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She floated around him in the recording he had found when he searched their apartment on a mission. The device was a small thing, barely large enough to encompass his palm and he had inspected it before sliding it into a pouch on his belt. Who knew Darth Vader was sentimental?
He had come back to the ship and made his report, before heading off to his own chambers to start up the holographic picture. The lights were dim like always, but he flipped switches on to see the dust caked in the grooves of the disk. Pulling out tools that he kept hidden in his drawers, Darth Vader scraped at and restored the piece until the buttons and hardware could operate properly.
If he remembered properly, this was one of the recordings he and Padme had made for their children, before everything went to hell. He couldn’t recall which one it specifically was, but the intention was to be something they could show off to demonstrate how in love they were.
Darth Vader took a deep shuddering breath, one that echoed off the metal walls, and pressed a button on the side.
An image flickered for a moment, and Darth Vader’s monitors beeped quietly as his heart sped up in nervousness. Would it work? He wasn’t sure he could handle seeing her face again after so long, but he wasn’t sure that he would deal with not seeing her either.
How long has it been now? Several years at least. The loss was still one of his biggest regrets.
The blue pictured stabilized and Darth Vader couldn’t parse together what he was seeing before he saw his own figure, younger, as himself, move away from the recording device. His face was unmarred and he didn’t need help to breathe. His eyes were lit up with excitement and a great smile beamed through the recording.
The image was so different from the one that Darth Vader saw in the reflection of the windows around the base. More open, passionate, loving. Where had he gone?
A burst of laughter crackled through the speaker as the figure dipped back. Padme came into frame holding onto what he used to be, leaning over his shoulders, clutching the fabric of his clothing. Her hair draped around her shoulders, loose and free and she grinned too.
“Ani! What are you doing over here?” she asked playfully, not seeing the device.
Darth Vader stilled, save for his hands, which shook with an almost imperceptible tremor. Her voice– it was a sweet sound that he had only heard in his most indulgent dreams, the ones that he woke up from scared and tense and alone. Even then the memory grew fainter and fainter with every dream, every night that he comforted himself through.
The Anakin that he used to be glanced over at the recording device knowingly. His eyes crinkled as he noticed Padme’s gaze following and seeing it too.
“Oh, you know, Padme,” he said, almost flipping her over his shoulder. “Just loving you as much as I know how.”
She tumbled into his arms with a giggle that left a cavernous pit in Darth Vader’s stomach. Her skirt spilled over her and she brought her hand up to Anakin’s face. The image was rendered in shades of blue, but Darth Vader recalled the scene, remembered how the blush felt as it reached from ear to ear.
The next part was familiar enough too. Anakin brought his own hand up to cover hers, his mechanical one, but Padme didn’t seem to notice the difference between his flesh or metal hands. It was a small gesture, but one that Darth Vader treasured.
In the back of his mind, he wondered how she would treat his mechanical parts now. Would they just be another part of him, or would they be a symbol of who he failed to be? Of who was ripped away on Mustafar? Was he too far gone for her love?
Darth Vader’s eyes returned to the blue picture as he heard their laughter mingling together. Padme’s face was impossibly close to his own, and he swore that he could feel the intensity of her stare through the image, years away from.
“Ani,” she smiled as she searched his face. “You know I love you?”
“Of course,” he responded quietly, his eyes flicking downwards towards her face. He glanced over at the recording device with a small smile and reached towards it to turn it off, but not before he leaned in for a kiss from Padme, which she gladly reciprocated.
The hologram flickered away, leaving Darth Vader alone in his chambers, like he had so often found himself in the past few years. If only Mustafar had turned out differently. If only he hadn’t been so scared, so fearful of Padme’s dying. He had turned a blind eye towards everything else because it hadn’t been weighted with the importance of her life, but he still lost her.
The love of his life. His best friend.
If the ducts in his eyes weren’t so burnt by his mistakes, one might’ve been able to witness a tear forming in his waterline and falling onto the scar of his cheek. It might’ve trickled down his face, leaving a track of water in its wake before dripping onto the floor. It might’ve been followed by more tears, but all that could escape from Darth Vader were the shuddering breaths that were distorted through his mask.
They clawed through his ruined lungs, made him gasp and clutch at his chest. He squeezed his eyes shut, praying that the images of her would leave his mind. They tortured him, filled him with anguish and torment. Immediately, regret flashed through him.
How could he ever wish her away when all he wanted was to be with her?
That was the only thing that he had wanted, since the very first day he met her, a beautiful angel in the midst of the hell of his life. He had pined for her for years, been with her a fraction of that time, and lost her to himself. It was his fault that all of this happened. Perhaps if he hadn't insisted on being taken so seriously, if he hadn't chosen to fall for the tricks of the Dark Side, she would still be with him now.
Darth Vader cried out again, his fists clenching around the small device he found. How could something so small provide him such respite, but so much heartache?
All it brought back were the memories of Padme. Running through the fields, getting married, laughing together, eating together, sleeping together in the same bed, they were all pushed to the forefront of his mind, exactly where he had fought to remove them.
With shaking hands, Darth Vader clawed at his helmet, searching desperately for the fasteners that held it shut. He found them and the mask loosened around his head with a hiss and clattering, it fell to the ground.
It sounded hollow, echoing with the beat of his heart.
The air around Darth Vader became harder to breathe and he stumbled clumsily down to the cold floor, where he laid. He took one last sighing breath and his eyes closed, finally, without fear.