Chapter 4

We can't stay long, but we promise to be back as soon as possible. Obi-Wan has sent the transmittion that he needs us. This is where we will be captured and that Padme will tell me that she loves me. This is when we will share our first kiss. That much I know.

We land and immediately are engulfed in fighting. Before I know it we are captured, as I remembered.

We are standing in this sled. My hands are bound and chained to this stupid sled. She's facing away from me in the same position.

"Annie," she whispers, looking over her shoulder. I look over at her and see the fear in her brown eyes, the eyes that I love so much.

"Yes, Padme?"

"I can't fight this any more. If we are to die then I want you to know that I love you, Anakin," she says. Tears begin to well up in her eyes. My heart breaks and I wish that my hands weren't bound so I could wipe away the tears.

So I do the best thing that I possibly can. I lean over and kiss her. She kisses me back with a passion that I haven't experienced in years. I feel the sled jolt underneath us and the kiss breaks, much to my dismay.

We are taken into the arena and my heart drops. I know how this is going to end today. Some of my fellow Jedi will die. But I know where Count Dooku will run to. I can stop him before it is too late. I can stop my arm from being cut off.

I look down at my real hand. I don't want to lose that again. Ever. That was an experience that I had gone through that still haunts my thoughts sometimes. Over the years I got use to it, but I didn't want to have to get use to it ever again.

Battle ensues, we get our lightsabers like before, we stop everything, Dooku runs, and before I know it I'm in the speeder with Obi-Wan and Padme.

"Go to these coordinates," I tell the clone commander after typing a set place. He nods and affirms my command.

"Anakin! What are you doing?" Obi-Wan asks me frantically.

"I know where he's going. You just have to trust me, Master," I say. My mind stops. I haven't called this man Master is years. When I saw him the last time I had mocked his authority over me. Now, looking at him I know that I should have listened to him. He is far wiser than I had ever deemed possible. I realize that once again I have much to learn, yet this time I am willing to learn it.

We fly to the place and jump out. I lean back into the cock-pit.

"Take the Senator to safety!" I order him. He nods and flies away before Padme can get out.

"ANAKIN!" She screams. I turn away. I know that she can't be here. Dooku would just use her. Last time she didn't have a chance to follow. She had fallen out of the speeder. I am thankful that I didn't have to watch her fall again.

Dooku gets there and I immediately use the Force to stop him in his tracks. I squeeze his throat enough so he stops moving and lift him off the ground.

"You are going to go to jail for what you have done," I tell him. Obi-Wan looks over at me.

"What are you doing?"

"Master call the General back. We need to transport him back to Coruscant for his trial," I reply. I can tell that Obi-Wan is afraid, but I'm not choking him. I'm just keeping him in his place. He is too busy trying to get free to use the Force and even if he does I am far stronger in the Force now then I was then. I know that this war is going to stop before it ends and that is the way it should be.

o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Dooku is dead. He was sentenced to death by Chancellor Palaptine. I requested an emergency audience with the Jedi Council and told them about the Sith Lord. The entire Jedi Council stopped him and produced their findings to the Senate which called for his immediately death, which Yoda saw to immediately.

The entire universe is now free. Naboo wants Padme to run for Chancellor, but she has refused. Bail is running against a Senator from Tatooine. I know that Bail will win the election.

I have petition the council on a thought: Allowing Jedi's to marry- to love. Anakin showed, through his own thoughts, that being a Jedi is hard enough to not live it without a significant other. How else would more Jedi be born and having that love of family would make the connection through the Jedi community. They thought long and hard about it and saw my point.

Thus, I was standing there in my Jedi robes waiting for Padme to come up the aisle. She looked radiant. I liked this wedding a lot better than our first. We were alone and there was no one but the droids to witness our wedding. It was romantic, but so secret that it seemed like our love for each other was just a big secret - which it was.

Padme came down wearing that same dress that she had worn on our first wedding day. I know I'm beaming. How couldn't I? She looks so radiant.

Yoda is our minister today. Our wedding is the first of that of a Jedi and a Senator. We've made the history books just by being in love. However, that doesn't matter to me. All that matters is that this time I get to have the life that I should have been able to have the first time.

The ceremony goes by and I can't remember much of it. All I remember is saying some words and marveling at my second chance.

Now my second chance has truly begun.