"Steady now, Padmé, steady."

All she could do was manage a faint nod, breathing deeply in and out, in and out. She'd been lying on the table for... She couldn't say but it felt like forever. Lying there, feeling the quickening contractions keep coming. Master Ti was with her through all of it, using the Force to calm her down more effectively than even the medication did. In truth, most of her pain wasn't even physical. It was something... More.

The children were rattled for the first time. She could feel it. The fear and worry from them both, the uncertainty of the galaxy they were coming into shaking them more than anything else so far. It was a palpable kind of sensation, one she had to focus so much of her willpower to fight. To let them know it was all going to be okay. That they didn't have to be scared, they were coming to a place with their mother waiting for them and many, many friends.

But not their father, who was fighting for them all. So far away, so distant she could barely sense him across the stars, in the pit of the Dark Side where Coruscant used to be. What little she did feel, ate away at her confidence...

Anakin thought he'd seen the speed of lightsaber combat pushed to its limit with Grievous. Though the recently deceased general lacked the Force, the number of sabers at his disposal and the diabolic brilliance behind his design left no wonders in his mind as to who the fastest duelist he'd ever seen was. With dozens of strikes in the span of a single moment between his six blades, each single-handed one as strong as a double-handed blow from Anakin himself, Grievous was more of a never-ending blur of motion. A living buzzsaw capable of decimating even some of the best Jedi into pieces.

He was nothing next to Sidious.

Anakin himself employed his tried and tested methods. A staunch, Djem So offensive, attack then block and finally counterattack using the kinetic energy built up with each motion to press the enemy and batter him down. Master Yoda was a green, living whirlwind, constantly jumping about in Ataru spins and leaps so intricate but also deceptively simple that it Anakin wished he could take even a fraction of a moment to enjoy the sheer craft behind it. It wasn't every day one could see the result of a thousand years of training.

Sidious was both of these and then neither one entirely at a moment's notice.

He tried to break the Sith Lord's defense with a strong, overhead swing. The kind of blow that would've sent Ventress' blade out of her hand and cut her in half. It was a known weakness of dual blade fencing, they simply lacked enough raw strength to meet or deliver Djem So level blows. Sidious didn't so much as flinch, catching the strike with almost no effort. With his free hand, he intercepted Master Yoda's latest acrobatic dervish while his leg went to strike at Anakin's knee.

Anakin broke the blade lock and jumped back, only to narrowly duck under Sidious' desk flung across the room at the back of his head with the merest wrist flick. He and Master Yoda dueled alone for a few seconds, moving so fast they seemed to vanish in and out of reality itself to someplace Anakin couldn't perceive. Not for the first time, he felt woefully inadequate even being there which wasn't about to stop him from helping any way he could.

Leaping in the fray, Sidious sensed his downward slash and deftly leaped back. Master Yoda was on him first, unleashed a series of low but very close lightsaber slashes directed for the Sith Lord's legs. Anakin went at him from above, opting to deliver a more decisive decapitation. Somehow, even with his arms occupied with defense, Sidious managed to contort his upper body just low enough to avoid the strike. This time, mid-swing and surprised, Anakin had no chance to stop his leg from burying itself into his left kidney.

Gritting his teeth to fight back the pain, Anakin fell anyway when something through the Force pushed him down. It was only when the heat of a red saber passed inches away from his ear that he realized Master Yoda saved him. Mid-fall, he managed the difficult task of balancing himself on one hand and pushing off the floor well enough to land back on his feet following a short jump.

Sidious had gone on more of an offensive in the brief span of time he was alone with Master Yoda, he was pushing forward with every strike, moving with a speed and precision matching that of the Grand Master. Anakin ran forward, hoping to take advantage of a strike to the back. Without even turning around, Sidious broke the offensive, purposefully aiming just close enough for Master Yoda to raise his saber in-defense without actually hitting it and side-leaped away from Anakin's stab.

