin’s mind. He pushed Anakin harder against the wall. “Memories can be manipulated,” he said. 

Anakin felt the simmering anger build up. “That’s all you have to say?” he asked. “After I showed you what could have been? What you could have had?”

“You are a liar,” Vader said. “I did everything for her.”

“Was it worth it?” Anakin said. “Your Empire? Was it worth it? I know you, because I am you, even if you don’t want to admit it. So tell me, would you do it again? Destroy everything you loved for the chance to be - what, another pawn, going around killing whoever your Master tells you to? Think of what you could have had!”

Vader closed his fist, and Anakin found himself unable to breathe. He seethed, gritting his teeth and maintaining eye contact with Vader. “If you are me,” Vader said, “do not presume to speak so boldly. I have done only what I must. The Republic was corrupt, the war was evil, and the Jedi did nothing but perpetuate it and blindly follow one another. I have built an Empire of peace, of safety, and of order. The galaxy is greater than it has ever been, and the Jedi would have stopped me. They tried, and failed. You asked who cut off my other arm? The same person who cut off both of my legs and left me to burn on the bank of a river of lava because he did not want me to have an easy death. Do you think happy memories can make me change my mind, Skywalker? Obi-Wan told me he loved me and then left me to die alone. Is that what you hold your faith in? The mindless platitudes taught to you by an old man who couldn’t even kill me properly?”

Anakin struggled to inhale. “Obi-Wan… wouldn’t,” he said, barely getting out the words. 

“You don’t believe me?” Vader asked. “Then let me show you.”

Again, Vader was in Anakin’s mind, but this time he was showing him something. Anakin watched through Vader’s eyes as he fought Obi-Wan on the bank of a volcano. He could feel Vader’s rage, at the unfairness of it all - Obi-Wan had betrayed him, had betrayed the Empire Vader was building. 

The worst part about it was how familiar Vader’s rage felt. Anakin had been thinking of Vader abstractly - him-but-not-him - but as he watched Vader use his moves, felt Vader’s hatred, it was all so familiar that Anakin balked. He thought back to his own brief battle with Obi-Wan and Ahsoka, remembered how Sidious had told him that only by killing them would he be strong enough to defeat the Sith lord.

Anakin watched as Vader made the same mistakes Anakin did, until he was standing on a hovering droid and Obi-Wan was atop a hill on the bank. 

And even though Anakin hated Vader and all he stood for, he cried out when Vader jumped. Anakin watched through Vader’s eyes as he stared up at his old master through his agony. 

And he watched as Obi-Wan turned away.

Vader pulled the memory back and released Anakin, who keeled over his knees and heaved. Next to him, Rex rubbed his back.

“You see,” Vader said. “The Dark side has no monopoly on cruelty.”

Anakin breathed deeply. “You’re right,” he said. “That seems to be a… you thing.”

“You think I am cruel? I must be. It is the only way to keep the peace. Even the Jedi knew this.”

“I might not have been… a great Jedi,” Anakin said, coughing slightly, “but even I knew that wasn’t what the Code said.”

“It is what they did,” Vader said. “In practice, if not in theory.”

If there was one thing Anakin didn’t want to do, it was to argue about the semantics of the Jedi Code and how it was carried out with his evil alter-ego. So he sat back and scowled, wishing his hands were unbound so he could cross them over his chest. 

“Now,” Vader said. “I will ask you again: what do you know about my son?”

Anakin stared past Vader at the wall and decided he was done answering questions. It was a very boring wall, he thought, trying to keep his surface thoughts occupied so that even if Vader breached his shields he wouldn’t find anything interesting. A plain gray wall - durasteel, almost certainly. The benches had been welded together uniformly, and the single light fixture in the ceiling was circular and tightly screwed in - but not welded. Interesting. Anakin filed that away for future reference. 

“My patience is not infinite,” Vader said. “Just because I want you alive doesn’t mean I need you in one piece.”

Anakin stopped looking at the light fixture and turned back to Vader. “You want to hear about Luke? Fine,” he said. “He’s not quite a year and a half old, his favorite food is mashed Shuura fruit, and he calls every ship a speeder. On his Life day, we gave him a model starfighter, and his favorite game is to have someone zoom it around while he tries to catch it. He’s happy most of the time, but he hates feeling like he isn’t the center of attention. Happy?”

Vader leaned in close. “No,” he said. “My real son.”

“Well, I met him a ten-day ago, so I can’t say I feel particularly qualified, if I’m being honest,” Anakin said. “Mostly, I learned that he hates you and would never join you in a million years.”

Vader’s respirator was unwavering, but if Anakin was a betting man he would guess the Sith was less calm than he appeared. “He will not have a choice,” Vader said. 

“Shaavit,” Anakin said. 

“If he will not turn to the Dark side and join me…” Vader trailed off. “Then I cannot control what the Emperor might do.”

Anakin shot to his feet. “Luke would never Fall,” he ground out. “He’s not like you, or me - he wouldn’t.”

“He must,” Vader said.

Anakin saw red, and before he properly registered doing so, he was rushing at Vader, hitting the man hard in the chest with his hands. “If you let the Emperor so much as see him,” he threatened, “you won’t be alive for long enough to wish you hadn’t.”

Vader shoved Anakin back into the wall, where he hit hard enough to let out a cry. “I see that I have no time for this,” he said. “Soon, Luke and his friends will attempt to come to your rescue, and then he will be mine. If I didn’t have a use for you, I would kill you now, but I shall be patient. I advise you do the same.” With that, he stalked out of the cell, locking it behind him.

Rex helped Anakin stand up, and Anakin turned to him wildly. “We can’t let him do that,” he said. “Luke - we can’t let him do that.”

Rex glanced around the room. “They’re probably monitoring what we’re saying,” he said. A warning: don’t say or reveal anything. 

Anakin slammed his wrists against the corner of the bench, trying to break the binders, but all it did was make his arms hurt. He stalked around the small cell. “They’re going to take the bait,” he said bitterly. “Maybe there’s a way to warn them once they get here.”

“Maybe,” Rex said, though he didn’t sound optimistic. 

“I’ve got an idea,” Anakin said. “Help me up to the light fixture, will you?”

Rex knelt, and Anakin used the bunk to climb onto Rex’ shoulders. Rex stood up, and Anakin swayed slightly before steadying himself. He frowned. With his hands bound, there wasn’t much he could do, especially with his glove still on. Carefully, he used his teeth to unbuckle his glove, then yanked it off, leaving his mechno-hand free. He began unscrewing the light fixture until it came out from the ceiling, leaving just the wiring and bulb behind. Anakin dug around until he found the battery it was connected to, then yanked it out. The room plunged into darkness, and Rex cursed.

Anakin jumped off decidedly less gracefully than he should have been able to. 

“What was that for? Now we can’t see anything,” Rex groused. 

Anakin hummed. “Trying to see if I can get out of these binders,” he said. He felt around for the lock, then stuck a wire in. After several minutes of fidgeting and messing with it, he felt a click, and the binders fell away.

Anakin sighed in relief. He concentrated on the door lock, but whatever it was, it didn’t budge. He frowned. “Good news and bad news, Rex,” he said.

“Good news first,” Rex said.

“The good news is I have the Force back,” Anakin said. “The bad news is that I don’t think there’s much else I can do about escaping.” He grimaced. “Also, I can’t fix the light.”

“Well, better than nothing,” Rex said. “Can you - warn Luke, or something?”

Anakin frowned. “I don’t think so,” he said. “He’s not nearby - when he is, I’ll be able to sense him, but we don’t have a bond or anything, so I can’t communicate with him.”

“...Right,” Rex said. “Of course.”

Several hours later, and nothing had changed. Anakin had taken to pacing, which was clearly annoying Rex, who was trying to sleep on one of the benches. Nobody had come to give them anything to eat, and Anakin was hungry as well as annoyed. It didn’t help that he could feel Vader’s presence on the edge of his mind, like a cold, angry storm. And that was truly worrying, because if Anakin could sense Vader, there was a good chance that, no matter how good Anakin’s shields were, Vader could sense Anakin now that he knew to look for him. And Vader hadn’t come to put new Force-binders on. So either he only had the one pair, or he had wanted Anakin to get his off. Probably as a way to help trap Luke. 

“Can you quit the pacing?” Rex finally asked. 

“Sorry,” Anakin said. He sat down heavily on the bench opposite Rex. “I just can’t shake the feeling that this is what Vader wants somehow.”

“Well, there’s not much that pacing is going to do to change that,” Rex said. 

Anakin tensed. A presence had just come out of hyperspace. “They’re here,” he said grimly. “Get ready.”

Anakin tried his best to project trap to Luke, but he couldn’t tell if the young man was getting anything or not. Again, he blamed Obi-Wan for not teaching Luke how to do even the most basics. “He’s… not coming in our direction,” Anakin said with a frown. “Maybe he’s lost.” A siren could be heard in the distance. “I think the Imperials know they’re here.”

“Great,” Rex muttered. 

“He’s somewhere above us,” Anakin said. “I don’t think he knows where we are at all.”

The door sprang open just then. Leia stood there, wearing an Imperial pilot’s uniform. “He knows where you are,” she said, shortly. “He’s causing a distraction. Now let’s go.”

“This is a trap,” Anakin blurted out. 

“We know,” Leia said, her tone still tight. “We have a plan. Follow me.”

They followed her until they came across a pair of Stormtroopers, which Leia stunned with quick efficiency. “Get their helmets and blasters,” she said. She opened a room and stuffed the bodies inside. 

Leia walked with them back to a level Anakin and Rex hadn’t been before, revealing a hangar. Everywhere, pilots and Stormtroopers were getting into ships, enough that nobody questioned when Leia, Anakin, and Rex boarded a shuttle and started it up. 

Once inside the shuttle, Leia hit her comm. “We’re ready,” she said.

“I’m in position,” Luke’s voice said out of the comm.

“Okay,” Leia said. “Good to go.”

Leia exited the hangar. “Luke’s in his X-wing,” she said. “He’s going to clear us a path.”

Anakin watched out the viewport as Luke diverted the TIEs away from them, swooping around the base and narrowly avoiding their fire. “He can’t hold out forever against all of them,” Anakin said.

“He’s just going to give us a window,” Leia said. “And then he’s going to follow us.”

Unfortunately, their luck didn’t hold. The intercom crackled. “Shuttle, get in formation,” an officer said. “Lord Vader himself will have your hide if you don’t go after that Rebel ship!”

Leia grimaced. “Yes, sir,” she said. 

“Nav is almost calculated,” she said. 

“Where are we going?” 

“We’re rendezvousing with Han,” Leia said. “We’re pretty sure this ship can be tracked, so we’re going to meet up with him and then leave.”

“Sounds good,” Anakin said.

“Shuttle,” the intercom crackled again. “This is your final warning. You will be considered an ally to the Rebels and fired upon.”

Leia grimaced. “Just a few more seconds,” she muttered. She hit her wrist comm. “Luke,” she said, “we’re almost able to jump. Leave when you can.”

“Got it,” Luke’s voice said. “I’ll be in position soon -” the comm cut off, and Luke’s Force signature spiked in alarm. 

Anakin rushed to the other viewport. “He’s been hit,” he said. He couldn’t tell where the starfighter had been hit, exactly - it was trailing smoke, but it didn’t seem to be badly damaged enough that it was in danger of exploding. But it was bad enough that Anakin doubted the hyperdrive could be convinced to go back online. 

Leia’s face went white. “Luke?” she said over her comm.

Luke’s comm was dead. Anakin panicked. “We have to go back,” he said. “Vader wants him, you know that - we need to go back and make sure he gets aboard.”

Leia opened her mouth as if to agree, but the ship shuddered, and suddenly they were in hyperspace. Anakin put up his hands to the viewport as if he could wish the ship back into realspace. “This is what he wanted,” he said, numbly. “We played right into his hands.”

Chapter Text

The shuttle really wasn’t designed for three people. It could be operated by a single pilot, and had accommodations for two, but three was stretching the limits a little. There was only the cockpit plus a small cabin, meaning that it was impossible for more than one person to be alone at a time. Currently, Leia was in the cockpit fuming while Anakin and Rex sat opposite one another in the cabin. 

“I should have done something,” Anakin said.

Rex sighed. “Like I said the last five times you said that, there’s nothing you could have done. Even you can’t stop laser cannons.” Rex looked worn out, and it occurred to Anakin again just how old he looked.

“Well, then I should have figured out a different way to stop it,” Anakin said. “I knew what Vader’s goal was. I shouldn’t have left the outpost until I knew where he was and what he was doing.”

“At least we know he isn’t going to kill him,” Rex said unhelpfully. 

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “He’s going to do something worse.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Yes, I do,” Anakin snapped. “The Dark side, it - it sucks up who you are and spits it out different. It’s like a drug. Once you’re using it, you can’t stop, and it twists you so you don’t even know who you are anymore.” 

“You said before that Luke wasn’t going to turn,” Rex said, his voice still infuriatingly steady. “All due parental respect, and all, but I’ve known the kid longer than you have. I might not have an all-powerful energy field giving me insight, but I know how to tell a good person from a bad, and Luke’s good.” He paused. “And I still don’t think you would rather him be dead than turned.”

“Maybe not,” Anakin muttered. “But if Vader can’t get him to Fall, he’s going to take him to the Emperor,” he said. The very thought of Luke being in Palpatine’s clutches made Anakin’s blood boil. “And we can’t let that happen.”

“Well,” Rex said, “I’m always up for a rescue mission.”

Anakin slumped. “I just don’t know how to find him,” he said. “Luke and Leia got us because Vader wanted them to, but Luke’s probably halfway around the galaxy by now, hidden away in some secret lair.” 

Rex stood up and put a hand on Anakin’s shoulder. “You should get some rest,” he said. “We still have over a day til we rendezvous with Han.”

“I’m not getting rest until we have a rescue plan,” Anakin said. “I’m not letting my son stay with that thing one second longer than necessary.”

“If this is where you suggest we drop out of realspace and turn around, that plan’s already been shot down,” Rex said. Anakin understood that Rex was trying to be something of a voice of reason, but he didn’t need or want that right now. Luke was in danger! Vader could be trying to get him to Fall right now. 

“Well, I don’t see you coming up with any bright ideas!” Anakin said, raising his voice more than he expected to. “I have a responsibility to him!” He stood up and began pacing.

“Don’t act like this is my fault!” Rex said. “If you had told him who you were from the beginning, maybe you would have been able to avoid this situation with the Force!”

“That’s not how the Force works - and if I had told him from the beginning, he might hate me,” Anakin said, stepping closer to Rex. “And how could I protect him then?”

“Have you considered that he’s an adult who doesn’t need constant protection?” Rex shot back.

“He’s my son,” Anakin exclaimed. “It’s my job to protect him, no matter what universe or galaxy or time or anything! And now I’ve failed, and - and he’s been captured by an evil, older version of me that I can’t seem to beat!” He glared at Rex. “I know he’s an adult, but he’s still only what - twenty? I was fighting a war at age twenty, too, and let me tell you, I sure as hell needed protection! What do you think I would have done without you, or Obi-Wan, or Ahsoka?” Anakin paused, then let out a short, hysterical laugh. “I guess I know that answer - I become an evil mask-wearing maniac! Don’t you get it, Rex? I can’t let that happen to Luke!”

Rex, Anakin noticed, had shifted his gaze from meeting Anakin’s eyes to looking slightly over Anakin’s left shoulder. Anakin whirled to see Leia standing in the doorway, her mouth a small o of surprise.

Immediately, Anakin could feel his face turning red. He stepped back, knocking into Rex. “Uh,” he said, “how much of that did you hear?”

“Enough to know you have some serious explaining to do,” Leia said evenly, her tone cool. “Why don’t we all sit down?”

Fuck. Anakin really, really was not in the mood for this conversation right now. He’d promised Artoo that he’d tell the twins, but Artoo was currently captured with Luke (a sudden, terrifying thought occurred to him: Vader wouldn’t destroy the little droid, would he?), and now really didn’t seem like the best time for familial revelations. But both Rex and Leia were staring at him with expectant looks on their faces, so Anakin sat down across from them and cleared his throat awkwardly. 

“Yeah. So, um, my real name is Anakin Skywalker,” he said. “And I’m from another universe.”

Leia’s eyes widened, but she managed to stay calm. “A - another universe?” she asked.

Anakin nodded. “Yeah. And about eighteen or nineteen years in the past.”

Leia frowned. “Okay,” she said slowly. “Can you - explain a little bit more?”

“I don’t really know how,” Anakin said. He sighed. “Sorry. I’m - this is a lot. Sorry in advance.” He took a deep breath and tried to center himself. “In my universe,” he said, “I destroyed Palpatine and the Empire never happened. I left the Jedi Order to live with my wife and my children.”

“Luke,” Leia said, nodding. 

“Um, you too,” Anakin said. 

If Leia had been taking it all in stride, this was the first thing that tripped her up. Anakin winced. 

Flatly, she said, “that’s impossible. My birth parents were refugees who died at the end of the Clone Wars.”

“I’m sure that’s what your father told you -”

“Are you suggesting he lied?” Leia asked icily.

“No! I’m suggesting he - hid the truth to protect you,” Anakin said. 

“Why would he need to protect me?” Leia met Anakin’s gaze evenly. “You died in our universe, right? What’s the harm of being a dead man’s daughter?”

Anakin winced again and looked to Rex for support, but the man was just looking at him with an eyebrow raised as if he was as curious to the answer as Leia was. “I didn’t exactly die,” Anakin said. 

Leia’s eyes flashed. “So what? You abandoned me and Luke, then?”

“Well -”

“I don’t care,” Leia said. “My father was a great man, and he’s the only one I ever need. Whatever your reason was - or, the you of this universe - I’m glad you left. I’m proud to be Leia Organa.”

“That’s great,” Anakin said. “I’m really glad you grew up happily. The Organas are wonderful people - in my universe, we get dinner together whenever we’re all on Coruscant at the same time,” he said weakly. “I’m not trying to say anything bad about them.”

“Then what are you trying to say?”

Finally, Rex took a hint and gave Anakin a nod of support. “In this universe,” Anakin said bitterly, “I turned to the Dark side. I’m - Darth Vader.” Anakin looked down at the floor miserably. “Darth Vader is me,” he said again.

As ever, Leia’s shields were impeccable, and Anakin couldn’t get a read on her emotions. But she stood up and swept out of the cabin with a finality that brooked no questions. Anakin put his head in his hands. 

“Well,” Rex said, “I guess that could have gone worse.”

Anakin looked up. “How, exactly?” he asked. “Please. Tell me how it could have gone worse.”

Rex shifted. “Well,” he said. “She didn’t say she hated you,” he pointed out. “You were worried about that.”

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “She only angrily stalked away to avoid the rest of the conversation.”

Rex raised an eyebrow. “You’ve never done that, right?”

“Not now, Rex,” Anakin said. He sighed. “Why doesn’t this Force-forsaken shuttle have a third room that’s not a refresher?” he demanded of nobody. “Stupid ship! This ship is kriffing useless ,” he said, standing up and giving it a kick for good measure. “Can’t exit hyperspace because the navicomputer only allows exits at the end of preprogrammed jumps, can’t get to the engine for maintenance from the inside, barely has any weapons, and is three square kriffing meters! I could have built a better ship when I was six! ” 

Rex waited a beat. “Is that all?”

Anakin looked up at him. “This is why I didn’t want to tell them!” he said. “Leia hates me now, and Luke is captured, and everything is just - fucked. Everything is really, really, fucked. And I don’t know how to fucking change anything.” He sat down heavily. “I just - I need to protect them,” he said. “I’m going to use the refresher.”

Rex didn’t say anything, which was appropriate when somebody announced they were going to use the refresher, but sometimes called for when somebody made a desperate plea to be alone, which is what Anakin had done. But maybe Rex didn’t give a shit, Anakin thought. He would have the right not to, especially considering how he clearly felt towards Vader. 

The refresher was tiny. It didn’t have a shower that Anakin could sit in, and he grimaced at the thought of either standing upright or sitting on the toilet, so he found himself sitting under the sink with his knees drawn up to his chest like he was indeed six.

He missed Padmé. She was always good at seeing things rationally and explaining them so other people could understand. Anakin picked at a loose thread on the knee of his pants. He didn’t know how she had died in this universe, and he’d been trying not to think about it, but he couldn’t help it. She’d lived to give birth to Luke and Leia, but that shouldn’t have been a problem - Anakin remembered the dreams he’d had of her death, but they had turned out to be nothing. She’d had a smooth, if long, labor, and no complications. Which meant that somebody had killed her. But that somebody hadn’t been able to kill the twins. And somehow Obi-Wan and the Organas were able to save them. Anakin picked at the thread some more until he had created a small hole, which he poked with his mechno-hand. Obi-Wan had had Luke. Bail Organa and Obi-Wan were friends, so maybe Obi-Wan had initially had both twins and then given Leia to the Organas for safekeeping? But Obi-Wan would have been able to keep Padmé safe too. Anakin remembered the video of Padmé’s funeral he’d watched on the holonet. Somebody had taken great care to make sure she still looked pregnant - probably so Vader would never find out about his children. Could Vader have - ? No, he banished the thought. Even if he turned to the Dark side, he wouldn’t do that. Not to Padmé. Right?

