Fall of a Sparrow
by KrystalBlaze
Summary: Anakin cannot live without forgiveness, but Obi-Wan isn't sure he can give it.
Timeframe: four years post-RotS
Genre: AU, drama
Notes: the quote comes from William Shakespeare's Hamlet
-----.
There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all.
-----
Before him… before him this man, this fire-bringer, this man whose lack of body was stunning and chilling. This man, this fire-bringer, this destroyer of life, knelt before him, head bowed, and begged for forgiveness.
The lightsaber was cold in his hand, yet he knew it should be warm. He could not see the red and filtered eyes, eyes so distant and lying red when they should be hearty and wholesome blue. There were scars running along the neck and to the back, angry burning scars that raised from the skin and screamed for attention.
Before him, this man, this fire-bringer, who asked and begged for forgiveness.
"Why do you ask this?" he asked, unsure of what else to say.
Silence, and then, "I have failed you. I have fallen, but I am back now."
"You expect me to trust you? After all this… all this time? After all those people you slaughtered."
"You forget to mention the one I killed that will bring peace."
He rubbed his forehead, the fire-bringer still kneeling, still bowing his head, yet with now the irony in his tone.
"That doesn't erase what you did, Anakin!"
And now, the pleading was gone, replaced with the well-worn anger. "But I am sorry, Master."
He snorted, something much like a cry. "You call me 'Master' now when the man to whom you swore allegiance barely dead? Why are you here, truly? What do you want?"
"Isn't forgiveness enough of a reason?"
He wished Anakin would look up, so he could gaze into those surreal crimson eyes, shake him and make him speak truth. "You've never asked for forgiveness before. Why do you want it now when you know I can't give it?"
The other man continued to look down. "Why won't you? I've done wrong."
"You need a trial," Obi-Wan said. "I can't pass judgment on you."
"Oh, but you have, Master," said Anakin, and he looked up, the crimson eyes sparking. "You don't forgive me, and you never will. You left me to die, but you won't let me live."
"You're living without my forgiveness, Anakin," he said. "You've been doing a beautiful job of living."
"You've never been good at sarcasm, Master," Anakin shot back. "Your words never bear the bite like mine."
"Could it be, perhaps, that's because I'm not being sarcastic? Realistic, maybe?"
Silence, silence weighed down by light and life. They stood, often as they had before the dark times, before Anakin had turned. Now, on Tatooine, away from any form of dark and bathed in sweltering light, Anakin was still dark, the only speck of it in this non-shaded world. His demeanor, his very essence, was light – his clothing, his hair, even his eyes were not hollowed by darkness as they once had been.
Except for the Force.
In there, he was still tainted, deep and unmoving.
"You need a trial," Obi-Wan said again. "I won't be your jury."
"My executioner, then?" Anakin asked.
"I would very much like to be," Obi-Wan said before he could stop himself, and Anakin got abruptly to his feet.
"What do you mean?" he asked, voice suddenly quavering.
Eyes steady, heart beating without system, he said, "You fell, again. What do you want me to say? Erase the past and let it go? You know I can't do that."
"But… it was a mistake."
"A horrifying, brutal mistake that nonetheless cost millions of lives and the destruction of the Jedi Order. I will not let you go after that."
"Master – "
"I can't, Anakin. Don't ask me to try."
"Please, Master. I need your forgiveness."
Obi-Wan tried to summon up something, an emotion or thought that would cause pity or even sorrow for the man in front of him, but nothing came. Was this it, then? Two years of dreams and hopes Anakin would return and be welcomed were gone, dreams after all. He was the worst kind of hypocrite, the kind without the courage to act and say.
"I can't give you that."
The eyes were red. "I fell, Master."
"You didn't fall, you turned willingly."
"I fell."
"We all fall, Anakin. It's how we are when we get up that counts."
Anakin looked so broken, so rigid yet so cold. "Master… those people. I can't… forgive me. Just say the words!"
Obi-Wan closed his eyes, summoned the strength to do what must be done. "It's not my right to purge you."
"Yes, it is!" Anakin cried, screamed. "You… you of all people I hurt the most! You of all people saw what I could do! You left me to the fire; you have a duty to forgive me! You let me burn, let me die within! You can't just walk away and pretend its alright because its not! It can never be!"
"And whose fault is that?" Obi-Wan growled. "I didn't tell you to turn."
"I fell."
"There's no providence in that. I can't fix what you did."
"But you can make it so it never happened."
Obi-Wan's mouth fell open, and before he could stop himself he was embracing Anakin and shaking him. "Oh, Anakin, how can you think that? What have you done to make you think that?"
Anakin pushed him away. "No… no, what have you done?"
"Please, Anakin, let it go. You will have your chance in trial."