Using the motion to switch over into a swing, Anakin and then Master Yoda came at him again and this time, Sidious performed the most unnerving thing he'd done by far: he was moving like Obi-Wan. It was the same level of Soresu mastery, now with two blades, absolute devotion to defense, a minimalist movement that nevertheless never allowed any harm to come to him. A conscious retreat, letting the enemy burn through their energy reserves while he kept his just fine. Energy reserves that seemed to considerable already. Master Yoda's weren't. However, imperceptibly, Anakin started noticing him slowing down. Ataru was a drain even for young men like him and Master Yoda was no such thing and his height meant he had to keep it going.

And there was no way he could take Sidious down if Master Yoda was hurt or... No. It was time to try something different. He missed his next attack, letting the motion look clumsy and tired. He missed again, and again, and again. Making himself appear as sloppy as possible until the constantly smiling Sith Lord attacked. In an instant, he transformed into a wild blitz of strikes Anakin had no hope of counter-attacking against. He didn't have to, he was pulling an Obi-Wan too and completely ditching attack for defense.

Master Yoda took advantage of this, stopping for a fraction of a moment to re-gather more energy from the Force before jumping back into action to something closer to his initial speed. With Anakin taking the brunt of the blows, staunchly if with less finesse than his Master would have and Master Yoda unrelentingly attacking, the two of them managed to deadlock Sidious just long enough for him to slip up for the first time.

He overshot his right saber's swing and Master Yoda leaped alongside it, spinning his tiny green body and slicing the tip of its emitter clean off. Sidious' yellow eyes blazed in the moment of his retreat, a series of quick and sly body contortions allowing him to emerge unscathed from the lightsaber attacks coming at him. He struck back during a break in the assault, snarling and thrusting both of his hands at them.

The effect was immediate and powerful enough that Anakin's whole body seemed to shake from the telekinetic blast, it hurt even worse than the flash of pain coming from the back of his head. Master Yoda took it better, managing to curl himself into ball mid-air and mitigating the damage, landing on his feet while Anakin lied there.

"Well done, Jedi," Sidious' pleased but distorted voice said as the roof of the office opened up and he stood atop the Chancellor pod's spire. "I was starting to think this contest was already over. I am happy to see that it is not."

With a massive leap, he flung himself into the Senatorial chamber overhead even as the spire continued rising up. Master Yoda didn't pursue, he went first to Anakin who was still busy trying to get back up.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I just..."

"Troubled you are, and sense I can for what reason," Master Yoda said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Your wife, sense her distress you do..."

Anakin looked at him and nodded. The truth was he'd thrown himself into the fight not simply to stop the Sith, it was to not think about what was going on elsewhere. An old habit he thought he grew out of but it was easier said than done. Even with the power of the Dark Side all but severing the connection between them, Anakin knew, deep down, his wife was hurting. Were the children coming? Were they all alright? Would he come back to them and find something terrible waiting for him?

"... We've got to get back, soon."

"Yes, we shall. But not before we finish what must be done."

With one of the shakiest attempts to calm himself possibly in his life, Anakin refocused as much of his perceptions on Master Yoda as he could, even with the air still crackling, waiting for another spark to light it up. Rising to his feet, he looked at the spire of the Chancellor's pod go up and up and approached it with Master Yoda at his side. With another glance, the two Jedi gathered their energies and leaped several feet into the air, landing at the very base of the gargantuan Senatorial Dome.

And there, waiting for them at the upper levels was the smiling Sidious. Arms spread out, lightsaber nowhere in sight, the Sith Lord stooped at the edge of one of the countless empty pods and with a single flick of his wrists, detached several of them from their sockets. Anakin and Master Yoda both knew where this was going and the instant the first pod came crashing toward them, they jumped away. One to the left, the other to the right.

Both of them leaped from pod to pod as Sidious cackled on, a deranged sound so enhanced by the vacancy of the dome Anakin could swear it was boring into his very brain. The Sith Lord was far from distracted, he struck out at the two of them again and again with deft speed, constantly cutting off one means for them to get up or pushing them down a level. At least, Anakin found himself more pressed. Master Yoda was faring better.

