Lightside Sith 044 Interlude 001

AN: Note, I am using a “George Lucas-esque” writing style for Anakin's “vision.” aka, bad romance!

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Anakin was tossing and turning in his sleep. Sweat stained his sheets as a vision through the Force clouded his sight. 

Through powers of the universe, he saw a scene that made his heart burst with joy. Rolling around in the verdant hills of Naboo, he was frolicking side by side with the love of his life. 

“Oh Ani, you're so tall, smart, intelligent, witty, and charismatic. Any girl would fall in love with you, but you chose me.” His angel smiled brilliantly at him. 

“I would do anything for you, my love.” He said, running both of his hands across her face. 

“Then please, give me your child. I wish to be a mother. Please.” She tickled his ear with her hot breath, and then without another thought, she dropped her robe to the ground. 

“Padmé.” Anakin gripped his wife, and felt time shift forward. 

Nine months had passed, and her belly was now wide like a ripe fruit. 

Anakin held her hand as the medical droid beeped nearby. 

“Vitals are dropping. Increase the dosage by .55cc.” The surgeon droid mechanically stated. 

“No no no no, this can't be.” Anakin choked out, falling to his knees. 

“Don't cry, my love.” Padmé spoke, her voice less than a whisper, death was at hand. 

“The Jedi, they have healing arts, they can-!” Anakin got out, speaking incoherently, his very soul full of desperation. 

“No, Anakin, no, the fault. The fault lies with you. If I never had your children, it never would've come to this.” Padmé accused, closing her eyes in pain. 

“This was all my fault. What have I done?” Anakin asked himself in a pain filled voice. The young man rocked back and forth, unable to come to terms with reality. “I never should have made you pregnant.” 

“No, your seed was too weak. That's why…I won't die. I found another. You won't blame me, will you, Ani?” Padmé said. 

“Her vitals are stabilizing. Quick, engage the C-Section maneuver.” The surgeon droid said with some urgency. 

Anakin blinked, then saw a pair of twin, red-skinned babies held in her hands, in the hands of his angel. 

“P-Padmé.” Anakin stuttered out, unable to comprehend what was going on. 

Padmé then smirked at him in an infuriatingly familiar pose, and she then glanced up at a rainy window reflecting the night sky. 

Anakin felt something was there, and stood up. Once he did, a distant bolt of lightning flashed, and then he saw a reflection. A reflection of him. 

“RENSTAR. THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT. I'LL CHASE YOU TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH…RENSTAAAAARRR!!!” 

Anakin roared, the Force shuddered, and cracks appeared at the edge of his vision. Igniting his lightsaber, he lunged at the smug nerf herder, broke through the glass, and tumbled end over end. A bottomless pit of darkness encapsulated him, and when he struck the hard ground, it was like he had collided with a freighter. 

Eyes snapping open, Anakin found it was 3AM, and his heart was pounding. 

The dream, that nightmare was much more than something normal. He had experienced something when his mother had been raped then murdered by those filthy sand people. Squeezing and opening his mechanical hand over and over and over and over again, an hour passed as he brooded in the darkness. 

Finally, he decided to hit the training room, and break something. 

Entering a training room at the top of a tower, the dim Coruscanti skyline was easily seen through multiple windows. The rain struck each surface, briefly making him wonder if he truly was awake. 

Extremely impatient by this point, he spoke to the training center. “Room: Training Scenario A-5.” 

A practice droid rose up out of the ground, pushed up from a storage room. The second it had made its appearance, it spun across the floor and smashed into the far wall. Reinforced glass hardly dented, but the mechanical intelligence was not so lucky. 

Before it finished clattering down, Anakin had hurled a second droid one into the ceiling. He slashed through several ball-shaped drones as they darted around him, their little blasters spitting harmless bolts that he barely bothered to deflect, as his rage was so strong, they practically skirted around him as he wielded the Force. 

Within the training room, a holoprojector was broadcasting news of the war effort. Kaine Renstar’s recorded image stood frozen in the middle of his announcement, dressed in immaculate finery, looking far too pleased with himself. Playing, pausing, rewinding, then playing again, he focused upon that smug asshole's face again and again, each one of his strikes coming faster and faster. 

The room shook as he prowled around the venue. Cubes rose up to block his path. Ordinarily, Jedi used them to test their agility, and would dodge around them, or use them as cover from the enemies ‘spawning’ in. 

Anakin went through them. 

Shoulder checking a metal cube the size of an average flatscreen TV, and then dicing through another, he hardly felt satisfied by the level of carnage that he had wrought. 

Suddenly hearing a ding on his dataslate, Anakin's heart rapidly beat, and he fumbled to pull it out of his pocket. 

[Notification: Automatic System Update: ETA 1 hour.]

Anakin snarled, tossing the damned thing away. 

As the device clattered to a corner, the screen showed 99 unanswered phone calls sent to Angel, and several dozen paragraphs of text that could take an hour to scroll through & read. 

“She’s carrying his child.” Anakin said to himself, his voice came out thin and disbelieving. He looked around the wrecked room, knowing that it wasn't enough, that he could still do more. “He told the whole galaxy. He stood there and told them like it was some kind of, some kind of victory. No, no, she wouldn't. We promised.”