Anakin curled closer in on himself under the sink. Angrily, he projected his thoughts into the Force. Obi-Wan, he called, if you’re there, how about some answers?

Like Obi-Wan would give him answers. The man clearly had his own definition of truth. And he’d left Anakin to die. Or Vader, rather. Whatever. It had still looked and felt like Anakin. 

Hello? Anakin tried again. I know you’re out there somewhere.

Why wouldn’t Obi-Wan just have killed him? And why didn’t he try harder to stop Anakin in the first place? Anakin jabbed the newly-created hole, making it a little bigger. In the back of his head he knew he would just have to sew it up again later, but for now it felt good to be able to do just a little minor destruction. It wasn’t as though there was much else onboard he could destroy, and he didn’t want Rex to get any more worried.

The Force shifted, slightly, and Anakin snapped his head back hard enough to hit his head on the sink behind him. He cursed softly, and rubbed it. “Obi-Wan?” he said aloud.

Slowly, a bluish form materialized in front of him. Anakin gave it what he hoped was an unimpressed look. “I didn’t realize ghosts still had to use refreshers,” he said. 

I’m not a ghost, Anakin, Obi-Wan said, sounding tired. 

“Oh, yeah? What are you, then?”

I am a manifestation of the living Force.

“Sounds like a ghost,” Anakin said mulishly. 

Perhaps.

Anakin avoided looking at the manifestation of the living Force. He’d wanted Obi-Wan to show up, but now that he was here, Anakin kind of wanted him to go away. “Is it true?” he asked instead. “Vader showed me your fight. Did you leave?”

The specter sighed. I did, Obi-Wan said heavily. 

“Why?”

I thought he was dying. I didn’t know he would survive.

“Would you do the same to me?” 

Obi-Wan was silent for a long pause. He turned to the Dark side, Anakin, he said. There is no coming back from such a fate.

“There is, actually,” Anakin said. “I did it. But I guess you never would have given me the chance.” He crossed his arms. “If you Fell, I wouldn’t have left you,” he said. 

Obi-Wan looked old and haggard, but he still managed to get a steely glint in his eye. Then you would be dooming the galaxy, he said.

“And you lied to Luke about it,” Anakin said, bitterly. “Now he’s going to hear the truth from Vader.”

I thought it was for the best, Obi-Wan said. 

“Yeah, well you thought wrong!” Anakin exclaimed. “Vader has him and he has no training and nobody to lean on! He’s alone!”

The ghost (Anakin was just going to think of him as a ghost, manifestation of the Force be damned) leaned down. I am sorry, Anakin, he said. I am so sorry .

“That’s not good enough!” Anakin said. “Can’t you do something from the netherworld of the living Force, or whatever? Kill Palpatine, destroy the Empire, something useful?” Without waiting for Obi-Wan’s response, Anakin continued. “How could you just - go to the desert for twenty years and then die? You left Vader, and you left me, too!”

Obi-Wan didn’t answer, just sat quietly, glowing bluish.

“I’m sorry,” Anakin muttered. “I didn’t mean that.” He looked at the hole in his pants and wondered why he had thought that would be a good idea. His legs were starting to cramp from sitting with his knees drawn up so tightly, but he didn’t move.

Did you really come back from the Dark side? Obi-Wan asked.

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “Ahsoka came through time and we tried to stop things but Palpatine kidnapped Padmé and so I Fell so I could get the power to destroy him, but I came back when he tried to kill Padmé and Ahsoka and you and Rex. Then I killed Palpatine and the war ended.”

Padmé thought there was still good in Vader, somewhere, Obi-Wan said. Those were her last words, before she died.

“I doubt it,” Anakin said bitterly. “I barely came back after Falling for a day and a half. Vader’s had twenty years of it.”

I didn’t think it was possible at all, Obi-Wan said.

“Well, you learn something new every day,” Anakin said. 

You should talk to Leia.

“She doesn’t want to talk to me right now.”

But you still should. She’s in pain.

Anakin hummed. “Maybe later,” he said. 

Obi-Wan sat in silence for a little while before he slowly faded away, leaving Anakin alone in the ‘fresher. 

Or, alone until Rex banged on the door demanding for him to come out.

“Can’t I get some privacy?” Anakin asked, using the Force to open the door.

Rex gave him a critical look. “You’re sitting under the sink talking to yourself,” he said. “And I have to use the fresher.”

Anakin gave him a look, but could admit to himself that it was pretty undignified to have been sitting under the sink for the better part of an hour. So he crawled out, ignoring the way his knees protested, and found himself knocking on the door of the cockpit. 

“Go away,” Leia’s voice came, muffled. 

“Leia,” Anakin said, “I’m sorry. I should have told you about who I was earlier, but - can I please come in?”

A long pause. “Fine,” Leia said. 

Anakin walked into the cockpit to find Leia curled up in the pilot’s chair staring determinedly out the front viewport at hyperspace. 

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Anakin asked. “Seeing the stars like this.”

Leia nodded. 

Anakin sighed. “I know I can’t - change anything - who I am, or who I became in this universe. But I want you to know I do care about you, Leia, and I’m on your side.”

Leia didn’t take her eyes off the stars. “The Force,” she said. 

“Yes?”

“I have it because of him, don’t I?”

Anakin looked down. “Yes,” he said softly. 

“I don’t want it.”

“It can be used for good,” Anakin started, but Leia cut him off.

“I’ve seen what it can be used for,” she said. “Nobody should have that kind of power over other people. Nobody should be able to - to look inside someone else’s mind.”

“I agree,” Anakin said, quietly. “It’s not fair.”

“And there are people like Luke where I see that power and I'm glad someone on our side has it, but - I just - what if I become like him?” Leia asked, finally turning towards Anakin. “I'm not - calm, or - or serene, like the stories talk about the Jedi. What if I get so angry that I just - control someone, even if I don’t mean to?”

“You won’t,” Anakin said, firmly. “You might be his daughter - my daughter - by blood, but that doesn’t make you - predisposed for anything. Even if you have the power to, I know you would never try to control someone like that." He paused. "You remind me so much of your birth mother, you know.”

“Who was she?”

“Her name was Padmé Amidala - well, Naberrie, but she dropped that name when she became Queen - at the age of fourteen,” Anakin said, smiling.

“I’ve heard of her,” Leia said, a little crease forming between her eyebrows. “She was a Senator, right? There’s a holiday for her.”

Anakin nodded. “She was good friends with the Organas,” he said. “She was a firm believer in peace and freedom. She would be proud of you.”

Leia shifted in her seat. “Thanks,” she said. 

“I know I’m not your father - not who raised you, anyway, but if you ever want to talk, I’m here,” Anakin said.

Leia smiled wryly. “Using my own words against me, are you?”

“Something like that,” Anakin said. 

Leia suddenly leaned forward and hugged Anakin. He wasn’t expecting it, and froze, but then he relaxed and hugged her back. 

“We’re going to get Luke back,” Leia said when she released Anakin. She had a look in her eyes that reminded Anakin so much of Padmé it ached. It was determined, knowing that she was going against all the odds, but with such faith that she was doing the right thing and that somehow, she would pull it together, even if she had to stand against the whole galaxy.

“Yeah,” Anakin agreed. “We are.”

The rest of the hyperspace flight was made without any more earth-shattering realizations, something everyone on board was pleased with. Soon, they were approaching the rendezvous with Han: Cholganna, a planet in the far Outer Rim that, despite being just off of the Perlemian Trade Route, was mostly uninhabited, due to the fact that it teemed with large, carnivorous beasts. Apparently, that made it a great place to hold illicit deals. 

They touched down near a small clearing in the forest world, where Anakin could see two other ships: the Falcon and another that he didn’t recognize. 

Han walked up immediately, catching Leia into a hug and looking surprisingly uninterested in making jibes. “Don’t worry about the kid,” he said. “We’re gonna get him back.”

“There’s a lot to catch up on,” Leia said into his shoulder. 

“Save it for hyperspace,” Han said. “I’ve been nearly killed twice already by the miserable things that live here, and I’m ready to get out.”

Anakin walked down and out onto the ground. “Hey, Han,” he said. 

“Glad to have you back in one piece,” Han said. “Same goes for you, old timer.”

Rex gave Han an unimpressed look. 

“Well,” Han said. “If that’s all, we can head onto the Falcon.” 

“We can’t just leave the shuttle here,” Leia pointed out. “It could be useful in the future.”

“Don’t worry about your ship!” A voice called out. Anakin whipped around. He knew that voice.

An old Weequay walked down the ramp of the other ship Anakin had seen. He waved his hand. “I’ll take care of everything, don’t you worry!”

“Hondo,” Anakin said, flatly.

The pirate took a few steps closer, peered at Anakin, and jumped back almost comically. “Well!” he said. “Would you look who it is! Anakin Skywalker, back from the dead!”

Han turned to Anakin. “Excuse me?”

“Oh, yes,” the pirate said. “Skywalker and I go way back.” He gestured to show just how long. “We’re old friends!”

Anakin took a step closer. “That’s not exactly how I remember it,” he said. 

“And yet, here we are! On the same side! You have to understand, when you were with the Republic I had to charge a little extra. But now that we’re all against the big power in the galaxy, well. All traitors must stick together, right?”

Anakin turned to Leia. “You didn’t mention this was who Han was making a deal with,” he said. 

“I didn’t think it was relevant,” Leia said.

“Excuse me,” Han said. “Can we go back to where the guy introduced to me as Ani Naberrie is apparently Anakin Skywalker?”

Hondo laughed. “Well!” he said. “It seems you have a lot of catching up to do! Don’t mind me, I’ll just be on my way. I’ll make sure the shuttle is in safe hands,” he added.

Leia shot him a look. “We’ll be back for it,” she said. “I expect you to keep it in one piece.”

“When has Hondo ever let you down?” Hondo asked, adopting a very offended expression. Anakin shot him a look, and he raised his hands. “Okay, okay,” he said. “Very good condition. Understood.”

Han looked back at Anakin and blinked. “Can someone please tell me what the hell is going on?”

Chapter Text

Shortly after extracting the promise from Hondo that he would look after the stolen Imperial shuttle, Han announced they had to make a stop at Quermia to refuel. A Separatist world during the time of the Clone Wars, Quermia was now virtually isolated from the rest of the galaxy. The Empire maintained a presence there, but no more than any other inhabited planet. With luck, they would be able to make a quick stop, refuel, and get out without being stopped. 

Anakin spent the majority of the short jump explaining and over-explaining to Han exactly who he was and what he was doing. It took a lot of explaining, and nearly the end of Anakin’s patience. 

“The thing I still don’t get,” Han said, “is how the hell you got here. I mean, I get it, magical nonsense, but - I mean, come on.”

“I don’t really understand it myself,” Anakin said. “All I know is that my former apprentice, Ahsoka Tano, managed to do it to get back to my time, and when she tried to get back to hers, I must have gotten… sucked here somehow.” 

At Ahsoka’s name, half of the ship started. “Are you kidding me?” Han muttered. “Fine, I’ll bite. Who’s that?”

Anakin looked to Leia, who seemed eager to finally get to contribute positively to the conversation. “I didn’t know she was a Jedi until much later,” she said, “but when I was little she taught me how to shield myself - that is, guard my mind. It’s how I was able to survive Vader’s interrogation,” she said stiffly. “I saw her every so often - she was important to the Alliance, I know, but…” she trailed off, looking at Rex expectantly.

Rex looked down. “She died about four and a half years ago,” he said. “Last I heard, she was with the Ghost crew going to Malachor to find secrets of some sort that would help them against the Sith.” He paused. “Vader killed her,” he said shortly. 

“But that’s not true,” Anakin blurted out, trying to sift through the timeline in his head. “She came to my time immediately after dueling Vader - some kid pulled her into a portal.” He grimaced. “I don’t remember his name.”

Rex frowned. “Ezra Bridger?”

“Maybe,” Anakin said. He looked at Rex. “She could be alive. If she is, we need to find her.”

Chewbacca said something in agreement, and Anakin turned to him. “Where do you know her from?”

Chewbacca began relating a story that had Han’s eyebrows inching higher and higher. “He says they were kidnapped by Trandoshans,” Han said. “Some time during the Clone Wars.”

Anakin remembered that, all right. There were few moments in the Clone Wars that were more terrifying than the few days when his Padawan had gone missing and he’d been unable to find her. “Well,” he said, “I’m sure she’ll be happy to see us all.”

Han, a bit grudgingly, said they could go to Malachor after they stopped at Quermia. They didn’t have any leads on where Luke might be, but it made sense to pick up another Jedi-trained individual if they were going to take down Vader. And Malachor was nearby - it would only take a few hours to get there.

The atmosphere in the Falcon seemed cautiously optimistic, and Anakin felt his shoulders lose a little bit of their tenseness. Ahsoka would have answers, he thought. Maybe not the ones he wanted, but she would… know more. And he wouldn’t have to explain himself to her because she already knew everything. 

The stop at Quermia was as uneventful as could be hoped. Han took the ship in, haggled a bit for the fuel, and got out before anybody so much as spotted a Stormtrooper. 

“Alright,” Han said once they were out of the atmosphere. “Next stop, Malachor.”

On the way, Anakin explained to Rex what had happened when Ahsoka visited his timeline. Rex took it all in with a look of longing. When Anakin had finished, the old clone sighed heavily. 

“I’m glad she managed to get through to you,” he said. “It sounds like your universe is a hell of a lot better than this one.”

Anakin nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “You’re a civilian, back home.”

Rex looked up. “Am I, now? Funny, that. Never really thought I’d live to see the day I wasn’t fighting something or other.”

Anakin put a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “With any luck, you’ll live to see it in this universe, too,” he said. “And if there’s anything I can do to speed that process up, I will.”

Rex gave Anakin a smile. They held eye contact for a second, and then Rex shoved off Anakin’s hand. “Easy there, General. Can’t have you going soft on me now, can we?” he said gruffly. 

Anakin grinned. “Of course not.” He leaned back in his seat. “Ahsoka will be happy to see you’re still alive and well,” he said. 

“Not as glad as I will be to see her,” Rex said. “You know, I didn’t know she was alive until just a couple months before Malachor,” he admitted. “And then I lost her again. I just hope this time sticks, you know?”

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “I know.”

They made it to Malachor in a few hours, and from the second they dropped out of hyperspace Anakin felt like his skin was crawling. Malachor felt wrong , the way the Dark side often did, but to a degree Anakin wasn’t familiar with. It wasn’t just a few kilometers of Darkness, it was like the entire system was steeped in it. The closest thing Anakin could think of was the way it had felt to be right next to Palpatine when he dropped his shields, but even that was centered around one man. This was like the whole system was rotting. Anakin remembered, vaguely, learning something about the Malachor system during a history class taken long ago. It was not a place spoken very often among the Jedi save in expletives. 

From across the cabin, Leia blanched. She turned to Anakin. “This place is bad,” she said, sounding spooked. 

“Yeah,” Anakin agreed. “Like you can’t see it properly, even though you’re looking right at it.”

Han gave them both a look over his shoulder and flew the Falcon closer to the surface. “Glad to hear you guys are happy with it. See anything that looks like we should land by it?”

Anakin closed his eyes. The Dark side was obscuring everything, but he could still tell where it was concentrated the thickest. “Fly towards the northwest,” he said. Han complied, and once they were closer to the surface, Anakin opened his eyes and looked out. “There,” he said, pointing to a pyramidal spire that stuck through the surface. 

Han got closer, and the feeling of suffocation got worse. Anakin looked at Leia worriedly, but she had her jaw set. “I’m fine,” she said at Anakin’s look. “A little shaken, but fine.”

“Hey, come take a look at this,” Han’s voice called out. Anakin walked over to the viewport to see that the pyramidal structure was surrounded by a cracked crust-like surface that dropped, chasm-like, all around it.

“We’re gonna have to land underground if we want to get near that thing,” Han said. “I’m not convinced the ground’s gonna hold.”

“Okay,” Anakin said. “Just get us as close as you can.”

The Falcon descended beneath the surface of the planet into an appropriately shadowy underworld. Anakin took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The Dark side was calling to him, reminding him of what it felt like to wield that power. Anakin couldn’t imagine fighting a Sith here. 

He tried to reach out and sense if Ahsoka was nearby, but it was like everything was covered by a thick cloud. Maybe he just had to get used to it, but Anakin got the feeling that it would only get harder the longer you stayed here. He gripped the back of Han’s seat tightly. Ahsoka had been here for four years - what if something had happened? What if she had succumbed and turned to the Dark side? Kriff, what if she died of thirst?

Calm down, he told himself. Just the planet, making his fears seem more real. Anakin released the back of Han’s seat and made himself walk back into the cabin, where Rex and Leia were. 

“I don’t think it’s safe for anyone besides me to go out there,” he said. At Leia’s look, he continued. “This place is a Sith temple. It’s going to be full of traps, and might not even let you in if you aren’t Force-sensitive.” 

“I’m Force-sensitive,” Leia countered. “I should go.”

“You aren’t trained,” Anakin said. “I have no idea what’s inside there. If I’m not back in a rotation, leave without me.”

Leia gave him a critical look. “If you aren’t back in a rotation, I’m coming in after you,” she said. 

Anakin looked at Rex, who didn’t seem keen to offer any help. “Fine,” he conceded. It wasn’t likely he was going to win that argument, and if he really did die in there, he didn’t want to go out trying to shoot his daughter down. “But wait a full rotation.”

Leia nodded. “Hopefully you’ll be back long before then.”

Anakin nodded, looking out the viewport at the Sith temple, which now rose ominously above them. “Hopefully.”

The Falcon landed, and Anakin double-checked that his blaster was fully charged (not that a blaster was likely to do too much damage, but you could never be too cautious) before he exited the ship.

Outside, the planet was too quiet. Underground, there was no wind, and it seemed as though Anakin’s footsteps echoed for miles in every direction. He walked up to the pyramid’s entrance and noticed that what he had taken for rubble was in fact the petrified remains of beings, lost to a fight long ago. He knelt down and peered closer at one - it was a female human, and her arms were up to shield her face from something. In her left hand, she clutched a lightsaber.

Anakin frowned. He wished he had paid more attention to his history classes in the Temple, but he’d never felt quite the drive to do so. Malachor, Malachor, Malachor, he thought, running through the major wars from antiquity in his brain. Something from the Second Sith War, he thought. Whatever it was from, the deaths of so many Force-sensitives, be they Jedi or Sith, only added to the thick, unyielding wrongness that radiated from the temple itself. 

Carefully, he walked forward, letting his eyes adjust to the new dimness before crossing the threshold. 

Almost immediately, the walls began moving, and Anakin realized too late that he was caught in a trap. He ducked, covering his head, as rock shot up around him on all sides, forcing him into a small, enclosed space. 

As soon as the dust settled, Anakin reached around the top of the trap. There were razor-thin gaps between the walls of the enclosure and the ceiling, enough that Anakin could see a slice of light filtering through. He tried to get a grip on the gap with his mechno-hand, but he scrabbled in vain: it was stuck tight. Time to try something else, then. Slowly and deliberately, Anakin began reaching out with the Force.

He had barely begun when the walls shuddered, shrinking closer. Immediately, Anakin stopped, and the walls did, too. Anakin cursed loudly and fluently.

He sat down on the floor, bracing his back on one side and his feet on the other, and pushed with all his might. The walls didn’t budge. 

Grimacing, Anakin pulled out his blaster. This was a bad idea, he knew, but he had to try. If only he had a lightsaber - but then again, judging by how the walls had reacted when he used the Force, that might only make things worse. Carefully, he crouched in one corner and took aim at the edge of the wall. 

He fired and ducked, but the wall held. He frowned. This was pretty bad, he admitted. Reluctantly, he dropped into a cross-legged pose and resigned himself to wait, either for the constructor of the trap to appear or for Leia to get tired of waiting on the ship. Though he didn’t relish the thought of either, Anakin fervently hoped the first option would come about sooner than the second.

Anakin couldn’t tell exactly how much time had passed while he tried frustratingly to meditate (and that had not gone well, thank you very much), but he thought it was somewhere between one and three hours. That was when he felt something shift. Not enough to tell who it was, but enough to tell that someone - or something - was on their way. He stretched and stood up, taking his blaster back out. Always meet your enemy on your feet, he thought.

“Who do we have here?” a voice called, and Anakin started. 

“Ahsoka!” he called out. “Ahsoka, it’s me, it’s Anakin!”

The walls dissolved into air, and Anakin looked up excitedly to see Ahsoka.

She was standing some meters away, though, and upon seeing Anakin her face turned upset.

Anakin stepped closer, concerned. Ahsoka looked - well, not great. She was thinner than she should be, her bones all sticking out at hard angles, and she looked too tired. The clothes she had on were dirty and scuffed. 

