Ahsoka sucked in deep breaths of the warm air with every footfall she made on the obsidian shore, her boots pounded a desperate rhythm against the warm obsidian, and with every bound she thanked the force for repulsor vents.
She paused, panting, where the rock cut off, across a chasm of magma, the open corridors of the mining complex lay scorched with saber marks. The chase continued there.
The nearest bridge was yards away, and though she could sense that was the path the fugitives had taken, she felt that such a roundabout route would slow her down. Drawing strength from the force she cleared the gap, slipped, and dashed her knees against warm dura-steel floor
"Ahh!" she cried out, sucking in a sharp breath through her teeth.
Focus, she chided herself as she struggled to her knees. Her mind was clouded; she'd been off her game the whole rotation because of it. She snorted with frustration, it was othersome, to not have seen that slimy Neimoidian slink away from the rest, not to have sensed his intention before he shut the blast doors behind him, slowing down anyone who wished to follow. Anakin had sensed it, and as he leapt through those doors Ahsoka felt the pit in her stomach grow that much deeper. She had a bad feeling about it.
Focus, she reminded herself, she could practically hear Master Yoda chiding her,
"Dwell on the past, a Jedi does, not"
Ahsoka smirked, I am no jedi, she thought, and this was no ordinary brain fog. The harder she tried to clear her mind of it, the more it seemed to fight back. Darkness swarmed where Anakin's aura should have been. She focused on the spot.
Golden eyes danced back at her.
She started, nearly losing her footing a second time. A pair of steady arms wrapped carefully round her shoulders and helped her regain it. The young togruta whirled round,
"Obi-Wan," she cried, half in desperation, half in relief, "It's Anakin—"
He held his hand up for silence, "I feel it too," he said, his voice resigned, dejected.
"We have to go after them," she said, throwing a glance at the multiple entrances running down the corridor.
Obi-wan nodded, "Do you have any idea where they've gone?"
Ahsoka shook he head, not a trace. They would have to go down and inspect them individually, and by that time… She shuddered, not wanting to entertain the thought of her master hunting down a man just to kill him.
"Jedi!" a voice echoed from around the farthest corner. Obi- wan looked to Ahsoka inquisitively before training his gaze on one of the lower entrances.
A smallish figure leaned out from one of the doors, a faint trace of smoke wisped out behind him as he waved them down. Ahsoka returned Obi-wan's glance with a wary one before cautiously inching closer, her grandmaster following close behind
"Jedi!" the voice belonged to a Mustafarian boy, not more than fourteen standard years.
"You speak basic?" Ahsoka asked him gently, though her voice was coated with urgency. The boy nodded, his beady black eyes glistened with excitement, and Ahsoka found herself smiling. Not everyone was as enthusiastic to meet a jedi as he was. She bent her knee in a crouch and spoke to him slowly,
"Did anyone else come this way?" she asked, "Any other jedi?" she laid one hand on the boy's shoulder to communicate urgency, and with the other she ignited her lightsaber, in case his basic wasn't fluent enough to understand the question entirely.
The boy's eyes lit up, following the beam of energy, he nodded vigorously,
"Yes!" he cried, "The jedi!" He jumped up agitatedly and ran ahead of Ahsoka, gesturing for the two jedi to follow, "Come!"
Ahsoka and her grandmaster exchanged nods and followed the child in through the smoke dusted door. Inside, Ahsoka took one sniff and recoiled, backing away into Obi-wan.
"What is it?" he asked
"That's not smoke," she replied, attempting to cough out what little she'd been able to inhale. Obi-wan raised an eyebrow in concern, but pressed forward, gesturing for Ahsoka to stay back. She waited in the corridor, and moments later he returned with the boy, both holding their breath even as Obi-wan used the force to part the gases.
"It's the repulsor vents," he explained panting for air. The boy nodded vehemently, "They're completely charred."
The padawan drew in a shallow breath, "Anakin," she whispered,
"Rex," her voice trembled with urgency as she raised the comm to her lips, "Rex do you copy?"
"Loud and clear commander," the response chimed over the comm, tense and expectant.
"Commander send down a med-kit and two toxin filters," she paused, her finger pressed to the comm, "Rex, it's Anakin."
Screams
Anakin struggled through the parting mist, its many curls and swirls twisted around him revealing the warped landscape he had stumbled into.
A second scream rent the air around him. Heart wrenching in its pain and sorrow, it tore at the gentle cream-colored throat of the woman around him.
"Hello?"
He reached out to her, she shrank from him,
"Your breaking my heart," she sobbed, turning upon him with careworn eyes,
"Anakin"
"Padme," he gasped
Dismayed he wrapped his arms round her frail body, she felt thin and sickly, her bones seemed to pierce into his skin, and it was with horror he realized she had withered away in his arms.
"Padme!" he cried out as his wife's ashes were swept away
He looked up, the light suddenly seemed blinding, and he blinked up at the scarred face of a man he thought to be a ghost
"Chancellor Palpatine," he backed away, his head shaking
"It seems in your anger you killed her," his words had lost the lilt of comfort they had always seemed to have. Rather, he seemed to sneer, there was pride in his voice and triumph.
"You used me!" The jedi master pointed into nothing, the Chancellor was gone.
"You chose not to see," two voices whispered in unison. Anakin felt their cold hands resting on his back; he turned on his heel as they whispered, Fives and Ahsoka together,
"You didn't believe me,"
they were joined by a chorus of familiar voices,
"You didn't save me!"
His Padawan, his friend… he ran to them with tears in his eyes.
"I'm sorry!" he cried out,
He clutched their tunics and washed their hems with his tears.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" he sobbed, "I'm sorry! I shouldn't have let you go, not without a fight!"
But one after another they turned away, the arc trooper's tunic left a trail of blood in their wake.
"Anakin," a soft voice chided
"Mother," his lips were dry, they could hardly form the word,
She lifted a calloused hand to caress his cheek, "Oh Ani," she whispered, shaking her head.
"Mother," he sobbed, burying his head in her shoulder.
The warmth of her tunic quickly turned to heat, and then screams,
The screams of men, of women, of children.
"You were the chosen one," someone sighed, pulling him from the flames when he thought he had cried himself hoarse. Warm brown robes surrounded him, the same ones he'd watched on a funeral pyre his first day of freedom.
Qui-Gon looked down scornfully, "Now look what you've done,"
"Please," the word caught in his raw throat, "Please master I didn't mean to,"
But it burned, the screams burned- the darkness burned
"You see," pale bony fingers curled round his shoulders, and he shivered at the trust he'd learned to feel at their touch, "I only helped you see what you've become."
"No," he cried out weakly, "Please no,"
The hooded man looked down, a chuckle forming on his tallow lips,
"Take hold of your destiny Anakin."
"Rise"
Anakin remembered a quote he'd once heard from Obi-wan as a youngling in the temple,
"A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it"
Perhaps Anakin had thwarted destiny long enough. Perhaps he had always been meant to- to-
Mortis
He remembered now, how he had turned, as perhaps he had always been meant to.
"Anakin!"
"Anakin!"
Voices- so many voices always calling his name. They were ghosts, ghosts sent to torment him. He tore at his hair, as though he could wrench their voices from his ears. If they could see what he'd become-
"Anakin!" a hand too familiar, too comforting found his shoulder. And in the same moment his hand found his saber.