Chapter Twenty-Seven: A Greater Dark

When they'd first arrived on Coruscant, Anakin had wanted more than anything to try the transplanetary express. Padmé had rolled her eyes. It's for tourists, Skywalker.

Isn't that what we are?

Who wants to sit on a train that goes around a whole planet? It'll take like two days, and if we see anything we like we won't be able to get a closer look.

Oh come on, how often do you get the chance to—

Anakin, we just got out of a bunch of caves. I'd rather avoid enclosed spaces for a while if it's all the same to you.

Somehow, in all the next four years he'd never had occasion to change her mind. After he'd joined up with the Jedi and the Defense Force, she with Bail, they'd kept busy on adventuring and on politics. Whenever they got a break, Padmé would want to spend it away from their new home—going back to Oseon, or taking in a podrace. And then, after the Jedi . . . well, vacations had just seemed less important.

But now Vader was between missions—despite Palpatine's praise, after the Kamino debriefing no new assignments had come. Padmé was still gone, and hadn't been answering calls—he'd gotten a perfunctory voicemail apologizing for Bail's cramped schedule, nothing more. For the first time in . . . months? Longer? He'd found himself with nothing to do.

He'd just let his feet guide him. Before he'd known it, he'd been at the station, hastily changing money for a faux-paper ticket edged in gold leaf and touting itself as a passport to Coruscant from pole to pole. Stepping aboard the train, his boots had met not metal but rich red carpet; his ticket had bought him not a seat but an entire car, which he'd been guided to by a black and white Bothan dressed in an utterly spotless uniform.

One wall was devoted to a sink and a bed, for those passengers who didn't feel like consciously taking in all two days of the journey. The other was the reason he'd come—one big window stretched across nearly the entire car, almost two meters tall and four times that long. As Anakin had sunk into the window seat—not synthleather but the real thing, by the feel of it—the attendant had smiled, told him to head to the dining car at any time, and moved on to the next passenger. He'd simply settled in and looked out at the Capitol District, feeling a thrill of little-boy elation several minutes later when the train began to move.

Now, four hours into the trip, he gazed at the shimmering, constantly shifting skyline out his compartment's window. It was a district he'd never seen before—while it looked like any given part of Coruscant, there was also something alien to the spires as they stretched for the highest reaches of the atmosphere. There was more of a pearlescent sheen to them—the curves were more pronounced, the underlying structures narrower. Or that's what you're telling yourself to make the cost of the ticket worth it, he told himself.

Then again, he had been seeing things differently lately.

It was alarming, really, how much the Force was like slipping on an old glove that still fit snugly after years of disuse. The overstimulated panic that had set in as he came down from Kamino was gone now. In its place was a constant, unobtrusive pulse in his mind, one he could tap into as easily as pulling up the holonet on his datapad. The ambient sense of people simply lingered at the back of his head; if he pushed at the perception, he could feel the Rodian in the car behind him, see the Bothan attendant a few compartments ahead striding down the aisle to check if any customers wanted food or something to drink. Further outward, deeper down within his own mind, were the people all around the train. Their little points of light would flare up in one blazing instant as the express passed their buildings, then dwindle down into nothingness to make way for the next skyscraper's inhabitants.

The sheer normality of the feeling was intoxicating.

And if you wanted, came the whisper, you could do so much more.

When he'd reconnected, it had been as natural as anything he'd ever felt. Everything had come easily—seeing his enemies' movements, crushing clones' throats. Bringing down the entire facility. One clenched fist, and the waters had come pouring in. His abilities hadn't atrophied at all in the time he'd been cut off.

In fact, he wondered to himself if they'd only gotten stronger.

How long ago had Palpatine spoken to him about the war centuries past? How long since he'd asked Qui-Gon what she believed—since she'd heard him say Darth Plagueis and acted as though he'd summoned up a ghost?

How long since that niggling thought had refused to leave his mind?

Yes, the notion of light and dark constantly balancing each other out, the Force as an arms race of sorts . . . it's not unheard of. Especially in times like these, when the Jedi for all our reach can't finish off the enemy. Grow too powerful, and all you do is multiply your enemies. If one side grows too strong, the other will meet them—light or dark, Jedi or Sith.

He wasn't a Jedi. Nor was he a Sith. He didn't know what he was right now. But when he thought back to the power he'd drawn on to sink Tipoca City, he knew what it had felt like.