"You'll need to get me there."
"What?"
"The government is in disarray. It will be months yet before I will be brought to trial."
"I will manage."
"Months yet before you know where to take me."
Obi-Wan laughed and gestured to his shack. "Of course. You'd love to stay here."
"You'll forgive me," Anakin said, the confidence was back.
"I won't," Obi-Wan said, and he meant it.
-----
The first night, Obi-Wan did not much of anything. He paid no attention to the mangled man sitting in his parlor, sitting there and looking at him with the full expectation of forgiveness. He felt the eyes trained on his back, watching, waiting. Anakin sat there, his hands folded neatly, head bowed, perfectly obedient.
"You know, I never really turned," he said when they ate. "I was coerced."
Obi-Wan ate in silence.
"He made me do it, you know. He wanted me, he always did. He wanted me to be his for the evil, and I had to. He was convincing. I couldn't just not do what he said. He was much more convincing than you."
"I'm glad you paid attention," Obi-Wan said and left the table.
Anakin was quiet then, and for a long time after. With Anakin's credits, he went to town and bought a holo, so they could watch the news. Every night and every morning, they watched as chaos reigned in Coruscant, as the military and Council struggled to piece together their shattered world. Four years had been all since the fall of the Jedi, yet Coruscant was just a twisted mirror image of what it had been, desolate and sparse.
"Tell me, Anakin, why did you kill him?" Obi-Wan asked one evening.
Anakin did not answer.
"Did you just get sick of him? Or were you actually hoping for something good?"
The silence resumed, and their lives passed with the blowing of sand and the riot after riot on Coruscant. Anakin would watch, his battered face stoic. When talk turned to the whereabouts of the Emperor's second, Darth Vader, he would shut his eyes tightly, and his lips would move. Obi-Wan watched him, didn't say a word.
"Things are changing," he said one day. "They're going to be in control soon. I hope it comes quickly. I don't like the sand here again. It's very messy and annoying." He walked around the room, scratching at the sand with his nails. "I want to go. Can we go somewhere else? Just for a little while?"
As always, Obi-Wan did not answer him. They had never spoken to one another, only in the direction that meant it to be heard. Anakin was not fazed by this silent approach, but the next day took the same stance on leaving.
"I want to go away. I don't want to be here anymore."
The days passed, and Anakin's insistent to leave grew. He became agitated, fidgety. The voice that had been calm and collected vanished, and turned desperate. He followed Obi-Wan around, shouting and screaming behind him, voice on the edge of tears, but none leaving his eyes.
"I can't stay here! Let's go somewhere! Master, please, please." He reached for a shoulder, but Obi-Wan spun away. "Master, Master, Master, I can't… let's go, please, please, please."
Obi-Wan did his best to ignore him, and Anakin's cries turned to silence. They watched the holo that night, and Anakin began to mumble about falling. His mumbles turned louder, as the riots blazed fire; his eyes were wide, red, tearing. Obi-Wan watched him from the corner of his eyes, curious, sad, compassionate, hating himself for that compassion.
"I need to leave," Anakin said again the next day. "With or without you."
Obi-Wan awoke to Anakin's cries that night, piercing through the dark. For a long time, he laid there, listening as Anakin fought against his nightmare, shouting out obscenities and curses, crying out in fear. Obi-Wan heard him whimper, "Padme," over and over, and then a horrid cry he was sure was heard for miles. He laid there in the dark, hands over his eyes, and felt them water as the boy he loved cried in fear and was unable to do anything.
After that night, Anakin's eyes got lost again and became vacant. The chair he normally sat in was moved outside in the sun, and he sat facing the direction of the Lars, though Obi-Wan knew he did not know nor remember. Still, Obi-Wan kept watch on him, as he moved like a ghost from one slow activity to the next, eyes wandering and towards the sun.
For weeks, Anakin was nothing and no one, facing the Lars homestead in the day and silent at night in his bed. He no longer watched the holo, left Obi-Wan to pursue to activity in solitude. Obi-Wan watched alone as the riots stopped, and some kind of order moved throughout the city. Officers of Palpatine's Empire were being brought in; the Senate was reinstated. People began questioning the if, perhaps, there were any Jedi left at all.
Obi-Wan watched and waited, knowing every day was one closer to when they'd have to leave. His eyes watched Anakin, watching as he grew more and more distant, wishing he could speak to him, then violently reprimanding himself. Anakin did not deserve pity. This was less than what he ought to get.
The boy you trained is gone. This monster is someone you don't know.
But still, when Anakin's cries in the night returned, and his eyes came back, he wanted to forgive him, get on his knees and hold the boy he loved.
