Of course this is all Fan-Fiction. I don't write about anything I own on this site. I have never, nor do I expect to receive payment for any of these works.
I had this idea since seeing The Revenge of the Sith. I hate bad endings and I remember watching it hoping they'd pull a story teller magic and give it a happy ending anyways. Some Time Travel snafu. I was going to continue to ignore this idea, but then I had a dream and an epiphany moment, and was inspired to write it anyways. I know the first chapter is pretty much a monologue, but it was the best way I could figure out to get it set up, without taking longer or going over events you already know from the movies. I can see this Alternate Universe going into the OT and even ST times. Of course things will happen very differently then. But I don't know if I'll be able to keep it going that long, or if there'll even still be an audience for it.
10/31/2021 New Note: This story is a lot longer than I ever expected it to be. It is an entire AU. I suppose a sane person would've broken it into parts. If you are just starting this now, you can think of it like this:
Chapters 1 - 32 is Luke and Leia's childhood years. Quite a bit happens there, some of it not canon. (If you skim this, don't skip chapters 11, 14, 17, 24, 27 and 28. These chapters feature some of my key divergences from Canon.)
Chapters 33 - 49 is Luke and Leia's Teen years. Focus is much on them as they learn and grow.
Chapters 50 - Present, Luke and Leia are grown up adults, Some of these events are similar to certain movies, others are much different.
Chapter 1 – Bedtime Stories
"Waaaaa-waaaaa" Baby Leia begins to cry.
Anakin rushes into the room, still rushing to throw on a robe. He knows he doesn't have much time before…
"Wah-Wah" Baby Luke adds his cries to the chorus.
"Ooh" Anakin takes time to wipe the disappointment from his sleep addled brain. "Little one, lets see, you just ate. Do you need a change." Anakin bent over to sniff the danger zone, and his face relaxed. "Nope. Oh I know what it is. He reached down to pick up baby Leia, knowing if he can get her to settle, Luke will soon follow suit. "We all know Babies need quiet to sleep. I only wished someone would tell that to the Force. I can feel it too, little one. It's crying now, so many deaths in so short a time." Anakin walks over to a rocking chair with Leia in his arms. As he talks to the babies both begin to soothe. "I know it all may seem scary at this point, but if it wasn't for that Force, you wouldn't be here today."
"It all began three years ago. I was with your mother, assigned to protect her, but I kept having these dreams. Dreams of your grandmother dying. I had to go. I had to find out. Don't worry, I didn't leave your mother behind. She came with me." Anakin smiles at the baby. "When I made it to the Tusken Raider camp, and I saw the state she was in I wanted to kill every last one of them, I did. But then she opened her eyes, and I knew there would be no time for that. I picked her up and we managed to get back to the settlement in just enough time. She was badly injured, and bedridden for several weeks, but she recovered in the healer's hands." Anakin stopped to put the now sleeping baby Leia back into her crib. "Of course, I couldn't stay there that long. I had to go fight in the First Battle of Geonosis, but we kept in touch."
Anakin turned to discover baby Luke, still awake and fussing. He picked him up and went back to the rocker. "Obi-Wan and I had to rescue the then Chancellor Palpatine when he was captured over Coruscant. We managed to capture the Count Dooku at the same time. When we were up there Palpatine urged me to kill Dooku. I suppose that should have been my first clue of what was to happen, but I didn't see it then. Not yet."
"He didn't last long in our custody, though. Dooku was assassinated soon after we handed him over. We never found out who, but now I believe Palpatine had him taken out to avoid him talking."
"Though at the time I was a bit distracted. Your mother told me she was expecting you two. Well, we only knew about one of you at the time, but it was big enough news to shatter my senses for a while. Shortly after she told me, I started having dreams. They were like the ones I had about your grandmother, only they left me feeling helpless. It's not like I could go rushing off to save her life, like I did before. I commed my mother to talk about the dreams that next morning. She promised she'd look into some things for expectant mothers and told me to have faith. The force wouldn't show me that if there was nothing I could really do."
"At the time Palpatine asked me to serve on the Jedi Counsel, as his representative. The Jedi wanted me to keep eyes on Palpatine because they were not trusting him completely. Boy, if I'd known what I know now, things would be different for you." Anakin takes several breaths to calm his voice. "Palpatine told me that the Jedi were plotting against the Republic, and he tried to get me to distrust them. Then he told me about a Sith who discovered a way to cheat death. That should've been my clue, but at the time he was my friend. I didn't want to suspect him of any wrongs."
"It was only after this that he revealed himself to me. I ran off to inform the Jedi. It was the late Master, Mace Windu, who went after him. I wanted to join him, but he told me to stay in the temple instead. Said he felt in the Force that there was somewhere else I had to be. As I waited, I received a comm from your grandmother again. We talked again about the dreams. I told her the latest had Obi-Wan there during your mother's labor pains."
"Mother laughed at this. Said that was likely the issue. What does a Jedi know about delivering a baby. I brought up the stuff Palpatine had told me, about the Sith who cheated death, but she urged me not to do that. She reminded me that if that's what it took, Padme would rather die. But she had another plan. She told me that she had reached out to the Tusken people again. To a group that doesn't believe in using the radical methods the others do. One of them, she said, was a Tusken midwife who had experience in a lot of difficult births. She said they knew more about delivering a baby and supporting a mother than anyone in the Republic. It was then that I left the temple to get your mother to a ship and off to Tatooine as quickly as I could."
"Before we were off we noticed smoke coming from the Temple, and I could feel the turmoil that you guys felt before. Your mother told me to go. Help who I could. She knew the way to Tatooine."
"The temple had been raided by our own loyal army. Many there were killed. I barely got in unnoticed, and out with what few survivors I could find. Most of them children. That next morning, I found Masters Obi-Wan and Yoda trying to break into the temple again. I had to tell them there were none left alive. Palpatine was the Darth Sidious we had feared, and he likely killed Master Windu the night before. It seems he had all clone troopers ordered to kill any Jedi on sight, and he set a trap for them summoning them to return to the temple. Together we deactivated that message."
"Then I got a comm coming through from my mother. Though Padme had made it to Tatooine, she was filled with worry. We hadn't spoken since the previous night, when she sent me off into danger, and she was beginning to go into early labor from all the anxiety. Though I knew that Yoda was planning to confront Sidious, I couldn't stay any longer. I left them and headed off to Tatooine."
"When I got here, you little one, were near arrival. I rushed in and kissed your mother, then held her hand as she got another burst of energy. Out you came. Then two minutes later your sister came next." Luke began to squirm and fuss. "Oh, don't worry. You'll learn to appreciate having a sister, one day." Little Luke kept fussing, then Anakin wrinkled his nose.
"You didn't. Did you?" He sniffed the diaper and made a worse face. He then got up and went to a changing table to do the deed. "Looks like someone needs a diaper change. So that's how the force saved your lives, little ones. If I hadn't saved your grandmother, she'd never have been able to save you two." Anakin pauses with the bottle of white powder in his hands. A thoughtful expression on his face. "You know, I won't be able to be around all the time. No, but when I am gone," Anakin put three of his fingers up to point to his chest, "there will be a piece of each of you in here." Anakin glanced up to see Padme standing in the doorway to the nursery. "Always."