Author's Note: This is will be updated at different speeds.

Cas Taylor Skywalker found her son, Cade, looking at a familiar hologram.

"Cade, where did you get that?"

"Who is he, Mom?"

She snatched it from her twelve year old son.

"No one."

He gave her a look that clearly said he didn't believe her.

"He looks like me."

His mother sighed.

"No. You look like him."

She changed the hologram to full color, and Cade gasped softly. He looked like that man in more ways than features. He shared the same coloring, though the man in the hologram was darker.

"He's your father."

He sat on the couch, and Cas sat next to him.

"I never got the chance to tell him I was pregnant with you."

"Where is he?"

She sighed.

"I don't know."

Cade looked at her.

"Why did he leave?"

"He had no choice. Your grandfather made him leave."

The boy found he could easily believe that. His grandfather had been a cruel man and had hated him for little more than simply existing and being related to him.

Cas stood up.

"Come with me. It's time you knew the whole truth."

He followed her to her and his stepfather's room.

"Anakin."

The mask of the man once called Darth Vader turned to them.

"It's time."

He nodded and dug a box out of their closet. The three sat on the bed.

"Once I adopted you, your grandfather made us give you a different name," Anakin told his stepson as he handed him an envelope.

Cade opened it to find his birth certificate.

"Mitth'ras'safis?" he read, the name strangely easy to say.

His mother and stepfather nodded.

"Thrass, for short. It's a Chiss name."

"Chiss?"

Cas lifted an old, worn, black military uniform from the box.

"This was your father's."

Cade took it and examined it. It had seen better days, and he judged it to be at least forty years old, if not older. After a moment he set it aside. He picked up a hologram of his father with his mother. They looked like they were on Naboo.

"That was taken two years before he was made to leave."

His mother looked so happy, and his father was beaming, unlike the straight face he wore in the other hologram.

"Who was he?"

Anakin and Cas looked at each other than back at him.

"Imperial Grand Admiral Thrawn," came the answer in his stepfather's mechanical bass.

Cade recognized the name. Thrawn had been sent away to the Unknown Regions two years before the Battle of Endor for some scandal or other, or that's what they were taught in school.

"Why was he sent away?"

"Because your grandfather already had engaged Anakin and I, but we didn't love each other. When he found out Thrawn and I were secretly together he sent him to the Unknown Regions and had Anakin and I marry that very night."

Now that he thought about it, he had no siblings from his mother, only his stepbrother and stepsister, Luke and Leia, who were only Anakin's. He had never seen them be romantic with each other. They were close, yes, but they were more like brother and sister close than lovers close.

"Do you still love him?"

His mother nodded.

"He would love you, Cade."

The door com buzzed.

"I'll get it."

Anakin left mother and son alone to find his own son at the door.

"Luke? What is it?"

"A small fleet of Imperial Starships just emerged from the Unknown Regions."

The cyborg stared at his son.

"Did you say the Unknown Regions?"

Luke nodded.

"Yeah, why?"

"Any idea who's behind them?" he asked, keeping his hope in check.

"Some guy called, uh, Mitth-something."

Anakin wanted to shout for joy but remained calm.

"Mitth'raw'nuruodo?"

He hated Cherunh. It was extremely difficult to say, but Thrawn had managed to teach him how to pronounce his name.

"Yeah."

"I'll be right back."

He all but ran to his and Cas's room.

"He's back!"

"Who?"

Anakin was grinning behind the mask.

"Thrawn! He's back from the Unknown Regions!"

Cas whooped for joy and hugged him, laughing happily.

Meanwhile, Mitth'raw'nuruodo, better known by his core name of Thrawn, sat in his command chair in his quarters aboard his flagship, the Chimaera, his thoughts on Cas. He still loved her.

Did she still love him or did she love Vader now? Did they have children?

His heart clenched at that thought.

"Incoming transmission, sir. It's from Courscant," said Vice Admiral Gilad Pellaeon.

"Send it through."

The mask of Darth Vader appeared.

"Lord Vader, I-"

"Anakin."

He blinked.

"Pardon me?"

"I go by Vader no longer. I have reclaimed my true name, Anakin Skywalker."

Thrawn felt awe fill him. The legendary Hero with no Fear.

"Master Skywalker-"

Anakin shook his head.

"General. Luke is the Master."

Just what happened since he had left?

"How fairs the Emperor?" he asked almost bitterly.

"Palpatine has been dead for nine years, Admiral."

The Chiss blinked and had to fight to keep from smiling.

"Oh. I... I'm sorry."

Anakin smiled, knowing Thrawn lying.

"Don't bother with fake sympathy. No one really misses him."

The older man allowed himself to smile now.

"And Cas?"

"Overjoyed at your return. I trust your feelings for her haven't changed."

Thrawn shook his head.

"Good. Our marriage shall be dissolved, and you will be free to have her as yours."

He could hardly keep from shouting with joy.

"I will be on Coruscant in a few hours."

"Good."

A few hours later Thrawn and Pellaeon landed on the designated landing platform. The Grand Admiral walked down then ramp, and he and Cas ran to each other, embracing. They kissed happily. After pulling away, Cas smiled.

"I have so much to tell and ask you, but first... Cade."

A boy came out from behind Anakin, and the Admiral could only stare. He looked so much like him, though his skin was a much lighter shade of blue than his own.

"Thrawn, meet your son."

"My... my son?"

Cas nodded.

"I found out after you left."

Thrawn's thoughts hinged on something.

"The Emperor didn't make you-"

"He didn't know you were the father until after he was born."

He looked at her.

"How could he not know?"

Anakin stepped forward, and Cade gave his stepfather his attention, wondering that himself.

"Cas told me, and once she could no longer hide it, I claimed the child was mine."

It made sense. Palpatine would not kill the unborn baby while believing it to be conceived with his apprentice.

"Once Cade was born he was unable to kill him without being discovered. He knew it would be unwise to murder his own grandson, regardless of who his father was, and thus was forced to let him live."

Cade's love for his stepfather grew, and Thrawn's admiration for the man grew as well. Even while still Darth Vader at the time, he had saved the life of a child that he had every right to want dead or not care about, yet he had stepped in to spare him.

"However, he did not make life with Cade easy," Cas said.

Though still very young when Palpatine had died, Cade remembered well the hatred his grandfather had for him.

"Did he ever... hit him?" Thrawn asked.

Cas nodded.

"Once. He was two."

"He never did it again, though."

The Admiral looked at Anakin.

"Why not?"

Anakin smirked behind his mask.

"Because moments after he did so I broke his wrist."

Cade remembered that day rather well. He had been running from Vader to avoid going to bed and had collided with his grandfather. Palpatine had snarled something at him then slapped him, knocking him. He remembered, through the tears, Vader charging in, practically roaring in fury, and his grandfather's howl of pain as his stepfather snapped his wrist.

"He learned his lesson that day," Anakin said, sounding rather satisfied with himself.

Never again did Palpatine raise a hand against the child. Though he was the Master, the old Sith understood that rank meant nothing to Vader when it came to his stepson. The cyborg would kill him if he had to in order to protect the boy.

Cade hugged Anakin, remembering how far he had gone sometimes to protect him, even at the risk of his own life a few times.

"He's a bright boy, with a mind much like yours," Anakin told Thrawn as he hugged the boy back.

Thrawn smiled. He held no jealously for the closeness that his son seemed to have with his stepfather. He was glad Cade had grown up with a father figure who truly cared for him.

"So, what's your story?" Cade asked his parents.

"Well, it really started at an Empire Day Ball," his father said.

End Note: Even as a Sith, Anakin is a protective daddy, even though Cade's not his.