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The tabloids that called Anakin Skywalker the Hero With No Fear had clearly never heard the way he screamed like a youngling at the mere suggestion of a nearby spider.
Master Kenobi liked to tease him for it. Ask him how he managed to throw himself into blasterfire and leap from skyscrapers without a second thought, when a tiny multilegged creature sent him packing. Yet in moments like this, Ahsoka found that a comforting thought—that even the bravest of them got scared by little things. That maybe he could just be hero—the no fear part was unattainable, even for the Chosen One.
And especially for her.
“I can’t believe people actually live in this place,” Ahsoka muttered, drawing her cloak tighter around her shoulders. “Look at all the bare trees and dead leaves. It’s eerie.”
“Not to mention the cold,” Anakin said.
“And the spiders.”
“Where?!”
Anakin flung himself into high alert, and Ahsoka doubled over in laughter.
A few steps ahead of them, Master Kenobi looked over his shoulder, amused. “Samhain just has an unbalanced climate, that’s all,” he said. “The planet’s tilted axis makes it autumn here for most of the year.”
“And can the axis also account for the full moon?” Anakin said. “Or the bats in the sky?” He mimicked fluttering wings with his hands, waving them in Obi-Wan’s face. “I’m just saying—spooky.”
“You know, Master Yoda always said the mind of a child is a wonderful thing. I just never realized he was referring to my twenty-one-year-old Padawan,” Obi-Wan said with an eyeroll, swatting Anakin’s hands away. “Now, can we focus on the matter at hand? We need to get information from this bounty hunter about Dooku’s whereabouts before—”
“Before the sun rises and we’re trapped in Halloweentown until next year?”
Ahsoka laughed and they exchanged a high-five, while Obi-Wan just face-palmed.
“I should’ve left you on the ship.”
Her fear temporarily forgotten, Ahsoka skipped ahead. The town was spooky—and she was glad to hear at least Anakin thought so, too—but there was something enchanting about it. The wind blowing dead leaves across the cobblestone streets, the full moon half shrouded in clouds—it was a nice change from droid armies and the hot sting of midday battle.
Well, for about five seconds, before they heard the crash in the alleyway.
On guard now, the three of them sprinted forward.
“There,” Obi-Wan said, gesturing forward to where the bounty hunter dashed across the street. “Anakin—”
“On it.”
While Anakin went the other way to cut off her escape route, Ahsoka and Obi-Wan ran forward.
The bounty hunter was quick on her feet—several times she ducked in and out of alleys, popping out in places they didn’t expect. But Ahsoka and Obi-Wan were quicker. They were right behind her. Just paces away, moments from capturing her and getting what they needed, when—
“Ready, little one,” Obi-Wan said to Ahsoka. She nodded and set her jaw.
The bounty hunter turned the corner.
They followed, rearing to tackle her, when—
“Ow!”
Ahsoka slammed into something soft and warm and tall, stumbling backward into the alley wall. Not the bounty hunter. No, it was…
“Anakin?” Master Kenobi said. He rubbed his head where he’d collided with Anakin’s shoulder, looking dazed. “Where did—”
“I didn’t see her. Thought you had her.”
“We did,” Ahsoka said. “She was right there, until—”
Crash.
Ahsoka jumped. And there, sprinting up the lawn of a rickety old house, was the bounty hunter, leaving an overturned trash can in her wake.
She started forward, with Anakin and Obi-Wan close behind.
They slowed to a stop halfway up the grass. The bounty hunter had disappeared into the house, leaving the door ajar in a flickering porch light. Ahsoka’s eyes grazed the shattered windows, the twisted vines climbing the walls, and again she felt the tickle of fear in her stomach.
But as Obi-Wan stepped forward and held open the door, she swallowed it.
They entered the house.
Inside, it was silent. They’d stepped into a parlor decorated with ancient furniture—the floral couches and gnarled banisters were coated with dust and smelled of decay. Anakin tried the light switch on the wall, but still there was nothing but darkness.
“Do you think someone lives here?” Ahsoka asked quietly.
Anakin reached up and swiped the cobwebs from his face with a grimace, where they hung from the corners of the doorframe. “If they do,” he said, “they ought to hire a maid.”
“We should split up,” Obi-Wan said. “Search the place top to bottom before she finds another way out.”
But no sooner than he’d spoken did the ceiling creak. From above them, the sound of shattering glass seemed to ripple down the stairs. Ahsoka couldn’t help it—she jumped. Anakin didn’t move, but beside her, she felt him prickle.