Pushing his Ataru skills to their levels, Master Yoda leaped from pod to pod, sometimes crawling under or between two to break Sidious' line of sight long enough to make the next jump. Just three sections down, he re-ignited his lightsaber and prepared to take a final, distance closing leap when everything went completely wrong. Sidious, as though he saw it coming, swung his right arm, and flung the pod Master Yoda stood on all the way to the other side of the Senatorial chamber. Not only did he throw it was a grossly catastrophic speed, but he added the flourish of making it spin around and around as it did so.

Then, with a disgusting crunch, the metal pod smashed into another parked far away and Anakin watched as Master Yoda just barely managed to jump out at the last second and sink his claws into the side, holding on for dear life.

"Master!"

"Always look out for yourself, first and foremost, Anakin!"

Snapping back in the direction of Sidious, his eyes widened and saw the shadow of another pod coming right toward him. Anakin knew there was no chance for him to dodge it and so he didn't. Instead, he stood his ground and thrust both hands toward the incoming projectile. Halfway between them, it stopped, caught in their telekinetic push and pull. Despite his smile, the Sith Lord seemed to strain against Anakin's power, not managing to win the contest of strength. Anakin himself was emboldened by this and pushed harder, gritting his teeth so hard he could swear they'd break soon.

Then, Sidious' eyes almost blazed enough to glow from under his cloak, and from his fingertips, came a torrent of Sith Lighting. But not directed at Anakin, at the pod. With a horrible clarity born from his skill with technology, Anakin could see it all happen. The dark power enter into the mechanisms of the pod through a series of holes built into it. He could feel the circuitry inside burst into fire as though it was his own hair doing it. He could feel the heat of the explosion moments before it happened.

And even with all of this in mind, even with all his skill in technology, it wasn't enough. Anakin let go of the telekinetic battle too late. Mid-leap and just barely five feet away, Sidious' timed bomb went off with such force his whole body reeled from the impact. His back went numb, his ears rang and every pod he hit on the way down hurt worse than the last. By the time he reached the bottom, he was too beaten and dazed to feel anything at all.

He lied there, in a state of near unconsciousness, and stared at nothing. Some old reflex kept his mechanical hand moving, looking for his lightsaber but he couldn't find it. Distantly, he thought Obi-Wan would kill him for that. Eyelids heavy, fatigue, and overwhelming, numbing pain wearing him down, Anakin almost let himself drift off into sleep.

Then he heard it, a cry from a hoarse, unmistakable voice and the cackle of deranged maniac followed by the whizzing and whirling of lightsaber blades. Very close by. Finding a new shred of strength within himself, Anakin tried to get up, to force his body to listen to him, to get back into the fight any way he knew how. And it did, in the slowest and most laborious way imaginable. If he had the luxury of time, Anakin would've thought he was lucky he was only beaten and bruised and not left a cripple by the fall.

Turning himself to face the floor, Anakin took long, unsteady breaths and through his clouded vision, saw the outlines of Master Yoda and Sidious fighting on. Again, he looked about for his saber and couldn't find it. Only distantly feel it somewhere far below the Senatorial chamber. It must've gotten lost in the pipes down there. He briefly wondered if he could actually somehow get to it and return in time to help Master Yoda when he heard the distinct sound of a lightsaber carving through something.

With a suddenly horrible clarity, Anakin saw it: Master Yoda's lightsaber cut in half, its owner panting and taking steps away from Sidious while the Sith Lord, smiling and triumphant loomed over him. From across the sixty feet separating them, Anakin could swear those evil, yellow eyes looked at him a moment before his leg moved like a blur and uppercut Master Yoda across the face.

Before he even landed, Sidious grabbed hold of his throat across the Force and proceeded to pound the struggling Master onto anything he could see over and over again. With each bang, Anakin tried harder to move, each blow to his teacher hurting so bad he could practically feel it. But he was still too slow, he'd barely gotten his chest off the floor when the noise suddenly stopped. Only to be replaced by something far more horrible. Yoda's scream.

