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If there is one thing that Anakin Skywalker will never admit it is that he is quickly becoming terrified of himself. This fear is rooted in many things, the least of them being the twenty-two months he spent being held as a prisoner of war by terrorists overseas. He is twenty-three years old and none of these years have been kind to him. Perhaps he’s seen too much, done too much, and his mind is simply straining under all the pressure. Whatever the reason, he is beginning to fear the man he’s starting to see in the mirror. Sometimes, late when his family and the world are asleep, Anakin wonders if maybe he should have died rather than coming home. He stares into his own pale, dead eyes and wonders if he’s endangering his family by being in their lives. These are not thoughts that he will ever voice, however. His wife spent twenty-two months thinking that her husband was dead and Anakin will never hurt her by taking himself away from her.
Tonight, he is awake and the thoughts are louder than usual. He can’t quite shut them up the way he normally does, can’t simply curl around Padme in their bed and force himself to sleep again. There’s nothing abnormal about tonight, he’s awake because of the same nightmare he’s been having since Obi and their unit rescued him. It’s that nightmare where the terrorists give him a choice between killing an unarmed young woman and killing himself - that really happened and he’ll never forgive himself for choosing wrong - but instead of the woman he actually killed, the woman they bring in is Padme and he freezes up. He wakes up, every time, with the sound of machine-gun fire ringing in his ears and the feeling of blood staining his skin.
The house is silent as he slips out of bed and down the hall, careful not to disturb Padme’s sleeping form. It isn’t until he’s in the living room that he releases the breath he’s been holding and it trembles a little as it comes out. He can feel himself start shaking, it starts in his fingers and travels slowly through the rest of his body like a disease. Anakin tries to lean back against the couch cushions, tries to steady his breathing the way Obi taught him after that first panic attack. It doesn’t work. His limbs are locking up and his throat is tightening and his vision is going blurry. He lurches forward, cradling his head in his hands in an attempt to push himself through the worst of this.
He can still hear the machine-guns bursting all around him and even opening his eyes doesn’t help. Rationally, he knows that he’s in his living room at home and not in a dusty cell with an armed guard on the other side. But his mind isn’t rational right now and he doesn’t know how to make it be rational again. He’s so full of fear that he can’t breathe properly. The minutes pass and the panic pumping through him only grows, intensifying until he feels like he’s drowning in it. His eyes fall closed as even the sound of his own heartbeat starts to get too loud for him to bear.
It’s over as quickly as it began and Anakin slumps back into the couch, his breathing heavy. There’s a part of him that wants to just say ‘fuck it’ and sleep right where he is, but the logical half knows that he’ll only aggravate the problems in his lower back if he does so he gets slowly to his feet. His body is already aching when he climbs back into bed, curling around his wife’s body with a short sigh of relief. Awake or asleep, Padme’s presence is enough to calm him so that sleep might just be a possibility. And, even if it isn’t, it’s comforting to lay here with her in his arms.
* * * * *
He wakes to the feeling of someone shaking him and finds himself back in that dusty cell again. There’s someone beside him, but he can’t see their face properly in the darkness of his cell. He realizes where he is and he starts to cry because it was all a dream, of course it was all a dream. Obi and their unit never found him and he never went home to his wife and their children. He’s still trapped here in this fucking cell and now he knows that he’ll probably never leave. Rage pulses through him at the thought and he reacts without hesitation. His hand doesn’t shake as he grabs the person who’s been shaking his shoulders, fingers tightening around their throat.
“A-Ani-Anak-”
The person is trying to say his name and that’s weird because they don’t say his name, not his first name anyways. It’s always ‘General Skywalker’ in that mocking, sneering tone. Anakin starts to loosen his hold as the room begins to shift around him, the scene altering to match a familiar room in a familiar home. It’s his room, the one he shares with- and then it hits him and he’s out of bed, flying across the room where he can stare at his hands in horror.
“Ani?”
The sound of Padme’s voice, hoarse from his hand around her fucking throat, makes him look up and his eyes find her immediately. She’s standing near the foot of their bed, her expression cautious as she waits for him to answer her. He can’t answer her. His eyes drop to the angry red spot on her neck where his hand was only moments ago and he lets out a harsh, terrified cry.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” The apologies flee his lips over and over again as he slides down the wall, drawing his knees to his chest.
She moves closer and the absolute devastation on her face makes him curl into himself. He didn’t mean to hurt her but he can’t tell her that because he can’t find the words. His tongue feels too big for his mouth and he doesn’t know if he’s breathing. He stares at her, watching as she drops to her knees in front of him, and he can’t help flinching away when her hand reaches for him.
“What’ve I done? Oh God, what’ve I done?” He doesn’t know who he’s talking to now, can’t think through the rushing in his ears.
“It’s okay, I’m okay.” She whispers, reaching again for him. “Come here, Ani. Come here, love. It’s okay.”
She keeps whispering that. ‘It’s okay, I’m okay.’ Like he can’t see the mark his hand made around her fucking throat. He can’t even move away from her, can’t help leaning into the hand she places against his cheek, and he needs to. He needs to leave, needs to get away from her before he hurts her again. Oh, God. What was he thinking? He shouldn’t have come home, should’ve stayed overseas and let them kill him. His eyes remain fixed on that mark on his wife’s neck. Even as she pulls him into her arms, cradling him close to her chest as her fingers stroke his hair, he sees that mark in his mind and he can’t breathe.
“I didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to,” She has to know that, has to know that he didn’t mean to, and he can’t say those words enough to make her understand.
Her fingers scratch gently at his scalp. “I know, I know baby. It’s okay. I promise it’s okay.”