One day, when Obi-Wan returned from town with food, he found Anakin laying on the floor, curled in a ball, letting sand fall through his hands like an hourglass. He left him to it, worried but putting it off. When he heard painful screaming that night, he rushed from his bed, and found Anakin still on the floor. He switched a light on, and saw him clawing at his arms, bloody tracks already left and tears rolling down his face.
"Master, please, please, please," he chanted, his voice a whisper, wretched and broken.
And despite himself, Obi-Wan went to him, took his hands away, and hugged him to his chest, rocking him back and forth, his own tears dropping. Anakin grabbed him around the neck and pulled him close, sobs from the depth of his soul tearing up and up, splintering Obi-Wan's heart with each moan.
"Master, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Anakin sobbed, voice inhuman.
Obi-Wan took him to bed and rocked him, and did something he had not done since Anakin was twelve and come crying into his room with a nightmare.
He sang him to sleep.
-----
"I hate sand. I want to leave. Can we leave now?"
"No, Anakin. Not until they have a system set up."
"Master, can we go somewhere? Anywhere but here?"
Obi-Wan didn't answer him.
"Please talk to me."
Obi-Wan sighed. "I want to ask you a question, Anakin. What made you come here? Come back to me?"
Anakin hugged the pillow to his chest, thought about it, and spoke with confidence. "I don't know. It… I wanted to kill you, Master, for what you had done to me, leaving scarred like this. They put me in a suit for a long time, until they figured out I could live without it. I hated my body. I wanted to be strong again. Palpatine…" and he shuddered when he said it, "I hated him. He said no one would love me again because of what I was. No one would ever take me back."
The confidence faded. "I wanted… I wanted to kill him. And… I did kill him. I murdered him in his sleep. He was so strong, stronger than you or me or Yoda, and I just killed him. I wanted to get away. I couldn't help it. I wanted… Master, I wanted you. I wanted you to forgive me."
There was silence, and Obi-Wan wasn't sure if he believed him or not. Part of him still believed Anakin had killed Palpatine for power, the other part of him desperately wanted to believe he was telling the truth. He watched Anakin, studying him.
"I can't do that, and I won't," he said finally. "Your jury will decide what your fate is."
"Not your forgiveness?" Anakin asked sadly.
"No, Anakin, for what you became, I cannot," Obi-Wan told him. "For what you did, though, because of that… I do. It doesn't make it right, but I do."
The next days passed again in a silence shared by regrets. Anakin took to wood carving, and spent all his time on it. At night, as he slept, he cried in his dreams, and Obi-Wan did not go to him. During the day, they meditated together, on the sun and sand and on the rebuilt Coruscant.
The day before they left, Anakin came to Obi-Wan with accusation in his eyes. "Master, you have this."
The lightsaber, Anakin's lightsaber, was in his hands, in curled, tightened fingers. "Master, why didn't you tell me you had this?"
"It is the tool of Jedi, and you are no longer one," Obi-Wan said, taking it back without difficulty. "I didn't think you had to know."
"I would have wanted to."
"I'm sorry, then, that I didn't tell you."
On the ship, Obi-Wan kept the lightsaber in his boot, his own on his belt, hidden under the folds of the cloak. Anakin watched him, his face hidden by layers of fabric. They watched the holo again on the ship in their private room, as Coruscant welcomed back to its midst a Jedi now safe in his trade.
"They'll give you a hero's welcome," Anakin said morosely.
"I'd rather there be a thousand of us than a hero's welcome," Obi-Wan said to his tone, and Anakin shut up.
They did not sleep much, and woke early the day of docking. "Master… before we go… tell me… did I kill Padme with that 'saber?"
The question took Obi-Wan by surprise. "What?"
"Tell me, please," Anakin said in a dead, defeated tone. "If I did, I want you to destroy it. I don't use the Force anymore, you know. Because I know that helped kill her."
"Anakin, you didn't kill her. She died in childbirth."
That stopped him. Anakin sat there, cross-legged on the chair, his bag in hand, and just looked at him in amazement and accusation. "I didn't kill her?"
"No, Anakin, she died," Obi-Wan tried to tell him kindly.
Very peculiarly, Anakin just sat there in silence. Obi-Wan left him to it, waiting for the ship to dock. After a while, Anakin's fervent whisper came to his ears, joyfully.
"I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her."
The ship docked, and Obi-Wan made for the door, but Anakin was already up and blocking it, his hands clenched and boyish smile on his dreadful face.
"Master, I've been thinking," he said, his large frame in front of the door. "I don't need to do this, really? You've forgiven me, I think that's enough. You're safe now. I can disappear."
Obi-Wan stared at him. "What are you talking about?"
"I don't want to do this anymore." The words tumbled out. "I don't want to go to trial. I've paid my penance. I went mad, didn't I? Well, I think that's enough. I want to go to Naboo and see where Padme and the children were buried. I don't want to spend my days locked up. They may even kill me."