“Hello, Anakin,” she said in a voice that sounded - well, resigned, if Anakin had to put a word to it.

He frowned. “Aren’t you surprised to see me?”

Ahsoka sat down and leaned against the wall wearily. “No, not really,” she said.

Alarms were going off in Anakin’s head - something was wrong, this wasn’t how Ahsoka should be reacting to him. “Ahsoka,” he said again. “When did we last talk?”

She looked up at him. “A week ago, I’d say? Though you were much angrier then. This is a nice change of pace.”

“Ahsoka, what are you talking about?”

“Go away,” Ahsoka said. “I’m not in the mood to talk right now.”

Anakin walked forward hesitantly, holding out his arms. “Ahsoka, it’s me, it’s Anakin Skywalker. I followed you into this universe,” he said slowly. “I’m real. I’m here with Leia -”

Ahsoka looked at him with wide eyes. She jumped to her feet and drew a lightsaber, lighting it and holding it out threateningly, effectively cutting Anakin off. “You don’t get to do that,” she said, her voice shaking. “Stop it.”

“Ahsoka, what -”

Ahsoka brought the lightsaber closer. “Go on,” she said. “Say your piece, and be done with it. I left you behind, you’ve become a monster and it was my fault, et cetera. Then leave.”

Anakin’s eyes widened. He held up his hands. “I’m real,” he said again. “Please don’t stab me.”

“I don’t know why I bother talking back,” Ahsoka said. She extinguished her saber and clipped it back to her belt, stalking off down the hallway.

“Ahsoka, please, you have to believe me,” Anakin said, jogging after her. “I’m here with Leia and Rex and a man named Han Solo and a Wookie named Chewbacca. We have a ship and we can get you out of here. Please,” Anakin said. 

Ahsoka froze. “Han Solo,” she said.

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “He’s Corellian, a smuggler, good guy, has a thing for Leia but I know I probably shouldn’t try to talk to him about it -”

“That’s not possible,” Ahsoka said, turning to stare at Anakin. “I don’t know anyone called Han Solo.”

Anakin looked at Ahsoka with confusion. “Yeah, I don’t think you would have met him? He joined the Rebellion just a few months ago. Still doesn’t technically consider himself part of it.”

Ahsoka looked at Anakin, and suddenly Anakin noticed tears were falling down her face. She ran up to him hesitantly, reaching out with her left hand. When it came into contact with Anakin’s jacket, she sobbed. “You’re real,” she said.

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “I am.”

Ahsoka threw her arms around Anakin, leaning into him desperately. Anakin hugged her back, one hand coming to rest on her shoulder and the other on her back. 

“You idiot,” she said. “Why did you follow me?”

“Don’t think I did it on purpose, Snips,” Anakin said. At the use of the nickname, Ahsoka only held him tighter.

“What took you so long, then?” she asked when she finally calmed down. “It’s been a long time.”

“Four and a half years, according to Rex,” Anakin said. “But I only arrived here a little over a tenday ago.”

Ahsoka wiped her face. “Well,” she said. “It seems like you’ve already met everyone.” She put her hands on Anakin’s shoulders. “I’m glad you’re real,” she said, “but don’t think I’m not angry with you for coming here, even if you did it by accident.”

“Well, yell at me all you like later,” Anakin said. “But for now, there are a couple people that want to see you.”

Ahsoka grinned, and the expression made her look a little more like her usual self. “Take me to them, Skyguy.”

Chapter Text

Anakin and Ahsoka made their way back to the Falcon, which looked farther away than it should have. Anakin commented on this, and Ahsoka grimaced.

“The temple is good at illusions,” she said. “Visions, hallucinations, making you think you’re seeing things you aren’t. The trap you were in, for instance.”

Anakin frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You thought you were trapped, but you weren’t. It’s the temple, playing with your mind. Think of it like a mind-trick. You were only perceiving the walls because you expected there to be a trap.”

Anakin frowned again. “How can you tell the difference?”

“The temple can only work with what’s already inside your head,” Ahsoka said. “I knew you were real when you mentioned the name Han Solo, because that’s not someone I know or knew. It took me a long time to figure that out, but once I did, the traps were easier to avoid. That just left me with visions.”

They picked their way through the millennia-old battlefield. “Visions?” Anakin asked. 

“Of you, mostly,” Ahsoka said. “Reminders of my failures - or what I perceived to be my failures.”

“Oh,” Anakin said. He kind of wished he hadn’t asked. 

“But you’re here now,” Ahsoka said, and turned to smile. “I was worried I was never going to leave this place.”

“How did you manage to survive that long, anyway?”

Ahsoka stepped delicately over the petrified remains of the woman Anakin had inspected earlier. “A lot of Dark side teachings can be adapted to the Light,” she said evasively. “I found a way to draw upon the Force for an extended period of time. It’s not unheard of,” she added when Anakin’s eyes narrowed. “Master Yaddle did it for over a hundred years.”

“But you - you know, you didn’t Fall, right?”

Ahsoka gave Anakin an unimpressed look. “No, I didn’t Fall,” she said. 

“Good.”

They were about to the ship, when Ahsoka suddenly started walking slower. 

“Everything alright?” Anakin asked.

“Yeah,” Ahsoka said. “I’m just - it’s been a while.” She squared her shoulders and walked forward. Someone must have been watching out for them, because the ship’s ramp began descending as soon as they got close enough to be spotted. 

Predictably, Rex was the first one to greet them, looking for all the world like he’d just won the lottery. Anakin felt his chest make a funny jump at the sight of his friend, who was staring at Ahsoka with shining eyes.

He crossed his arms as Ahsoka stepped forward. “Commander,” he said, inclining his head slightly.

“How many times do I have to tell you, Rex?” Ahsoka asked, fighting to keep a smile off of her face. “You don’t have to call me that.”

Rex nodded like this was an old dance. “Guess you’ll have to remind me at least one more time, Commander,” he said, grinning.

“Come here,” Ahsoka said, and pulled Rex into a hug.

Anakin thought his face might break from smiling. Leia looked at him from where she’d walked out on the ramp. “Glad to see I didn’t have to come and get you,” she said.

“Me, too,” Anakin said. “It was a close call.”

Ahsoka and Rex broke their embrace, and Ahsoka turned her gaze to Leia. “Leia,” she said, smiling. “You’ve grown up since I saw you last.”

“That’s what happens in five years,” Leia said.

“Stars, has it really been that long?”

“I’m twenty, now.”

Ahsoka faltered, slightly. “I’m going to need you to catch me up on some things,” she said. “How’s your father?”

Anakin could feel Leia’s sudden and sharp pang of grief even through her shields and Malachor’s obscuring haze. “We do have a lot to catch up on,” Leia murmured.

Ahsoka pulled the younger woman into her arms. “Leia,” she said into her hair, “I’m so sorry.”

“The man who gave the order is dead, now,” Leia said. “Wilhuff Tarkin.”

Something close to an angry cloud seemed to hover around the group at the mention of the man’s name. Anakin’s last memory of the man was of him presiding over Ahsoka’s trial, demanding the death penalty for crimes she didn’t commit. He was glad the man was dead.

“Let’s get you inside and caught up,” Rex said, breaking the tension. 

“Alright,” Ahsoka said. They all went into the Falcon, where Chewbacca was waiting to greet Ahsoka as well. Once inside, Rex set about making sure Ahsoka had some real food to eat (“because, no offense, but the Force is no substitute for a hot meal”), and everyone sat in the cabin (or leaned against the wall, in Han’s case) to discuss what Ahsoka had missed in the last four years.

When Leia got to the point of the story where Han showed up, the pilot began to take interest, going back and explaining how he’d met Luke when he and an old man named Ben Kenobi hired him to take them from Tatooine to Alderaan. Ahsoka had looked up at that. “Ben Kenobi?” she asked, mostly at Anakin. “Is Obi-Wan around here somewhere?”

Anakin looked down. “He’s dead,” he said, shortly. “Vader killed him.”

“Oh,” Ahsoka said. There was an awkward silence for a little while before Han continued his story.

“So, when we got to Alderaan,” he said, glancing at Leia, “it wasn’t there. The whole planet was blown up by this new superweapon of the Empire’s. They called it the Death Star, and we ended up getting stuck inside it. Then, we rescued Her Highness here, who was helpless without us -”

“Han,” Leia warned.

“So we get away, but not before Vader kills the old man,” Han said. “Anyways, I got my reward, Luke blew up the Death Star, and Vader escaped somehow. It’s all been fine and dandy these last few months until this guy shows up,” Han said, gesturing to Anakin. “Claims his name is Ani Naberrie, something I didn’t find out was a lie until yesterday,” he said, pointing an accusing finger at Anakin.

Ahsoka gave Anakin a deadpan look. “Ani Naberrie?” she asked.

Anakin could feel his face heating up. “It was the first name I thought of that wouldn’t be easily identifiable,” he muttered.

“Right on, Ani,” Ahsoka said. 

“Everyone knows my real name, now,” Anakin said, speaking over Ahsoka’s attempts to further embarrass him. “And all of the… pertinent familial statuses.”

“Yes,” Leia agreed. She took up the story from there. “The Alliance has a mole somewhere,” she said, “and the location of the fleet leaked to the Empire. In the fallout of that, we extracted Rex, who was running an inside operation on an Imperial outpost in the Mid Rim.” She took a deep breath. “Unfortunately, Luke was captured by Vader. We don’t know where he is.”

“Okay,” Ahsoka said. “Do we have a plan?”

“Not currently,” Leia said. 

Ahsoka took a bite of the reheated freeze-dried food Rex had given her. “Force,” she said, with her mouth full. “I forgot how good food is.”

“If that’s your reaction to Han’s spacer rations, wait til you get to eat at a real establishment,” Anakin said. 

Ahsoka poked a finger at him. “You,” she said, “do not get to criticize the food I find enjoyable. You ate bugs,” she said, taking another bite.

Anakin blinked. “Where’d you hear that?”

Ahsoka glanced at Rex, who held up his hands. “Cody told me,” he said. “General Kenobi told him. I was just passing along information.”

“If he wasn’t already dead, I’d kill him for this,” Anakin muttered. “You hear that, Obi-Wan? I’m offended.”

Rex shot Ahsoka a concerned look.

“I’m not going crazy,” Anakin said. “Obi-Wan can hear me, I think.”

“Okay,” Ahsoka said, a little uncertainly. 

“He’s a ghost, now, or something. A manifestation of the living Force,” Anakin said. “I think it takes a lot of effort for him to manifest himself, though.”

The cabin was quiet as everyone digested Anakin’s words. “Well,” Han said, “on that lovely and completely insane note, should we get off this rock?”

“Not yet,” Anakin said. He looked at Ahsoka. “You know how to cleanse kyber crystals, right?”

Ahsoka nodded.

“Are there any in the temple? I need a new lightsaber.”

Ahsoka looked up. “Yeah, actually, there are. There’s a whole room full of them.” She looked at Leia. “You could come, too,” she said. “If you want.”

Leia looked surprised. “I don’t know how to use a lightsaber,” she said, doubtfully. 

“You don’t have to learn if you don’t want to,” Ahsoka said. “But you have the ability to.”

“I - okay,” Leia said. “If only so I can surprise Vader the next time I see him.”

Ahsoka smiled. “Let’s go, then, so we can get off this rock, as Han so elegantly put it.”

Anakin and Leia followed Ahsoka back towards the temple. Leia walked in the middle, and along the way Ahsoka talked about lightsabers and the Force. Anakin wondered if it was easier for Leia to hear it from someone she’d grown up trusting than from him. Especially with her anxieties about Vader, it made sense, but Anakin felt a little disappointed all the same. 

Ahsoka led them through the temple expertly, avoiding traps and illusions. They stepped into a side room that, upon entering, revealed itself to be a high-ceilinged vault. Scattered around the vault were crystals, all blood-red.

“This vault holds the crystals that belonged to slain Sith warriors,” Ahsoka explained. “The ancient Sith believed that their power was imbued into the crystals, and that when they died, the next wielder of their crystals would have some of their power.”

Leia looked around warily. “I don’t want the power of a Sith,” she said.

“Don’t worry,” Ahsoka said. “We’re going to heal the crystals, remove stain of the Dark side from them. Any traces of Sith power will be gone from them.” 

Hesitantly, Leia stepped forward. “I can… hear them,” she said, uncertainly. 

“That’s good,” Ahsoka said. “Reach out with the Force, see if there’s one - or two, maybe - that are particularly loud.”

Anakin watched as Leia closed her eyes, reaching out with her hands in a mimicry of what she was doing with the Force. She frowned, walking forward. Without opening her eyes, she stopped just before the center table, then turned left, walking until she was at the far corner. She opened her eyes. “I think there’s something over here,” she said.

Suddenly, Leia panicked. “He’s here,” she said.

Ahsoka frowned. “Who’s here?”

“Vader,” Leia said. “He’s - he’s coming for me.” She reached to her hip to pull out her blaster. Her eyes were open too wide, and she pointed the weapon at Anakin. “Stay back!” she cried.

Anakin put up his hands. “It’s an illusion,” he said, trying to project calm. “I’m not him.”

Leia was terrified, but her arm didn’t shake. She squeezed the trigger, pulling off two shots. In a flash, Ahsoka deflected them, preventing them from hitting Anakin.

“Leia,” Ahsoka said. “Let the Force flow through you. It doesn’t control you. You have the ability to perceive what’s real.”

Leia scrambled backwards, tripping, and reached back instinctively with the hand that wasn’t holding her blaster to catch her fall. She cried out as she landed, and Anakin made to rush over, but Ahsoka stopped him.

Leia held up her left hand, the one she’d caught herself with. There was blood running down it. She looked back up at Ahsoka and Anakin, this time with clarity. “You’re not him,” she said, clenching her jaw.

“No,” Anakin agreed. “I’m not.”

Leia regulated her breathing. Slowly, she put her blaster away and walked over to Anakin and Ahsoka. 

“Is your hand okay?” Ahsoka asked.

Leia nodded, opening her fist. A small crystal was cupped in it. “It cut me when I landed on it,” she said. “But I think this is the one.”

Ahsoka smiled. “I’m glad you found it. Now we just have to wait for Skyguy to make his decision.

Leia quirked a smile. “Skyguy?”

“An old nickname,” Ahsoka explained. 

Anakin hunted around for a crystal. None of them felt particularly right to him. He closed his eyes, letting the Force guide him, until he heard something. A voice, soft and whispery.

You’re out of your time, aren’t you? the voice crooned. Anakin frowned, trying to locate the source.

You know of the power of the Dark side, don’t you? You’ve let it in before, the voice continued.

Use that power, and you can defeat your enemy. He won’t be expecting you. 

Anakin tried to block out the voice, but it was coming from inside his head, and it wasn’t as though he could cover his ears. 

You will have to use it if you want to save your son from going down the path you took, the voice said. 

Anakin studiously ignored it, opening his eyes and deciding he was going to pick a crystal at random if it didn’t shut up in the next five seconds.

You cannot escape your destiny, the voice said. This is not a kind universe. Only blood can bring balance, Chosen One. It said the title mockingly, as though speaking to a very small child. Anakin simmered. He hated that title - true or not, it had brought him only self-importance and pain.

No, he thought, and pushed out, scattering the crystals in front of him. Only one remained, and Anakin picked it up roughly, shoving it into his pocket. 

“Let’s get out of here,” he said, and Ahsoka nodded. She led Anakin and Leia out of the room and back into the hallway, then out of the temple. 

Anakin felt the weight of the crystal like it was tenfold, dragging him down. He exited the temple and straightened his shoulders, walking forwards with a spring in his step that he didn’t feel.

They reached the Falcon, which was no farther away than it should have been, and boarded. Han took off, and Anakin relaxed, hoping he never had to step foot on Malchor again.

As the ship exited the atmosphere, the ghostly voice rang quietly through Anakin’s head again. Good choice, it said. May your crystal serve you well.

Chapter Text

Once they left Malachor, it became apparent that there were, at the moment, very few places that could be called friendly to go. And not that the Falcon wasn’t nice, but six people were pushing it a little, especially since there hadn’t been a time to properly restock. On top of that, Han refused to allow people to build lightsabers in his ship, citing safety concerns and potential explosions. 

“There aren’t many friendly systems nearby,” Leia said, hunched over the star charts with Han. “And with the Imperials monitoring major hyperspace lanes, we can’t risk going near the Core.”

“Troiken?” Anakin offered from where he was sitting nearby. 

“No good,” Leia said. “Like Quermia, we could probably stop to refuel, but it would be risky to stay more than a couple hours. Most of the former minor-player Separatist worlds are safe to stop briefly, but most of them have at least a small presence.” She grimaced. “We could go back to Cholganna, but -”

“Not happening,” Han cut in. “There’s a reason nobody’s been able to make permanent settlement there. And besides, I’d like to go to a world with at least one bar, thank you very much.”

Leia sighed. “Fine.” She looked to Rex. “Do you still have contacts on Lothal? It’s a little out of our way, but it’s better than nothing.”

Rex frowned. “Not sure they’re on Lothal at the moment,” he said. “But I can check. At any rate, the planet itself is out of the way, and there aren’t Imperials anymore.”

Han frowned. “I know a guy on Lothal,” he said. 

Leia gave Han a look. “And when you say ‘know a guy,’ you mean -”

“I mean he’s a friend,” Han said. “Well. Sort of. We’ve had our differences in the past.”

Chewbacca said something, and Han shot him a look. “He owes me one,” Han said. “Besides, we aren’t going to be staying at his place, or anything, just asking nicely if the planet is safe.”

Anakin really wished he had bothered to learn Shyriiwook, because whatever Chewbacca said next made Han’s face turn a very bright shade of red.

“It’s settled, then,” Leia said. “We’ll go to Lothal, make lightsabers, and create a plan for rescuing Luke.”

“Okay,” Han said. “Lothal it is.” He set coordinates, and the navicomputer began running the hyperspace calculations. While he waited, he sent a message to his contact. Rex did the same.

Because they were doing their best to avoid the Empire, the hyperspace route they ended up taking consisted of no less than seven different jumps of varying lengths, making what could have been a four-hour flight nearly the rest of the day cycle. Several hours in, during the break between their fifth and sixth jumps, Han announced that his contact had responded, saying that while he was not currently on Lothal, they could stay at his farm. 

“You have a friend who’s a farmer?” Leia asked suspiciously.

“Lando’s an entrepreneur, really,” Han said. 

Leia didn’t seem convinced, but they didn’t have many other options. They arrived on Lothal during the middle of the night cycle there, touching down on the coordinates Han’s friend had given him.

Lothal was pretty much as Anakin remembered it. His mind boggled slightly at the realization that he’d been here only just over a tenday ago before getting sucked into this universe. After a brief stop at a restaurant where everyone had the chance to have some hot food, the group called it a night. There weren’t enough beds for everyone, but the Lothal night was mild and rain-free, and it wasn’t as though Anakin hadn’t slept in the elements before. It was almost pleasant, actually, and it was certainly nicer than having to share one of the Falcon’s cramped bunks. Besides, he was happy to give up his bunk to Ahsoka - she needed it far more than he did. 

He woke up at dawn the next morning to find that a small, furry creature had curled up next to him in his sleep, and while he usually would have been put-out about finding an animal to have invaded his personal space, the loth-cat seemed to be exceedingly friendly, and so Anakin let it stay where it was as he dozed back off to wait for the rest of the crew to arise. 

Maybe an hour or two later, Anakin woke a second time to see Rex and Ahsoka standing a couple meters away, clearly laughing at him. He scowled and sat up, gently shooing the creature away. It darted off into the high grass, but Anakin got the sense it hadn’t actually gone very far. 

“Morning,” he said, trying to sound casual.

“Good morning,” Ahsoka replied, fighting to keep from smiling. “I see you made a friend.”

Anakin felt his face heat up slightly. 

“What, loth-cat got your tongue?” Rex asked, gently teasing. Ahsoka actually let out a peal of laughter at that, and Rex looked seconds away from laughing himself.

“How long were you standing there waiting to use that?” Anakin asked, stretching and rolling up the blankets he’d slept under.

“Long enough to ensure you’ll never live it down,” Ahsoka said. 

“It’s not embarrassing,” Anakin insisted. “You’re just jealous. Besides, he’s long gone now.” 

This, unfortunately, was not the case, and the loth-cat bounded out of the grass, carrying a many-legged insect in its mouth. Anakin grimaced.

“Look at that, it’s brought you breakfast,” Ahsoka said delightedly. “Eat up, we’re building lightsabers in half an hour.”

Anakin scowled. “You’re both terrible,” he muttered. He brushed past them to enter the Falcon, selecting a granola bar and one of the Jogan fruits they’d bought the night before. Back in the ship, Leia was sitting in the cabin, braiding her hair and glowering. Anakin almost asked, then thought better of it. If it was something he really needed to know, she’d tell him, and if it was something related to Han, Anakin probably didn’t want to know. 

