A/N: Have you ever fiddled with a chapter so much that you make yourself crazy? That's this chapter.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The more distance that I put between myself and Korriban, the less crazed and maniacal I feel.
There is a measure of relief that comes with the realization but I'm not entirely sure about what I think of the aftermath. It is only when I've left the Horuset system entirely, however, that the bloodlust that had overtaken me during my duel with Dooku finally begins to ebb away. While I am calmer in the aftermath, I am no less disturbed by my actions. I'm not sure how much of what I had done back on Korriban could be attributed to that wretched planet's influence and how much had been my own subconscious leanings.
The inescapable truth was I had wanted to kill both Dod and Dooku…and I had enjoyed it.
My sense of justice had rebelled at the thought of allowing either of them to live. Dod was an irredeemable, greedy leech. He was always going to serve his own interests first which, as far as I was concerned, made him unfit for the office he held. And, since it was unlikely that he would leave of his own volition or be ousted either, death seemed the most appropriate end for him.
And Dooku. Like me, he had been drawn to the dark side due to his disillusion with the Jedi Order and politics in general. And like me, he eventually became the very thing that he hated. But that was where the similarities ended. Dooku had been content to remain steeped in the dark side. He would have continued to serve his master loyally up until the time inevitably came when he would seek to replace him. That was, after all, the way of the Sith. The master continually seeking to replace the apprentice and the apprentice always seeking to become the master, each student subsequently becoming more powerful than the teacher.
I had chosen to break that cycle when I found a way to come back to this time. I wanted to break it. Dooku had not. He had chosen his death. Or, at least, that was what I told myself. The most fundamental truth is that Dooku had been Sidious' agent, his ally. And any ally of Darth Sidious' was an automatic enemy of mine. And so, on some level, I had been motivated by hatred and revenge as well.
After all I have suffered and sacrificed, after literally ripping the fabric of time itself apart to be here, I will not allow that unconscionable piece of filth to succeed in his plans! It has gone far beyond principle by this point and encompasses far more for me than the fate of the galaxy or fulfilling some obscure prophecy I don't completely understand. This is personal.
I want to make Sidious pay for what he took from me, for the lies he told me, for the numerous ways he manipulated me from my boyhood on, but mostly for making me believe that he ever truly cared about me at all. That last truth stings more than all the others because I had genuinely cared about him. I had loved him once. I had regarded him as my family. Of all the people I had once deceived myself into believing had betrayed me, he was truly the one who had betrayed me the most.
I've not ever reconciled myself with that realization before, certainly not to him and least of all to myself. I consider it now. Turn it over in my hands and study the fact with objective detachment. Yes, I had loved him very much, but in the ensuing decade of servitude to him that deep affection I'd harbored for him as a young man had eventually turned to deep loathing. I've no doubt that is what drives me now on some basic level. In retrospect of what happened with Dod and Dooku, the thought is worrisome.
After all, hatred is the path to the dark side. But try as I might, I'm unable to release those emotions into the Force. I've tried. But they always come ricocheting back at me with deadly intensity.
Maybe Sidious isn't the only Sith left to destroy this night…
All those thoughts rattle around in my mind as I enter the Coruscanti air space and make my way towards the senate building at the center of the capital. The bright blinking lights and bustling traffic that characterizes the city continues to dance and swirl all around me, its preoccupied citizens oblivious to the radical change their world is about to undergo. I set the ship down into the designated hanger and take a moment to collect myself before I exit the cockpit.
Killing him won't be an easy task. I know how strong he is. The few times I had been foolish enough to face him on my own, he had been quick to remind me why he was the master, and I was the apprentice.
But I had also been a lesser man back then, confined to that mechanical monstrosity, scarred, and disabled both physically and emotionally. That constant pain and degradation had anchored me more firmly in the dark side, but it had come with a price. I would never be the man I was before Mustafar. Hadn't Sidious reminded me of that endlessly…how my failure on Mustafar had cost me the chance to reach my full potential.