Red. Hot. Concentrated. The Force an extension of his body, doing what he commanded even as it guided him.

It hadn't been the light. Of that much he was certain.

Smoke was rising in the distance, eating up the sun and shading the sky orange. An industrial district, one that looked shockingly opaque compared to what was typical for Coruscant—no transparency or reflections, just duracrete and corroding metal and thick black discharge. Ugly, dangerous, something the rest of the planet would rather forget about—but necessary. Indeed, the overhead PA system announced proudly, it was zones like this that kept the capital turning. Without the power they supplied, it would be a dead husk of a planet, all lights snapping to black. It was why Valis's clone/mercenary chimera, even as they had pounded at the symbolic target of the Capitol District, had sent ground troops and air raids to harry the plants night and day.

A dozen Jedi dead. Countless troops thrown away. Years of waste and futile pursuit. And still she and her Zabrak master were alive.

I think you are the person I know who stands the best chance, Obi-Wan had said. Maybe he'd been more right than he knew.

If Plagueis's philosophy of the Force was true, it would be simply, almost laughably perfect. Two puzzle pieces coming together. Click.

If the Jedi outnumbered the Sith, Plagueis believed, the Sith would be granted power to match the Jedi.

Perhaps the reason all the light's warriors had failed lay in their name. Perhaps the only thing that could swallow up the dark was greater dark.

The smoke outside was thicker now, seeming to deepen the closer the train came. In fact, Anakin saw, it was contagious. The transparisteel of his window had begun to fog, not with condensation but with soot fumes; black was smearing itself across the surface like a wispy, sinuous handprint. Even as he noticed it lapping at the edges, it was spreading inward, coating the whole window in a layer of grime.

He frowned. You would think the train would have a stronger self-cleaning mechanism installed on the windows—the soot was deepening from black to ebony, the window not obscured but opaque. The grime was so effectively blocking light that his compartment seemed to be slipping to utter blackness. And a sudden sticky chill was spreading across his back, as though some frigid slime had stuck there and was beginning to take root.

Too late, he realized what was happening.

The wind claws at Anakin Skywalker's back, blasting him with its chill and shrieking in his ears like one driven mad by grief. His clothing whips around him—black and tattered, the cape a plague flag. The only thing that lights his path is the torch he holds in his mechanical hand, and even that is dim, flickering.

Desperate for light, he thrusts the torch forward and sees it's not a torch at all but a lightsaber. His lightsaber, washing his surroundings in cyan.

Then, even as he feels his heart leap at the old connection between him and the weapon he built, the light shifts to emerald. Now it's not his saber anymore, but the backup he and his master constructed all that time ago, the one Obi-Wan had offered him in his home.

He's uneasy—it feels wrong, somehow, marching into the void with this weapon that is neither his nor Obi-Wan's but something in between. But standing still, Anakin knows, is not an option. He has to step forward—move, or perish.

Grinding his metal hand against the green saber's hilt, he starts walking.

At first there's still nothing—just the roar of the wind, the guttering light of the saber against the blackness swallowing him up. Then, with a sudden snap, the wind vanishes, an entire storm's worth of air going quiet at once.

A moment later, another storm roars to life.

The darkness is ripped apart as all around Anakin spring up blades of pure light—blue, green, the occasional fleck of purple, and above all red. Screams rend the air, the sizzle of plasma so loud it seems to burn, as light and dark tear each other apart.

Winner take all.

The Force whispers a warning, and without thinking Anakin pivots, raising his sword just in time to deflect a shattering overhand slash from an enemy who sprang up behind him. His attacker's face is twisted in grim concentration, marred by scorch marks where lightsabers have glanced off the skin. And their lightsaber . . .

It's green. Just like his.

Before he can cry out, tell the assailant I'm on your side, another strike comes screaming at his face. Without thinking he ducks, drives his weapon forward, carving through the enemy and dropping them to the ground. He can feel the life drain from them, their face a frozen rictus as it slides into death.

You idiot, he tries to shout again, we're on the same side. But then he remembers that no they aren't, he's not a Jedi, not anymore.

And as his gaze flits across the combatants near him, all of them in turn somehow meeting his eyes, he realizes they know this about him too.