“Morning,” he said, taking a bite of the granola bar. 

“Hello,” Leia said crisply.

Point taken, Anakin sat to eat his breakfast in silence. 

“Leia!” Han called from somewhere in the ship. Abruptly, Leia finished her hair and stalked off in that direction. Anakin decided he was glad not to have asked.

“Guess it’s just you and me,” he said to where C-3P0 sat in the corner, asleep after Han had one too many anxious calculations in hyperspace during their many-jump ride. It was a little strange that the droid didn’t recognize him, even though it made sense - Threepio couldn’t keep a secret to save his life. Still, it made Anakin a little sad that the droid he’d spent so many hours painstakingly creating as a child didn’t recognize him. Absently, he wondered if there was a way to reverse the wipe. Sometimes, core processors retained bits and pieces of old memory files even after a thorough wipe, but that might be too much to hope for. Certainly the Organas knew what they were getting into and would have made sure that the droid couldn’t betray them. Artoo, on the other hand - Anakin smirked. He wondered if they simply hadn’t been able to disable the little astromech’s memory. Anakin had added so much encryption to it over the years that he doubted even he could get whatever he wanted out of the droid. 

His smile vanished when he thought about all of the data on the Rebellion that Artoo might have, and whose possession he was currently in. Suddenly, he really, really hoped that there was enough encryption.

Leia returned a couple of minutes later looking altogether too pleased with herself, and Anakin decided that he was never, ever going to ask what exactly the dynamic was between those two. 

“Ready to go make lightsabers?” Leia asked lightly. She might have been asking if Anakin was ready to go for a picnic. 

Anakin felt the cold, heavy crystal in his pocket. “You bet,” he said, matching Leia’s tone. “Don’t worry if you don’t get it right at first,” he said. “It took me hours to get my first lightsaber working.”

Leia looked at him gratefully. “I am nervous,” she admitted. “I’ve held Luke’s before, but the idea of having my own is still strange.”

“It’ll feel like you,” Anakin promised. “It won’t be as strange as you think it might.”

“I guess,” Leia said. She patted a little pouch where she had her crystal, and together she and Anakin walked back outside to find Ahsoka.

When they walked out, Ahsoka met them with a grin. “Ready?”

They walked a little ways away until they had some privacy, and Ahsoka sat down in a crosslegged pose in the grass. Anakin and Leia did the same. 

“The first thing we have to do is heal the crystals,” Ahsoka explained. “The Sith bleed their crystals by bending them to their will, so the basic theory of what we’re going to do is that we’re going to release them back to the Force.”

Leia frowned. “They’re rocks, though,” she said. 

“True,” Ahsoka said, “but they have special properties. They’re Force-sensitive, for one, and that means that their natural state is attuned to the Force. The Sith corrupt their crystals to attune them to the Dark side, which is unnatural for them. Thousands of years ago, it was quite common to have to heal crystals, but it’s a practice that was lost for a while, since nobody needed to use it.”

“Okay,” Leia said, frowning uncertainly at the small crystal in front of her. 

“Hold it in your hand and feel it as though it’s a living thing,” Ahsoka said. 

Anakin picked up his crystal. It still felt unnaturally heavy, and warm, as though it had been sitting in the sun. He closed his eyes and tried to feel the Force surround it. 

The Force did not want to flow through his crystal, and he frowned, opening his eyes to peek over at Leia. She had a determined look on her face. 

“It does… feel like something,” Leia said. 

“Feel the Force flowing through yourself, and your crystal,” Ahsoka said. “Allow your crystal to reunite with the Light side.”

Anakin closed his eyes and tried again, but his crystal didn’t feel quite right, somehow. It was as though the part of him it was calling to was the part that had once been on the Dark side, and he couldn’t quite pull it back. He knew it was in pain, but it was like the pain was locked and Anakin didn’t have anything to pick the lock with. He held onto the crystal tighter and tried to convince it to heal, pouring as much of the Force as he dared into it. If anything, that only made the crystal resist more, and he opened his eyes wearily to see both Leia and Ahsoka staring at him.

“Maybe a little less with the mentally screaming at your crystal, Skyguy,” Ahsoka said. She sounded concerned.

“I can’t get it to work,” Anakin said. “It’s like it doesn’t want to be healed.”

Ahsoka frowned. “That can’t be true. All crystals want to be healed; bleeding them puts them in pain.”

“I know,” Anakin said. He held it out. “Here, you try it.”

Ahsoka gave him a dubious look, but took the crystal and closed her eyes. After a few seconds, she gave Anakin a confused look. “You’re right,” she said. “It feels very… locked up. I wonder if that’s a Sith technique.”

“Or I just happened to pick the first crystal in existence to want to turn to the Dark side,” Anakin groaned. He turned to Leia. “How’s yours?”

Leia opened her hand. The cut she’d received from the crystal had scabbed over, and the crystal sat on top of it looking very plain. “I think I got it?” she said. “It felt like I was able to free it, and now it feels even more right. I don’t know how exactly to explain it.”

“It sounds like you did it,” Ahsoka said. “That’s great. Now, we just have to construct them.”

Anakin frowned. “Am I going to construct a - a Sith lightsaber?” he asked.

Ahsoka grimaced. “Well,” she said, “since kybers are in pretty short supply, and we don’t know when we’re going to have to face Vader again, then yes, it seems like you will.”

Anakin really, really hated that idea, but he didn’t say anything, just sat moodily while Ahsoka explained all of the different lightsaber components to Leia. After Leia picked the things she was going to use, Anakin took some for himself. He didn’t put the usual care he would have into building it, because he didn’t want to care about a lightsaber that was going to burn red. It felt like a betrayal. As he fiddled with the different parts, Ahsoka walked Leia through the process. 

“One last thing,” Leia said, and Anakin looked up. She pulled a ring out of her pocket. “This was my mother’s,” she said, looking at it. It shined bright copper in the light. “It’s made from ore from the mountains of Alderaan.”

Ahsoka smiled gently. “It’s beautiful, Leia.”

Carefully, Leia cut the ring and re-soldered it together around the narrowest part of the grip. She looked at Ahsoka. “I think it’s done.”

Ahsoka stood up. “Light it up,” she said.

Leia took a couple steps backward and held the blade out determinedly. She hit the activation switch, and a brilliant beam of pure white light sprang from the hilt. Her face looked awed, and she stared at the blade open-mouthed. “It’s… beautiful,” she said. 

“Beautiful, but deadly,” Ahsoka reminded her. “We have to practice with it a lot before you’re able to use it in combat.”

Leia shut it off and clipped it to her belt, nodding. She turned to Anakin. “What about yours?”

Anakin grimaced. He held his saber up, pressing the activator, and a beam of red light spilled out from the hilt. Almost as quickly as it did, he shut it back off and clipped it to his belt. “I’ve made better,” he said. 

Ahsoka frowned. “I agree.”

“We should go back to the others and make a plan,” Leia said after an awkward pause. 

“Yeah,” said Anakin. “That would be best.” He started off back towards the Falcon and their friends, trying to ignore the lightsaber that slapped familiarly against his leg as he walked. 

Back at the Falcon, everyone gathered in the cabin to discuss the potential avenues for rescuing Luke.

“I have a bit of a network,” Rex said. “Not many, just a few people. I can reach out to them and see if they know anything.”

Leia frowned. “No,” she said, “I don’t think they will. There’s been a bounty on Luke’s head for months, and we all thought that if he was caught, the Empire would make it public knowledge. But as far as I know, the bounty’s still there.”

“Vader doesn’t want the Emperor to know he has Luke,” Anakin said. “He’s going to try to convince Luke to Fall, because he needs Luke’s help if he’s going to take on the Emperor.”

“The kid’s not going to agree to help with Vader’s coup,” Han pointed out. 

“Obviously not,” Leia said. “So we need to find out where Vader’s keeping him and get him out of there.” She turned to Anakin. “If you were trying to keep someone hidden, where would you put them?”

Anakin thought about it. “Somewhere I know well,” he decided. “It’s too risky to take the chance that your opponent knows the territory better. So, someplace with personal significance.”

“Okay,” Leia said. “What places have personal significance to you?”

Naboo was the easiest answer, but that wasn’t a good place to hide someone from Palpatine. And besides, if Padmé was dead, it would be too painful to step foot on that planet. Anakin wracked his brain for alternatives. Palpatine wouldn’t think to look for him on Tatooine, and it certainly was devoid of life enough that nobody would be able to find Luke, but Anakin didn’t think he would willingly go back to that place even if it was the best hiding spot in the galaxy. And aside from those two… there just weren’t that many places in the galaxy that had ever really felt like home.

“I don’t know,” he said, shoulders slumping. “He has almost two decades’ worth of time to have invested personal significance in a new place, and nowhere I can think of would be safe enough.”

“Well,” Leia said, “we can’t wait to search the whole galaxy.” She stood up, her tiny frame somehow more commanding the attention of the whole room with ease. It reminded Anakin of Padmé, or even of Yoda. 

“Can’t you - I don’t know, feel him in the Force or something?” Han asked.

An idea came to mind. “I can’t,” Anakin said. “But I might know someone who can.”

After several seconds where Anakin tried very hard to get Obi-Wan’s attention through the Force, Rex tapped him on the shoulder. 

“So, are we going to… comm this person?” Rex asked, perplexed.

“No,” Anakin said, concentrating harder. “I know you can hear me,” he muttered. The rest of the group shared alarmed glances.

Finally, Anakin began to detect Obi-Wan’s presence. Ahsoka gasped.

“Obi-Wan!” Anakin said. “Do you read me?”

The Force isn’t a commlink, Anakin, Obi-Wan’s voice filtered through, disapprovingly.

“Master Kenobi,” Ahsoka said. “I’ll be honest, I thought Anakin was making you up.”

Rex frowned. “General Kenobi is here?”

“It’s a Force thing,” Anakin explained. “He’s somehow kept his consciousness from dissolving into the Force. I’m hoping he can help us find Luke.”

Rex nodded, though it didn’t look like he quite understood. “Well,” he said, “tell him he isn’t forgiven for not telling me or Ahsoka he was alive for so long.”

Ahsoka relayed the message. Obi-Wan didn’t deign it with an answer.

“Obi-Wan,” Anakin said hurriedly, “Vader has Luke. Do you know where he is?”

Something like a sigh filtered through the Force. I do not, Obi-Wan’s voice said gravely. His presence is shrouded by the Dark side. Wherever Vader is keeping him is thick with it, so much that even I cannot detect him. 

Anakin clenched his fist. “Well, aren’t you all-seeing, or something? Can’t you tell us anything?”

Believe me, I have been trying, Obi-Wan’s voice filtered through. If I knew, I would have told you immediately. 

Anakin cursed. 

“Alright,” Leia said shakily. “Since General Kenobi can’t help us, I have a plan.”

All eyes turned to her. Anakin had the feeling he really was not going to like this plan.

“Vader wants Luke because he knows he’s his son, right?” Leia said, staring determinedly ahead. “Well, it stands to reason if he knew I was his daughter, he’d want me too.” 

Han held up his hands. “No way. Look, we all want the kid back, but nobody’s asking you to go give yourself up to the guy who tortured you.”

Leia gave Han a steely glace. “You’re right,” she said. “Nobody’s asking me. But I want to find Luke, and this might be our best shot.” She raised her chin. “We have ways to communicate with the Empire - intelligence, et cetera. We filter it through the right channels, and I’m sure we can make sure it gets directly to Vader. Tell him I’m his daughter, and he’ll want me just like he wants Luke. Then, we get me some sort of delayed-activated tracker that I can swallow, and when Vader takes me to Luke, you’ll know where we are in a couple weeks.”

“Absolutely not,” Anakin said, folding his arms across his chest. “I won’t allow that.”

Leia turned to look at him. “Allow it? You might be my father from another universe, but you don’t get to allow me to do anything. Luke might be your son, but he’s my brother and my best friend, and like hell do you get to tell me what I can and can’t do to get him back.”

Anakin flinched. “Vader won’t listen,” he said. “He’ll kill you before bothering to check.”

“We’ll send a DNA test, then,” Leia said. “Luke’s medical records are on file, we’ll just run a test against them.”

“It’s a bad idea, Leia!” Anakin said. “Look, we don’t know that Vader will go along with it. If anyone, we should send me. I can tell Vader that he can’t kill me because it’ll set off a - a time warp, or something, and then maybe he’ll send me to wherever he’s hiding Luke because he doesn’t want the Emperor to know about me, either -”

“That won’t work,” Rex said. “He knows you’re from an alternate timeline, remember? You showed him in the cell.”

Anakin ran a hand through his hair. There had to be something he knew that could lead him to Vader’s hideout. He frowned, thinking about the cell and what he’d shown Vader, as well as what he’d been shown. Clearly, Vader thought about his duel with Obi-Wan often. Could that be a place of personal significance? After all, he’d lost that duel. But conquering the place you’d lost all your remaining limbs and staking it for your own did feel like a very Sithly move, Anakin thought. He frowned, thinking of the memory.

“I just had an idea,” he said. “A place that might have personal significance to Vader.”

“What is it?” Han asked.

“Obi-Wan, are you still there?” Anakin asked. 

Yes, Obi-Wan’s voice said.

“When you dueled Vader next to the lava river, what planet were you on?”

There was a pause, like Obi-Wan didn’t want to think about it, but he answered, his voice heavy. Mustafar, he said. We were on the planet Mustafar.

Chapter Text

Mustafar. The word felt like a lodestone in his stomach, and Anakin sat down heavily. Across the cabin, Ahsoka looked at him worriedly. Mustafar, it seemed, was cruel to Anakin in either timeline. It was where he had Fallen in his attempt to defeat Palpatine last year, and if Anakin was being honest, it was about the last planet in the entire galaxy he wanted to go back to. 

“Hello?” Han asked, cutting through the silence. “Did your Force buddy give us an answer?”

“Mustafar,” Anakin spat. 

Han frowned. “I’ve never heard of Mustafar,” he said. “You sure it’s a real place?”

“I’m sure,” Anakin said. 

“Well, okay. Where is it?”

“It’s on almost the exact opposite of the galaxy,” Ahsoka said grimly. “It’ll take us three days at best.”

“Well, we should get going, then,” Han said. “We can go into town today to get supplies and top off the engines, and leave tomorrow morning. Does that work for everyone?”

Nobody objected to that plan. Rex volunteered to go into town to get supplies, while Han and Chewbacca set about getting fuel and any last-minute repairs that needed to be done. 

“I’m going to go to the old Jedi temple here,” Anakin said once Rex, Han, and Chewbacca were off doing their tasks. “See if there’s any wisdom there about my lightsaber.”

Ahsoka nodded. “We’ll be here when you get back,” she said. 

Anakin smiled tightly. He hopped on one of the speederbikes they’d rented from town and sped off into the grass, trusting that the Force would lead him in the right direction. 

His head pounded, and Anakin realized that he was afraid. Mustafar was a harsh reminder that he had failed once, and he was terrified of doing so again. And his kriffing lightsaber wouldn’t even work the way it was supposed to. Anakin hadn’t constructed a new one since he’d briefly turned Dark - the one he’d lost on Kamino had been recovered by Plo Koon - so what if this meant that now he was permanently corrupted, or something? The Jedi always talked about how it was impossible to come back, but Anakin had done it, and it had been fine. No lasting urges to go on killing sprees or attack his friends, thank you very much. 

But then again, a voice whispered in the back of his mind, that never stopped you before, did it?

Abruptly, he shut down that line of thought. These things were behind him. He sped on, opening the speederbike’s throttle wide, urging it to go faster. The grass whipped around him, and Anakin squinted in the wind.

There, up ahead. He could feel the temple. He urged the speeder forward until he saw the crest of a mound in the distance. Answers, he thought. If there were some to be found, maybe he would find them here. 

As he approached the temple, though, it became obvious that something had happened. The temple didn’t look as it had when Anakin had stepped through the portal - it looked as though somebody had tried to demolish it. Anakin’s anxiety rose, and he jumped off the speeder and ran to it. A sudden, unexpected thought struck him. If the temple had collapsed, what about the portal? Could he get home? Anakin pressed his palms against the cracked stone door. It stood firm and unyielding. 

“Open,” Anakin commanded, pushing with the Force. Nothing happened.

“Please,” Anakin said, pounding against it with his fists. If he couldn’t get it open, he couldn’t go home - Padmé, his kids - he needed to be able to go back -

Abruptly, Anakin pulled out his lightsaber and switched it on, plunging the red blade into the door. With an effort, he carved out a circle, using the Force to pull the stone out. What was left was a circular hole leading into darkness. Anakin stepped through.

The room he was in didn’t feel Dark, but it still seemed to project an aura of unwelcome so strongly that Anakin nearly stepped back out on instinct. But he soldiered on, walking deeper into the temple.

“Hello?” he asked, feeling a little silly. “I, uh, need help,” he said. “Please.”

His words echoed back to him hollowly, and Anakin sank to his knees. He wanted so badly to go home, to wake up from this terrible dream and be next to his wife, to hold his children in his arms and promise them that the galaxy was a kind and safe place, to not have to be here, now, about to go to Mustafar and try to save his son from the Dark side. “I want to go home,” he said, miserably. 

He felt something almost like a hand on his shoulder, and looked up to see the ghostly form of Obi-Wan standing next to him. 

“Obi-Wan,” Anakin said. “I… don’t know what to do.”

Trust in the Force, Obi-Wan said. 

“I can’t,” Anakin said. “I - what if when I go back to that planet, I can’t stop myself? What if I turn again, facing Vader? How can I trust the Force when I can’t even trust myself?”

Obi-Wan’s ghost moved to sit down opposite him. And that is why you must trust it, he said. I do not think the answers you seek will be found by breaking and entering. 

Anakin tried to look Obi-Wan in the eyes, but his gaze kept sliding through him to the far wall. “He’s - he’s me, Obi-Wan,” Anakin said. “He might go by a different name and use different powers, but he’s me and I’m capable of everything he’s done,” he said. 

He has been twisted by the Dark side, Anakin. He is… no longer what you are, Obi-Wan said after a pause. 

“But that’s not true,” Anakin said. “That’s why you couldn’t kill him on Mustafar, isn’t it? Because you knew he was me and you couldn’t do it.”

Obi-Wan was silent. 

“I want to go home,” Anakin said again, softer. “I know I need to stay here and help them, but I want to go home and pretend I never knew about Vader at all.”

I do not think you will be able to live with yourself until you confront him, Obi-Wan said at last. Whether you think he is you or not. 

“Yeah,” Anakin said. “I guess.” He looked back out through the hole. The sun was medium-high in the sky, casting dark shadows through to the floor Anakin was now sitting on. “This temple feels dead,” he said.

Vader destroyed much of it, Obi-Wan said. 

“What about the portal? The way I get back home - eventually, that is?”

Sidious has it, on Coruscant, Obi-Wan said. He cannot use it, as it can only be unlocked by the Light side.

That was some small comfort, at least. But the weight of knowing he would have to face Palpatine again if he wanted to go home sat hard in his mind. 

“I should go back,” Anakin said. “The temple doesn’t want me here.”

Then you should go, Obi-Wan said.

Anakin stood up, looking around at the dim, empty room. “I’m sorry,” he said to it. “I shouldn’t have forced my way in.”

The temple didn’t reply, but the air felt slightly warmer as Anakin made his way back to the entrance he had carved. 

“Obi-Wan,” he said, pausing before the doorway. “Will you be there? On Mustafar?”

I cannot, Obi-Wan said. You will have to face Vader on your own. 

Anakin hadn’t been expecting anything different, but it still hurt. “Alright,” he said. “I guess I will.” He stepped out of the door, walking over to his speederbike and kicking it on. 

He arrived back to the Falcon to see Ahsoka and Leia standing a few meters apart, lightsabers up. He parked the bike and walked over, some of his anxiety dissipating.

“Anakin!” Ahsoka said warmly. “How was it?”

“It’s been mostly destroyed,” Anakin said. “But I don’t think it could have helped me that much anyway. How are things going here?”

Leia powered down her lightsaber. “Rex, Han, and Chewbacca are still in town,” she said. “Ahsoka is helping me learn some of the basics with this.”

Anakin smiled. “Well, let’s see what you’ve got,” he said, crossing his arms. 

Ahsoka nodded at Leia. “We’ll do the first kata,” she said, holding up her blade. 

Leia powered her blade back on, adopting a starting stance. She moved fluidly through the kata, blocking Ahsoka’s saber at every turn. When they finished, she smiled, breathing hard. 

“That was great,” Anakin said. “You’re a natural.” He meant it - Leia’s form was rough, to be sure, but she moved with a quick, efficient grace. 

“Thanks,” she said. 

“I’m glad to see Ahsoka taught you to hold it the right way,” Anakin said. “Wouldn’t want you learning bad habits.”

Ahsoka rolled her eyes at the comment, but didn’t respond to it. “You’re going to be smaller than most of your opponents,” she said, “so whenever you can, get close to them. Quickness and efficiency of motion are your best friends.”