“Or,” Obi-Wan continued, “perhaps we stick together.”
“Scared?” Anakin said.
“No.” Obi-Wan nudged away Anakin’s teasing elbow. “But it sounds like our friend went upstairs, so I don’t see the need for us to divide our forces looking elsewhere.”
“Admit it,” Anakin said. “You think this place is haunted.”
“I think,” Obi-Wan replied with a pointed look, “that you’ve been watching too many horror holos. Now, come on.”
He gestured forward, toward the noise, starting up the dusty staircase.
But before Ahsoka could follow, she froze. Whirled around.
There was nothing there.
She swore she’d felt a breath on her neck, warm and slow and scented with mold. But the parlor was empty save for the spiders, and now with Anakin and Obi-Wan nearly at the top of the stairs, she was alone.
Ahsoka hurried after them.
She found Anakin and Obi-Wan peering into the first room at the top of the stairs. Poking her head between them, she scanned the pastel walls and crib mobiles and realized instantly what she was looking at.
A nursery.
They stepped inside, walking between row after row of empty cradles. Ahsoka gazed down into one of them. The blankets were disturbed, rumpled, like the child was removed quickly. She stepped back, but couldn’t tear her eyes away.
“What happened to them?” she murmured.
When Obi-Wan appeared behind her, his voice made her start. “The war has caused the need for many to flee their homes. Made refugees of far too many children.” He reached into the cradle, where a stuffed bantha lay abandoned, and tucked it gently into the blanket. “These little ones may have been among them.”
Ahsoka stared down at the toy. She remembered those she’d seen, the children who fled battlefields, whose homes became hospitals or worse, cemeteries. And, not for the first time, she wondered how it could be that they were doing the right thing, fighting a war. How could they—both the Republic and the Separatists—claim they were fighting for the future of their children when the present of their children was this?
She’d said that to Anakin once—who, although kindly, told her that perspective was a bit naïve. Maybe it was. But still, she couldn’t help the thought.
Master Kenobi set a hand on her elbow. “Let’s keep moving.”
Regretfully, she tore her eyes away. The floor creaked as they walked, and as they passed a long mirror on the wall, she swore she saw something in it flash.
They were nearly to the door when they heard the crying.
Ahsoka froze. She heard Anakin murmur, “What in the name of—”
Master Kenobi held up a hand, stopping him short. The sound—like a child whimpering, despondent—was coming from somewhere nearby. Ahsoka watched as Master Kenobi traced it across the room, to the little closet door in the corner, and turned the knob.
The door creaked open. He stepped inside and crouched down.
And then the door slammed shut behind him.
“Obi-Wan!”
Anakin rushed forward first, Ahsoka tight to his heels. He grabbed for the doorknob.
This time, it didn’t turn.
Locked.
And on the other side, Obi-Wan calling out.
“Anakin?”
His voice was small and tight, and Ahsoka’s heart clenched.
“Obi-Wan,” Anakin said. “We’ll get you out. I’m going to pick the lock, okay? You’re okay—”
“Anakin,” said Master Kenobi. “What’s happening?”
“Nothing’s happening. Nothing’s…” Anakin was down on his knees, eyes lightly closed as he tried to unlock to door with the Force, until— “Kriff, Ahsoka, nothing’s happening. This place is Force opaque.”
“You can’t unlock it?”
“Anakin!”
From inside the closet, pounding on the other side of the door.
“I’m coming!” Anakin ignited his lightsaber. “I’ll cut down the door if I have to—”
Obi-Wan’s voice, sounding strangled, crying out—
“Skyguy, wait.” Ahsoka pulled his arms down just before he jammed the blade into the door. “You’ll hurt him. Make sure he’s away from the door.”
Anakin pushed her away. “I know that, I—”
And suddenly, silence.
Anakin powered down his lightsaber. He put both hands on the door, leaning his ear against the peeling paint.
“Obi-Wan? Can you hear me?” Anakin pounded on their side. Nothing. “Obi-Wan?”
Silence.
“Obi-Wan!”
Ahsoka could do nothing but watch as her master pounded against the door until his fists were raw—and as awful as Master Kenobi’s screams had been, this was infinitely worse.
“Skyguy…” She stumbled forward, reaching for Anakin’s flesh hand before he pushed her away. “Skyguy, stop, your hand—”
She grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him backward, and when she let go, her own palm was red with his blood. Dumbfounded, they both stared down at the torn and splinted skin. No one commented on the way his hand was shaking.