Only now, I have reached that potential. I am stronger now, fortified physically, emotionally, and mentally in a way that I've never been before. I'm not sure if that's because I've finally experienced what true love and support feels like…what true family feels like, but I feel grounded and focused.
Further, I have the agility and stamina of a 20-year-old man but the skills and training of a seasoned Sith lord. I'm not so sure that I will be as skilled as Windu had been in bringing my old master to his knees (though I have the motivation to do so), but I plan to try my earnest best. And if I die in the process…then so be it. Maybe that is how the prophecy will be fulfilled.
Truly death would be the easiest part of the task that lies ahead for me. No need to worry about the fallout that comes after if I'm dead. But if I'm successful and I live, I will no doubt be arrested promptly following. No matter how justified I know my cause to be, the truth is that, from the public's standpoint, I will have attacked the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic without provocation. Such a thing would surely be deserving of death. I suppose in the end it doesn't matter then. Death is the foreseeable conclusion for me one way or another.
Resolved, I inhale deeply and then finally exit the starship. R2 immediately prepares to follow me as I step off the wing and flip up the hood of my cloak. "R2," I tell him without a backwards glance, "stay with the ship." We've been here before. In that first timeline, I had asked him to stay back because I didn't want him to witness what I had become. This time, I don't want him to see me die.
When I arrive outside of the chancellor's office, I briefly reflect on the last time I was there, how difficult it had been to hold myself back from killing him. There is a cold excitement banked in me now with the knowledge that this time I would hold nothing back. I didn't have to any longer. The time for subterfuge was finally at an end.
Upon my approach, Sidious' stationed red guards acknowledge my arrival with silent nods and then bid me entrance without question. Clearly, their master has already made them aware that he is expecting me. After I am escorted inside, the guards immediately take their leave and then secure the door firmly behind them, leaving only the two of us alone in his office.
I find him seated behind his desk, his Palpatine face wreathed in a warm smile of welcome when I approach. He immediately motions for me to take a seat. I do so but my wary gaze never leaves him. My mental shields remain firmly in place.
"Anakin, my dear boy, I cannot express to you how relieved I am that you finally know the truth!"
"Are you?"
His smile widens. "Of course, I am!" When I respond to that with little more than an impassive stare, he sighs and leans back in his chair to regard me with a demure expression. "Clearly you have something on your mind. Speak freely, Anakin. You have my undivided attention. I assure you."
I fix him with a scathing grimace. "You think I did this for your attention?"
"I see," he murmurs thoughtfully, inclining his head in a slight nod, "You're feeling betrayed. Is that it?"
"Does that surprise you? You have lied to me for my entire life."
"With good reason," he says, "You have no idea how many times I've yearned to tell you the truth over the years. Countless times, Anakin, but…I was afraid. The Jedi had poisoned your mind against those like me, taught you that we were nothing more than inherent evil."
"Should I believe otherwise?
He offers me a tsking smile. "Anakin, you know me. Have I ever, in all that time, done something that you would characterize as evil?"
"You've orchestrated this war," I point out, "and the conflict that sparked it. Don't deny it."
"Yes, but for a purpose," he argues smoothly, "The Senate, the courts, even the Jedi…they are all irreversibly corrupt. There was no way for me to expose them on my own. They were too powerful. I had to create circumstances so that their own misdeeds would lead to their eventual destruction." He appraises me with a knowing look. "After all, isn't that the same thing you did to Jabba the Hut?"
"I am nothing like you!"
Unbelievably his smile only widens at my denial. "Oh, my dear boy, you are perfect. More perfect than I could have ever dreamed."
"This isn't about me! This is about you and what you've done!" I spit, "Don't try to convince me your motives are selfless! Do you take me for a fool?"
His eyes flash dangerously at my harsh impertinence but, for the time being, he maintains his facade of amiable old mentor. "Do you remember when you were a young boy, and I took you to that club in the Coruscant lower levels?" he asks.