Leia nodded. Then, she turned to Anakin. “I want to be able to fight Vader,” she said, bluntly.

Anakin set his jaw, fighting the urge to respond that she would be no match for the Sith. “Alright,” he said. He powered up his lightsaber, then leapt at her.

Leia raised her saber to defend herself, her eyes widening as she scrambled backwards. “I didn’t mean right now,” she said, swinging to block again.

“Vader’s not going to give you the benefit of a warning, either,” Anakin said, twisting and brutally disengaging so that Leia’s saber sprang out of her grip. He pointed his saber at her throat. “You lose.”

Leia glared at him for half a second, then quickly pulled something from her pocket. “We both lose,” she said.

Anakin raised an eyebrow. “You carry detonators in your pockets?”

“In case of emergency,” Leia explained. 

Anakin powered down his saber and called Leia’s to his hand with the Force, giving it back to her. “Well, if Vader gives you two seconds to pull that out, then I guess you both lose. But it’s probably a better strategy to avoid him altogether.”

Leia gave her saber a twirl, testing its weight in her hand. “Maybe,” she said.

“You did well blocking my first hits, though,” Anakin said. “Quick thinking.”

Leia gave Anakin a disbelieving look. “Let’s go again,” she said. 

A couple hours later, when Han, Chewbacca, and Rex came back, Leia had made a little more progress. Part of it was natural ability, part of it was the fact that she’d trained in melee combat before, but Anakin thought the biggest part was probably her sheer determination to keep going. If he was honest, it reminded him of himself. Anakin remembered first coming to the Temple and being years behind the other students, spending long hours in the training salles, refusing to be satisfied until he was the best. Leia, it seemed, had similar unrelenting qualities.

But lightsaber practice had to stop once the rest of the crew got back with food and supplies, and everyone ate. 

“We’re leaving at eight hundred hours tomorrow morning,” Han announced. “Sleep well, everybody.”

Anakin slept outside again, but this time he was far from well-rested when he awoke.

By eight hundred hours, the ship was hurtling off to Mustafar. 

The atmosphere in the ship was tense the entire way there. Nobody knew exactly what was to be expected, but everybody had the feeling that it was going to be worse than they imagined. Han grudgingly allowed Leia to practice with her lightsaber in the cabin (“on low power, though, and if you even think about cutting open my ship -”), and dug out a training remote from somewhere that he claimed Luke had once used. 

Leia, for her part, got good at deflecting the training bolts, but Anakin knew from experience that it was entirely different in real combat. 

He spent a lot of the trip meditating, or trying to. Ahsoka offered to join him, but after they tried and only succeeded in becoming more anxious than before, she gently told him she was going to go do it by herself. 

The last day of the trip was distressingly silent, both out loud and in the Force. Ahsoka and Leia were both shielded tightly, and even Han wasn’t in the mood to talk much. Everyone was laser-focused on one thing: the task ahead.

“Dropping out of hyperspace,” Han announced. Anakin braced himself.

As soon as the ship shuddered into realspace, the aura of Mustafar hit him hard. If Malachor had been thick and oppressive and cloudy, Mustafar was hot and angry, feeling less like a fog in the Force and more like a maelstrom. Ahsoka and Leia both winced, and Ahsoka said grimly, “I think we’re in the right spot.”

Han took the ship down into the atmosphere. “Scopes say it’s breathable, but just barely,” he said. “Volcanoes are spewing out toxic gas, most of the surface is unstable - yeah, this seems like the kind of place Vader would find relaxing,” he muttered.

The center of the storm of Dark energy was easy enough to locate, and soon they were flying towards the northeast quadrant of the planet. They got closer, and out the front viewport, Anakin gasped.

Sticking out of the molten landscape was a huge, jet-black fortress. It was immense, perched on the edge of a cliff, brutally harsh in its design. A thin flow of lava flowed from the center to rejoin the river at the base of the cliff. Huge spires rose above it like a tuning fork, and the Dark side positively churned around it. It looked and felt like it had been designed to inspire terror. 

“That’s the place,” Anakin said. Han looked wary, but flew the ship closer. There was a small landing platform just in front of it that Han landed the Falcon on. 

“Keep the engines running hot,” Anakin said. “Rex, Leia, Ahsoka - go find Luke and get him back. Let me handle Vader.”

Ahsoka turned to him. “You can’t take him by yourself,” she said.

“Yeah, but I can hold him off until it’s time to retreat,” Anakin said, “and I’d rather we have a trained Force-sensitive going after Luke, in case anything goes wrong.”

Ahsoka didn’t look happy with that, but she didn’t argue, either. “Fine,” she said. 

“May the Force be with you,” Anakin said. He stepped out of the ship and onto the solidified lava, looked towards the castle, and unshielded with intent. Come and find me, he thought.

Almost immediately, he felt Vader’s presence. Anakin pulled out his lightsaber, holding it as he walked into the fortress.

The inside was no less bleak than the out, all black marble and deadly-looking corners jutting everywhere. Anakin walked forward, the Dark side prickling like electricity down his spine.

He didn’t have long to wait. Vader entered the room (front hall? foyer? evil entranceway?) with intent, his lightsaber already lit. 

“I wanted a rematch, what can I say?” Anakin asked, drawing Vader out.

“Do not think I will show mercy this time, Skywalker,” Vader said. Anakin swallowed. He didn’t doubt it. 

He raised his lightsaber. “Don’t think I will, either,” he said, igniting the red beam.

If Vader was surprised or moved by the color of Anakin’s lightsaber, he didn’t take the time to show it. Instead, he launched himself at Anakin, his own blade crashing down with dizzying strength. Anakin parried, leaping backwards only for Vader to match him stride for stride.

The lightsaber felt unpredictable in Anakin’s hands. He wasn’t fighting so much with an extension of his body, but more a barely-controlled weapon, and Anakin was suffering for it. Vader swept low, forcing Anakin to jump, and just barely managed to avoid getting his legs chopped off for his efforts. With a grunt, Anakin swung hard.

Vader met his stroke easily, but Anakin continued with his offensive, vaulting over Vader to push the Sith towards a wall. 

There wasn’t a sound in the room other than the clashing of their lightsabers, the red light bouncing off of the gleaming floors and scattering in a thousand dancing beams.

Vader Force-pushed Anakin back, knocking him off of his feet. Anakin barely had time to raise his blade before Vader was on him, his blade arcing down. They were saberlocked, their blades a hand’s breadth from Anakin’s face. Vader’s mask bore down on him, and Anakin saw himself reflected in the shiny plastoid armor. He breathed raggedly, fighting to keep their blades from coming down and killing him.

Vader’s breathing hissed in Anakin’s ears. “You are weak,” the Sith said. 

“You… gotta… start coming up with… better insults,” Anakin ground out. His arms were shaking with the effort of keeping their sabers up - Vader’s full weight was behind his.

Anakin looked up into Vader’s lenses, trying to imagine his own face behind the mask. With enormous effort, he brought his leg up and kicked Vader in the chest, finally breaking the lock.

Vader stepped backwards and Anakin sprang to his feet. He adjusted his grip on his saber and attacked again, fury and intent behind his actions.

“I’m not weak,” he said after a particularly hard blow that forced Vader back a couple steps. “I’m more powerful than you’ll ever be.” His lightsaber hummed in his hands, and Anakin rolled his shoulders before attacking again. Vader was the weak one, he thought. Weak for Falling. Weak for failing. Weak for letting himself be the Emperor’s puppet. Anakin snarled, pressing forward. His lightsaber was finally working with him, and he felt so in control of the fight. He could move Vader wherever he wanted to.

He pressed on, pushing Vader again towards the back wall. “You’ve failed again,” he said, suddenly confident he would win the fight. “Luke will never be yours.”

Vader didn’t respond, just continued parrying, but he was out of room to back up. With a quick disengage, Anakin swept his saber in a circle, cutting off Vader’s right hand. Wires sparked, and the Sith collapsed against the wall. Anakin caught his lightsaber.

And oh, this lightsaber felt right. Vader’s saber sang in Anakin’s hand like it was one of his own, and he smiled, crossing his blades in front of his opponent’s neck. Vader would recognize the similarity between this and the end of Anakin's duel with Dooku, and the thought made Anakin smile.

Anakin looked Vader in the eye, preparing to strike. Vader didn’t speak, just looked up in acceptance of his fate.

Suddenly, from behind Anakin, someone cried out. 

“Don’t kill him!” Luke’s voice came again. “Please, Ani, don’t kill him.”

Anakin turned to see Luke staggering forward, his face pale. Behind him stood Ahsoka, Leia, and Rex.

“He’s injured,” Luke said. “We can escape. You don’t have to kill him. Please,” he said again, his voice ragged.

Anakin looked back at Vader, who was slumped against the wall. “Fine,” he said. He deactivated the sabers, clipping them both to his belt. “Let’s go,” he said.

They walked back to the Falcon, Luke leaning heavily on Leia. Once they boarded the ship, Luke collapsed, Anakin and Leia both reaching out to catch him. 

The ship took off, and Luke looked up. He was crying, Anakin noticed, just a little. Luke blinked, moving to press the heels of his hands to his eyes.

“Thank you,” he said to Anakin. “I’m sorry, I - I couldn’t let you kill him.” His breathing was coming in short gasps, and he curled in on himself. “I - he’s my father,” he said, miserably. Tears leaked out from under his hands, and Leia ran a hand through his hair. 

“Luke,” Anakin breathed, feeling a righteous fury well up in his chest. He put his hand on Luke’s shoulder. “Luke, look at me.”

Luke did so, meeting his gaze with red-rimmed eyes.

“I don’t care what Vader said,” Anakin said, his shields open so Luke could sense his honesty through the Force. “Luke, I am your father.”

Chapter Text

At Anakin’s admission, Luke looked up at him like he had grown a second head and promptly passed out.

“Skyguy, you can’t just say that with no warning -”

“Look at the state he’s in, did you really think that was a good idea?”

“Kid probably thinks this is a hallucination of some sort -”

“Are you trying to confuse him?”

Even Artoo had something rude to say, beeping furiously about overpowering Luke’s circuits.

Anakin held up his hands. “Fine!” he snapped. “Everyone just calm down, please? I’m sorry I didn’t want him to think that only that - that monster is his father!” He looked around to the surrounding people for support, but nobody seemed particularly charitable. Leia’s mouth was a hard line, kneeling over Luke.

“He needs medical attention,” Leia said after a silent standoff with Anakin. “I don’t know what Vader did to him, but we found him hooked up to a medical droid. And I think he has a concussion of some sort.”

Anakin blanched. “What - you don’t think Vader was - was torturing him, do you?” 

Leia looked up at him cooly. “We all know he’s not above it, don’t we?” she said. 

Anakin seriously regretted not going ahead and killing the Sith when he had the chance. Luke might be able to forgive him despite everything, but Anakin suspected nobody else in the ship would have had any qualms. “I’m gonna kill that guy,” he muttered. 

Ahsoka was giving him a strange look. “Hey, Anakin?” she asked, “why don’t we let Leia and Rex deal with Luke’s injuries for a moment?”

Anakin blinked. It was a not-very-subtle request for Anakin to leave the area, and Anakin almost snapped back before he realized that loose items in the cabin were rattling a little. He took a deep breath, trying to calm down. “Okay,” he said, stalking off to an adjacent room. 

Ahsoka followed him. Once the door was closed, she crossed her arms. “What the hell was that?” she demanded.

“Excuse me?”

“Back on Mustafar. I could feel your fight with Vader across the whole fortress, Anakin, and I know the Dark side when I feel it.”

Anakin raised his eyebrows. “Are you accusing me? Need I remind you that I didn’t kill Vader, when he’s a Sith and responsible for the deaths of millions of people?”

Ahsoka’s eyes were hard. “You can’t go Dark again, Anakin,” she said. “It won’t end well for anyone if you do.”

“I couldn’t have defeated Vader without it,” Anakin said. “You don’t understand.”

“I don’t understand?” Ahsoka took a step closer. “Listen to yourself, Anakin! You thought you could control it last time, too, remember? But you can’t. No one can. By its very nature, it can’t be controlled.”

Anakin simmered. “Maybe not by you,” he said harshly. Ahsoka’s eyes widened briefly, and a hurt look came over her face. Anakin felt a twinge of guilt, but the words were already out of his mouth, and he turned on his heel to walk out the door back to the cabin. 

Leia and Rex had shifted Luke so that he was lying on a mattress that had been dragged out from one of the bunks. He was still unconscious, and looked paler than normal. As Anakin walked in, Leia looked up. 

“He needs to be in a proper medical facility,” she said grimly. “We’re en route to rendezvous with part of the fleet now. We still don’t know the source of the information leak, so it could be dangerous, but…” she looked down at Luke. “We can’t risk anything happening to him.”

“Where are we headed?”

“Orto sector,” Leia said. “Orto is friendly to the Alliance, and we’ll get there in less than a day.”

“Good,” Anakin said. 

“You should get some rest,” Rex suggested from where he was sitting across the cabin. 

Anakin thought he was probably too keyed up to rest, but he nodded anyway. “We don’t have enough bunks,” he pointed out.

“We can sleep in shifts,” Leia said. “Han and Chewie are flying; I’ll wait up with them until you’ve rested. But you really should go to sleep.”

Anakin’s gaze fell to Luke. His brow was creased in sleep as though he was having a bad dream, and Anakin sent out a wave of calmness towards him. He ran a hand through his hair, suddenly realizing how tired he was. He hadn’t been this tired before, had he? 

He looked up at Leia. “You mindtricked me,” he said.

Leia looked confused. “I what?”

Anakin smiled. “When you said I should go to sleep, you sent a suggestion through the Force. It’s really hard to do to another Force user, especially accidentally. But I’m not surprised - your mental shields are stronger than anyone I’ve seen, and it stands to reason that you’d be good with other mental abilities.”

Leia did not look pleased with herself. In fact, she looked horrified. “That’s terrible,” she said. “I - I can’t do that,” she said, her voice sounding strangled. Her mouth opened. “What if - in the Senate,” she said. “How could I do that?”

Rex gave Anakin a look, and Anakin’s brain spun worriedly. “You wouldn’t have,” he said, trying to calm Leia down. “Look, when someone who is Force-sensitive doesn’t realize it, and doesn’t know what the Force is, they usually can’t access all their abilities. Just knowing you have access to the Force increases the ability to use it, because your subconscious suddenly becomes aware of it.” And, Anakin thought, if you did do it in the Senate, it probably helped people. But he didn’t say that.

Leia looked unhappy. “This is exactly the kind of power I don’t think anyone should have,” she said. 

“I agree,” Rex said. 

Anakin looked over at him in surprise. “You do?”

Rex looked at him seriously. “I do. Do you remember on Teth, when Ventress got into my head? And - you weren’t there, of course, but on Mandalore, Maul got everything he wanted to know about Ahsoka from Jesse.” His voice shook slightly with emotion. “To take away somebody’s free will like that - no one should have that power,” he said firmly. “But the Force - from what I’ve experienced of it - it’s a little bit like a lightsaber. Useful, to be sure - it’s saved my life on more than one occasion - but not something you can carry lightly.” He looked at Leia. “It’s a part of you,” he said. “You can’t change that. But you can learn to use it for good.”

Anakin looked at Rex, stunned. “Well, who knew?” he said. “There’s a Jedi Master in you after all.”

Rex shrugged. “Believe me, I’ve no wish to have the Force. That’s one responsibility I don’t need. But I’ve worked with enough of you Jedi to know that I’d rather have the all-powerful freaks on my side.”

Anakin grinned. “Master Yoda would say we’re luminous beings, not freaks.”

Rex looked at Anakin flatly. “Well, Master Yoda can take it up with me later, then.”

“Wipe the floor with you, I could,” Anakin said in what he thought to be a spot-on Yoda impression. From the look on Rex’ face, it was less than perfect.

Leia looked between them with a confused expression. 

“Well,” Anakin said. “On that note, I do think I’m going to try to get some rest. Wake me if anything happens.”

They nodded at him, and Anakin walked off to the bunks.

He passed Ahsoka on the way there, though she didn’t make eye contact with him. Anakin pushed down a surge of guilt. He meant what he’d said; despite his brief flirtations with the Dark, Anakin had come back. And if he could come back, that meant there was a way to control it. He just had to figure out how. Later, though - for now he needed to sleep. A lightsaber fight really took it out of you. 

Several hours later, Rex woke him up as the ship exited hyperspace in the Orto sector, and Anakin rubbed his eyes and watched through the viewport as the Falcon docked onto a larger transport ship. The whole fleet wasn’t there, just a single transport, and Leia explained that the other transports were in need-to-know locations. 

As soon as they docked, Anakin helped get Luke to the medical center. A doctor there ran some diagnostics and explained that he would be okay, but he should remain under observation to make sure his concussion healed okay. His state of unconsciousness, she explained, was to help his body heal. He wasn’t in a coma. They could visit him when he woke up.

It was a relief, to say the least, and Anakin resolved to wait outside Luke’s room until he woke up. Joining him was the rest of the crew from the Falcon.

About two hours later, the doctor came out and said Luke was awake and they could see him. Careful not to crowd him too much, the group walked into the room. Luke was hooked up to an IV, and looked a little too pale for Anakin’s liking, but other than that he seemed to be doing fine. He grinned at them when he saw them. 

“Glad to have you back in one piece,” Han said, reaching over to flick Luke on the face.

“Ow,” Luke said.

“Han, don’t,” Leia said.

Luke’s smile abruptly vanished when he saw Anakin. “Ani,” he said, cooly.

“How are you feeling?” Anakin asked.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were a Jedi?” Luke asked, sounding hurt. 

“It’s complicated,” Anakin started, but Luke cut him off.

“No, it isn’t,” he said. “You were good enough to defeat Vader, and you let me think you didn’t even know basic lightsaber forms.”

Anakin sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Really, Luke, I am. I didn’t tell you because I was afraid of how you would react, and - and that’s a coward’s move, I know.” He looked down, hunching his shoulders a little. “I hope you can forgive me.”

“I’m just - I’m tired of people lying to me,” Luke said, his voice tight. “First Ben, lying about my father, and now you - I’m not a kid, you know!”

“I know,” Anakin said. 

Luke frowned. “In the ship - I might have been hallucinating, but I thought you said…” he trailed off, looking at Anakin questioningly. 

Anakin sighed again. “It’s true, Luke,” he said. “I’m your father. I’m from another timeline, one where the Empire never happened, and about nineteen years in the past.”

Luke paled. “How -”

“I don’t know,” Anakin said. “The Force, I guess.”

Ahsoka took over, thankfully sparing Anakin from having to talk. “In this timeline,” she said, “Anakin fell to the Dark side and became Darth Vader, but in the one he’s from, he was able to destroy the Emperor and prevent the Jedi purges. In this timeline, he wasn’t aware of the birth of his children, so they were split up to prevent the Sith from noticing them.”

“Split up - then - you mean -”

Leia smiled at Luke a little sadly. “Haven’t you always wanted a twin sister?”

Luke’s brow creased. “That’s - that’s a lot to take in,” he said.

“You’re handling it better than I did, if it’s any consolation,” Han said.

Luke nodded weakly. “I… think I need to rest,” he said. 

“We’ll leave,” Leia said. “Let us know when you want to talk again, okay?”

“Okay.”

They trooped out. Anakin felt terrible. He could feel Luke’s presence - he had to teach that kid to shield, he was projecting his emotions all over the place - and he was clearly hurting a lot. And it was Anakin’s fault, for being too much of a coward to tell the truth. 

Leia looked over at him. “Do you want to go to the gym?” she asked in a clear attempt to make him feel better.

“Not really,” Anakin said.

“I’ll go with you, Leia,” Ahsoka said. Anakin felt a little stung, but let them walk off. 

Han glanced after Leia awkwardly, then at Anakin. “Chewie and I are gonna go work on the Falcon,” he said. 

It was just Anakin and Rex left, then.

“I fucked up, Rex,” Anakin said. 

“It does look that way,” Rex said. “But Luke will come around. He’s not one to hold a grudge. You should be glad it wasn’t Leia who got all touchy about this.”

“Hm,” Anakin said. 

“Walk with me,” Rex said. 

Anakin fell in step with his old captain, wandering through the transport.

“You can’t fix this, Anakin,” Rex said. 

“What do you mean -”

“Let me finish. You can’t undo the past,” Rex said. “No matter what, Luke’s father turned to the Dark side and killed his friends and stood by while Leia’s planet was destroyed. You can’t make all that hurt go away, no matter how much you want to.”

Anakin nodded. They walked past the commissary and turned the corner.

“And now, on top of all that, he finds out Vader is the same person he idolized his entire life,” Rex said. “He feels betrayed. I know how that feels.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“I know your first instinct is to tell him that everything is going to be okay, but this is one of those situations where you can’t do that. You need to let him grieve. He’ll come to you, if he wants - and I think he’ll want to, after he gets over the whole time travel and hiding your identity bit - but you can’t force him to.”

They turned another corner. 