"Anakin," he said forcibly, "you have to go to trial. You didn't kill Padme. You slaughtered hundreds of Jedi and innocent people. I've forgiven you; the Republic must now, too. I can't let you go."
"Yes you can!" Anakin said. "Yes, just let me walk out this door and buy a ticket to Naboo. You can go back to Tatooine; no, go back to the other Jedi."
Obi-Wan's hands drifted to 'saber. "Do not make me do this, Anakin."
From years of working together, Anakin saw the hand and knew what it meant. "Let me go, Obi-Wan."
"I can't," Obi-Wan said, drawing the 'saber as Anakin ripped the door open and slid through it into the hall.
"NO!" Obi-Wan shouted, dashing after and chasing him down the hallway. Anakin sprinted away, towards the exit and leaping over the security at the ramp, twisting down and into the port. Obi-Wan followed him in the same method, shouting "thief!"
Heads turned, and Anakin lost his cloak and hood, laughing as they came undone. People gasped, horrified to see his face tarnished from the fire. They watched as Obi-Wan caught him, spun him around and kneed him to the ground. They faced each other, eyes hardened, blue and red, light and dark.
"Let me go," Anakin whispered, still laughing, his laughter peeling into whimpers. "I didn't kill her."
"Her!" Obi-Wan cried. "Her? I wasn't bringing you to trial for her, Anakin! You slaughtered an Order! Hundreds died because of you! What have you become, Anakin, what has this thing done to you to make you think it was only her that mattered? Is that why you came back? Is that all you wanted forgiveness for?"
Tears lolled down Anakin's face, and he started crying. "Please, please, let me go. I don't want to be a prisoner again."
"How dare you say that?" Obi-Wan hissed. "How dare you say he kept you prisoner, when it was you. It always was. Get up."
Roughly, Obi-Wan yanked Anakin to his feet and held him tightly. He asked the bystanders to call for a taxi, his friend was sick, he needed to get to a hospital. Obi-Wan pulled Anakin's cloak and hood back over his face, and pushed him into the taxi, then told the driver to take him to the Chancellor's office.
Anakin started screaming in agony, his face contorting in pain, curled against the seat, sobbing onto his knees.
Obi-Wan turned away from him, his friend and brother and son, and wept bitterly on his own.
-----
They welcomed him back like a hero, like Anakin said. He met Syfer Helis, the other Jedi who had managed to survive and stay alive the past four years. Syfer was young, energetic, and just grateful to be alive. Obi-Wan told the Chancellor about Yoda, and immediately Syfer embarked to retrieve him and bring him back.
Anakin was stripped, issued clothes, and sent to await trial. Obi-Wan pulled him to him and hugged him tightly, whispered in his ear, and let him go. He was led away, screaming and sobbing.
Yoda arrived, and the three Jedi conferred. Parades were set to herald this triumphant return, because in the riots the city had found the Jedi were good and whole and not to be touched. Syfer had been on Crodai when the Order had been destroyed, and had world-hopped, always narrowly avoiding detection. It was a miracle he was alive, and that night they shared in their losses and visited the Jedi Temple.
"He's not well," Obi-Wan told the Chancellor about Anakin. "I don't believe he is fit to stand trial, honestly."
The jury found him guilty of Crimes Against Humanity and exiled him to a planet on the far Outer Rim dedicated solely to him with guards to be stationed there at all times.
Before he was taken away, Obi-Wan visited him. He was vacant, morose, lost. He laughed without restraint or reason, and talked very little, mimicking Obi-Wan and banging his head back and forth.
"I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her."
Obi-Wan had Lars bring Luke and Bail bring Leia, and the children met. Four years old, completely identical, they brought them to their father, hoping to restore some of the sanity he had lost. Luke and Leia hugged him and laughed with him, and Obi-Wan explained what the man was to them, and they played together.
It didn't help.
"What good was it, then, for them to know their father was that man?" Bail asked.
Obi-Wan sighed. "At least they know him at all."
He rode on the ship with Anakin to the exile planet, talking to him like old times and trying to bring him back, just some essence.
"I killed them?" Anakin asked once on the voyage.
"Yes," Obi-Wan said hopefully.
"Okay then," he said and laughed.
The ship docked and Obi-Wan showed Anakin his world, a small one with lots of forest and the place he would live. Obi-Wan made him a meal and tea, and they ate together, and Obi-Wan cried.
"I didn't kill her," Anakin told him as he left.
Obi-Wan turned around, grabbed Anakin, hugged him and rocked him. He kissed him on the forehead, and looked him in the eyes and said words he didn't feel but had to say.
"I forgive you."