A burst of Sith Lightning exploded from Sidious' hand and slammed him back into the ground, causing Yoda to skid against it with Sidious moving closer. The Grand Master gasped, wheezed, and struggled in the assault, his body so electrocuted his skeleton was becoming visible. But that was nothing next to the sound of it. The cries of pain and misery from one of the greatest men he'd ever meant sent a cold chill through Anakin's whole body. Worse than the Dark Side. Worse than Sidious' very presence.

The sheer, horrifying notion that Anakin would see Master Yoda die right in front of him terrified him so much it gave him the incentive he needed to finally move... Into the Lightning. With no lightsaber to use, Anakin simply threw himself there and hoped beyond hope the Force would know what to do for him. His left hand managed something, moving on an instinct unknown to him, forming a small barrier to block off the Sith Lightning. His other hand wasn't so lucky.

The arm given to him by Dooku could not channel the Force properly. Anakin always had to struggle against an invisible barrier with it and nothing made this deficiency more clear than the Sith Lightning effortlessly cutting its way through it. With the same clarity as with the pod minutes ago, Anakin could imagine the frying of circuitry, the explosion to come, and this time he felt it too. Moments after throwing himself in front of the attack, Anakin's glove burst into the flames, then his arm began to jitter and spasm. Finally, it exploded with such a searing pain it was like a lightsaber crawled up through his stump and burned into his brain.

Somehow, his miserable barrier managed to hold, but just barely. He was on his knees, crying and moaning openly from the sheer agony. The strands of Sith Lightning slowly but surely burning away at him piece by piece, growing stronger with each one of Sidious' steps.

"This power could have been yours, Anakin!" Sidious, now appearing more like a gargantuan monster than anything resembling a man shouted through the noise of his own malevolence. "But you chose the path of weakness. Now, you will suffer for it. Just as your precious Master Yoda did, just as all of your friends and family will too. In due time."

Another realization of a different sort then came to Anakin, spurned by his imagination and what Sidious threatened. No, would absolutely do if he failed. Anakin could see it all with horrible clarity, the galaxy fallen, Sidious reigning supreme. Everyone Anakin knew and love dead... Or worse. He didn't know if this was something from the Force, a vision of what was to come or merely his own pained, agonizing mind playing a horrible trick on him. But as a feeling of pure, seething anger the likes of which he hadn't sensed in a long time came over him, Anakin very quickly stopped giving a damn.

Managing to hold the barrier steadier, Anakin dared to look at Sidious and grew angrier. Angry for how he was winning, how he was smiling and cackling his way through the entire battle, how he was so smug and conceited that he dared to think it was already over. That he'd beaten Anakin Skywalker, the Chosen One! Anakin hated him. Deeply, intimately. Hated him more than the Sand Raiders who killed his mother. Hated him more than the war which had torn the galaxy into pieces.

Anakin managed to stand, feeling a fresh, invigorating power come over him. Yes, he hated Sidious... And Yoda. The old fool for being too weak to hold his own. He hated Obi-Wan for not being there, wasting time - saving a bastard like Dooku who didn't deserve anything but a saber through the neck. He hated them all, smug, conceited, self-righteous... They'd all condemn him for beating Sidious like this, to hell with them! How else could he win?! There was no other way! Even she would look down on him, even his own wife...

His wife whose voice appeared in his thoughts. She sounded tired, worried... And happy. Happier than he'd ever heard her before. Anakin didn't need to wonder why both of the reasons became clear to him soon after. His children, they'd arrived. That's why Padmé had been hurting, the twins were coming and now, they were there. Suddenly, Anakin was no longer on Coruscant. He wasn't fighting Sidious or trying to save Yoda. He was with them. Inside Kota's ship, in the medical bay where a sweating Padmé was holding in both hands two of the most precious things he'd ever seen.

Luke and Leia.

They cried at first, needing to be shushed by their mother until they were together. All four of them in the Force, pure and clear again like they always were. Drawing incredible strength unlike any other from one another. With a restored right hand, Anakin touched the twins and couldn't help but smile when they giggled at him. And as he basked in this feeling, Anakin Skywalker was given a true vision of the future.

