Where Am I Going To?

Part Three

Chapter Twelve

There was a blinding flash of light, something eyes could not adjust to, because his already had. He saw nothing but light, endless and beautiful, and he heard voices far off, and the light grew stronger now. He felt the cold air on his dead skin, which he hadn't felt in twenty three years.

"Father?"

And the light faded, leaving only the briefest halo around the head of his son, who was holding him tenderly, unafraid by his gruesome appearance.

An angel…

And Vader, Anakin, closed his eyes for a moment and allowed himself to think of the boy's mother.

He was going home. And it momentarily pained him to think he would lose Luke because of that, but he knew better. He could never lose him.

He opened his eyes again when a tear drop stained his cheek. His son was crying over him. Not even over his appearance, he could tell, but over his soul, which was slowly gaining some whiteness amidst the black that had so long tainted it.

The halo around the boy's head – no doubt caused by a ceiling light angled just conveniently…surely…. – did not fade. The boy was light.

"There," Luke gulped, straining to control his voice. "Can I put it back on now? It's not that it bothers me, I don't care one way or the other, I just don't want you to go without it for too long, in case you might…."

Good God, it was like looking in a mirror! Those eyes! They'd always been that heart melting blue, but had they ever been so sparkly, even with the tears?

Vader, Anakin, shook his head. He was never putting that mask back on ever again.

"Please?" begged the loyal son. "You must live," he pleaded. "You've got to see Leia. I really think she and Han are gonna seriously hook up. The way they look at each other…it's quite disgusting….Father?"

The light was coming back….

"Father, please…."

No, he couldn't leave him like this.

Reaching out a trembling hand, he felt it tightly grasped by the young man, who pressed it to his cheek in desperation. Oh, the boy was too good for him….

"There," he whispered hoarsely. "You've won….I'm so proud of you…." Luke didn't respond, leaning in to catch the soft words. "I love you…so much…"

"I know you do…" Luke murmured fiercely.

"Now…you go on….go back to your sister and your friends….I've got…to go too…."

And Vader, Anakin started slipping back again, started closing his eyes. All was calm, even with the sirens blaring and the officers running about in a mad frenzy.

"Don't leave me!"

Like a frightened child! How could he deny that voice? He'd tried when Luke was still a boy, but it had never worked.

"Everyone always leaves me…."

"Not me," he whispered, fighting for these last moments only because he knew his son needed them so desperately. "I will stay with you for the rest of eternity."

"Please…."

"I'm so happy…" It was almost impossible to hear him now. "Thank you…" Anakin was smiling.

"Father…" No reply as the form slipped further from his grasp. "Father!" Nothing. The body fell from his grip, and the soul fled into the light it saw, among the voices it had always treasured, and Luke sat there dumbstruck, mute. Like a knife was plunged into his heart, and being twisted. He gasped for air, felt himself trembling.

I couldn't even save him! Not one person! Force, why! Not one person…

There was nothing he could do, and he was too afraid to die. But there was the shuttle, and beyond that was a short hop to Endor.

What else could he do?

…

When the shuttle had landed with both of its passengers, only one got up – because only one could. And when the ramp was lowered, only one began the descent – because only one could manage it.

And when that one – being a bruised and bloodied Luke – saw an ecstatic Leia waiting for him, his knees buckled, he stomach flipped, and he ultimately collapsed at the ground in front of her.

This sent Leia into a tizzy, who was grabbing him and shaking him and about to go screaming for a medic when she was able to tell that Luke's vital signs were not failing.

"Luke?" she asked, trembling from her momentary scare. He was inconsolable, and she knew he hadn't really cried since Obi-Wan had died, and she slowly lowered herself to the ground next to it.

He took her hands, pressing them to his face and trying to breath. He spilled the whole episode to her there, them just sitting there while words flowed uninterrupted from his lips. "I failed him…Damn it, I couldn't do anything! Not a damn thing!" His tirade would have gone on had she not freed her hands to smooth back his hair while she whispered hush.

"What are you talking about?"

He stared up at her with red rimmed eyes that didn't even have the luxury of being hollow – they weren't completely beaten with the shock of it, they felt every pain freshly and acutely. "He's dead," he choked out, and Leia blinked at him, still pushing hair out of his eyes.

"And that's why you think you failed?"

He nodded. "Why am I so useless? Why do I try so hard to save people if the only thing I do is hurt them? I killed him!"

"I don't believe that."

"I may as well have. If I hadn't fought him, if I hadn't worn him out-"

"If only you'd give into the Dark Side? Luke, listen – and hear me!" He stopped his sniffling, met her tragic gaze and felt a strange, calming stupor fall over him. She struggled for a moment. "He…You didn't fail him. He died loving you, and Sith can't love. So he wasn't a Sith. He died a good man, and didn't you say yourself you went to save his soul? Well, Luke, you saved his soul. You couldn't protect his body, had to hurt it in order to accomplish what had to happen, but you still won." She stood now, gently pulling him up with her. "I refuse to hate you for something like this, and I demand you see clearly. Alright, maybe you can't save the galaxy. Really, no one asked you to. But you did save Anakin Skywalker, Luke. And that's more than enough, more than most people can do."

