The End of Innocence
Nikko was the first to hear the gunfire.
He and his two best friends, Heila and Dyren, were practising their lightsabre techniques with the training droids when Nikko stopped for a moment, receiving a painful shock from the still-active droid.
"Shh," he whispered to his friends as they looked quizzically at him, their lightsabres deactivated. He strained his ears… his mum always said he was a good listener for a nine-year-old…
"There!" he hissed, his eyes widening. From the looks on Heila and Dyren's faces, he knew that they'd heard the noise, too.
"We have to warn the other younglings!" Heila urged, springing into action. Activating her bright blue lightsabre, she sprinted from the room, followed closely by Dyren and Nikko.
Farther up the hall, a horrifying sight met their eyes. The Jedi masters were battling wave after wave of droids and clones, their lightsabres whizzing through the air as they defended themselves from the furious blasterfire.
"Come on!" Dyren shouted, taking off for the masters.
"NO!" Nikko yelled, grabbing Dyren and pulling him back. "The masters..." he swallowed hard. "The masters can defend themselves. We need to help the other younglings!"
Dyren looked ready to cry as two of the masters fell lifeless to the ground, overpowered by the clones. He nodded finally, and the three dashed away from the conflict to find the others.
Some time later, Nikko led the younglings in silence down the hallways of the Temple; the blaster fire was getting closer.
"Stay together," he whispered, leading them at a quiet run towards the council room. He waved each of the padawans inside the room, looking around anxiously for clones or droids.
Dyren and Heila brought up the rear of the group. "That's all of them," Dyren said, deactivating his green blade.
Nikko nodded and followed his two friends inside.
"What do we do now?" asked one of the younger girls.
"We hide here," Nikko instructed. "No one go out; it's too danger—"
A huge explosion rocked the temple, throwing them to the floor. Faint screams could be heard a long way away, and the blaster fire began to fall silent. Nikko listened hard and heard the sound of troops marching closer.
"Get behind the seats! HIDE!" Dyren hissed frantically, diving behind a chair. All the other children followed suit, huddling in terror behind whatever they could find.
The door to the council chamber hissed open, and Nikko tentatively poked his head out. A wave of relief washed over him; it was a Jedi, a Jedi master no doubt, coming to defend and protect them.
They were safe.
Darth Vader opened the chamber door with a wave of his hand and stepped into the council room, the door sliding shut behind him. The room was dark and cool, isolated from the sounds of war… but outside the huge windows behind the chairs, turbocannons and blaster fire lanced across the night sky.
A sudden movement caught his eye; a little blonde haired boy, no more than nine or ten years old, was peeking out from behind the chairs. A look of immense relief replaced his worried features at the sight of Vader.
"Master, there's too many of them! What are we going to do?" The boy's blue eyes were bright with intelligence and resolve as he stared up at Vader, waiting for instructions. Vader stared at him, darkness burning in his own eyes… and a shadow of fear crossed the child's face.
Something deep within him quailed, a tiny corner of his mind that begged him to stop. The child was younger than he himself had been when he'd first arrived…
No. Not himself; Anakin. Anakin Skywalker, the weak one, the one afraid of the dark side, the mewling child who had followed and accepted the lies of the Jedi… the lies that the little boy in front of him clung to as his truth, his guidance, the lies that he would spread throughout the galaxy as he grew—all because of his, Darth Vader's, pity.
Years later, Vader would that the little boy had called him "Master". But too late… far too late.
Show no mercy, Lord Sidious' voice hissed venomously in his ear.
Vader activated his lightsabre.
A/N: Definitely a dark!fic… I just watched Star Wars episode 3, and it made me really sad, but I wanted to do a fanfic of it. As for the kids, Nikko (NEE-koh) is the name I made up for the little boy who asks Vader (VADER, NOT ANAKIN!) what they should do about the clones; Dyren (DEER-ehn) and Heila (HEY-luh) are my own OCs.