“I’ll wrap it,” Ahsoka said quietly. “Just wait a second—”
“Obi-Wan first. We—”
His voice dropped off as the whole house filled with a deep and wretched moan.
The floor shook, the cradles rattling on their frames. Ahsoka grabbed Anakin’s prosthetic hand and held on until the house fell silent again. There was stillness.
A stillness that felt false.
Anakin stood, his hand falling from hers. He stepped backward, away from the door, his feet unsteady. “Ahsoka…”
“What the kriff was that?”
“Ahsoka,” Anakin said again. He was behind her now, but she didn’t dare look away from the closet door. “Ahsoka, something isn’t—”
When his voice cut off, she finally tore her eyes away and whirled around.
“What?”
But—
No. How could that…?
Anakin was gone.
“Skyguy? Master Skywalker?” She ran into the hall, but it was empty. Dark. She dashed back into the nursery. “Anakin?”
No answer.
Ahsoka stepped slowly now—afraid that a single misstep would make her vanish, too. Until her foot struck something hard around the spot she’d seen him last, and sent it skidding across the hardwood floor.
Anakin’s lightsaber.
She picked it up and stared down at the metal hilt, still warm from her master’s hands. When she looked up, Ahsoka found herself staring into her own face—reflected in the dirty mirror on the wall.
And in that reflection, she was completely alone.
Well, not quite.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Footsteps.
Slow. Menacing. Too heavy to be Anakin’s or Master Kenobi’s. In the mirror, she watched her own eyes widen.
Thump.
Someone else was coming.
Coming for her.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
There was no child. Obi-Wan realized that much instantly.
The crying had stopped the second the door slammed shut behind him, and Obi-Wan was completely and utterly alone. He’d been knocked to his knees, felt the dusty hardwood beneath his hands as he crawled forward. He hit a wall.
And then another.
And another.
And as much as Obi-Wan would rather pretend that he wasn’t a bit claustrophobic, that this particular situation didn’t bother him in the slightest—
He took a deep breath.
It shuddered.
“Anakin?”
He pushed to his feet. The ceiling was only centimeters from the top of his head—Anakin would’ve needed to crouch. He put a hand up to touch it, then felt the walls around him one by one, boxing him in.
Like a coffin, his brain helpfully supplied, before he told it to kindly hush. Reminded himself to breathe. That’s right, he thought. If Anakin were here, he’d remind you to breathe. He’d have you match your inhales and exhales to his so you didn’t breathe too fast, and—
It occurred to him then that he didn’t hear anything from the other side of the door.
“Anakin?” he called again. He pressed an ear up against the wood, feeling the splinters graze his cheek. And for a moment, there was nothing.
But only for a moment.
Because then, the screaming started.
It was Ahsoka’s voice that came first—shrieking, wailing in agony. Obi-Wan rushed to the door and tried the knob again, twisting it relentlessly even as it didn’t move.
“Obi-Wan!” Anakin’s voice came through the wall. “Obi-Wan, help! Help!”
“Anakin,” Obi-Wan choked out. “What’s happening?”
“Please,” cried Ahsoka. “Please, you have to help. You have to—”
“They’re—” Anakin’s voice cut off in a bloodcurdling scream. “It’s the Sith. Obi-Wan I need you, I can’t do this, I need—”
“Anakin.”
Obi-Wan pounded on the door, crying out for Anakin, for Ahsoka, horrified at what he couldn’t see. The Sith? How could that be? But they said, and their screams, and—
“Obi-Wan, please, please—”
Anakin was crying. Ahsoka wailed, a guttural noise that wrenched his gut so deeply he thought he might be sick. Oh, Force, the Sith, the Sith, they’re torturing them, they’re—
I can’t help them.
I’m trapped.
It’s just like Qui-Gon.
Oh, it’s Qui-Gon all over again, I—
Around him, the walls seemed to breathe and spark like red ray shields.
Obi-Wan had long since begun to hyperventilate, his heart hammering as fiercely as his fists on the door. The Force seemed to have abandoned him; his lightsaber, too, somewhere in the darkness, and he was helpless. Helpless as he listened to them cry out, beg for him to do something—
And as he stood there, pounding the door until his hands went raw and his throat rasped from screaming their names, Obi-Wan heard himself lose everything.
He heard Anakin and Ahsoka tortured by the enemy, while he listened—helpless.
He heard the Order stripped down to nothing, while he listened—helpless.
He heard the Sith win, heard the Republic fall, heard the war ravage his world and his home and his family while he listened.