“Maybe I can’t fix everything,” Anakin said, “but I can at least try to make sure this universe doesn’t get any worse.” 

“That’s what we’re all trying to do,” Rex said. 

They walked in silence for a while, making their way around the transport. Eventually, they stopped to eat, and Anakin felt some of the tension ease out of his shoulders at the mundane task. 

A couple hours had elapsed by the time they got back to the medical center. Anakin knocked on the door to Luke’s room.

“Come in,” Luke said.

Inside, Leia and Ahsoka were sitting, and Leia was talking animatedly about lightsaber moves. Luke looked happy.

“I want to apologize again,” Anakin started, but Luke held up a hand.

“It’s fine,” he said. “If I was a time-traveler, I wouldn’t think anyone would believe me, either.”

It wasn’t an exoneration of Anakin’s actions, but it was close enough, Anakin smiled gratefully, and he and Rex settled into chairs.

“Now that you’re here,” Luke said, “I think I need to tell you about my time with Vader.”

Leia’s eyes widened in sympathy. “Oh, Luke,” she said. “You don’t have to - I understand, believe me -”

Luke shook his head. “That’s the thing,” he said. “He was - almost kind.”

“Oh,” Leia said. She leaned back. “I’m glad,” she said, though her words were a little short. 

Luke didn’t appear to pick up on the underlying bitterness in Leia’s tone, and he continued. “After my X-wing got hit,” he said, “I crashed into the outpost. Got knocked out for a while, and got a nasty cut on the back of my head. When I woke up, I was strapped to a medical gurney, surrounded by Stormtroopers.

“Of course, I thought at first they were only bothering to save my life because they wanted to interrogate me - or worse, execute me publicly for the Death Star,” he said. “When I saw Vader, I panicked, but I fell unconscious before I could do anything to get away. When I woke up, I was in his fortress, in a room hooked up to a medical station. Nobody had come to interrogate me, but I could tell in the Force that Vader was nearby, so I tried to escape. I didn’t get very far - almost as soon as I got out of the fortress, I collapsed. Vader brought me back to the room. When I woke up again, the door was locked.

“I didn’t talk to him until the third - or maybe the fourth - day. A droid delivered my food, and it was almost like Vader was afraid to come and talk to me, but after I threatened to stop eating until I had answers, he stormed in. I was terrified.” Luke bit his lip like he wasn’t sure how to continue. “And then he… told me everything. It was terrible,” he said. “He killed Ben, killed my aunt and uncle - and so many more - he tortured Leia - but he was telling the truth, I could sense it. And he didn’t turn me over to the Emperor, even though that’s what he was supposed to do.” Luke looked up at them, earnestly. “I think there’s still good in him,” he said. “Buried deep down.”

Leia pursed her lips. “Sometimes,” she said, “when people are held captive, and they expect to be treated much worse than they are, they misinterpret a lack of cruelty for kindness. But Luke - you were a prisoner. This is Darth Vader we’re talking about, not some bounty hunter. Just because he didn’t torture you doesn’t make him a good person!”

Luke looked pained. “I know,” he said, “but he cared. He has to do whatever the Emperor tells him to - but he’s going to try and overthrow him,” Luke said. 

“Don’t transfer blame,” Leia said tersely. “And don’t think that Darth Vader as Emperor would be any less cruel than Palpatine.”

Luke’s face crumbled. “I just -” he looked up at Anakin. “He was a good man, once,” he said, meeting Anakin’s gaze. “And I think maybe there’s some good left.”

Emotions flitted over Leia's face rapidly before she composed herself. "I'm sorry," she said, standing up. "I have to go."

Chapter Text

“Leia!” Luke said, reaching out a hand, but she was already halfway out the door. Ahsoka and Anakin shared a look of alarm.

“I’ll go,” Anakin said, standing abruptly to follow Leia. She was already halfway down the hallway, and Anakin had to jog to catch up to her. 

“Leia!”

She whirled, looking up with anger flashing in her eyes. “What do you want?” she snapped.

Anakin swallowed, suddenly feeling very self-conscious. “To talk about it. If you want to.”

Leia looked at him with an intensity that left Anakin a little unnerved. “Fine,” she said, at last. She stalked off, letting Anakin follow her into an office. He sat on a chair, watching as she paced back and forth, fuming for a few strides before saying anything.

“I just don’t understand how he can think that,” she started with, gesticulating wildly. “How he can think that that - that monster - that thing - could ever do something kind.” She turned on her heel, pacing the other direction. “He deserves to die for what he’s done,” she said, her voice hard. “I don’t care that he’s my biological father. I don’t care that he was a good man. I care about what’s right, and what’s right is ending his reign of terror once and for all.” Her chest heaving, she paused her pacing and turned to Anakin. “And to hear that Luke thinks maybe he can be - what, redeemed? Saved, because his first instinct upon learning he had a son wasn’t to torture him to death?” Leia let out a bark of mirthless laughter. “Excuse me for thinking otherwise!” She slumped, suddenly, falling into a chair. “I don’t know how he doesn’t blame him,” she said. “I don’t know how we can be related, Luke is so - so calm all the time, and good.” She smiled grimly and looked up, meeting Anakin’s eyes. “I just don’t think I can forgive him,” she said. “When I saw you about to kill him, I was angry. Not because you were killing an unarmed man - because I wanted to kill him myself.”

Anakin looked down at his hands for a long time. “I understand,” he said. “Part of me wants nothing more than to kill him.” He swallowed, looking up and meeting her gaze. “He’s what I became,” he said. “How can I accept that I have that capacity for evil?”

Leia’s face crumpled. “I don’t know,” she said. Suddenly, her face was in her hands. “I don’t know,” she said again. “My father was the leader of the Alliance, and now everyone here expects me to follow perfectly in his footsteps. I have to be strong for the people of Alderaan that survived, because to them I’m a hero, when - when Alderaan was destroyed because of me,” she said. “And now - to find out I have the responsibility of the Force and all that it implies, and now in the back of my mind I’m wondering - what if I end up just like him?” she asked, looking up to meet Anakin’s gaze. Her face was messy with tears. “I - I’m angry, Ani, and it scares me.”

Anakin frowned. His heart ached. “My mother died when I was nineteen,” he blurted out. He didn’t know why he thought he had to share this story, the one only two people had known - one dead, one the Emperor of the kriffing galaxy, here - but it suddenly seemed like it was bursting out of him. “I was there,” he continued. “She had been enslaved almost her entire life,” he said, his head ringing. Unwelcome images leeched into his consciousness. “But a few years before she died, she had been freed - she got married. She was happy,” he whispered. “And then she was kidnapped, and tortured to death. I arrived too late to save her,” he said, numbly. 

Leia looked at him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “That’s terrible.”

“I killed the entire village that killed her,” Anakin said.

There was a pause as Anakin’s words sunk in, and Leia looked at him in horror. “Why are you telling me this?” she croaked.

“Because I get being that angry,” Anakin said. “And if you can’t control it, it’s - bad,” he finished, weakly. “I told myself what I did was just because they were kidnappers, rapists, murderers, slavers - if they weren’t doing it they were complicit in others doing it, and that’s just as bad. But really I did it because I was angry,” he said. “If you can’t control your fear, your anger - it controls you. That’s how you go to the Dark side,” he said. 

“I killed someone for the first time when I was sixteen,” Leia said. “I had just begun going on missions for the Alliance, and one went badly. Officially, you know, it was a relief mission - the Princess and Junior Senator of a Core world couldn’t be seen with the rebels,” she said bitterly. “We got pinned down in a bar, and had to shoot our way out to escape. It was a Stormtrooper. I don’t even know what he looked like under the helmet. He could have been anyone,” she whispered. A faintly nauseous look crossed her face. “It didn’t even hit me that it was real until we were in hyperspace,” she said. 

“I’m sorry,” Anakin said. 

“It’s fine,” Leia said. “It’s just - I know what Luke would say. If good people can do bad things, it stands to reason bad people can do good things. But if Vader can do good things, that just means that every awful thing he’s done hurts more, because it means he was capable of doing something different, and I just - I don’t want that to be true,” she said. 

“The Dark side makes it hard to make rational decisions,” Anakin said. “It’s kind of like spice - it feels so powerful that you forget who you are, and all you care about is getting more power.”

“But you came back,” Leia said. “And that means he could, too. But he hasn’t.”

“Yeah,” Anakin said. He sighed. “I don’t know. I think Luke’s confused.” Leia snorted, and Anakin smiled at her. “You still angry?” 

“Very much so,” Leia said.

“Want to go work on your lightsaber technique? When I got mad all I wanted to do was spar. It drove Obi-Wan crazy.”

“I would be grateful for the distraction,” Leia said, which Anakin guessed was as close as she was going to get to admitting that she was itching to let a little steam loose. 

“This office probably isn’t a good location,” Anakin said. “Is there a gym somewhere around here?”

Leia led him to a gym and unceremoniously kicked out the young woman who was currently occupying the side room. As soon as she was inside, she turned to Anakin and powered up her lightsaber. “Ahsoka and I went through the Form I basics,” she said. 

“Okay,” Anakin said. “Let’s see it.”

Leia went through the basic stances of the form, transitioning from one to another with relative ease. Her footwork was a little sloppy, but she looked sure of her movements.

“It looks good,” Anakin said. “Did Ahsoka show you any moves from any of the other forms?”

“Not really,” Leia said. “She mentioned the others, but she didn’t go into detail.”

“Right,” Anakin said. “Well, she favors Shien, and I use Djem So, which are the two aspects of Form V, so that’s probably the form you’ll learn, too. The biggest difference is that Form V is more attack-focused and better suited for a single opponent, whereas Form I is mostly just useful for deflecting blaster bolts.”

Leia nodded, and Anakin held up his lightsaber. “This is the opening for Djem,” he said. “I’m going to move through the basic stances of the form.” He did so, pausing at every stance for Leia to see. She held up her own saber.

“Elbows up higher,” Anakin said. “Gives you more freedom of movement.”

Leia adjusted, and Anakin was hit with a sudden memory of the first time he’d helped Ahsoka with her form. It had been right after that horrible first assignment rescuing Jabba’s son, and Anakin hadn’t had the first idea of how to train an apprentice. He’d blundered through the first lesson, torn between frustration by Ahsoka’s insistence on the reverse grip and feeling impressed by her ability at such a young age. 

“That’s good,” Anakin said. “We can come back to that later, but now let’s go back to Form I. I’ll go easy on you, but see if you can use the moves independently.”

He held up his blade in the Form I guard, letting Leia make the first move. Sure enough, she stepped forward, swinging her blade in a wide arc towards Anakin. He deflected it, following it up with an attack she just barely made.

“Good,” he said, returning to guard briefly. “Keep your movements as efficient as possible - big swings like that leave you open to attack.”

Leia nodded, attacking for a second time with a more direct swing. Anakin grinned. “That’s it.”

They went through the Form I attacks and defenses, edging into one or two of the Form V moves after Anakin felt like Leia had a handle on the concepts. After a couple hours, they finally called it an evening. 

“Thanks,” Leia said. She wiped her forehead and took a drink of water.

“Anytime.”

Leia left to go take a shower, leaving Anakin alone in the room. He sighed and held up his lightsaber, switching it on. Despite the brief moments during his duel with Vader when it had worked for him, it felt flat and foreign to him now. He frowned and held up Vader’s lightsaber next to it. The problem was that Vader’s lightsaber was almost too much like Anakin’s old one. It had the same weight and feel, the same showy grips, and when Anakin held it out and turned it on it hummed with a frequency that sounded right to his ears. And that had a terrifying implication, the confirmation that Vader and Anakin were more the same than different. 

Anakin switched both blades off and frowned. On one hand, it was generally a good idea to use the lightsaber that worked the best for you, but on the other, Anakin was loath to use a lightsaber that was a constant reminder of what he might become. He thought back to his conversation with Ahsoka about the Dark side, and her insistence that it was unable to be controlled. 

But Anakin had done it before, hadn’t he? Sure, it was difficult, but he had done it. His hand tightened on the grip of Vader’s blade, and a thought struck him. Vader might not want to tell the Emperor about Luke, but he would have to explain losing his hand somehow, and Anakin doubted there were many adversaries in the galaxy who could best Vader in a duel. If the Emperor figured out that the portal worked and Anakin had come back, Anakin had no doubt he would soon figure out a way to open it. And that, more than anything, couldn’t be allowed to happen.

Anakin took a shower and freshened up, weighing his options. Now, while Vader might still be incapacitated, would be the best time to take out Palpatine. But he didn’t have a plan to get into the Emperor’s palace, and it was unlikely that, however skilled, Anakin could get past all of the guards without being noticed. The only way to get in would be for Palpatine to think Anakin was somehow on his side. As Anakin mulled that over, the beginnings of a plan started to form. Ahsoka, he thought, really wasn’t going to like it.

His comm beeped, and Anakin opened it to see a message from Leia: the rest of the group was getting dinner with Luke, and did he want to join them. That would be fine, Anakin thought. He couldn’t realistically leave until tomorrow anyway.

He returned to Luke’s room to see that everyone else was already there. Luke was sitting up and claimed to be feeling much better, and someone had brought what looked like half the commissary’s food to rest on a table. 

Anakin made himself a plate of brown mush and roasted tubers and sat on one of the plastoid chairs lined up against one wall. 

“Wedge came by,” Luke said, looking at Anakin as he sat down. “He’s glad you’re okay.”

“Oh, good,” Anakin said. He took a bite of food. “You didn’t - I mean, he still thinks my name is Ani, right?”

Luke nodded. “Yeah, I didn’t think it would be easy to explain,” he said. “But he flew your ship, and it’s back in the hangar if you want to make sure everything’s okay with it.”

“That’s great,” Anakin said. “Tell him thanks for taking care of it, will you?” This was great news to Anakin - it would be easy to take the ship out and use the excuse of a test flight if anyone asked. Anakin’s plan became more detailed. 

Leia seemed to have forgiven Luke, or was at least ignoring her feelings on Luke’s opinions, and was sitting next to his bed. Next to her, Han was engaged in an argument with Chewbacca over the Falcon ’s hyperdrive, and Anakin was starting to suspect that there were very few times when that ship wasn’t in need of repairs of some sort. 

Anakin smiled at the thought. He’d come to this dimension just two tendays ago, but already he found he cared about the people in it like he’d known them for much longer. His children, obviously, but also their friends. And it was weird being around a version of Rex that was so obviously old, but Anakin found he liked him a lot. Ahsoka, for her part, was not quite the same Ahsoka who had come to his dimension last year, but even with four years on Malachor under her belt, she had a determination like no other. Anakin smiled to think of it. She was going to be a great teacher for Leia - and for Luke as well, if he wanted. 

It struck Anakin that if his plan was successful, he wasn't going to see these people again. The galaxy would be better off (and Anakin would finally be home), but he would miss them. 

He didn’t talk much during dinner, smiling at people’s jokes and trying to make sure he would remember this. 

Once it started getting late and people began going their separate ways, Anakin called Ahsoka over to the side. 

“I wanted to say I’m sorry,” he said, “about earlier, on the Falcon.”

Ahsoka nodded cautiously. “Okay,” she said.

“You were right. The Dark side can’t be controlled,” Anakin said. “I was foolish to think it could be.”

“You don’t have to fight everything alone,” Ahsoka said. “I know I can’t understand, but Anakin - your friends want to help you. I’m sorry, too, for lashing out.”

Anakin smiled. “Thanks,” he said. “And thanks for helping Leia. She really looks up to you.”

Ahsoka smiled. “Well,” she said, “I learned from the best.”

“Alright,” Anakin said. “Well, I’m going to call it a night.”

“See you around,” Ahsoka said.

“Yeah,” Anakin responded. “See you around.”

She walked off, and Anakin smiled a little sadly before heading over to where he and Rex were sharing a cabin. This transport, it seemed, was full to max capacity, and so Rex and Anakin got to sleep in makeshift bunks in one of the spare rooms. Not an ideal situation, but it would be better than having to evade a whole barrack’s worth of people.

Rex was already asleep when Anakin walked in, though, which would make it easier for Anakin to escape undetected. It did make him a little sad - he’d wanted to say some sort of goodbye to Rex, too, but it seemed it was not in the stars. 

Anakin sat on the ground, watching the wall-chrono as it slowly ticked on.

It was almost three hundred hours, Anakin’s chosen time of departure, when Anakin felt a flicker in the Force. Obi-Wan shimmered into view.

You should not go alone, he said.

Anakin ignored him, stuffing his and Vader’s lightsabers into the inside pocket of his jacket. 

This is a foolish plan, Obi-Wan insisted.

“Go figure,” Anakin muttered, keeping his voice low so as not to wake Rex. “When did you ever think my plans were anything else?”

Even for you, this is poorly thought-out, Obi-Wan said. He stood between Anakin and the door, and his face was worried. Don’t go through with this, he said. I already lost you once.

“Sorry,” Anakin said. “I guess you’ll have to live - or rather, not live - with the disappointment.” He fastened his jacket and tied his hair back, squaring to face Obi-Wan. “Are you going to move, or am I gonna have to walk through you?”

Obi-Wan didn’t respond.

“Through it is, then,” Anakin said under his breath. He stepped through the apparition, grimacing slightly at the weird feeling it gave him. When he turned back, Obi-Wan was gone.

Anakin made his way to the hangar without incident, locating his X-wing and checking the fuel gauge. It wasn’t completely topped off, but it would be enough to get him to Coruscant, he thought. Now, if only he could find Arthree. 

An astromech beeped softly from the shadows, and Anakin smiled. “Ready to go, Arthree?” he asked, walking towards the sound.

But it was Artoo, his dome newly shiny from the cleaning he’d been given upon his arrival onsite. Anakin’s face fell. 

“No, buddy,” he said. “You’ve got to stay here and take care of Luke.”

Where going? Artoo beeped, rolling out to stop just in front of Anakin. 

“I’m just going out for a spin,” Anakin said. “No need to worry.”

The droid spat out a disbelieving sound. If not going far, why not bring R2-D2?

Anakin knelt down. “Nothing gets past you, does it?” He put a hand on the droid’s dome. “I’m going far away,” he said. “I might not come back. In fact, I probably won’t. But I’ll be okay, alright?”

Artoo rolled closer, bumping into Anakin’s shin. Ani: designation friend, he beeped lowly. 

“Yeah, I’ll miss you too,” Anakin said. “But you’ll still have Threepio and Luke and Leia around.” A thought occurred to him. “While you’re here, do you mind recording a message for me?”

Artoo reluctantly turned on his holorecorder, and Anakin smiled into the camera. “Hi,” he said. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you all about this earlier, but I didn’t think you’d approve of it. I’m going to Coruscant to try to defeat the Emperor, and I’m going to try to go home. Luke and Leia, I love you both and I’m so proud of you. Rex, keep fighting the good fight. Han and Chewbacca, I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to go over the Falcon’s modifications with you, but I trust they’re amazing. And Ahsoka, I’m sorry I didn’t take your advice. Goodbye. Good luck.” He paused, and looked at Artoo. “Cut the recording,” he said.

Artoo beeped sadly. 

“Give that to them, but wait a few rotations, okay?” Anakin said.

Affirmative, Artoo responded.

Anakin grinned. “Now, where’s Arthree?”

Artoo led Anakin to the back of the hangar, where Arthree rested, plugged in and shut down. Anakin switched the droid on. “Time to go,” he said. 

The yellow-and-red droid beeped and followed Anakin to his ship. Anakin helped get him into the astromech slot, then climbed into the cockpit himself.

“Here’s to nothing,” he said, and fired up the engines.

Chapter Text

Anxiety pooled in Anakin’s stomach, feeling like a coiled snake that could spring at any moment. The course was plotted, Arthree was handling the hyperspace jumps, and all Anakin had to do was sit and wait. He had never been very good at that.

The X-wing’s cockpit was cramped, but not so much so that Anakin didn’t have freedom of movement. These ships were never designed for long hyperspace hauls; just because they could didn’t mean it was going to be very pleasant. He shifted around, rolling his shoulders and neck. A few joints cracked pleasantly, relieving a little of the tension, but the coiled snake still sat low in his abdomen.

Anakin took a deep breath, holding it for several seconds before exhaling. It wasn’t that he was claustrophobic – much the opposite; in fact, small spaces usually calmed him down – but with nowhere to go and nothing to do but look at the stars streaming around him, Anakin felt trapped. The Force hazed around him, the usual dullness of hyperspace only adding to his anxiety. He didn’t usually mind that, either. The Force could be overwhelming, at times, and in most cases the slight fuzziness that came with hyperspace was a welcome relief from the constant buzz of beings. It figured that now was the time for it to feel less like a reprieve and more like a loss.

Afraid, are you? a voice floated through his head. Anakin scowled. Leave it to his subconscious to project Yoda of all beings right now. And kriff that, Anakin wasn’t afraid, he didn’t get afraid, he was the Hero-With-No-Fucking-Fear, thank you very much. Suddenly, he was nine again and standing in the middle of the biggest, tallest room he’d ever been in, surrounded by unreadable adults who were judging him because he had some kind of rare blood disease. How did they expect him not to be afraid?