He wants it to be, he wants it to be so bad. But she’s gonna hate him when she realizes what he did. When she wakes up tomorrow and she sees that bruise around her throat, she’s going to hate him and she’ll tell him to leave and then he’ll have nothing. He’ll have nothing and he’ll be nothing and oh, oh God he can’t lose her. He hurt her and he didn’t mean to and he’s so sorry and he doesn’t know what to do. Unconsciously, he curls tighter into her arms.
“Ani, it’s okay. I’m not mad at you.”
Her voice is so soft and he wants so badly to believe her but he can’t. He hates himself already so how can she say that she’s not mad at him? Still, his body curls into her chest as her arms tighten around him. She pulls her fingers through his hair, one hand rubbing up and down between his shoulder blades, and he wants to sink into her and savor this moment for the rest of time. Savor it, because it will soon be gone as he will be gone because he cannot stay and endanger the woman he loves. Now that he knows what he’s capable of, he will do whatever he can to protect her from his hands.
The soft voice of their daughter brings her away from him, though she goes hesitantly. Anakin takes this moment, the moment where she leaves their room and enters Leia’s, as his chance. He stands on shaking legs, bolting from the room with a speed that will leave him weak later. Padme’s voice follows him worried and a little scared, and he forces himself to ignore it. He’s never ignored her fear before and the thought grates on his already-frayed nerves. He still doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know where he’s going. His body aches and his head is fuzzy, but he leaves the house anyways.
It isn’t until he’s outside that he realizes that he is not fully dressed. He’s wearing black cotton sleep pants, worn and faded. They provide no protection from the bitter cold that hits him on all sides. He is not wearing a shirt or shoes. There is nothing in his pockets and it hits him that he’s alone, wandering without anywhere to go. Still, he continues walking. His feet ache from stepping on the icy pavement and the pain is starting to pull him out of the panic. By now he doesn’t know where he is, can’t identify anything around him, and he’s a little scared.
He collapses onto the sidewalk, shivering more out of fear than the cold. He’s lived in this town for the past thirteen years, long enough that he should know where he is. Nothing around him looks even vaguely familiar and he releases a sharp cry at the realization that he’s lost. Anakin can count on one hand the amount of times that he’s been lost in his twenty-three years of life. Three. He’s been lost exactly three times. Wrapping his arms around himself in a vain attempt to protect himself from the cold, he closes his eyes against the sudden onslaught of fear that presses in on him.
* * * * *
In the end, he loses track of the hours he sits along the roadside. The sun is starting to come up now, illuminating the area around him. He’s surprised to find that he isn’t in a neighborhood. There are no houses near him, only an empty field with three cows and a small pond. The sidewalk he’s currently sitting on is cracking and faded, clearly remnant of an earlier time period when there may have been a house or two out here. He’s still every bit as lost as he was a few hours ago and the fear comes up to strangle him at that thought.
He’s contemplating his options when a familiar car slows to a stop in front of him. The car is a dark blue Corvette with tinted windows and custom license plates. Anakin watches as a man climbs out of the car, though he doesn’t stand up to greet his old friend. Obadiah’s expression is at first irritated, he’s clearly been searching for Anakin for hours and he’s probably exhausted. When he takes in Anakin’s bleak expression and shaking limbs, his face softens and he shakes his head. He reaches into the car, pulling out a hoodie that Anakin recognizes as his own as well as a pair of boots that also happen to belong to Anakin.
“Would you care to explain why you’re sitting out here in the middle of nowhere, six miles away from your house?” Obi asks, tossing the boots and hoodie over to Anakin.
Warmth spreads through Anakin’s chest as he slides his arms into his hoodie. “I had to get out of there.” Is the only thing he says and his voice is sullen even to his ears.
“What happened? Padme sounded frantic but she wouldn’t tell me what had happened.” Obi plops down beside him, heedless of the bitter cold.
“I-I choked her.” The memory pulses through Anakin again, waves of fear and guilt following it. “I woke up from a nightmare and she was shaking me and I-I didn’t know where I was and I reacted and she-”
An arm drapes around his shoulders. “It isn’t your fault. You know that, Anakin. That doesn’t explain why you’ve run out of your home like this.” Obi interrupts his rambling in that calm tone of his, the calm cutting through Anakin’s fear and panic.
“I hurt her. I can’t risk it happening again, Obi. What kind of man am I if I allow myself to stay when I know what I am capable of?” Anakin’s voice shakes and he drops his head between his knees. “I love her. I love her and our children too much to risk hurting them.”
“They need you, Anakin. You cannot leave them just because you’re scared.” Obi reasons. “Do you know what a gift it is to have a woman love you through something like this? To have her stay by you and be scared for you when you run out of your house in the middle of the night in your bed clothes?”
There’s a bitter edge to his voice that makes Anakin feel suddenly guilty. Obi had been engaged once, but Satine had left when he’d come back from war with PTSD. Sighing, Anakin raises his head.
“I can’t go back there right now. I know-I know I can’t just leave, but I can’t-Obi, I can’t go back there right now.” The panic returns, lacing Anakin’s words and he swallows it back. “Please don’t make me go back there.”
Obi sighs and the arm around his shoulders tightens briefly. “You can stay with me over the weekend.” He says, his voice gentling.
“Thank you. I’m sorr-”
“It’s all right. Let’s get out of this cold, though. I’m surprised you didn’t catch your death out here.”
Anakin can’t help but grin at the chastisement in Obi’s voice, though it’s a fleeting sort of grin that fades as soon as it appears. Obi pulls his door open and Anakin slides into the passenger seat, sighing at the feel of warmth curling around him. He hadn’t realized quite how cold it was outside until this moment and he’s suddenly glad that Obi found him. Resting his head back against the seat, Anakin closes his eyes. Now that most of the panic has fled, he’s found himself exhausted both mentally and physically. His brain shuts down to the sound of Obi’s quiet voice.