And just when he thought their screams couldn’t get any louder, just when he thought the sound had crawled inside his mind and torn out the last of his hope and his sanity, just when he thought he couldn’t take any more—
The voices fell silent.
Obi-Wan’s hands dropped away from the door. There was no sound but his own ragged breathing, the rush of blood in his ears as his heart pounded, pounded.
“Anakin?” His voice broke. “Ahsoka?”
Nothing.
They’re gone.
Obi-Wan shook his head. No—
They’re gone.
Kept shaking his head. Over and over and over.
And you were helpless to save them.
Obi-Wan felt a sob choke out from his throat as he sank to the floor, suffocating in solitude, imprisoned by grief.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
Ahsoka wasn’t one to hide from trouble. She’d faced down droid armies, dueled Sith apprentices, won battles all on her own. She didn’t run from danger—danger ran from her.
And yet, as the footsteps grew louder and heavier and nearer, Ahsoka bolted forward.
She shut and locked the nursery door.
Heart hammering, she considered her options. She couldn’t run—not when she knew that Master Kenobi was still trapped here, and Force knew what had happened to Anakin. This was her territory—her base—and she would defend it.
If I can.
She squelched the doubt. And not a moment too soon, as the footsteps slowed. Came to a stop.
Just.
Outside.
The door.
Ahsoka ignited her lightsabers.
And from the other side of the ancient wood came an ominous knock, knock, knock.
Silence. Ahsoka didn’t move, paralyzed except for the rush of blood in her ears and the twitch of her fingers against her sabers, itching with adrenaline head, until—
Click.
The lock turned, and the door flew open by itself and slammed into the adjacent wall.
Ahsoka leapt forward but—but—
Her battle stance dropped, her eyes narrowing.
There was nothing there.
Nothing, until an unseen force smacked her in the face and knocked her to the ground.
Her lightsabers powered down as she fell, slamming into the legs of one of the baby cradles. Her head spun from the impact and bewilderment, but before she could even catch her breath something grabbed her—a hand on her leg, dragging her across the floor. She kicked. Twisted. Ignited her lightsabers again even as her body scraped across the splinters. But when she craned her head to see her captor—
Nothing was there.
She sliced her blade through the empty air. Nothing. She couldn’t even feel the foe’s Force signature—it was as if it didn’t exist. The floor vibrated as clawed hands tightened their grip and dragged her toward the nursery door, screaming.
She jabbed her saber at the place she felt its clutches, but the heat just burned her own skin.
“Help!”
She cried out, even knowing it was useless. No one was coming. Not Master Skywalker, not Master Kenobi.
She would have to face this invisible foe on her own.
But how do I fight something I can’t even see?
Unseen claws drew bloody lines down her legs, and they only deepened as she tried to squirm out of its reach. With a grunt, she pulled herself over to the nearest anchor—a baby changing table—to keep herself from being dragged away. She clung to the table legs. But when the creature yanked her ankles—
Screech.
The table shuddered and scraped across the floor, sending its contents raining down on Ahsoka—diapers, rattles, wipes and rags. A bottle of baby powder struck her montrals so hard it made her dizzy. But then—
Wait.
How do I fight something I can’t see?
Ahsoka’s hand shot out and grabbed the baby powder.
Like this.
She set her jaw, unscrewed the lid, and aimed a puff of powder at the invisible creature.
It coughed—she heard the guttural sound from its lungs, and felt the grip on her ankles loosen just enough for her to kick—hard. She leapt to her feet, lightsaber ignited, and when she looked down her eyes caught a shuddering ripple of white.
Her invisible foe made visible.
Having covered it in powder, Ahsoka could see a vague outline of something out of a nightmare. But she didn’t pause to ogle. Instead, just as its teeth bared in an attempt to lunge, she swung her blades.
The whole house seemed to shake when its body hit the floor.
In the sudden silence, Ahsoka’s sigh of relief seemed to clang like a gong. She powered down her lightsabers, breathing hard, and let her gaze fall to her legs. The skin was torn and ragged. Red zig-zags trailed up her ankles and calves and shins, and only now did she process how much they stung. What kind of a creature…?
Her eyes flickered to the body, motionless on the floor, forcing herself to stare into the sinister, powder-caked face. She had just steeled herself to crouch beside it, to rest a tentative hand on its wrist to find (or, ideally, not to find) a pulse, when—
“Ahsoka?”
The voice—so soft it could’ve been a whisper—was unmistakable.
“Master Kenobi!”