For the briefest, smallest moments, Anakin glanced out the window, and considered it. Considered following through with what he had dreamt. Then he imagined that smug, muscular red-skinned bastard, and gnashed his teeth, unwilling to be a cuckold to his own wife. 

His face warped, appearing almost animalistic as the one thing he cherished in this galaxy was at threat of being taken away. 

Whilst Anakin was having a moment, the door to the training room opened up. Obi-Wan paused on the threshold. His eyes moved from the scattered droids to the saber on the floor, then to Anakin.

“I take it the training session isn’t going well.” Obi-Wan sarcastically remarked, striding into the room, and toed a broken cube curiously. 

“Get out.” Anakin flatly said over his shoulder, desperately trying to appear as if he was in control. 

“I would, but I’m concerned you’ll start taking your frustrations out on the windows next. The temple clean up crew are paid to do a job, but that doesn't mean we must create problems to keep them employed.” Obi-Wan tutted. 

Anakin’s jaw tightened, and he clenched his fist. “I said get out.”

“Oh, I heard you.” Obi-Wan lightly replied stepped inside, and the door shut behind him as he drew near.

Anakin seized a practice staff from a nearby rack and hurled it. Obi-Wan shifted aside, letting it harmlessly bounce off the reinforced glass wall. 

“You're getting sloppy.” Obi-Wan said, dusting off his shoulder. “Honesty, Anakin, I never took you for the type to indulge in HoloDramas. Staying up so late, and you didn't even think about inviting your Master? I'm hurt.” He said, raising his chin towards the currently paused section where Kaine was holding his sword aloft. 

“Don’t.” Anakin jabbed a finger at him. “Don’t stand there and make jokes at my expense.” 

“Jokes now, are they? Oh, here's a joke: Padmé Amidala pregnant with Kaine Renstar’s child.” Obi-Wan said, shaking his head. 

Anakin lunged for the nearest training droid and drove his fist into its casing. Once. Twice. The third blow bent its head sideways. He shoved it away, breathing hard. “I hate him. I hate that smug, self-righteous-”

“Anakin.” Obi-Wan sighed. 

“I hate everyone who’s just going to sit there and watch. Believe all his lies, how so many billions are, are shipping him and Padmé.” Anakin all but spat, barely able to get the words out. 

Obi-Wan’s expression softened, but he didn’t come closer. “You’re angry because your friend is being slandered. As Jedi, we must constrain those emotions, and act as protectors, not destroyers.” 

“Don’t tell me what I feel.” Anakin snapped back. 

“Then tell me yourself.” Obi-Wan pressed. 

The bearded Jedi Master was trying to be understanding, but was slowly beginning to lose his patience with his student's attitude. 

Anakin turned on him, what he wanted to say almost left his lips, he took her from me, but he ultimately couldn't bring himself to incriminate himself. 

Obi-Wan let the silence settle between them.

“He made an announcement. A cruel one, by the sound of it. That doesn’t mean he owns her, nor does it mean that that was necessarily Padmé that he had kissed. Have you tried calling the Senator?” Obi-Wan asked, crossing his arms. 

Anakin’s face twisted. “You didn’t hear the way he said it.”

“Please, Anakin, I think half the galaxy has heard what he said. Which is precisely why I believe it is nothing more than a lie. Afterall, you described him as such just now-a liar-isn't that right?” 

Anakin shoved a workbench with the Force. It scraped across the floor and struck the wall hard enough to buckle one leg, and then fell flat on its face. 

“I’m going to find him.” Anakin darkly intoned. 

“And then?”

“I’ll make him answer.”

“You will do no such thing.” Obi-Wan sternly declared. “Should you meet him during war, or are assigned a planet by the Council where he happens to be, then we shall take him on together. Do not forget, Renstar’s intelligence helped reveal the location of a CIS superweapon. A weapon, mind you, that we have yet to sabotage.”

Anakin’s eyes flashed. “You always do that.”

“Do what?”

“You don’t understand. He’s making a spectacle of her. Of us. Of, of the office & democracy.” Anakin’s voice hitched as he realized he had almost spilled his secret, and then changed the topic towards ‘democracy.’ “I have the power to stop him. As a Jedi, it is my responsibility to pursue the Sith at every turn.” 

Obi-Wan finally moved closer, careful and unhurried. “You can’t protect Padmé by turning this room into rubble.”

“I can do whatever I want.”

“Yes yes, you're a grown man.” Obi-Wan sarcastically remarked. “If you ever wish to advance to the rank of Jedi Knight, Anakin, you must show more maturity. You’re not a child, Anakin. You don’t have to throw a tantrum because the galaxy has seen something you wish it hadn’t.”

Anakin flinched as if the words had hit harder than any physical blow. He then walked up to Obi-Wan’s side, paused for a second to retrieve his lightsaber, and then strode out without another word. 

“And just where do you think you’re going, Anakin? Whatever you think you’re doing, it had better not be to find Renstar.” Obi-Wan warned, calling out to his back. 

“The Chancellor will understand.” Anakin said dismissively, throwing his hood up over his head like a petulant teenager. 

Obi-Wan, meanwhile, glanced at the destruction, and sighed. 

Honestly. 

“Master Qui-Gon, I could truly use some of your advice right about now.” 

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AN: My beta reader was like “who td js Angel?” To answer that, it's who Anakin listed as a nickname in his contacts for Padmé. Recall kid Anakin calling her that in the Phantom Menace.