Standing to the side, observing time and space flow away from him as though he were an observer from a distant galaxy, Anakin saw it all. The Jedi Order, restored and made better than ever. The Republic entering a new golden age, free of tyranny and Sith machinations. He saw Obi-Wan, an older man, smiling in that mild way he did, both hands on the shoulders of two people Anakin recognized immediately. Their children, grown up and happy. And they weren't alone.

Faces he thought were gone were there too, along with many, many more he didn't recognize. But he recognized Padmé immediately, looking older, with lots of grey in her hair. Proud, smiling but also with just a hint of sadness on her face. And he knew exactly why. Because Anakin wasn't among them and he knew why. This final truth was clear and unmistakably painful but he only allowed himself a moment to feel sad.

Because this was still only one possible future, one among many and the moment to decide which one of them would come to pass was still happening. Back on Coruscant, between himself and Sidious. The point which would tip the Force back into Balance or send it into a dark chasm. Everything rested on his next move, and Anakin knew it because the Force would help him see it through. If this was what he had to do help save the galaxy, save his teachers, friends, and family, then there was nothing else for it. He'd get it done.

But first, there was something else to do. With a steadiness amidst the growing chaos of lightning, Anakin directed his stump in the direction of Master Yoda. Grand Master, moaning and steadily waking up was as gentle as a leaf to move away to safety. He was also still strong, forcing himself awake despite his injuries and fatigue. For a moment, Master Yoda sat near one of the lower entrance, back pressed against a wall and expression drowsy and dumbfounded.

Anakin gave him a warm smile and then brought down his barrier. He didn't have a chance when it came to blocking Sidious, with one arm, no lightsaber, and nothing but instinctive experience in the deflection, trying it was useless. But what Anakin could do was let go and embrace the overwhelming energy crashing into and through his body.

He didn't feel any pain as he ran into it, he didn't scream or flinch or even slow down. The only thing Anakin did was let the power in and with his remaining hand, grabbed Darth Sidious by the throat. The Sith Lord was so shocked by what happened that he failed to react and soon, both victim and torturer became two parts of a supper conductive loop of Sith Lightning perpetually coursing in and out of both of them.

Soon enough, they were lifted off the ground as a massive wind of crackling power reverberated in their immediate vicinity, growing more and more powerful with each moment. The Force itself seemed to bend around this focusing point, this cataclysmic convergence of powers unlike any seen in a thousand years. Sidious tried to break free but there was nothing he could do, Anakin's grip was tighter than steel and he was already past the point of mere physical agony slowing or stopping him down.

It was at this impossibly long moment where Anakin and Sidious were locked in a loop of perpetually building pure Force energy, a veritable time bomb that was impossible to stop the Sith Lord was afforded a vision of his own future. Immediately, all his decades of plotting, scheming, training, and accumulated power gave away to a crippling fear for his own existence. He would not pass on into the netherworld of the Force, he would not linger on as other Sith Lords have as a malignant entity to poison the galaxy further. No, Sidious would become nothing. For a creature who so thoroughly personified the idea of putting oneself above absolutely everyone and everything else, who along with his Master had designs to manipulate life itself, there was no more fitting punishment than absolute oblivion.

Such was the fate of Plagueis before him, such was his impending fate as well, such was the will of the Force. And more clearly than ever before, Sidious understood it in all its horrifying implications. He raged, snarled, and tried to fight through the storm even as the second part of it, only hastening his already inevitable demise. The blowback from being incinerated inside out by his own power cast away the visage of Palpatine and revealed the sunk-eyed, malformed grotesquery of Sidious' true appearance for all to see. His momentary fit gave way to even greater fear, causing the Sith'ari to snivel and beg for a reprieve he wouldn't get. When the accumulated power of the Force finally exploded in an incinerating display of power, Darth Sidious was vaporized instantly, his final howl of abject misery and terror so feeble one would think he died whimpering instead.

As for Anakin Skywalker? He peacefully and graciously accepted his death, becoming one with the Force.