I do remember, but because I already suspect where he might be going with this walk down memory lane, I refuse to grant him the satisfaction of admitting it. "I don't know. You took me many places when I was a boy."
"We were in Club Kasakar," he reminds me softly, "You recall Senator Colandrus and how the chance cubes turned against him that night and he suffered a great loss." He regards me, his expression sharp and keen when he says, "You manipulated those cubes that night. You caused his loss."
"Because that was what you wanted!" I grind out angrily, "You put the idea in my head!"
"And as a result of your actions, I was able to oust Senator Colandrus from the Senate and serve justice to him," he says, "I had him removed from office so that he could no longer hurt others! Don't you see? You didn't do anything wrong that night! Colandrus was the culpable one and, ultimately, it was his own greed that was his undoing!
"That is the entire purpose for this war, Anakin, so that the guilty will finally destroy themselves and the Galaxy can know true peace and security."
He thinks that he has me. I can see the complacency gleaming in the depths of his eyes. His argument makes sense and could even be characterized as selfless and brilliant. If I were still that naïve, devoted child who had trusted him implicitly, I might have been persuaded by his arguments, his noble altruism. But I know better now. I've seen his true face, having been on the receiving end of his cruelty, deception, and sinister manipulations more than once. The isn't an ounce of benevolence in this man at all. Whatever he does is always in service to himself.
For now, however, I'm content to play out this little charade with him. I don't have to do a thing except wait for him to stumble into his own trap. After all, he's the one who taught me how to play the game in the first place.
"What of the innocent who suffer right along with the guilty?" I ask him, "Do you not care for them at all? Or do you consider them little more than collateral damage to achieve your ends?"
"Those are the shortsighted words of a Jedi and that's not you, my boy. You are so much more than that. You know that the world is far more complicated place than the Jedi perceive it. They preach idealism and sentiment, but they do not live by their own creed. They are just as corrupt as the rest."
"And that's the reason you pulled them into this war."
"I didn't have to do a thing. As soon as they learned that Dooku was a Sith, it became incumbent upon them to act," he says, "Never mind that the reasons the Separatists had for withdrawing from the Republic were valid and motivated by a desire to be free from corruption. To the Jedi, their movement was being led by a Sith and, therefore, wrong and rooted in evil."
"So now you defend the Separatist cause?" I scoff.
"I defend justice. All will receive what is rightfully coming to them."
The words chill me because I've used the same argument countless times myself, most recently in fact. It makes me wonder if, despite all my strident protests to the contrary, I'm really that different from him after all. I'm sickened by the very thought. And ultimately, it is that fear that motivates me to end the verbal sparring between us.
"You know nothing of justice, Sidious!" I shift to my feet and ignite my lightsaber. "I didn't come here to destroy the Jedi. They've been right about the Sith all along! I came to destroy you."
"Anakin, you've been sorely misguided," he chides me like a small child, "If you think this action will endear you to the Jedi, you're mistaken. They will never accept you, not as I have."
"This has nothing to do with the Jedi!" I hiss from between clenched teeth, "I know you. I can see clearly through your lies now. Everything you've done, everything you do is self-motivated. You're completely without a conscience and consumed by hatred. You don't want what's best for the Galaxy! You want power! Nothing more. And I will stop you."
"Oh, my dear boy," he murmurs with a disarming smile, "you will try…"
Sidious is out of his chair and approaching me with such alarming speed that I don't even see the movement. In one blink, he goes from being seated behind his desk to spinning straight at me, his dual lightsabers trained directly at my heart. I hadn't been prepared for him being so blindingly fast, but I should have suspected after he managed to dispatch three Jedi masters on his own in that first timeline. At the last second, I block his whirling approach with a reflexive Force push and simultaneously spin out of the trajectory of his incoming assault.
