Chapter V: Padawan Lost
Ahsoka leaned back in the pilot's seat of her stolen TIE fighter, the remains of the ship's emergency medical kit scattered across the flight deck.
How long had she lain broken and bleeding at the bottom of the chasm before her consciousness had stirred? How long had it taken her to emerge, barely clinging to life and force herself to mount the ruins of the temple and search for the means of her escape? She didn't know.
The pain, which had come in jagged streaks of white lightning across her thigh and lower back as she had dragged herself across the barren landscape of Moraband, had finally receded to a dull roar, banished to the edge of her consciousness by a raft of looted painkillers. Her wasted lips had cracked and bled the moment she had taken water from the ship's stores, followed quickly by spasms of retching from a stomach long since shrunken with disuse.
She was dying and she knew it, but the realization meant nothing. The agony of her body served only to heighten the feverish hysteria that convulsed her consciousness. Her mind reeled endlessly back and forth over the events that had transpired at the dreaded Sith temple. Jedi training and years of discipline had seemingly vanished in the face of the traumatic revelation.
He was alive.
She had faced him. Her master. Her best friend. A reunion that in all her fantasies had been uniformly joyful had in reality proven the most terrifying and terrible experience of her life.
Worst of all, she had faced the unforgiving and unforgivable truth that Anakin Skywalker was Darth Vader.
Oh, master! Master! Anakin… please! Don't let this be! Anything, anything but this!
Her broken mind had repeated these anguished cries in an endless, bottomless death spiral. The physical pain, she understood, was a mercy in this insane circumstance. Only the blackouts driven by her body's weakening struggle against her wounds provided any relief. She had found herself praying for the pain and injuries to take her so she could at last escape the memories that tortured her fevered mind.
Each waking moment brought her back to the windswept altar of evil where she had revealed the face of the dark lord himself, to that awful, sickening instance when reality itself had broken and she had felt his presence through the Force, the moment she knew she would do anything and everything to save her best friend… and then minutes later, when she had proven it.
Her old world, her old life, had ended. She wept as much for this, she knew, as for her master. The events on Moraband cycled endlessly over and over in her mind, the devastating revelation, the duel where she betrayed her beliefs and the final descent into oblivion.
Suddenly the console in front of her beeped and two of the small screens blinked rapidly as they displayed line after line of code. She had no memory of initiating the startup sequence. Time seemed to skip and the barest moment later the hum of the engines around her and the dashboard instruments indicated the ship was ready for takeoff.
She looked up at the controls on the console suspended over her head, her mind lost in an opiate induced fog.
Foils… foils… must put them in launch position…
Her powerfully trained mind tried to focus, forcing her left hand upward. Her right arm was useless, broken in two places. The orange limb rose far enough for her to see the cauterized hole where Darth Vader's saber had cut it clean through. Her hand wavered. The pain, which had blissfully receded after her orgy of injections, flooded back upon her. She gritted her teeth in agony, feeling a gout of warm blood escaping between them and dropped her hand.
Her breathing now came in heavy, ragged gasps. The painkillers could do nothing to heal the internal injuries that would no doubt soon kill her.
Ahsoka looked up to try again and caught sight of her reflection on the bright, polished surface of the darkened communication display. Gone was the athletic, confident ex Jedi she had always seen in the mirror. In her place was a skeletal, haunted creature with blood, dried and fresh, spattered all over her face, mouth and neck. Her beautifully patterned lekku had been perforated in many places, an unsightly, nauseating mess that wept blood, puss and the chitinous tissue of which it was made.
She barely saw any of these things. The glimpse of herself in the display shocked and terrified her beyond anything she had seen since arriving on this cursed world.
My eyes!
The eyes that had stared back at her had been hard, alien, pools of the palest blue surrounded by a ring of angry, reptilian yellow.
The universe spun once again. A sharp intake of breath at the sight of her reflection brought another spasm of rapidly escalating pain. She tried to release the breath, but the sensation only worsened as she let it out in brief, staccato bursts.
Don't let fear control you! Only by mastering your fear will you be able to help others!
There it was again, the voice in her mind, giving her advice, coming to her in times of need. His voice. She bit her bloody lip. How many times had her master told her that when she was his padawan? More times than she could count. Resolution sprung up within her.
I won't let you down again, Master! I'll make this right! I promise!
Her head snapped back up as soon as the pain in her chest ebbed. A pair of deep blue orbs sparkled in the reflection. Her panic receded. Her breathing resumed its heavy, ragged gasps.