If Yoda was to be believed, fear was the beginning of the path to the Dark side. If that were so, maybe Anakin had been doomed the minute he stepped foot into that shiny ship and realized that most things were a lot bigger than himself. Inside the X-wing, Anakin glowered. This line of thought was going to get him nowhere. The past couldn’t be changed (except, apparently, when it could), and anyway, Anakin had no desire to have stayed on Tatooine. Of all the bleak scenarios, that one was one of the bleakest.

When he was really small, Anakin used to dream that pirates would come into town and take down all the bad guys and Anakin would get to join their crew and become a swashbuckler himself and do whatever he wanted. He remembered very vaguely sitting with Kitster in the alley behind their homes and discussing their hypothetical adventures of the pirate disposition: fighting rivals, running blockades, and, of course, finding buried treasure.

Needless to say Anakin no longer wanted to be a pirate, but that didn’t mean he didn’t still long for the kind of fearlessness he used to associate with the trade. He exhaled slowly and checked the chronometer. Coruscant was still hours and hours away.

Anakin wanted to sleep, but he couldn’t, his churning stomach keeping his eyes open despite his growing fatigue. After nearly an hour’s effort, he gave up, re-elevating his seat to an upright position and frowning at the dimmed viewport in front of him. He needed to rest, dammit – he couldn’t take on the Emperor running on fumes. Maybe if he ate a little something, that would help. He reached into his jacket pocket for an energy bar.

While he was pulling said bar out, his hand fumbled over the lump left by the lightsabers in his inside pocket, and he sighed. So maybe he was afraid; what about it? Who wouldn’t be afraid in his situation? Roughly, he pulled the lightsabers out. Unlit, Vader’s lightsaber could have been his own, and Anakin let it rest in his lap. 

It probably wasn’t a good decision to mess with lightsabers while in a cockpit in hyperspace, but suddenly Anakin felt the need to prove himself. He held out Vader’s lightsaber, closed his eyes and relaxed, feeling the parts come apart and hover in front of him. He reached out, his hand guided to the crystal and latching onto it. What had Ahsoka said about healing crystals? Setting them free, or something. Anakin’s hand gripped it tighter, letting the Force flow through it. Then, he released it, giving it back to the Force. 

He opened his eyes. The crystal didn’t look any different - it was still small and cloudy-colored, but Anakin hoped it had worked. He reassembled it and let the lightsaber drop down to his lap. He wouldn’t know whether it had healed until he lit it up. 

The rest of the journey was almost unbearably slow. Anakin did manage to sleep, fitfully, for a few hours, but for the most part he sat in silence, thinking about what he had to do. Before he felt ready, Arthree announced they were dropping out of hyperspace for the last time, and Anakin exhaled slowly. 

He focused on his anger, trying to wrap it around him and project it outwards. This was the tricky part - Palpatine had to believe Anakin could be his, or the whole game would be off. It was easier than he thought it would be. Anakin pictured Vader’s castle, and how he had felt fighting him; he thought about the decimation of the Jedi; the way the clones had been controlled, the way the Force itself was darker than it should be. He thought about Padmé and how his children had grown up separated and without her. The Force roiled, and Anakin smiled. Even though he was still in orbit, Anakin was sure the Emperor would notice his presence.

He was hailed almost immediately, an Imperial officer telling him to state his business or be shot down. 

“I’m defecting from the Rebellion,” Anakin said. “My name is Ani Naberrie.”

There was a long pause on the other end of the line, and Anakin smirked. He doubted the Empire received many defectors. They were probably trying to figure out what to do. 

“We will escort you to a transport to be taken to the surface,” the officer said. “Don’t get any ideas, and put your deflector shields all the way down.”

Anakin did as requested, and waited for the squadron of TIEs to escort him towards a Star Destroyer. He was directed to the hangar bay, where a group of Stormtroopers made a perimeter around his ship, blasters raised. An officer stepped forward.

“Get out of your ship slowly and with your hands up,” the officer directed. 

Arthree beeped with alarm as Anakin did as asked, climbing out and raising his hands. The officer nodded, and two Stormtroopers came up and pulled his hands down and behind him, securing his wrists with binders. The officer pointed them towards a shuttle. “Search him and take him down to the surface to be processed.”

Anakin was hustled onto a shuttle, where the Stormtroopers undid his jacket and began patting him down. When one of them came to the lightsabers, he pulled them out, cocking his head at Anakin. “What’s this?” he asked.

Anakin layered his voice with as much suggestion as he could, trying to influence the entire shuttle. “You only found one of them,” he said. “You can give me back the second one.”

The Stormtrooper looked at him. “I can give you back this one,” he said, putting Vader’s lightsaber back in Anakin’s inside jacket pocket. He clipped Anakin’s lightsaber to his belt.

“You’re good to go,” Anakin continued.

“We’re good to go,” the Stormtrooper repeated.

The shuttle took off, and Anakin projected his feelings even stronger in the Force, both a warning and a challenge. Palpatine would notice him, Anakin was sure, and he wouldn’t be able to resist seeing for himself. 

The journey down to the surface was a silent one, and the shuttle landed by a building next to the old Senate district. Anakin looked out at the planet, amazed at how it had changed. What had once been a vibrant, lively neighborhood was now all gray-and-white severity, buildings uniformly dull. 

They were about to disembark when one of the troopers held up a hand. “Change of plans,” he said. “He’s to be taken directly to the Palace. His Highness wants to see him personally.”

Success. Anakin schooled his face into a neutral expression to keep from smiling. Around him, he could feel the fear and panic of the troopers at the mention of the Emperor, and Anakin grabbed onto it, using it to fuel his own emotions.

“Right away, sir?” one of the Stormtroopers asked.

“That’s correct.”

The fear in the shuttle ratcheted up, and the pilot changed course. Soon, they were headed in the direction of the Jedi Temple. The Darkness in the Force grew stronger.

The shuttle came to a halt just outside the Temple precinct, and the Stormtrooper squad escorting Anakin led him to the vast building itself. Anakin swallowed, quashing any fear remaining. He let himself be marched through the Temple, ignoring the ghostly echoes of pain that radiated through the Force. Anakin wrapped the Darkness thicker around himself, trying to hide in its cold slickness. He had to be perfect.

The troopers led him to the lift that went up to the central spire, and Anakin steeled himself. It would be easy to take out these troopers and run to attack the Emperor now, but he had to be patient. Undoubtedly, there were guards with Palpatine, and it didn’t pay to show your hand too early. Anakin let himself be pushed out of the lift and towards the Council chamber. The Dark side grew more intense with every step he took, and soon he was standing in front of the doors.

Red-clad guards stood on either side, and Anakin stood tall, waiting as the Stormtroopers explained who he was. The guards opened the door, and the trooper with Anakin’s lightsaber clipped to his belt held Anakin’s arm and pulled him into the room. 

Palpatine - or, a wrinkly old monster that must have been Palpatine - sat on an immense throne in the center of the room, flanked by more red-clad guards and Darth Vader. He wore black robes with a hood that covered most of his face, and his hands were gnarly and wrapped around the armrests. On seeing Anakin, he let out a long, slow laugh.

The Stormtrooper next to Anakin immediately knelt, bowing his head and tugging on Anakin to do the same. Anakin, for his part, shook off the trooper’s hand and stared at Palpatine, feeling his emotions rise. 

“What do we have here?” the Emperor asked. Anakin could feel his curiosity in the Force, a want that verged on hunger. He stayed silent, and the Stormtrooper spoke up, his voice quivering.

“He claims to be Ani Naberrie, a rebel defector, Your Highness,” the Stormtrooper said. He held out Anakin’s lightsaber. “He was carrying this.”

The weapon flew from the Stormtrooper’s grip to the Emperor’s hand, and he lit it, the red blade springing to life. Palpatine’s smile widened.

“So Lord Vader was telling the truth,” he said, meeting Anakin’s eyes. 

Anakin stayed silent.

“You are dismissed, trooper,” Palpatine said, and the Stormtrooper scurried out. He snapped the lightsaber off. “Anakin Skywalker,” he said, the name twisting in his mouth. “Why have you come here?”

Now or never, then. Part of this was banking on Anakin’s hopes that Vader hadn’t told the Emperor about Luke, and part of this was going to be dumb luck. “To prove myself,” he said. Anakin stepped closer to Palpatine. “I’ve beaten Vader before. Let me prove I can beat him again.”

Palpatine’s grin widened. “You would be my apprentice, then?”

“Yes,” Anakin ground out. 

“Ah, but you don’t want to,” Palpatine said. “No. I think you’ve come here to kill me.”

Well. If that was how it was going to be, that was how it was going to be. Anakin stood rigidly. “Yes,” he repeated, summoning his lightsaber and lunging towards the Emperor.

Palpatine held out his hands and Anakin froze in place, unable to move so much as his fingertips. He cursed himself. He should have been quicker, done something sooner - now he was going to die having accomplished nothing. He thought about Padmé and the twins back home, deciding that if he was going to die, he was going to die picturing their faces.

But the killing blow did not come. Palpatine stood and took the two steps necessary to stand in front of Anakin. He plucked the lightsaber from his hand. “You’ve touched the Dark side,” he said. “That much is true. But I don’t need another apprentice. Instead, you’re going to do something for me.”

“Never,” Anakin said, glaring at Palpatine. “You might as well kill me now.” He concentrated on breaking Palpatine’s hold. Vader’s lightsaber was just inside his jacket; if he could grab it, he could use it before Palpatine had the chance to defend himself. 

“We’ll see,” Palpatine said. He gestured for Vader, and the Sith walked over and held Anakin’s hands behind his back, putting Force-suppressing binders on them. Palpatine released him, and Anakin stumbled forwards, barely catching himself.

Palpatine strode forward, out of the throne room and down the lift. Vader led Anakin to do the same. They traveled down, going far below the surface level to a cold, dimly-lit room. A stone wall dominated the space, and Anakin recognized it as the portal. He remembered what Obi-Wan had said, that only the Light side could unlock it, and he knew what Palpatine was going to ask before he did so.

“You’re going to open it for me,” the Emperor said. 

“No, I won’t,” Anakin said. 

Palpatine smiled. “I thought you might need some encouragement,” he said. “How fortunate, then, that we intercepted a ship not an hour ago that was planning to rescue you.” Anakin’s stomach dropped, and Palpatine gestured to the back of the room, where Anakin noticed for the first time several kneeling figures flanked by Stormtroopers.

“I will make it easy for you,” Palpatine said flatly. “For every minute that you delay, Lord Vader will kill one of your friends.” He smiled, his eyes shining in the low light. “You have five minutes.”

Chapter Text

Time seemed to slow down as Anakin considered his options. Palpatine could not be allowed to open the portal; that much was clear, but neither could Anakin stand by and let Vader kill his friends. Could he kill Vader and free his friends before being killed himself? Or somehow incapacitate Palpatine as soon as the Force-suppressing binders were taken off? He still had Vader’s lightsaber in his jacket pocket; there had to be something he could do with it. He looked back over at his friends. There were - hold on, he thought. Palpatine had said five minutes, not six. He took a step closer. There was Han, looking as though he hadn’t gone down without a fight, sporting a bloody lip and glowering; next to him Chewbacca seemed similarly roughed up. Rex, back in what looked like his old armor, seemed less visibly injured, and he was staring at Vader with an expression of total betrayal. Ahsoka had her eyes closed, kneeling like this was some sort of glorified meditation session. And Luke was looking very small, also looking up at Vader, an unreadable expression on him. But Leia wasn’t with them.

Ice gripped Anakin’s stomach. Had she been killed when they were apprehended? Somehow incapacitated and left to bleed out? She wouldn’t just leave the rest of them, that’s for sure. Anakin intended to live long enough to find out. He turned to Palpatine. 

“Alright,” he said. “Uncuff me and I’ll do it.”

Ahsoka’s eyes snapped open. “Anakin, don’t,” she said. One of the Stormtroopers stepped behind her and whacked her with the butt end of his blaster. She winced, but remained upright. 

“I’m sorry,” Anakin said. “I have to.” 

Vader’s lightsaber sat in his pocket. As soon as he was uncuffed, he could use it to attack Palpatine. He would be ready, this time, make sure he could throw off any attempts to freeze him in place. But there were the Stormtroopers and Vader to think about - if he attacked Palpatine, he wouldn’t be able to stop the Stormtroopers and Vader from attacking. So he would have to go for them, first, leaving himself potentially open to Palpatine’s attack. The only problem being - if Anakin failed, Palpatine could still get to the portal using someone else. 

Which meant, really, there was only one option.

Anakin closed his eyes. He might still have a fighting chance, especially if he could get those Force-suppressants off of Ahsoka and Luke, but it would mean he would never go home again. Padmé wouldn’t even know what had happened. He’d never get to celebrate the twins’ second lifeday, never get to watch them grow into the amazing young adults he’d briefly known them as. And they would have to grow up without him. They managed a pretty good job of it here, at least. The thought wasn’t especially comforting. 

“I knew you’d make the right choice,” Palpatine said. He walked over, and with a wave of his hands, the Force-suppressing cuffs fell off. Anakin flexed his wrists, and then several things happened at once. If time had slowed before, now it was practically a standstill.

Anakin felt the Force swirl back into him with an intoxicating rush, felt the raw power and emotion behind it. He could feel Palpatine practically breathing down his neck as he stepped closer to the portal, and felt sweat begin to bead on his forehead. He stopped, less than a meter away. To his left, in the shadows, knelt his friends, flanked by Stormtroopers and watched over by Vader. 

With blinding speed, Anakin reached into his jacket, pulling out Vader’s lightsaber and igniting it. It shone a brilliant white - so he had managed it - and in the fraction of a second before he swung it, Anakin felt a weight lift off of his shoulders. He raised it up, aiming it towards the middle of the portal, intending to destroy it forever.

Something stopped him. Or rather, someone. At the igniting of his lightsaber, the Stormtroopers had raised their blasters, intending to shoot Anakin’s friends. And, at that moment, someone had shouted stop from just outside the room, the word so laced with command that they did, their fingers paused on their triggers.

Anakin stopped too, his lightsaber pausing just millimeters above the wall. The voice was layered with suggestion, its effects so strong that for just a second Anakin hesitated. The second was more than ample time for Anakin to recognize the voice and its owner, and the realization made him turn from the portal in shock.

Leia stood just inside the door, panting like she’d just run for her life. Her hair was mussed up, for once, and her face was red with exertion. She held up her blaster and fired two shots, eliminating the Stormtroopers on either side of the kneeling group. She looked at Anakin and nodded once, grimly, then leapt into action. 

Her command may have caught everyone by surprise, but it didn’t last more than a second, and Palpatine and Vader had got their wits about them just as quickly as Anakin had. There was barely time to hold his saber up before Palpatine was swinging one right back at him. Anakin grimaced. He didn’t like being attacked with a weapon he had made. It felt like betrayal, somehow. That crystal had called to him back in the cave in Malachor, and now it was being used to try and kill him? Seriously, what the fuck?

Anakin was a good duelist, but he hadn’t practiced as much as he should have over the last year. The war had kept him on his toes, but he’d been busy raising babies, and though he and Ahsoka had a standing sparring session once a week, playing around outside the house on Naboo was hardly keeping battle-ready. Obi-Wan had said so much last time he’d visited, but then again, Obi-Wan was the one who still needed to be battle-ready, off trying to negotiate re-entry to the Republic on half a dozen worlds at once. 

Focus! Now that was Obi-Wan’s voice, either in Anakin’s subconscious or returned from the grave. Regardless, it was right. Anakin couldn’t afford to get lost in his thoughts. There was only the here and now.

And now, he was losing. Palpatine’s rage was fueling him, driving Anakin back towards his friends. They were no longer kneeling, having scrambled to their feet, but their hands were still bound. Leia, who had attempted to go free them, was nowhere to be seen - no, scratch that, Leia was currently in a lightsaber duel with Vader. Anakin blanched. So she’d been interrupted on her way to free them, then. He didn’t have time to tell whether or not she was holding her own, and her invisibility in the Force made it impossible to track her. Anakin’s best shot was to get Palpatine to follow him away from her, as much as it hurt.

Anakin sprang into an overhead Ataru move, not catching Palpatine off his guard, but forcing him to turn around. Now Anakin could back up safely. He deflected blow after blow, but barely had time for an opening to attack himself. Palpatine wasn’t smiling anymore, and his anger was pouring off of him. Vaguely, Anakin registered that he probably wasn’t going to win this fight. 

The portal was still intact, but Palpatine wasn’t letting Anakin anywhere near it. He steered him further away until Anakin was nearly flush with the back wall. 

Anakin was saved by the fact that a blaster started going off, momentarily forcing Palpatine to deflect its bolts. Han had managed to get his bound hands in front of him and was clumsily holding Leia’s discarded blaster. He shot again at Palpatine before turning his attention to Vader.

Vader deflected one of the bolts into Han’s shoulder, and he cried out and dropped the blaster. Anakin didn’t spare any time to make sure he was okay - at first glance it didn’t look serious, and if he spent any more time checking up, they were all liable to die in a much worse way than blaster bolts. He feinted left, ducking under Palpatine’s arm to allow himself a little more room.

Palpatine raised his lightsaber high, and Anakin had to leap back again. He found himself back-to-back with Leia, who had been similarly forced backwards. Not good. 

“So, the upstart Senator from Alderaan has a few tricks up her sleeve, does she?” Palpatine asked. His next stroke was brutal, and Anakin’s blade barely caught it. “Perhaps she will open the portal after I kill you.”

“I’ll do no such thing,” Leia said. Her words could have cut glass, and Anakin shivered. She wasn’t using the Dark side, not that he could tell, but she was perilously close, letting her anger for Vader sharpen her senses. 

“Pity,” Palpatine said, swiping for Anakin’s midsection. “Then stop toying with her, Vader. Kill her,” he snapped. 

Leia might have been nearly as strong as Anakin in the Force, but even that wasn’t enough to fight against Vader when he was actually trying. Her form broke down on his second stroke, leaving her vulnerable on her side. Vader drew the mistake, waiting for Leia to raise her blade and attack before cutting down brutally. Anakin saw it coming and leaned out, Force-pushing Leia back. It was enough to save her hand, but her lightsaber was cut in two, the top half sparking and spinning through the air to land on the other side. Caught off balance by Anakin’s push, she fell to the ground, defenseless.

Anakin took a step backwards, standing over her with his lightsaber held up, eyeing his two opponents. He wouldn’t be able to hold them for long.

“You’re outmatched, Skywalker,” Palpatine said. “You have one last chance. Open the portal, and I promise to kill you quickly.”

“I have a different idea,” Leia said from behind Anakin. She stood up and moved to stand next to him. In her hand was a small, gray sphere with a blinking red light on it. “Surrender,” she said, “and I won’t blow us all up.”

That’s my girl, Anakin thought. A swell of pride grew in his chest. He was probably projecting, but he didn’t care. He grinned. “Yeah,” he said, his confidence returning. “Surrender.”

Ahsoka cleared her throat behind him, and Anakin turned his head to see her give an expectant downward look at her still-cuffed hands. Anakin smiled. “Oh, yeah,” he said. He turned to them and, with a wave of his hand, the binders fell off of all five of them. He turned back to Palpatine, his lightsaber still raised. “I’d say you were outmatched, Your Highness.”

Palpatine’s face twisted. “No,” he said, and made a fist.

Leia cried out, and the detonator crumpled. Her hand crumpled with it, and Anakin opened his mouth in horror. He glared at Palpatine, and suddenly his arms gained a new strength. “You will never,” he spat, turning his saber in a slow circle, “hurt either one of my children ever again.” He stepped forward.

“Vader,” Palpatine snapped, “kill them all.”

But Vader was standing stock-still, his mask turned towards Leia and a shock radiating out of him through the Force. She lay on the ground, clutching her hand to her chest and staring up at him.

“Impossible,” he said.

Leia glared at him. “You owe me one,” she ground out. Next to her, Luke had come over and knelt at her side. He, too, looked up at Vader.

“Please,” he said.

Anakin redoubled his efforts against Palpatine, but it was still a losing fight. The Sith outclassed him, drawing on the Dark side effortlessly, parrying every attack and riposting with speed Anakin barely believed possible. It was like trying to fight a hurricane.

Someone again picked up the discarded blaster and began firing it, forcing Palpatine to deflect away its bolts. Anakin realized the trajectory of the deflections, but he couldn’t stop them - instead, all he could do was watch as they sped towards Luke and Leia with deadly accuracy.

A lightsaber ignited and deflected them away. Anakin’s eyes widened as he saw Vader step between them and Palpatine, his saber raised. Anakin felt his heart pound. He almost didn’t believe it - but then, Vader had treated Luke’s injuries, hadn’t he? He might want Anakin dead, but he didn’t want Luke or Leia dead, and the Emperor clearly did, and, well. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, Anakin thought. Or maybe, the friend of my friends is my friend? One of those pithy sayings Obi-Wan used to spout off in inconvenient times. He and Vader evidently shared an enemy in Palpatine and friends in Luke and Leia, so he figured he might as well give it a try.