Wait, he mouths, willing his lips to make sound, you don't understand, you and the Sith, both of you, are all going to die. But no words come, and though in the distance he can still see the clashing of crimson on sapphire, in front of him all he can see is Jedi sabers angling toward him. He brings his own sword up to guard—

—and then Malachor disappears. The candles of the Sith, the Jedi, all snuffed at once, afterimages of glowing plasma the only trace of them. Anakin once more stands in a pit of black.

And they didn't all die, he thinks to himself, exhaling shakily into the blackness. The Jedi, the Sith, they kept going. And all the deaths the Jedi paid did nothing against the dark.

Slowly, he takes another step, then another.

This time, his surroundings don't roar to life. Instead, the green of his saber is mirrored by a faint glow in the distance—the glint of reflected light off metal. His feet fall soundlessly against the ground as he strides forward, the only sound the ozone hum of the blade that illuminates his way; as he presses on, the distant light steadies, intensifies.

Finally, he stands over the objects that have caught his blade's light. Metal cylinders, dozens of them, piled haphazardly on the stone floor as if they've been tossed there.

Lightsabers. Dead lightsabers.

Again, cold seizes Anakin, and without warning that crackle of plasma grows louder.

When he turns, Maul and Valis are standing behind him, blades crossed in crucifixes of scarlet.

The Zabrak bares his teeth in a snarl, and though he doesn't speak, Anakin can hear his voice clear as day. Your Jedi can't stop us. They can't even slow us down.

At his side, Valis gives a regal sneer, bone-white cape flaring behind her. And they can't save the Republic. All you'll be able to do is watch as they bring it to its knees.

Before Anakin is even aware it's happening, the crystal clarity of rage floods through him. He brandishes his weapon, and only dimly notices that it's no longer green but a red-hot flame.

Maul chuckles, and disappears. Valis brings her sword to mock-salute, her dagger to an offhand guard, and smiles. Be seeing you.

Then she too is gone.

Behind Anakin, a cavernous roar begins.

When he turns, his vision is wreathed in flame.

Fire, pure cleansing fire on all sides—the heat is staggering, enough that his skin must be blistering, but when he raises his flesh hand it doesn't burn. Looking down at his feet, he sees that he's walking through this sudden furnace, his feet touching molten rock but pulling away again unharmed. The smoke is thick enough that it should choke anyone who inhales it, but he doesn't need to breathe, and when he slashes outward with his lightsaber it curls away, as though recoiling.

In the distance, he can see a shore, a kind of shadowy beach where the fire doesn't stretch. Standing there, staring out at him, are two figures obscured by darkness. Anakin can sense as strongly as he's ever sensed anything that these two are the key—somehow, if he reaches them through the fire this will all make sense, everything will be all right again. He pushes forward, opening his mouth to call out to them—

—and begins to sink.

Not much, at first—he's merely wading through the flames instead of walking atop them, and they still don't burn. But with his next step, he's sunk to his knees. When he raises his right leg to make another push, he staggers forward and almost falls, whatever solidity is beneath him starting to give way even as he struggles closer to the shore. And still he can't speak.

It's when the fire has risen to his chest that things begin to change. He can feel a constricting tightness against his ribs, pushing in against his lungs; it's impossible to lift his sword arm, and when he looks down he sees that the mechanical hand and the crimson lightsaber have sunk beneath the lapping flames.

When he looks back upward at the shore, the darkness has dispersed. He can see them standing there, the two people he needs more than anything to reach.

Obi-Wan and Padmé.

The two stare at him, calmly watching, neither making a move to help. His old master's arm is wrapped protectively around Padmé's waist; her hand grasps his tightly. And through his own rising panic, Anakin can feel that the latticework of glowing threads between them is . . .

. . . different, somehow.

As he opens his mouth to call to them, the flames surge down his throat. And as his vision plunges into red, the last thing he sees his best friend and his wife turning to look at each other, the fire begins to burn.

"Sir? Sir!"

Anakin shot upright so quickly that he almost cracked his head against the Bothan attendant's as she pawed at his arm. Something whipped at his face, a howling wind, and for a moment he frantically thought to look down at himself, to see whether his clothes had gone black and his hand held a lightsaber. Then his eyes caught up with his hearing, and he realized he had never left the compartment. He was still in his seat; beneath him was nothing but carpeted floor.