She ran forward even as pain shot up and down her legs, nearly tripping over herself to get to the closet door. She grabbed the knob, hands shaking, and when she twisted it this time, it turned.
The door opened.
Light flooded into the cramped closet. Master Kenobi had been sitting on the floor in the corner, his back to the wall and his arms hugging his shins, but right away he staggered to his feet. He looked like…well, for lack of better wording, Ahsoka thought, he looked like he’d seen a ghost—his face was pale and eyes tinged red at the rims, and he was breathing too fast, far too fast…
“Ahsoka,” he said, voice ragged. “You’re…”
He stepped forward unsteadily, out of the constricted quarters, and ran a trembling hand through his hair.
“You’re okay.”
Ahsoka’s own breath was shaky as she let it out.
“Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, of course—”
Obi-Wan set a hand on her shoulder. And the way he was looking at her—it was as if he’d never seen her before, or perhaps, would never see her again. He exhaled sharply, shakily. And though Ahsoka wasn’t certain who moved first, suddenly her face was buried in his chest as her eyes grew wet and warm, and as they both melted into the shelter of someone real.
“There’s something in this house,” Ahsoka said into Obi-Wan’s shoulder, her voice sounding high and squeaky to her own ears. “There was a creature—”
Pulling back, she gestured to the spot on the floor where the thing had fallen. But—
No. No, how could that…?
It was gone. Her legs, too, were clean of any blood and marks left by its ragged claws.
Obi-Wan eyed her quizzically. “Where’s Anakin?”
Ahsoka swallowed. “I—I don’t know.” Unclipping his lightsaber from her belt, she held it toward Master Kenobi. “He just vanished. He was behind me, I know he was, until suddenly…he wasn’t.”
She gestured to the spot she’d seen him last, just in front of the hanging mirror.
But it was then that they both noticed it.
Handprints on the glass. Smudging downward, as if someone had been had been carried—no, dragged—away.
Obi-Wan crossed the room, his footsteps creaking against the wood. Rubbing hard circles against the surface, he tried to wipe the prints away with his sleeve. It didn’t work.
Because the handprints were on the inside of the mirror.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
At first, all Anakin saw was his own face.
It was a mirror, after all. That made sense.
But what didn’t make sense was that the image didn’t move when he did. He raised his arms, locking eyes with his reflection. The reflection stayed still.
Anakin stepped backward, unnerved. What the kriff was this place, anyway? How did he end up here, when he needed to be helping Obi-Wan, and Ahsoka, and…
Instinctively, he reached for his lightsaber—as was always his first instinct. But his belt was empty. He stared back into the nearest reflection, saw his own eyes narrow. His reflection smiled. Anakin didn’t.
And that’s when its eyes went gold.
It was only for a moment. Just as soon as it appeared the flicker was gone. Anakin stumbled back from the mirror with a tight gasp, only to slam his back into another.
He whirled around.
This reflection, however, held someone else’s face.
“Ahsoka?” Anakin heard himself say. “Ahsoka, no—”
She was running down a wide tunnel, looking over her shoulder as if pursued, fear in her eyes like he’d never seen it. Who was chasing her? Who—
The image flickered out, replaced by his own golden eyes.
Anakin stepped backward. He tried to run, to get away from the sight, but no—more mirrors. Endless mirrors, stretching beyond where he could see, reflecting his own face infinitely. And in them, flickers. Voices—
“There’s good in him.”
“Padmé?”
“I loved you.”
Obi-Wan.
But their faces vanished before he’d fully glimpsed them, replaced by his own eyes, his own eyes, his own yellow and tormented eyes—
Anakin smashed his fist against the glass. Nothing.
Just Padmé saying his name. Obi-Wan crying out. Voices he couldn’t name or didn’t even recognize, screaming in agony until—
Silence.
And then the sound of someone‘s labored breath, slow and mechanical, through a mask.
Anakin fell to his knees and screamed just as every mirror exploded, and he shielded his face as glass shards cut his skin.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
Master Kenobi had told her not to—that in breaking the mirror, they might trap Anakin inside it forever.
But she was still thinking about that invisible foe—how the unknown was always her greatest enemy, and to dwell on it would paralyze her. She just had to act, or else—
She struck the glass with her lightsaber. It shattered, but the glass never hit the ground.
It, along with everything else, was sucked inward with a force so strong Ahsoka was reminded of an airlock.
“Hang on!”
She was pulled forward by the suction, skidding across the floor until Obi-Wan grabbed her hand and anchored them both to the nearest cradle. But Ahsoka stared forward, into the broken mirror frame.
