"Anakin, help me! Help, Anakin!"
Senator Amidala is lying on an operating table. She is screaming, her face contorted in pain. Medical droids surround her while two human doctors speak urgently to themselves, their grim faces showing their desperation.
"We are losing her," one says, shaking his head. "The haemorrhage is too extensive."
"At least we were able to save the twins…"
"Yeah…"
The monitor connected to Senator Amidala starts beeping frantically as one of the doctors shouts a series of orders. "Her heart is failing!"
Suddenly the door of the surgery room opens and a man enters. Of average height, he has reddish-brown hair, a well-trimmed beard, and blue-grey eyes that are devoid of light and yet very luminous.
He steps near the operating table and takes the woman's hand in his own. "Hang on Padme," he says in a clear, cultured voice. "You have twins, Padme They need you . . . hang on…"
Then he closes his eyes and a mask of total concentration falls on his face.
Silence reigns in the room as the Senator's screams cease and the frantic beeping of the monitor calms down.
Colour returns to the new mother's cheeks, her heart now beats strongly. The haemorrhage has stopped.
The bearded man opens his eyes and smiles. "She will be all right," he says.
One of the doctors stares at him open-mouthed. "This is incredible. How did you do it?"
"I used the Force. I commanded the midi-chlorians inside her…told them to repair the damage in her body…"
"The Force? Are you a Jedi?"
"No."
"Then who are you?"
"I am-"
"- and my vision ends here, Master Yoda, Mace," Qui-Gon Jinn said turning around from the window he had been looking out to face the other two Jedi in the room.
"Always at the same point it ends?" Yoda asked.
"Yes," Qui-Gon answered with a half-sigh, before moving back to sit on the round plush chair in front of Yoda. "It always ends after this mysterious man saves Senator Amidala. I have tried to relive the vision during meditation, to make it longer and learn the man's name, but to no avail."
Yoda and Mace Windu exchanged a glance before the diminutive master said, "Visited me Young Skywalker did yesterday. Troubled he was. Worried because of a vision he was. Someone dear to him dying he saw. Told him this person to let go, I did, but my advice, follow he would not."
"Are you saying Anakin is having a vision similar to mine? That he is seeing Padme's death?"
"It would be logical, don't you think?" Mace Windu intervened in the discussion. "We all know Skywalker is very attached to the Senator."
"To his wife," Qui-Gon mumbled, once again experiencing the pang he had first felt when Mace and Yoda had informed him Anakin had married Padme Amidala, just after Geonosis.
Back then, Qui-Gon had wanted to confront Anakin about his blatant break of the Jedi Code. However the two masters had stopped him, although they had not elaborated on why he should not do it—and they had decided to keep their discovery secret and not expel his Padawan from the order. Qui-Gon had suspected their behaviour might have been influenced by the fact that Anakin was reputed to be the Chosen One, and that feeling returned now.
"What's going on, Masters? I sense you have kept something hidden since the moment you discovered Anakin was married and I would like to know what it is. He is my former padawan and my friend. I think I have the right to know, especially now that I am experiencing these visions."
Qui-Gon fell silent and watched as Yoda and Windu exchanged another long glance, and the green master nodded.
Mace turned to concentrate on Qui-Gon and leant forward, fingers steepled in front of his face.
"Shortly before Geonosis, as Master Nu was running a search in our archives to discover who had erased Kamino from our records, she found an ancient tome. Inside, there was a previously unknown version of the Chosen One prophecy. The first part was similar to the one we already knew, but the last part was completely new." Mace took out a datapad from his inner pocket, switched it on and then read:
"A time will come when the Darkness will tempt the Chosen One,
When fear he will feel for someone he loves.
But a man will come to help him.
Lost in darkness, filled with Light,
The knight that should have been will save the Chosen One's love.
And Darkness will not prevail."
The Korun master put away the datapad and continued, "As soon as we read this, we began wondering who the person might be that Anakin would fear to lose. We thought it might be his mother, but we discovered she had recently died. We thought it might be you. And then, after seeing them fight side by side on Geonosis, we thought it might be Senator Amidala. So we put Jedi to guard over her—this is how we discovered their marriage. She is guarded and protected every moment, but now we know from your vision the danger to her won't come from another life attempt but by her own labour."
"It makes sense," Qui-Gon said slowly, his mind lost in thought.
"We want you to find the man you see in your visions, Qui-Gon."
"What?!" his head snapped up, and he did not try to cover his surprise.
"Only you can do it, because you know his face."
"But how can I find him? I have no clue from where I can start my search."
"Wrong, you are. Clues in the prophecy there are," Yoda exclaimed, tapping the floor with his gimer stick to prove his point.
Qui-Gon frowned, then thought back to the lines Mace had just recited.
"The knight that should have been…Uhm…Could this indicate someone who should have been a Jedi?" Qui-Gon rubbed his beard as he developed his theory. "It's possible since in my vision it is clear the man used the Force to heal Padme. But this isn't very helpful. Many times Force sensitive children aren't discovered or not given to the Temple for training. Or could this line indicate an initiate that failed to be chosen as padawan by a master?"
"We have been wondering about this possibility since the new part of the prophecy was discovered. I've a complete list of initiates that failed to be chosen in the past two hundred years on my computer," Mace commented, "but I never had enough time to study it in detail due to the war. I will send it to your quarters."
Qui-Gon nodded. "Does the list include the initiates sent to the Healers Corps?"
"Yes, of course."
"Of what 'lost in darkness' can mean an idea you have?" asked Yoda.
Qui-Gon frowned. "I don't think it refers to the dark side; otherwise the other line, 'full of Light' wouldn't make sense." He closed his eyes and concentrated, recalling his vision and the mysterious man's face. There was something strange in it…what was it? There…his eyes! The Jedi master smiled slowly. "He is blind," he finally said. "He is 'lost in darkness' because he cannot see."
Mace half-smiled as Yoda's ears perched up. "This should be helpful to narrow down the search."
"Only if the man was already blind when he was here at the Temple— admitting he has been an Initiate, something we are not sure of."
"That's right," Mace commented, sobering again. He shook his head, before continuing. "Qui-Gon, start this search at once. The knights guarding Senator Amidala have reported her pregnancy is quite advanced and her labour could start soon. Anakin Skywalker is already fearing for her life and thus, if the prophecy is right, we can presume the Sith Lord will soon come out to tempt him. We have no idea of how he may tempt Skywalker, what kind of offer he would make, but we cannot let it happen. You must find that man Qui-Gon. It's too important."
Qui-Gon nodded, pursing his lips.
Yes, it was too important. He loved Anakin and he had faith in him, but he could not deny the fact his former padawan had been a cause of concern lately. He had changed during the war and become more reserved, brooding…darker. The man, the teacher inside Qui-Gon could not, would not believe Anakin would ever betray the Jedi and let the darkness consume him-- the Jedi inside him knew he could not rule it out completely.
The only way to prevent it was to bring the prophecy to its fulfilment. Out there, in the galaxy, there was a man lost in darkness—and Qui-Gon Jinn would find him.