Had it been a trick? The momentary hallucination of a confused and unbalanced mind? She knew it reflected the deep seated fear that had settled in her breast like a cancer after her duel with Anakin on Moraband. She had betrayed his teachings, betrayed the light, betrayed herself… and his words… Vader's words… echoed in her head…
"Indeed, you are no Jedi. Your hate has made you powerful."
"Kill me then, Anakin," she had begged, still gasping for breath, "please… let me die a Jedi… even if I was never one in life."
Tears welled once more, but Ahsoka ruthlessly suppressed both them and the shame she felt at her betrayal. Forcing these feelings aside, she raised her left hand and calmly flipped the switches that set the foils in proper position. She exhaled as she heard the metal extensions unfolding on each side of the craft.
Moments later the ship was bursting through the upper atmosphere. The acceleration put pressure on her wounds, intensifying the pain. She grimaced and bore it. Mercifully, she blacked out once again. Sometime later she woke to find the ship escaping the planet's gravity well. The drugs still drowned out the pain, but her mind was a bit clearer than before.
She entered the coordinates for Atollon into the navicomputer.
"Whose TIE was this?" she wondered idly. It must have been either Seventh Sister's or Fifth Brother's. She knew she should search for a homing beacon or other security devices before making the jump for the rebel base, but she didn't have the strength.
Moments later the ship was at light speed.
Her breath now came in shallow, broken rasps. Dimly she was aware that somehow she had ended up on the flight deck, her broken leg splayed beneath her body, bent where she knew there was no joint. At this final point her thoughts became lucid and strangely disconnected from her smashed physical form.
Is this it, then? Will I die here?
If I live… what will I tell them? What can I tell them?
Her mind flashed to Rex, her best friend besides Anakin, her trusted and loyal compatriot. In her mind's eye he always appeared as he did when she first met him, young and strong with clear eyes that spoke of a true heart.
Rex! Help me! Please! What should I do!? Can I tell you this? Burden you with this terrible truth, as I am? Can I… can I destroy Anakin in your heart forever?
She knew she could not.
Mercifully her awareness of her surroundings receded once more as memories from her life began to drift through her mind in slow motion. Master Plo finding her on Shili, the beautiful yellow and orange grasslands of her people waving in the morning sun. She had looked up to see a beautiful silver craft descending and screamed in delight, "Look mummy! There's a spaceship up in the sky!" She remembered the joy of discovering her Force crystal on Ilum with Master Yoda and building her first light saber. The terror that had gripped her when her meditation class had been interrupted by a temple guard to announce that the Clone War had begun. Meeting her master for the first time, the legendary Anakin Skywalker, and his master, General Kenobi, at the Battle of Christophsis.
Inside she smiled at this last memory. She treasured it. "Skyguy" hadn't been pleased to learn that he'd been assigned an apprentice, a fact that provided Obi Wan an enormous amount of amusement. By the end of that mission she knew that she had found the best master for her, perhaps the only master she would accept.
He didn't want me… but… he needed me...
The deep seated certainty of this belief comforted her more than any other.
Her mind continued to wander over her life. The landing at Point Rain during the Second Battle of Geonosis. The hunt for the Malevolence. The Ryloth campaign and the lessons she learned there from her master. Saving his life on Cato Neimoidia.
The war was so awful… but we were so happy… I was so happy… what happened? What happened to us? What happened to you, Anakin? How did it end this way?
She had been so confident they would win the war. Dooku would be brought to justice and somehow, someway, good people like Padme Amidala, Bail Organa and Riyo Chuchi would address the legitimate grievances of decent Separatists like Mina and Lux Bonteri. The Republic would be restored. She would become the Jedi she had always wanted to be and would serve in peace and happiness where she belonged, alongside Anakin Skywalker, her friend and master.
Her memories shifted away from these happy fantasies to the bombing of the Temple. The betrayal of her friend, Bariss Offee. Her strange arrangement with the Sith war criminal, Asajj Ventress. The bitter, rigged trials that destroyed her faith in both the Jedi Order and the Republic. Her last meeting with Anakin as she remembered him, her desperate plea to let her help him rescue the man she later came to hate more than anyone else in the galaxy. The man who had proclaimed himself Emperor, replaced the Republic with a vile slave state, murdered her friends and above all… taken Anakin away from her and turned him into Darth Vader.
She found herself screaming in her own mind.
But, but… there is no Vader! It's Anakin! Anakin Skywalker! I won't give up on you, master! I won't! Not ever!
The events on Moraband came flooding back to her. She quailed internally at arriving once again at these dreadful, sickening memories. She'd cycled through them countless times, but still she could not stop them.
She watched as the dark lord towered over Ezra.