“Anakin?” she called.
No response.
“We have to get out of this room,” Obi-Wan shouted over the rush of air, “and close the door.”
“No!”
“Ahsoka—”
He was stronger than her, and when he pulled her back, she stumbled.
“Wait! Anakin!”
And for one terrifying moment, when again no answer came, she thought she might be wrong. But then—
A hand shot out from the mirror. A metal one.
It grabbed hers.
The wind died down as she pulled him toward her, and they hit the floor. The three of them crashed to a pile against a cradle, Ahsoka slamming her head into the rungs, panting. She sat up. She still had Anakin’s hand and Obi-Wan’s in each of hers, and didn’t dare let go.
“You’re okay,” she breathed, staring at Anakin through blurry eyes, mostly as a confirmation to herself. But then when she saw his face, white with shock but with a long, thin cut down his face— “Hey, you’re okay. We’re—"
Anakin crawled across the floor. Took she and Obi-Wan both by the shoulders and pulled them forward, and together they stayed there, shuddering until their heartbeats slowed.
At last, Anakin’s hand snaked out of hers and cupped his eye, where a long cut was still bleeding.
“Didn’t anyone ever tell you?” he said, using his sleeve to blot the blood away. “It’s bad luck to break a mirror.”
“I thought there was no such thing as luck,” Ahsoka said, trying for humor. But Anakin just shook his head, looking shellshocked, before he locked eyes with Obi-Wan.
“Hey,” he said. “The closet. Are you—”
“Fine,” Obi-Wan interrupted, though Ahsoka noticed he was still pale. But then, they all were. “Your eye…I don’t have a bacta patch.”
Anakin squinted slightly, and Ahsoka winced at the sight of the long gash. “Occupational hazard,” he said, then shuddered. “This place is—”
“Don’t say haunted,” Ahsoka said.
“I was going to say ‘seriously kriffed up,’” he said. “But ‘haunted’ about sums it up, too.”
Obi-Wan sat up, rubbing his head where he’d struck it on the wall. “We need to find that bounty hunter. The sooner we do that, the sooner we can leave.”
“Um, hold on, find the bounty hunter?” Anakin sputtered. “Can’t we just assume she’s been sucked into some other freaky mirror by now and get the hell out?”
“Anakin—”
“We can’t even trust what we see.”
“Or don’t see,” Ahsoka added.
“Or hear,” Obi-Wan quietly admitted, and again Ahsoka wondered what happened to him in there. “But we have a mission. A duty.” He let go of Anakin’s hand to push himself up. “And this time, stay—”
A bloodcurdling scream split the air.
This time, all three of them jumped, startled, before they bolted toward the sound.
But just as they skidded into the long corridor, every single door in sight flew open at once.
“What the actual vape—" Anakin muttered.
They ran down the hall. Ahsoka glimpsed wild sights in every passing room—bedframes levitating in the air, curtains flying about, old holoTVs turned on by themselves—flashing by so fast she wasn’t sure she believed her eyes. Until at last they reached the door at the end of the hall, the source of the wretched scream. And there, crouched in the corner of the bedroom, was the bounty hunter.
Ahsoka drew her lightsabers on instinct, and felt Anakin and Obi-Wan behind her doing the same.
Anakin stepped forward in the doorway. “Freeze. You’re under a—"
“Please. Don’t hurt him, I’m begging you.”
Anakin didn’t lower his lightsaber, but Ahsoka could feel him balk. He took a tentative step closer to the bounty hunter. “We’re taking you into Republic custo—”
“I’ll find you the money somehow, I swear,” the bounty hunter whimpered. “I swear.”
“We don’t want any money,” Anakin said.
“Not you,” she hissed. “Him.”
The bounty hunter gestured forward.
Toward empty air.
Ahsoka’s heartrate hitched. Could it be the invisible foe from the nursery, making a victim of someone else? The bounty hunter cowered, looking desperate, holding up her hands in surrender. Oblivious to the fact that there was no one there. Anakin opened his mouth—perhaps to tell her she was losing it, or accuse her of making it up—though they’d fallen victim to too many of this house’s traps to believe that either could be true. Yet Anakin didn’t get the chance to speak.
Because then came quiet footsteps behind them. A soft exhale.
And Obi-Wan’s breath catching as he whispered, “Master Qui-Gon?”
Ahsoka whirled around.