To his right, however, there had been a change. Where before there had been a pane of transparisteel between him and the outside, now there was nothing but empty air, a few flecks of glass clinging to the outer edge of the windowframe all that remained.

"Are you all right?" the attendant asked, her black and white snout rippling in distress. "I was outside when it happened—did you see whether—"

Whether it was a clone shooting at us, Anakin finished for her. One of Valis and Maul's leftovers.

"It was . . . it was a bird, I think," he managed, giving his best approximation of a shaky laugh. "Smacked right into the window at just the right point, I guess. Startled me so much I guess I fainted."

It was the worst lie he'd ever told. The Bothan opened her mouth to protest that couldn't have been it, and before he could stop himself Anakin reached forward to inject as much calmness as he could muster into her mind.

That's all it was, he shouted at her through the Force, not gentle persuasion as Obi-Wan had taught him but a bludgeon. Nothing is wrong. We'll repair at the next station.

Swaying, the attendant inhaled sharply, her eyes going glassy. For a moment Anakin was terrified she would slump to the floor, overpowered, but she managed to mumble, "We'll repair at the next station. I'll report to the captain." Turning on her heel, she shuffle-stepped away, as though half of her were paralyzed.

As the wind shrieked, Anakin looked out the window's remains. They were passing through another uptown district, the wastes of the industrial section they'd passed through far behind. Lucky—if he'd shattered the transparisteel any sooner, smog would have poured into the compartment. Still, he thought he'd get off at that next station. He was no longer in a traveling mood.

All you'll be able to do is watch as they bring it to its knees.

It hadn't been Valis saying that—that wasn't how these visions worked, Anakin knew that much. The Force had used her as its mouthpiece. And had meant . . . what?

His thoughts flitted back to that snatch of report he'd seen clutched in Tarkin's hands weeks ago, as the director had swept out of Palpatine's office. It had been pushed from his mind by everything he and Palpatine had talked about that day—Kuat, Malachor, Plagueis—but now, in his memory, the words stood out against the paper they'd been printed on as though they'd been etched in fire.

Report on the Investigation into Jedi Involvement . . .

Involvement with what?

Well, his own voice whispered to him, you watched as the Jedi brought something down once before. More than watched. You helped.

You, Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon—you went off to take down two Sith, and instead you sent Stratum Apolune to its death.

Both Sith had walked away that day. Were still standing, even now. And all the Jedi had to show for their efforts was some new plinths somewhere in the Hall of the Fallen.

Bad enough on its own. But what did that slip of paper Tarkin had carried meant? What was Palpatine keeping from him?

What was the Force trying to tell him?

As the overhead PA nattered about the train pulling into the nearest station a few klicks away, Anakin pondered that at least one part of the vision had been clear. Undeniably so. In fact, it had simply been telling him something he already knew.

The Jedi couldn't bring down Maul and Valis. Only Vader could do that. If he didn't do it soon, things could somehow grow even worse.

And somehow that wasn't the worst bit.

Looking out into the great gulf of the Coruscanti sky, Anakin saw two figures from the vision flash before his eyes. Not Maul and Valis.

Obi-Wan and Padmé, watching as he drowned.

Republic Archives: A Misguided Push for a Return to Normalcy

[excerpt from an inter-office note written on the letterhead of the Coruscant Transit Authority. Note was found in a waste receptacle by a cleaning droid and later delivered to the CTA's Executive Director.]

Look, no one questioned when we pushed the commuter trains back into service before we'd even finished clearing the rubble off the tracks. People have to get to work. I understand that. But this is too much.

That ridiculous planetary loop line isn't something the residents even use. It's a tourist trap—one that barely breaks even, I might add. You know as well as any of us that thing is one red year away from getting its funding pulled, and that was before we had to staff it with extra security because the Coruscant Guard can't do their damn jobs and finish killing whatever terrorist scum are still lurking in the streets. I'm just going to say it—reopening this train line is theater. Palpatine is showing off.

"Ooh, look how normal everything is! Come ride our overpriced hotel-on-tracks and blow a couple hundred credits on lunch in the dining car while pirates roam the streets!" I swear to god. If the train gets attacked, it's going to be our asses on the line. Our heads the public calls for. Even though the Chancellor is the one who made us reopen it.

I hate it here.