“So,” he said, grunting as Palpatine rained down yet another blow, “are you just gonna stand there, or are you going to help me?”

It appeared Vader needed more time to pause and consider things than Anakin, which was seriously annoying, because Anakin could really use the help right about now, and he was pretty sure there weren’t any more lightsabers to go around. Palpatine’s saber swiped dangerously close to Anakin’s face, enough that he could feel the searing heat of the blade. 

“Make up your mind,” Anakin snapped, ducking as Palpatine jabbed his saber into the space Anakin’s head had occupied a split-second before.

Suddenly, a squad of Stormtroopers ran in, though Anakin hadn’t caught when they’d been summoned, and Han, Chewbacca, Rex and Ahsoka were forced to duck behind the wall for cover. Using the fallen troopers’ blasters, they began shooting at each other, their fire edging closer and closer to Anakin.

“Now would be a great time,” Anakin said, though his hope that Vader would join him was dying. Perhaps Vader would prefer to uselessly stand guard and let Anakin wear Palpatine down. A stray blaster bolt grazed Anakin’s back, and he grit his teeth. One bolt wouldn’t even slow him down.

The Stormtroopers kept coming, forcing the small group fighting them even further behind the wall. Soon, they would be completely pinned down. 

“Please, you have to help,” Luke said again, his voice cracking. “Father,” he said. “Please.”

Something shifted, and Vader stepped forward, raising his blade to counter Palpatine’s attack before Anakin could. Anakin stepped to the right, giving his counterpart room.

“Nice of you to finally join the fight,” he said, ducking and weaving so that he complemented Vader’s parry with an attack of his own. 

“Do not think I am doing this for you,” Vader said. He attacked, forcing Palpatine to deflect his blow, and Anakin darted to the side. He brought his saber down hard, and Palpatine took a step backwards.

“Perish the thought,” Anakin said. “Still, it’s nice to have some help.” 

Palpatine raised his arms and Anakin and Vader were pushed back, but they dug their heels in and pressed forward.

“Did I always feel the need to talk so much during a fight?” Vader asked. Anakin couldn’t tell his tone of voice with his vocoder, but he felt a flash of annoyance through the Force.  

Anakin was about to make a snappy comeback when he realized that Vader had referred to himself as, well, Anakin. In a roundabout way, but still. The thought made him falter slightly, enough that had Vader not parried the next blow, he would have lost an arm.

“Pay attention,” Vader snapped, and Anakin hurried to compensate for his mistake, attacking in a flurry of blows that, combined with Vader’s own press, forced Palpatine back several steps. They were in full range of the Stormtroopers now, and Anakin could feel their confusion at seeing Vader facing the Emperor.

“Stand down, troopers,” Vader commanded. They stopped firing, hesitantly.

“What are you waiting for?” Palpatine snapped, turning his head desperately to the remaining troops. “Fire! Kill them all!”

The Stormtroopers turned to look at one another like they couldn’t decide whose orders to follow. 

“Fire, or I will have you killed!” Palpatine said, his voice sounding strained for the first time. “Vader has betrayed us! Don’t listen to him!”

The Stormtroopers raised their blasters halfheartedly, and Anakin could sense their anxiety. He didn’t have time to focus on them, though, as Palpatine’s efforts continued. 

In a lucky stroke, Anakin managed to knock Palpatine’s lightsaber ( Anakin’s lightsaber) out of his hand, and it fell to the ground. Palpatine raised his hands, lightning pouring out of them. 

Anakin and Vader caught the lightning together, and Palpatine shouted as Dark side energy surged out of him. 

“Together!” Anakin shouted, turning to Vader over the noise of the lightning and Palpatine’s screams.

They forced their sabers down until they hovered just above Palpatine’s chest. The Sith’s face turned into a snarl, and he pushed harder, but Anakin and Vader pushed back. 

In a half-second, it was over, and Palpatine’s body fell lifeless to the ground. 

Anakin collapsed, the exertion of the fight finally catching up to him. Next to him, Vader turned to the Stormtroopers. “Stand down,” he said. Then, “the Emperor is dead.”

Chapter Text

As the Emperor’s body cooled, the atmosphere in the room thickened. Suddenly, it was unclear who was on who’s side, and Anakin knew that he, at least, preferred a clear-cut fight to an uneasy truce. He got to his feet slowly, wishing he had an idea of what to say. Next to him, Vader was turning his head from side to side, looking from Luke and Leia to Palpatine’s body. Emotion was pouring off of him, though Anakin couldn’t decipher it.

Of all people, Han was the first to speak. He walked up to Palpatine’s body and put several rounds of blaster fire into it, and then, upon receiving several critical looks, gave everyone an eyebrow raise. “What?” he said. “Just making sure he’s really dead.”

“Thanks, Han,” Luke said in a long-suffering tone. He stood and stepped up to Vader. “And thank you, Father.”

“I… should have killed him a long time ago,” Vader said. He looked at the lightsaber still in his hand, and then back at the Emperor.

Despite still sitting unarmed on the ground and cradling her injured hand, Leia somehow managed to have an intimidating presence. She looked up at Vader with her jaw set. “Yes, you should have,” she said.

Vader tilted his mask down at her. “I am sorry, my daughter,” he said. Anakin wondered if the words I’m sorry had ever come out of Vader’s mouth before. It seemed unlikely.

“Believe me, I’m no daughter of yours,” Leia said. “And I never will be.” She blinked, and Anakin started suddenly as he realized she was fighting back tears. 

There was an uncomfortable silence, and Han stepped behind Leia, giving Vader a glare. “So, what,” he said. “Are you a good guy now? Poof, like that?”

Luke looked up at Vader expectantly, almost hopefully. 

“If by good guy you mean am I... joining your pathetic band of rebels, then no,” Vader said. Luke shrank back slightly, and Anakin frowned. Vader’s Force signature was difficult to read - he wasn’t as violently Dark and angry like he’d been before, but even though he was using the Light side it felt tainted, somehow. Anakin wondered if that’s how his own felt, and hoped not. 

“But you told those Stormtroopers to stand down!” Luke said, his voice strained. “You - you helped kill the Emperor!”

Vader tilted his mask to face Luke, and Anakin could feel a shift in the movement. When Vader looked at Luke his Force signature felt so full of protectiveness and loss it was almost overwhelming. “I will not join you,” he repeated, “but I will not stand in your way. There are those who must be dealt with. I will deal with them.”

Leia let out a bark of laughter. “So that’s it?” she asked, looking at Vader incredulously. “We’re supposed to just forgive you for all your crimes and let you loose to go kill a bunch of people?”

Anakin expected to feel a surge of anger at the jibe, but Vader just looked down at her sadly. “Yes,” he said. “I do not expect anyone to stop me.”

Leia’s response died on her lips, and it seemed like an uneasy truce was settled. “I don’t think I have the power to hold you back,” she said after a beat, “and I haven’t forgiven you for what you’ve done. But if you’re going to - to start making amends, then I won’t stop you.” She held her chin up, and Anakin knew it was taking an immense power of will for her to say the words. What went unspoken was clear: Vader didn’t deserve a second chance, and Leia knew that, but she was giving it to him anyway. After all he’d done to the Rebellion and to her specifically, Anakin didn’t understand why, but he guessed that was one of those things that made people good leaders. It was something Padmé would have done.

“Let me go with you,” Luke said suddenly. 

“Are you crazy?” Han asked. 

“No, I’m not,” Luke said earnestly. “I can make sure he stays on the straight and narrow. I’ll keep in touch with you guys, let you know what we’re up to -”

“Just leave like that?” Leia asked. “What about your friends? Wedge, your squadron? Luke, you have responsibilities to the Alliance that you can’t just - throw aside to go gallivanting across the galaxy chasing after criminals!”

Luke’s gaze didn’t falter. “Wedge can lead Rogue without me,” he said. “And besides, not everyone in the Alliance is on-base full time. Look at Han.”

“Keep me out of this,” Han muttered.

“Well, but Han’s -”

“He’s invaluable to the Rebellion, and he’s only on base once a month or so. I’m not going to disappear or leave my friends behind, Leia, but I think this is what I have to do.”

The room was silent. Luke stood tall, confident in his sudden decision. Leia looked as though it hurt her more to accept than Vader’s sudden change in heart, and Han was standing behind her shooting distrustful glances Vader’s way. Chewbacca had a hand on his shoulder like he was trying to make sure Han didn’t do anything stupid.

Rex and Ahsoka had stepped to the side and seemed to be having a conversation silently amongst themselves, though Anakin couldn’t decide what they were saying. That probably meant it was about him, he thought with a grimace.

“I would not be opposed, Luke,” Vader said, breaking the silence. Luke took a deep breath and nodded.

“Fine,” Leia said. “If that’s what you want - fine.” Han put a hand on her shoulder.

Anakin decided that nobody was going to kill each other, so he walked over to Ahsoka and Rex. As soon as he did so, Ahsoka’s face turned into a scowl. She grabbed him by the lapel of his jacket, pulling him over to face her and Rex head-on. Anakin nearly tripped. 

“You kriffing idiot,” Ahsoka said vehemently. “You almost got yourself - and us - killed. What in the hells were you thinking?”

Anakin fought to keep a rueful smile off of his face. The job was made easier by seeing Rex’ expression, which was stone-cold. He straightened, looked downwards. “I’m sorry,” he said, sincerely. “But I thought -”

“Clearly, you did not,” Ahsoka said, cutting Anakin off without giving him a chance to explain. “In what world did you think you could beat the Emperor alone? Do you remember what happened last time? You know, it makes the rest of us feel pretty shitty when you go off on some kind of heroic self-sacrificing mission like that, Anakin, it really does. After everything, do you still not trust anybody but yourself?”

“That’s not it!” Anakin said, conscious suddenly of how loud Ahsoka was being. He felt his face heat up, and he crossed his arms. “I - it wasn’t that I don’t trust you, it’s that I didn’t have a plan that would work with all of you! And I didn’t want to put your lives on the line just for a chance for me to get home!”

This time it was Rex who gave him a hard look. “Don’t you dare lecture us on risks, Skywalker,” he said. “Who and what we choose to risk our lives for is our business, and I daresay we’ve been in the game a lot longer than you at this point.” He inhaled, and Anakin saw a flash of hurt in his face behind the cold exterior. “And if you really thought you weren’t coming back, it would have been kind of you to wake me up and say goodbye.”

Anakin looked down. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Really, this time,” he added. 

Ahsoka sighed. “I forgive you, Anakin,” she said. “And you did win, so I’m not mad. But when you get back to Padmé and the twins, you need to stop going off and doing things without telling anyone. Even if it’s not a life-or-death scenario, you need to let the people you care about know what you’re doing so we can stop you from being stupid!” 

“Yeah,” Anakin said, after a pause. “Okay. I’ll do my best.”

After Ahsoka had finished with Anakin, she stepped past him, walking up to Vader and crossing her arms. “And you,” she began, but stopped. 

“I am sorry,” Vader repeated, and he sounded like he meant it.

Ahsoka’s face was all hard lines, but Anakin could feel her struggling to contain her emotions. “I want to forgive you, but - I can’t,” she said. “So I’m sorry, too.”

Rex just looked at Vader and gave him a curt nod.

Anakin suddenly felt very out of place. “I - what will you do now?” he asked, directing his question to Leia at the last second. “I mean, now that we’ve killed the Emperor.”

“Well,” Leia said, uncertainly, “we need to figure out how to dissolve the Empire,” she said. “Politically, the Alliance isn’t ready to take over, and since the dissolution of the Senate, the Imperial leaders have entrenched themselves. We don’t have the forces for a hostile takeover.” Her brow was furrowed in thought. “We need to convince individual systems that if they join us, we can protect them - that it’s in their best interest to join us.” She took a deep breath, like the gravity of the situation was suddenly dawning on her. “I need to speak with Mon Mothma as soon as possible.”

“You should provide amnesty for Imperial defectors, too,” Rex said. “Stormtroopers, petty officers, officials - I’m betting a lot of them didn’t choose to be on the Imps’ side.”

“There’s so much work to do,” Leia said. She sounded excited at the prospect, and Anakin smiled.

“I think it’s time for me to go home,” he said.

Leia looked stricken. “No,” she said. “Stay, you can help me - help us. The Alliance needs you.”

“I think you’re proving to be pretty capable on your own,” Anakin said. “I need to get back to the version of you that’s still crawling around with a ten-word vocabulary.”

Leia looked between Anakin and Luke. “I feel like I’m losing you both.”

“You aren’t going to lose Luke,” Ahsoka said. “And as for Anakin - this isn’t his time,” she said, gently. “You can’t ask him to stay.”

“Leia, Luke - I’m so glad I was able to come here,” Anakin said. “And I know you have your work cut out for you, but I can’t think of a better team to build a new Republic.” He picked up the still-warm pieces of Leia’s lightsaber and brought them back to her. He could have used the Force, but he wanted the second-long distraction, and it felt good to hold something in his hands. Leia took the pieces and inspected them. A wrinkle eased out of her brow as she held up her mother’s ring and slipped it on before depositing the saber pieces in a pocket. 

“Ahsoka,” Anakin said, smiling. “Thanks again for going back in time to save my ass.”

“No problem,” Ahsoka said. “Thanks for coming forward in time to save mine.”

“Rex, it’s good to see you’re still fighting the good fight.”

Rex smiled. “Looks like I’ll finally get some rest, if I’m lucky.”

“Well, if anybody deserves it, you do.”

Anakin’s goodbyes to Han and Chewbacca were less awkward than he’d thought they’d be, given that he’d known them for all of a month and half of that under an assumed identity, but he found himself being very genuine when he said he’d miss them. 

Finally, he turned to Vader. He wasn’t really sure what to say, so he held out Vader’s lightsaber. “Here,” he said. “I don’t know how the other one feels, but - this is yours, and you can have it back.”

Vader took the lightsaber without saying anything and clipped it to his belt. Anakin swallowed. “Right,” he said. He turned again to his friends and suddenly found himself in an awkward, multi-person embrace. He held them tightly, and through the crack between Ahsoka’s lekku and Rex’ shoulder, he saw the ghost of old Obi-Wan standing with a smile on his face.

When he was finally extricated from the group, he turned to the wall and exhaled slowly. He closed his eyes and reached out a hand, calling the Force to him to flow through the portal. When he opened them, the solid wall before him seemed to expand, and he stepped forward without looking back.

Once again, Anakin found himself in that strange in-between place, a world with too many doors. Whispers came to him from all sides, and he closed his eyes and pictured his family, following the memory of Padmé and his children until he was standing in front of a circular door. On the other side, grass waved gently in a breeze, and he stepped through to find himself again on Lothal.

His ship was still where he’d parked it, his lightsaber left in the cockpit and Artoo in the astromech slot. Anakin climbed in and set course for Naboo, eschewing hyperspace regulations in favor of a risky, more direct route.

When he broke through Naboo’s atmosphere and glided across the surface to the lake country, he nearly wept with relief. It was good to be home.

Padmé was there when he arrived, standing on the doorstep with baby Luke on her hip. She smiled as Anakin walked up. “You’ve missed a lot,” she informed him.

“Oh, have I?” 

Padmé poked Luke lightly in the face. “Lukey learned a new word,” she said. “Tell Daddy what you’ve learned, Lukey.”

Luke gurgled. “‘Peeder!” he said, excitedly.

Padmé laughed. “Yes, Daddy arrived in a speeder.”

Anakin felt like his face was going to split from smiling. “You know, you shouldn’t encourage that,” he said. He leaned up close to Luke. “Daddy arrived in a starfighter ,” he said, pronouncing it slowly.

Luke let out a shout of joy. “Peeder!”

Padmé sighed. “Maybe he’ll tell you at dinner,” she said. “Ahsoka volunteered to make it tonight.”

Anakin grimaced. Ahsoka was enthusiastic, but decidedly not the galaxy’s best chef. “Okay,” he said. 

Padmé ushered him inside and shut the door behind him. “Did everything go okay getting Ahsoka Senior home?” she asked, bouncing Luke a little to keep him happy.

Anakin thought back. “Yeah,” he decided on. “It went okay.”

“I’m glad,” Padmé said. They walked into the kitchen to see Ahsoka balancing at least three different pots on the stove, her eyes comically wide. When Anakin walked in, she smiled guiltily and tried to hide one of the pots, which was smoking heavily.

“Skyguy!” she said. “You’re back sooner than expected!” She gave him a sly glance. “You used some unofficial hyperspace lanes, didn’t you?”

Padmé’s eyebrows shot up. “Ani, you didn’t,” she admonished, setting Luke down on his highchair across from his sister.

“A pilot never tells,” Anakin said, sidestepping Padmé’s glare to go see what Ahsoka was burning.

“Don’t think you’ll get away with that,” Padmé promised. Anakin believed her.

After suffering through half of Ahsoka’s meal, Padmé very graciously suggested that they order takeout, and after putting the twins to bed with no more hiccups than usual, the three of them sat on couches in the sitting room and ate noodles.

“You know,” Ahsoka said through a mouthful of noodle, “you feel kinda different in the Force than when you left.” 

Anakin frowned. “I do?”

“Yeah,” Ahsoka confirmed. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “I dunno. It’s like you’ve been gone longer than you were gone, or something. Or like you had some kind of fight. You’re oozing all this relief, and a two-day easy flight shouldn’t have you this excited to see us.”

Padmé turned to Anakin sharply, and he relented. “Okay,” he said. “So when I said everything went fine, I may have been omitting some things...”

Several years later, the doorbell went off in the middle of the night. Padmé and Anakin woke up and looked at each other, and Anakin sighed, swinging his legs out of bed. “I’ll get it,” he said with a yawn. “None of your friends would be so rude as to come knocking this late.”

Sleepily, Anakin padded to the door. He opened it to find a tall figure in a cloak, and for half a second he went for his lightsaber, but the figure pulled back its hood to reveal a very old and very wizened-looking Togruta.

Anakin blinked. “Ahsoka?”

She nodded. “Anakin. It’s been a long time.”

“I - how long?”

“Half a century since I saw you last,” Ahsoka said. 

“What are you doing here?”

Ahsoka smiled faintly. “I thought someone should let you know that it all worked out,” she said. “Back in my universe. They did manage to get a new Republic up and running, and even though it took a few years to get all the kinks straightened out, they’re the better for it. Leia even served a term as head of state.”

Anakin opened and closed his mouth, unsure of what to say. “Do you want to come in? The twins are five, Padmé is here - your counterpart is off chasing some girl, but I can comm her - Obi-Wan, he’ll be awake, and Rex too, they’re both on Coruscant -”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Ahsoka said. “I only came to deliver a message.”

Anakin balked. “Well, alright then.” He took a deep breath. “What happened to Vader?”

Ahsoka got a curious look in her eye. “He died,” she said, simply. “I never heard the full story, but Luke said he died saving his life. It was a couple years after the death of the Emperor; he and Luke were off fighting what remained of the Inquisitorius.”

“Was Luke okay?”

“He lost a hand,” Ahsoka said. She smiled wryly. “It appears to run in the family.”

Anakin flexed his mechno-hand subconsciously. “But they’re happy, right?”

“They’re very happy, Anakin. They’ve lived happy lives.”

Anakin smiled. “That’s - that’s great.”

“It is,” Ahsoka agreed. She looked out at the predawn clouds, her montrals arching skyward and very tall. “The world between worlds is being destroyed,” she said at last. “That’s why I came to see you now after so many years.”

Anakin frowned. “What do you mean? The Jedi temple on Lothal is still here in my dimension; surely it is in others.”

Ahsoka hummed. “The portals may still exist,” she said, “but the world itself is threadbare. I wanted to come back and tell you all was well, and now I will go home.”

“Okay,” Anakin said, still bewildered. “Thanks for telling me.”

“It’s good to see you again.”

“You too,” Anakin said, though four years was nothing to fifty.

“Goodbye,” Ahsoka said. 

Anakin watched as she walked off, then heard light footsteps behind him. He turned to find Padmé walking towards him wearing a bathrobe, her face concerned. “Who was it?” she asked. 

“An old friend,” Anakin said. Then, “let’s get back to bed. The twins have school in the morning.”

Anakin slept peacefully for the rest of the night, and when he woke up he couldn’t be sure what had happened wasn’t just a dream. But as they were eating breakfast, Leia excited about school and Luke less so, Leia interrupted Anakin excitedly. “I had a dream,” she said.

“Oh? Of what?”

She scrunched up her face like she was trying to remember. “You were old,” she said, pointing at Ahsoka. “And I think me and Luke were too. And we were talking about you, Daddy.”

Anakin smiled. “All good things, I hope.”

“Oh, of course,” Leia said, her face instantly turning serious. The expression was comical on a five-year-old, and Anakin fought to keep down a laugh. “Awesome things.”