It was impossible. It should have been impossible—she’d heard the stories since she was a youngling, of the great Master Jinn who was killed by the Sith over a decade ago. And yet there he was—shimmery, but solid. Real. His hair was half pulled back and hung to his shoulders, his beard was neatly trimmed, and he looked exactly like the pictures Master Kenobi had showed her once from his Padawan days.
Well, except for the red lightsaber sticking out of his chest.
“He’s not real.” Anakin was at Obi-Wan’s side, gripping his arm as Obi-Wan stared down at the gaping wound in his old master’s flesh. “Master, he’s not—”
“Obi-Wan.”
Ahsoka stared as the ghosts’ lips parted, and her grandmaster’s name tumbled out. Qui-Gon stepped closer. She and Anakin stepped back, toward where the bounty hunter still whimpered behind them.
Obi-Wan didn’t move.
“Promise me you will train the boy. He is the chosen one. He…will bring balance…”
And then, Obi-Wan’s gaze faltered as he murmured, “Yes, Master.”
Anakin yanked him back, looking horrified.
“Was that…were those his last words?”
Obi-Wan didn’t answer.
“Obi-Wan, I don’t—I’m—”
Ahsoka watched Obi-Wan brush away Anakin’s hand and face the ghost again, locking its eyes.
But then a closet door behind her creak open. She turned.
And out stepped a bleeding woman.
Ahsoka didn’t recognize this ghost. Her skin was cracked and torn raw, her eyes purple and black, her clothes torn to shreds. Yet she was smiling—and the sight of that alone sent Ahsoka stumbling back with a yelp, until Obi-Wan grabbed her arm.
“My son. I…I love…”
The woman’s voice cracked. She reached out a hand.
She was staring straight at Anakin.
“Mom,” he said, in a broken tone Ahsoka had never heard him use. “Mom—no—”
“Anakin—”
Smash.
They all flew open—all the doors and windows, the attic hatch.
And in poured a dozen ghosts bearing Jango Fett’s face.
“Waxer,” Ahsoka murmured, recognizing him instantly. She whirled around, scanning faces— “Hardcase. Ringo, Oz, Tup—”
They were everywhere. Troopers who had died on Umbara, at Point Rain, at this that or the other battle where Ahsoka had failed to protect them. Their steps were stilted, their wounds still visible, and Ahsoka felt the blood rush out of her face and her heart drop to the floor.
She squeezed Obi-Wan’s hand so hard she was sure she’d broken it.
Obi-Wan came to his senses first. He herded Anakin and Ahsoka forward, and they climbed onto the bed in the center of the room. Clones surrounded them on all sides, calling out, moaning, screaming. Qui-Gon and Shmi Skywalker stood and stared.
With a trembling hand, Ahsoka fumbled with her lightsaber.
“It won’t work,” Obi-Wan said, waving it down. “We’re just going to have to run for it.”
“How?”
She glanced at Anakin, whose glassy eyes were glued to his mother.
“The window. You and Anakin first,” Obi-Wan said, then nodded toward the bounty hunter, who had curled into a ball in the corner. “I’ll take care of our friend over there.”
Ahsoka nodded, but didn’t move. Because in order to get to the window, she’d have to cross the room. And in order to cross the room—
The clones reached toward her with blue, ghostly hands.
But then Master Kenobi nudged her forward, and she was stumbling through the sea of wounds and pained faces and phantoms of loss. She tried not to look at them—yet, at the same time, felt as if she owed it to them to look. If she couldn’t be with them in their last moments, if she couldn’t save them—
Ahsoka made it to the window. She put one foot up on the ledge, feeling the rain outside start to splatter her clothes, and turned to grab Anakin.
“Go,” she said. He stared off over his shoulder, his face painted in shock as he watched the woman. But there were so many, getting closer and closer, hands reaching out to touch them— “Go, Skyguy.”
She shoved him a little harder than necessary. He stumbled as he fell, landing easily on his feet before standing, shell-shocked, in the yard. Ahsoka jumped after him.
She grabbed his hand and pulled him further back, where they could see into the window from the ground and wait for Obi-Wan. But he didn’t appear. And then all Ahsoka could think about was that invisible foe, and what she’d do if something had happened.
But then he was there. Standing in the window, while bloody hands reached out toward him and voices screamed and…
He was carrying the bounty hunter.
Ahsoka and Anakin ran forward as soon as he hit the ground, the wet and muddy soil splashing beneath their feet. But Obi-Wan had a strange look on his face as he stared down at the limp woman in his arms, and when Ahsoka followed his gaze her blood ran cold.
