Vader
by R. Campbell
Chapter Two
His Angel from Naboo
The bins were always dirty. The dust and grime built up in the crack and crevices, along the sides and at the botttom. And when the bins got dirty, the parts got dirty. And when the parts got dirty, they didn't work properly. So it was important that Ani clean them at least once a month, and Watto usually made him clean them more often. Cleaning the bins was a tedious task. All the parts had to be taken out, then scrubbed and put to the side. Then the bins had to be scoured in every part, furiously washed and dried. It wasn't an easy thing. The dirt liked to stick in the corners and edges, and sometimes Ani even ran his fingernails down the side to loose up the dirt. He usually clambered over the bin and squatted in it when he was washing it, the bins being that much bigger than the small boy.
One day he noticed a large crack in a bin he was cleaning; a crack so large the bin would have have to be thrown away; he would tell Watto as soon as he was done. As it turned out, he never had a chance to tell Watto, but he never forgot about that crack.
"Peedenkel! Naba dee unko!" Ani started, lifted his head and looked toward the shop. Watto was calling him, in Huttese, no less. Must be outlanders there, Anakin thought; Watto only talked in the language of the Hutts when he didn't want outlanders to understand him. Ani scrambled out of the bin and ran into the shop. A man, a creature of which he had never seen the like (indeed, Jar Jar was an amphibious creature, and Ani had never heard the word "amphibious" in his life) an astro-droid, and the most beautiful girl he had ever seen were standing inside the shop.
The girl had a soft face, soft features, soft lips. Her eyes were a deep brown, questioning, inviting. She looked a little nonplussed by her suroundings, by the situation, and wary, too. She had obviously never been to Tatooine, and most likely she had never been to a junk dealer's shop. But she seemed to take it all in, observing everything and saying nothing. Ani stared.
"What took you so long?" Watto asked in Huttese, raising a hand to strike the small boy.
Anakin flinched away from it, and said that he was cleaning the bins like Watto had told him to do.
Watto lowered his hand, and said, dismissively, "Chut-Chut! Ganda doe wallya," which means in Huttese, "Never mind! Watch the store." Then Watto told him that he had some selling to do, then went out the back door with the man to the junk piles.
Ani sat down on the counter and started cleaning a part which had been sitting on it, his eyes, though, were turned back to the girl. She made him think of those stories that the space traders had told him, about angels, about beautiful things. She smiled at him. He took a breath, and said, "Are you an angel?"
"What?" she asked, bemused.
"An angel," he said vigorously. I've heard the deep space pilots talk about them. They live on the Moons of Iego I thimk. They are the most beautiful creatures in the universe. They are good and kind, and so pretty they make even the most hardened spice pirate cry."
The girl was flattered and didn't say anything at first. Finally, she said, "I've never heard of angels."
"You must be one," Ani said forcefully. "Maybe you just don't know it."
Her eyes met his. He knew, with complete certainty, that he was meant for her. She was the kind of girl who came around once in a lifetime - and there's would be, although he didn't know it yet, the kind of love that only comes around once in a lifetime. He wanted to tell her, wanted to say something to her, something that would convey that feeling, but he didn't know the words.
They talked for a while; at times the conversation was easy, at times it was forced, but he liked the sound of her voice, and he liked looking at her. Her name was Padme, and he thought it was a nice name. He thought, also, that she was a very nice person, the kind of person he would like to be with. She, however, didn't seem to feel the same way; she looked at him in a funny, amused way; she didn't understand him. He didn't really understand her either, but he knew that he loved her. When she told him that Tatooine was a strange world to her, he said, with a mixture of a fondness he should not yet have for her, and a regret that he should not yet feel, "You are a strange girl to me."
She, the man, the droid, and the funny creature left some time later, without the parts for their ship. Ani told himself that he would never see her again - he didn't want to hope for her, in case she was something that he could never have - but he knew that he would. Watto, jerking Ani out of his thoughts, exclaimed "Outlanders! They think because we live so far from the center, we don't know nothing."
