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ANAKIN'S REDEMPTION

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Chapter Twenty - Visions from the Force

In the distance, shimmering in the heat, appeared the domed shapes of the former Lars moisture farm. Anakin and Luke immediately began to experience flashbacks of painful memories upon seeing the farm. Luke remembered his aunt and uncle and the horror of discovering their burned and charred remains. Anakin grasped the handrail tightly as he recalled his short time spent at this farm, the fear and worry for his mother only to find her beaten and dying at the hands of the Tusken Raiders. The tears stung his eyes, still fresh even after all these years. He felt an arm slide across his back, and found Leia beside him, looking at him with big eyes. He wrapped an arm around her, knowing that she too had lost her family as he had. She understood.

As the speeder stopped at the farm, it was clear the farm had been abandoned for many years. The buildings still bore blackened scars from the Imperial Attack. Tuskens and Jawas had raided the farm for anything of value.

"Home sweet home, huh Luke?" said Han, trying to break the obvious tension.
"Nothing but bad memories here," sighed Luke. "Even the good memories are of people who are dead now. Biggs, my aunt…"
Anakin fought a fresh wave of guilt that was welling up inside. Had he made different choices after his mother's death, his children would not have suffered as he had. He swallowed hard.
"Okay so the grave site was just over here. But I don't see the markers…"
"I remember something being there when I was younger," recalled Luke. "But my uncle took them down. I asked him why, and he told me to mind my business. He was always doing that." Luke sighed. He never would understand why his uncle kept his real life such a secret. "I always thought one of the graves belonged to my Father." He grinned at Anakin. "Turns out, I was wrong."

Anakin stepped to where the graves should be. "Yes…" he said thoughtfully. "It was right here. I remember, I was kneeling here, Owen, Beru and Cliegg were behind me." He picked up the sand and let it drain through his fingers as he had that day. "And Padme was there too," he added wistfully, his voice barely a whisper.
Leia slowly knelt down beside him. "Hello grandmother," she said softly. Luke followed, feeling a little awkward. "Um, hi grandmother," he said. "I'm your grandson Luke. Sorry I never knew you were here."
"This is my family," Anakin told the unmarked grave. "We're almost all together. I'm…I'm doing just fine now. I was…a little lost for a while there. I…I really hope you haven't been watching all these years. You would have been so ashamed…"
"No!" protested Luke and Leia.
"I hope you were looking over my children here instead," Anakin continued. "They're the ones to be proud of."
"She would be proud of you too," insisted Leia firmly. Luke nodded his agreement.

Han and Chewie stood back, clearly uncomfortable, watching. Chewie remembered his own family on Kashyyk, whom he had not seen in years. Han didn't really understand what was going on, having never had a real family of his own. He found himself wondering if he would, one day.

Anakin suddenly lifted his head. His face went blank for a moment.
"She's here," he said, eyes wide.
"What? Who?" asked Han.
Luke gasped. "I felt it too."
"Felt what?" Han frowned.
"Yes…I definitely sense it…"
"Sense WHAT?" Han was growing frustrated.
"Mother," Luke answered him, looking into the sky.
"Padme," said Anakin. "She's here."
That got Leia's attention. She snapped around. "Here on Tatooine? Why?"

Anakin looked to Luke. "Do you think she came here to hide from me?"
Luke considered him for a moment. "It's possible…it's a remote location. And clearly nobody thought you would come here again…"
Anakin frowned. "She's gone. The presence…I lost it."
Luke searched through the Force. "Yes…I can't feel her either!"
"What does that mean?" Leia looked worried.
"Well, it could mean she…that she…just died..." Anakin's voice choked on the words.
"No," said Luke, concentrating. "I think I'd feel it if she was dead. It's more like she just… disappeared!"
"Maybe she left the planet?" suggested Han. "Maybe she was here a minute ago, and took off?"
Leia nodded. "That's the best explanation I can think of. Certainly if she got word that Anakin was here, she'd have left."

"Perhaps," considered Luke. "But something doesn't feel right."
"Did you get a sense of how she felt?" asked Leia. "Was she suffering?"