The bounty hunter’s eyes were open.
Glassy.
“She’s dead.”
Ahsoka had meant it as a question, but it came out flat and dull. Obi-Wan just exhaled slowly.
“How—” Anakin started.
“I don’t know.” His eyes flickered briefly to meet theirs, before slipping back down. “When I went to her, she was…already cold.” He swallowed. “As if she’d been dead for hours.”
And for that, no one had an explanation.
At that particular moment, Ahsoka realized that silence had fallen behind them—the moans and screams and wretched sounds from the upper window had fallen silent, leaving only the night bugs and the shudder of their ragged breathing. She whirled around.
But there was nothing.
The house had vanished.
And with it, the ghosts of all they’d lost.
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
They lit a funeral pyre.
Obi-Wan had suggested they do it properly—respect the bounty hunter’s life, in spite of how she’d lived it. Anakin had some…other ideas for what they should do with the body (“I’m just saying,” he’d said, “she should finish her life the way she lived it—with her head up Dooku’s ass.”) to which, naturally, Obi-Wan didn’t take kindly. But Ahsoka was thankful for the moment of levity—after everything, Force knew they needed it.
She stood between Anakin and Obi-Wan now, watching the smoke trail up to the starless sky. She risked a glance up at each of them—Obi-Wan, whose face was still pale and drawn, and Anakin, whose eye had begun to swell and the cut down his face looking raw and red. She wondered what they’d seen—or if, like her, their assailants had been invisible. What could possibly be enough to rattle her Masters?
Obi-Wan caught her looking up, and followed her gaze to Anakin’s eye. “That’s going to scar,” he said.
Anakin ran a finger down the cut, only wincing a little. “Really sells the “rugged war hero” look, don’t you think?”
“What happened in there?” Ahsoka said. “What kind of a—”
“It’s not important,” he snapped.
“But you—”
“Plenty of things happened in there that didn’t make any sense, Ahsoka. I mean, look at her.” He gestured toward the fire, and Ahsoka’s throat tightened. Anakin exhaled, but when he spoke again, the sharpness in his voice was gone. “Sorry. It was just a twisted hall of mirrors. That’s all. We can’t trust that anything we saw was real.” He looked away, and the flames cast shadows on his face. “Even if it was…”
“Scary,” Ahsoka finished softly.
Anakin nodded. And in the silence that followed, that fear lingered as thick as smoke.
They waited there until the flames became flickers, and the flickers became coals, and at last the coals went dark. And the blackness that surrounded them, even with Jedi senses, made Ahsoka feel she’d gone blind.
They walked back to the ship in eerie silence.
As Obi-Wan lowered the boarding ramp, Anakin turned back to face the empty cobblestone streets. “Farewell, Halloweentown,” he said with a sarcastic salute, and Ahsoka was grateful to see the smirk that cracked across his face.
“I don’t think I ever want to watch that holo again,” Ahsoka said. “Or any spooky holo, actually.”
“Why bother?” Anakin said, nudging her shoulder with his. “No ghost story could top what we’ve seen. Honestly, someone should just follow us around with a camera all day and show that footage in theaters—we’d be top of the charts in the horror genre for sure.”
“Oh, yeah,” Ahsoka said, giggling. “But after hearing the way you scream at spiders, I don’t think they’d call you the Hero With No Fear anymore.”
“Hey.” He swatted at her, and she laughed. “Come on, can’t I be the Hero With One Fear? Those things are scary.”
“Well, on the bright side,” Obi-Wan said, appeared between them, “it appears the scariest part is behind us.”
Anakin scoffed. “Yeah, for now.”
But his tone was light even so, and Ahsoka felt happy and safe, and her Masters were here.
However, as most ghost stories do, this one ends on somewhat of an ominous note—for the scariest part, perhaps, was not behind them after all.
For Ahsoka would one day be left alone, the last one remaining as those who loved and raised her were picked off one-by-one. She would face a foe too vast and unknowable, never to truly see its sinister face.
And Obi-Wan, too, would find himself helpless to save those he loved most, to prevent the fall of that which he’d built his life around. To be cut off. Isolated in grief and solitude and failure.
And Anakin?
Anakin Skywalker would one day stare into the mirror and see who he’d become.
And everything he’d done.
And everything he’d lost.
And one day, it would destroy him.
These things would come in time. But for now, ignorance was bliss. For now, as they boarded the ship and joked about spiders and holofilms, there was only this—laughter, lingering jitters, and hope for tomorrow.
But only for now.