Ani replied, "They seemed nice to me." Especially the girl, who you'll never see again, Ani reminded himself forcefully. Although, as it turned out, he did see her again.
Watto told him to clean the racks, and after Ani had finished, Watto allowed him to go home.
Ani never knew if he believed in fate. By nature, Ani wasn't the kind of person who does believe in fate. By nature, he was a headstrong person, the kind of person who dictates his own life. But after a while, he started refusing to see his choices as his alone, as if fate wrote the script and he just played the part. Because it was certainly fate who killed Padme, certainly fate who created Vader.
Right now, though, as a boy of nine, he didn't think much of these things.
But when he saw her walking past a cantina, after he left the junk shop, he believed. There was something about this girl, something which was dragging them together, something that wouldn't let them be apart, and that was fate. Ani grinned as he saw her back, saw his chance to run up to her when Sebulba threatened the funny alien. After Ai had diffused the situation, and he and Padme had fallen into step, she smiled at him and he smiled back.
When he was younger he used to think about that smile, and it would make him happy, but after, after when he thought about that smile, it made him desperately sad, and the tears would spring to his eyes but wouldn't fall. There was nothing incredibly special about that smile; it wasn't as if it was the first time she had smiled at him, because she had, several times, in the shop; and it wasn't as if it preceeded anything spectacular, because she didn't speak to him afterwards. But it was the kind of smile that is remembered forever. It was the kind of smile, and it was the kind of moment, in which there are only two people.
Time passed.
Ten years pressed against him before he saw her again.
She was beautiful; he was tongue tied. "Grown more beautiful, I mean...," he said, and she laughed. She had, though, or maybe he just didn't remember correctly. The girl in his mind was still young, still slightly immature, although he hadn't thought so at the time. She held herself in the same assured, confident way, but there was something different about her. It was a nice difference, and he couldn't have loved her more.
She couldn't have loved him less.
Although, when she thought back on it, after he kissed her, it seemed to her that she had always loved him, loved him since that smile, loved him since he had given her the jappor snippet, loved him since before she knew him, and loved him even after. He said you killed younglings...
Once she said to him: It must be difficult having sworn your life to the Jedi... not being able to visit the places you like... or do the things you like..." He looked at her, and for the first time, he hated the Jedi order. He had felt resentment toward it, yes, toward Master Obi-Wan for not understanding him, for everyone not understanding him, but he did not feel the way he felt at that moment. It was a flash, that hatred, come and gone before he could think about, and then he looked at Padme and simply said: "Or be with the people I love."
His voice was simple, the way he looked at her, simple, but there was also a boyish eagerness to him, as if he was trying to say, "I want to be with you," but couldn't make it more clear.
He couldn't tell if she noticed, but he thought she might have, because she looked embarrased, and said, almost as if she was avoiding his real meaning, "Are you allowed to love? I thought it was forbidden for a Jedi."
He felt that brief hate again, red behind his eyes, blood boiling. He loved her, and he didn't care if it was forbidden.
When he first kissed her, he wasn't sure exactly what was being said; the words just flew out of his ears, and he knew he was making correct responses, but they just didn't seem relevant. What was relevant was his hand on her shoulder, the way she was looking into his eyes. And then they kissed. It was one of those kisses where time just stops, like when they had smiled at each other all those years ago on Tatooine. It was the kind of kiss, and it was the kind of moment, in which there are only two people.
One day she told him she loved him. She told him that she wasn't afraid to die, that she had been dying a little each day since he came back into her life. He looked at her and didn't understand. And then she said, "I love you."
Many things happened on that day. The clones came into battle. He lost his arm. But he never recalled most of that. All he remembered was the way Padme looked when said it, the light in her eyes, and her voice trembling.
And when they told her that he killed her, that was all he could remember.