He goes tumbling backwards over his desk, landing awkwardly on the other side of it. I waste no time stalking him, choosing to strike before he can regain his bearings. With both hands gripping the hilt, I bring my lightsaber down towards him with brutal intent. He catches my blade with his own, interlocking the blue shaft in a scissor hold before I can complete my intention to cleave his face in half. We lean into each other with feral growls, battling for dominance, locked in an eternal battle of wills.
"Impressive, young one!" he cackles proudly, "You are strong!" But then his genial features twist and contort into something dark and malevolent. "But not strong enough!"
Without warning, I am blasted backwards with enough force to send me careening into the opposite wall. I hit it. Hard. With enough force to rattle every bone in my body and temporarily blacken my vision. As I struggle against losing consciousness, I can hear him saying from somewhere above me:
"It doesn't have to be this way, Anakin. I have been waiting for you this entire time. Surely, you've sensed that too. Why else would you have killed Dooku? Join me and we will rule the galaxy together!"
"Never," I growl softly, struggling to my feet, "Never again!"
I charge at him, lightsaber flashing, twirling, propelled forward by my fury. We dart across the room, over and under, splitting furniture, toppling pillars, cracking foundation, back and forth, pushing and pulling in a blurring swirl. I pour all my anger, hatred, and pain behind every, single strike, visualizing the tip of my blade piercing his blackened heart.
The power within me swells, pulsing in my ears, burning in my chest and spreading like fire through my entire body. As I beat him back, it dawns on me that I am the stronger one in this battle. I am the master. And he knows it. I can feel his surprise and fear and fury resonating back at me through the Force. I push him back mercilessly, pounding at him again and again and again, the embittered refrain beating in my heart with each brutal strike. You lied! You tricked me! I hate you!
"Yes, yes…" he goads insanely, even as I have him pinned to the floor, "Use your hatred! Strike me down! Only then will you know the true power of the Dark Side!"
I stumble back at his words, as if suddenly snapping from a trance. Only then do I fully understand that this has just been another one of his lessons. This is what he wants. This is the moment that he has been grooming me for my entire life. I am becoming the monster he always intended for me to be, only this time…I'll be a whole one and not the mechanical monstrosity he had been left with after Mustafar.
It is during that brief instant of clarity that he makes his strike against me, pummeling me with the Sith lightning that he is so masterful at using. Pain rips through my body as every nerve ending is electrified with pulsating heat. His objective isn't to kill me. That would be too merciful. This is meant to be a demonstration of his power…a punishing one.
My lightsaber flies from my hand with the impact. I cry out but he doesn't stop. He blasts me again and again, holding his assault steady until I'm writhing, breathless and trembling and on my knees at his feet.
"And now, young one, I'm going to teach you a very painful lesson, but a necessary one."
That menacing promise triggers a memory. I had been on my knees before him then too. So soon after Padmé, after he had revealed that terrible truth…that she was dead, and I had killed her. I had lashed out at him, infuriated and betrayed, reaching through the Force to take hold of his scrawny neck to squeeze the wretched life from him… He had easily subdued me and then he had taught me my first lesson as his newly minted apprentice, and it had been one of the most punishing experiences of my entire life. And as he intended, I have never forgotten it.
You will learn, my young apprentice! You will learn, or you will die!
I'm unprepared for the moment when the steady barrage suddenly stops, and he releases me. I immediately collapse to the floor, shaking and sweating. The pain is unimaginable, an agony so intense that I find it difficult to focus. But I claw my way through that pain to throw him a defiant glare because I want him to know that even crumpled in a pathetic ball at his feet, he has not broken me. He will never break me again.
But instead of regarding me with the haughty superiority I am expecting, Sidious studies me in rapt fascination instead…as if he is seeing me for the first time. "You're not at all what you seem," he murmurs thoughtfully, "Are you…my apprentice?"
His quiet reasoning is met with my mutinous snarl. "I am not your apprentice!"
"But you are," he insists with a growing smile, "It is your destiny to serve me. I have seen it. You have shown it to me. You were always meant to kneel at my feet, weren't you, Lord Vader?"