"I don't fear you!" the boy screamed.
The monster spoke, his voice deep and threatening.
"Then you will die braver than most."
Vader and Ezra traded but two blows before the young Jedi's light saber was smashed to pieces. The boy fell to the ground and cringed in fear.
"Perhaps I was wrong."
The Sith raised his fiery lightsaber to strike, but she interrupted.
"It wouldn't be the first time."
He turned to face her. The mask completely concealed the face of the creature inside. It was hideous, soulless and sinister. The dark side of the Force swirled around the black monster in thick, inky curls. The eerie whisper of the dark lord's breath completed the visage of evil.
"It was foretold that you would be here," the black foe began, "Our long-awaited meeting has come at last."
She shivered slightly at this, her body rapidly divining what her conscious mind still refused to accept.
"I'm glad I gave you something to look forward to," she taunted.
"We need not be adversaries," he countered in a neutral tone, "The Emperor will show you mercy if you tell me where the remaining Jedi can be found."
"There are no Jedi," she contradicted bitterly, "You and your Inquisitors have seen to that."
The Sith ignored her response and turned back to Ezra.
"Perhaps this child will confess what you will not."
Unable to control herself, she revealed her deepest fear and greatest hope all at once, the words tumbling out in a swift torrent.
"I was beginning to believe I knew who you were behind that mask, but it's impossible. My master could never be as vile as you!"
Vader pivoted sharply to face her, his voice dripping contempt.
"Anakin Skywalker was weak. I destroyed him."
Her heart quailed with a strange, alien combination of anger and relief. Had this monster killed her master? Was it that simple?
"Then I will avenge his death," she vowed, her eyes flashing.
"Revenge is not the Jedi way," her opponent replied softly.
Something in the dark lord's tone tugged at the edge of her consciousness. A trace of disapproval? Disappointment? She couldn't tell. Warning bells rang loudly in her head, but she ignored them. All she knew for certain was her retort.
"I am no Jedi."
She drew her brilliant white lightsabers, fully committed to defending Ezra and destroying the monster that threatened him. Vader activated his own weapon in response, casting his form in a hellish pink aura. The distance closed between them as if by its own accord. They fought fiercely, their bodies lit in rapidly alternating hues of red and white. Hate and anger poured forth from her opponent, threatening to overwhelm her while the wind, charged with raw energy from the imploding altar, whipped around them.
Forced outside the pyramid, Vader threw her off the parapet. When she returned to the summit she found Kanan and Ezra desperately holding onto the Sith holocron as Vader used the Force to pull it from them. Leaning forward, her white lightsabers trailing behind her, she rushed headlong at the enemy.
The dark lord spun to face her just as she launched herself at him. He fended off one blow, but her offhand saber sliced open his mask as she vaulted over his head. She landed on both feet and looked up to see Ezra and Kanan, hands outstretched to her, as if at the end of a tunnel in some heady dream, beckoning urgently from the outside of the now rapidly closing pyramid wall.
"Ahsoka!" the boy called, "Come on, hurry!"
Her legs tensed as she prepared to run to her friends, but a single word from the wounded monster behind her turned them to stone.
"Ahsoka."
Her eyes widened and her breath caught in her throat. Gone was the deep, mechanically altered speech of Darth Vader. This voice was different, distorted, but still heart achingly familiar.
She turned away from her new friends for the last time. Behind her the dark lord turned his head to meet her gaze. There a baleful yellow eye gleamed, exposed through the cut she had made in the hideous mask.
"Ahsoka," he repeated, louder this time.
She stood frozen in shock. The moment this familiar voice said her name she felt a ripple through the Force as unique as a signature. Recognition exploded in her mind and reality itself twisted sickeningly on its axis. The ground beneath her pitched and swayed drunkenly. Whether it was the impending destruction of the temple or the shock of her realization, she did not know. The truth, the black, hideous monster that appeared unbidden now before her, was undeniable.
Anakin Skywalker was Darth Vader.
She heard screaming high on the wind only to realize it was in her mind.
Please, no! Not this! Anything but this!
She raised her eyes to regard her former master. Tears shimmered but did not fall.
"Anakin…" she breathed.
The memory dissolved. Dimly she realized she had repeated his name aloud.
Her mind returned to the present just enough to register that the ship had emerged from light speed. The wild motion of the stars outside indicated that the craft was spinning out of control.
She knew she couldn't do a thing about it.
Her consciousness faded with her memory and as she descended into oblivion she took with her Darth Vader's final command…
"Take your place with me and together we can achieve what we always wanted – to restore peace and freedom to the galaxy!"