"I felt….a lot of fear," said Luke.
"Fear of me." Anakin dropped his head.
"Perhaps…." Luke was distant as he tried to get a sense of his mother.
"There!" he cried. "I felt her again! Did you feel it Father?" Anakin closed his eyes. "Yes…just for a second," he acknowledged.
"She's still here then!"
Han was bewildered "What are the odds of her being on the one planet we came to visit?"
Anakin and Luke looked at each other. "Will of the Force!" they said in unison.
"So that's what it was…" Leia said to herself thoughtfully, looking off into the distance. "I wonder…."
"Wonder what?" asked Anakin, turning to her curiously.
"Well...it's just that I had a weird dream….a little green man told me if I went to Tatooine, I could put my family back together. When I woke up, I thought of my grandmother and it seemed like a nice idea to bring us all closer…"
Luke and Anakin's eyes were wide as they looked first at Leia, then at each other.
"Did the little green man have big eyes and pointy ears?" asked Luke eagerly.
"Yeah, and did he talk backwards?" added Anakin.
Leia frowned. "Yes…how the hell did you know that?"
"Yoda!" they both said.
"What the heck are you talking about?" Han was getting very tired of their Jedi double talk.
"Yoda visited you!" cried Luke. "You can use the Force, Leia!"
Leia just looked confused. "It was just a dream…"
"A Force dream," explained Anakin. "That was our Jedi Master, Yoda. He was trying to tell you where Padme was!"

"Who was?" Han turned his head back and forth for an answer.

"That's amazing." Leia was wondrous. "I never thought I had that power…"

"What power?" Han's face was turning purple.

"This means something," Anakin said seriously, pulling his head up. "We've been brought here to find Padme. We need to look for her. I must speak to her."

"Are you sure you should see her again?" Luke looked at him doubtfully. "Would it be…good…for either of you?

Anakin sighed. "Look, I realize that she may not ever accept me. I have made my peace with the situation. I know that my life with Padme is over. I have you and Leia, which is more than I ever could have asked for and more than I deserve. I don't want to hurt her, nor do I want to compromise myself and the progress I've made. But I will not have her tearing around the universe in terror for the rest of her life in some misdirected fear of me! She needs to know that she can have her life back. Return to Naboo, resume her public life if she wishes. Remarry, if that she what she wants. I just have to make sure she knows she is free now. If she wants to stay away from me, that's ok. But we must tell her she need not hide on this wasteland of a planet. She can go home. I'm no threat to her."

Leia nodded supportively. "I agree. If she is here as you say, it's a good opportunity to explain things to her. I don't like the idea of just leaving her."

"Um, don't mean to be a wet blanket here, but how exactly are you going to find her?" Han looked skeptical. "This is a huge planet, and you're going by a feeling that disappears every time you get it?"

Luke and Anakin looked at each other uncertainly. "We should head in the direction we felt her presence. Hopefully we will sense her again as we get closer," proposed Anakin."That sounds good," nodded Luke. "I wonder why we keep losing her…"

"I imagine it has something to do with the ysalamiri," said Leia. "If she walks away from them, you feel her. When she moves back, she's gone."

Anakin and Luke looked at her, suddenly understanding. "Of course!"

"We should get moving now, before it gets dark. The Sand People come out at night, and we do not want to mess with them," advised Luke.

Anakin made a scoffing noise. "The last time I met Sand People, they were the ones not wanting to mess with me. They don't scare me. If they try to get near us, they'll be sorry. After what they did to my mother…"

"Father," warned Luke in a cautionary tone.

"I know, I know," he said, suddenly sounding every bit the scolded child.

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Anakin and Luke sat on the speeder, crossed legged, eyes closed, deep in a Jedi trance. Every now and then one of them spoke up. "I feel her! This way!" and directed Chewie which way to steer the speeder.

Leia leaned on the side, watching the sandy landscape zoom by. A few times she closed her eyes and tried to feel whatever it was her brother and father were searching for. But she felt nothing. She bit her lip in frustration. Sometimes she thought she could feel something. She'd heard Luke that day on Bespin, and she'd felt when he survived the Death Star. She had a dream about some weird green Jedi, though she wondered if she actually needed to be force capable to be visited. Surely only HE needed those abilities to reach her.

"A credit for your thoughts, Miss Organa?" Han's voice interrupted her reverie.
"Skywalker," she corrected absently.
"Huh?"
"My name is not Leia Organa, it's Leia Skywalker. Organa was my adoptive name. Now I am back with my real family. I am a Skywalker."
"Oh," said Han, frowning a little. He shrugged. "Okay, Miss Skywalker."

From within his Jedi trance, Anakin opened one eye and smiled to himself.