"No…" I groan inwardly as I realize he's used our accursed connection through the Force to see things that I never would have shown him willingly. In my weakened state, I focus what remaining energy I have left on maintaining my mental shields against him though I realize it's too late. He's already seen too much. "Whatever you think you saw…that will never happen. I won't let it…I won't let you…"
"You are more powerful than I could have ever imagined. My beautiful boy…with the ability to manipulate time itself it seems!" He circles my prone form, his words tempered with admiration. "How ever did you accomplish such a thing, my young friend?"
"Wouldn't you like to know…"
"I would. And you are going to teach me all you know."
"Nah, don't think so," I pant out insolently, "I'm not in a sharing mood…"
He sends another barrage of lightning surging into my body. Despite anticipating the strike, my breath still escapes me in a tortured wheeze. "Come now, Anakin," he cajoles me with surprising gentleness, "We don't have to be enemies. I am offering you a chance at unlimited power. It is yours for the taking. Or…" he adds as he sends forth another surge, "…you can suffer unimaginable pain instead."
"Is…there…a third…option…?" I gasp.
In an instant, his artificial kindness is replaced with exacting brutality. "Are you certain you want to play games with me?" he snaps, "Shall I take away everything you cherish most instead?
"Your beloved mother, perhaps? So vulnerable and unassuming. You've made a great many enemies on Tatooine, my boy. If one of them were to target her…" He lets that statement hang with a mournful cluck, "Oh, that would be a terrible thing."
"You will not touch her," I grate, "This is between us!"
He zaps me again, taking supreme pleasure in my anguished screams. "I will do as I wish," he hisses, "And I won't stop at your mother! What about your old master? Obi-Wan Kenobi. Fighting the good fight like a good soldier. It would be a shame if he were to become yet another casualty of war."
With each implied threat, my fury grows. But every attempt I make to lunge at him, to rip him apart with my bare hands, is met with a fresh assault of lightning. He chortles with each feeble effort I make to attack him.
"And what about your sweet, precious Senator Amidala…?" he considers softly, "So young and beautiful. How dreadful would it be if she were to find herself the target of this 'unknown senate assassin'…and so soon after the two of you have become lovers…"
"No…no…"
"You can stop this, Anakin. None of that has to happen at all. Pledge yourself to me and I will give you everything you could possibly dream," he vows, "You will never have to fear losing the ones you love ever again. You will never be limited by anything ever again!"
I close my eyes, swallow roughly as I fight to form the words. "You…you promise me…you won't hurt them?"
He bestows me with an approving smile. "You have my word. Now, rise. And pledge yourself to the ways of the Sith. Fulfill your destiny."
Limbs trembling and unsteady, I push myself onto my knees and assume the same position before him that I had in another lifetime and for very similar reasons. I will do whatever you ask. Just help me save Padmé's life. I can't live without her. I feel that same desperation and fear now and I have so much more to lose this time. There is a familiar, unsettled gurgling in the pit of my stomach, the bitter taste of acid rising in my throat. My heart is lurching, my head spinning, but I have zero doubts about what I must do next.
This time…I have no plans of pledging myself to him at all. This time, he is going to die, and I'm going to die with him. This has been my destiny all along. In one fluid motion, I summon my lightsaber back into my hand and, using the last of my flagging strength, I plunge it deep into his chest.
His stunned gasp echoes in my ears as I throw back my head and fix him with a triumphant smile. "It seems…this…is the end for you…my master…" I whisper brokenly only seconds before my vision reduces and narrows and eventually goes dark.
A/N: The references to Club Kasakar came from a comic featured on Star Wars Theory's youtube channel. If you've never watched him before, you should check him out. Honestly, that video is what inspired this entire fanfiction. In fact, I had this very chapter plotted and outlined (though it was a BEAST to write) before I even knew how I wanted this story to progress. I also knew that it had to be first POV. I needed to be in Anakin's head.