They wrapped their arms around each other, his sobs fading into hiccups as he clung to her in the gathering darkness of the forest moon, and his breathing slowly calmed. Yes, she was right, something told him that. And at least that was something….

…

He was gentle when he put the finishing touches of the pyre together, laid the mask down. He let his fingers roam the surface of the barrier his father had hated all his days momentarily, and sighed. He wasn't happy. He couldn't be, because he missed his father terribly.

But all he had to do was reach out, and there he was – glittering in the Force like a newly born star.

He simply looked at the funeral pyre for a long moment, drank up the scene that he knew he'd carry with him for the rest of his days. Burned onto his retinas, like Obi-Wan's death at his father's hands, the corpses of his family on Tatooine, watching Yoda die in that small, dirty hut…And though the memories sounded unpleasant, he did not think of them with fear or even bitterness. He acknowledged that they happened, and nothing he could have said or done would really have changed it. He would have liked for things to work out differently, but there it was.

He would have liked to have had a real, semi-complete family. But he had his sister, and if he ever wanted to see his mother or his father, he could reach out. They were still a family, even if they weren't quite tangible.

And thinking of his long separated parents together made Luke smile, even as he remembered the torch in his hand, waiting to burn the body of the man he'd loved dearly all his life. The only family he had thought he'd had in the entire galaxy – and there he'd been proven wrong. That was a gift to treasure if anything was.

Well, and? Burn the body, and he destroyed nothing. The soul had been saved, and continued on; would continue on until the end of everything. Luke had to believe that.

Obi-Wan, and Yoda, and his mother and father….they were all right there. He hadn't lost them. He never had.

So he didn't mind when he put the torch slowly down to catch fire with the funeral pyre he'd made with absolute care and intensity. He tossed the rest of the stick in once the wood caught, and took a step back, watching the flames grow. He smelled the suit burning as the fire began to consume it, and he didn't care. He watched the flame like every aspect of the funeral landing – and if fire could destroy, couldn't it cleanse? Wasn't gold put through fires that were white hot, and didn't it emerge glittering?

And thus was life. Hard and hot, but, ultimately, worth the price.

Luke closed his eyes to the warmth of the fire, life circulating warm and real in the next generation, and who knew what that could give birth to. Yes, he'd won. Obi-Wan had won, his father had won, nothing mattered anymore. He was at peace with the universe for the moment. He knew he would watch the pyre burn until the embers were finally entirely gone, but in the morning would wake up still aching for his father like the lost child he was. But he would handle that when the time came. Living one day at a time. He could handle that. Maybe as he got better at it he could even try planning whole weeks ahead, but he wasn't quite up to that stage yet. Yes, better be patient. He had learned patience, Obi-Wan had said he would. For the moment, life was marvelous, even with the ache in his chest. He could go back to the party the Rebels were throwing and really smile, not just fake it. Be with the people he loved, who had supported him in his four year struggle. How did anyone survive in this world alone? The couldn't surely. What was living if there was no one to share it with? He and his father had had each other, but even with him gone, Luke was not alone. And he was comforted to know that.

He knew who he was, finally. And where he was going to, for the moment. And nothing else really mattered.

End Part Three

Wow. The end of the final part. All that's left is the Epilogue, with the long awaited Mara Jade. Again, wow. In twelve days, this fic will be a year old. I've got older fics, but this is the only one that lasted a year with pretty much constant updating. Wow. I think I'll just skip to reviews now and make a big long speech on the final chapter. Don't know when that'll be, as I'm still pretty busy. I'd like it to be the fifteenth, I think that'd be pretty neat. Anyway, yours – Shadow13

Jedi X-man Serena Kenobi: Sorry, I never liked the whole "Vader lived!" thing anymore than the "Padme lived!" thing. True, I'll be using the later in my next fic, and it's an interesting idea, but most of the time it's really abused. You have to play these sort of things. I've tried to be pretty careful in this fic. Of course, there's evidence of where I messed up, but otherwise, I don't want this getting too messed up.

Schnickledooger: Um….yes.

Jessica -Angel- Skywalker: I certainly hope so….

Myotismon13: Aw, thank you so much!

Stephanie C: Well, I mean, if I suddenly found out I had a daughter, I think there would be a big WTF moment there, personally. So I just played it off of that.

Madame Naberrie: Wow, your reviews are so much fun! Anyway, nope, sorry. Vader is as burned as Padme is dead. That's just the way it crumbles, cookie wise.

denique: It's another AU (I think I'm incapable or writing anything other than AU) It's got some similarities to this one on the outside, but it's really terribly different. Basically, it's just a "What if everything is switched around?" Anakin and Obi-Wan don't fight on Mustafar, Padme doesn't die in child birth, but Breha does, Luke initially lives with Obi-Wan on Tatooine before ways I'm still shifting through ends up becoming Imperial Prince (surprise, surprise), Mara ends up being Obi-Wan's apprentice. Big complicated mess. Just trust me: It'll be good.

Relyan: Oh, thank you so much! I mean, there's still that element of destiny, i.e. "Luke, you're destined to be a Jedi," other dimension Luke's emotions then forcing him to become one, etc. But ultimately, still, destiny depends on his own choices, not anyone else. Not even his other self. Did that make any sense? I think I just confused myself.

Amylion: And in that respect, he'll never die.