Galaxies Apart
Epilogue: Part Two
57 years ago, in a galaxy a whisper away…
Theed had never known a celebration like it.
Colours bedecked the streets of the city. A parade composed of humans and Gungans, watched by members of both species as well as many offworlders, was winding its way gradually toward the Palace. Gungan musicians and performers performed their instruments and their acrobatics for the first time outside the great aquatic cities in a long time. The spirit of reconciliation, of exuberance, was palpable.
Anakin Skywalker had seen Jabba's occasional processions through Mos Eisley. Next to this they looked tame, albeit in a more violent kind of way; Jabba's purpose with his processions was not to spread joy, but to remind his serfs who ran the show on that particular slice of Tatooine's dustbowl surface.
Anakin's eyes bulged from his head as he walked, dazzled by his surroundings, deafened by the Gungan drums and trumpets, not quite knowing what to gawp and gape at next. There was so much noise and joy. Against the odds, the invasion had been repelled, the battledroid army and its Trade Federation masters defeated.
But there was sadness also. Some Gungans, and some humans, did not join in with the others in their dancing and singing. He had asked Obi-Wan why, when the parade was just beginning its procession. Truth be told he was a little intimidated by Obi-Wan Kenobi still (though but a young man himself to his peers, to a boy of Anakin's age Obi-Wan was most definitely a man), but he had been grateful when the newly minted Jedi Knight had knelt beside him for a moment.
"It's because they've lost family or friends in the battle, Anakin. They mourn them, just as we mourn our own fallen."
His mind had flashed to his mother. He had felt guilty about that, since his mother was still alive; surely his mind should have gone to Qui-Gon Jinn, the Jedi Master who had plucked him from his slave life on Tatooine and had been killed only the day before. Anakin had loved him dearly and missed him terribly, and yet his mind had gone to his mother.
All of this must have played across his mind or shown in his face, even briefly, for Obi-Wan's hand squeezed his shoulder. "Come on, Anakin," he said, a little awkwardly perhaps but Anakin appreciated the effort. He even winked. "We're the heroes today, you and I. Who knows, maybe not for the last time."
"Yeah," Anakin had replied. It did feel good to be cheered, he had to admit. It wasn't quite a match for the feeling when he'd won the Pod Race back home...but it was neat. And he'd liked it when that nice man had told him he would follow his careen with great interest, even though he wasn't quite sure what a careen was. He'd asked Obi-Wan, but the Jedi had only laughed, which had puzzled him even further.
He stood with the others in a line on the steps of the Palace while the crowds cheered, trying not to look too dumb alongside all of these important people, and resisting the urge to tug at his freshly cut Padawan braids for the thousandth time.
The Gungan chieftain, Boss Nass, was accepting a gift of a special boobah (was that what they called it? Anakin had trouble understanding Gungans sometimes) from Pad...from Queen Amidala, Anakin corrected himself. He felt his cheeks warm.
Are you an angel? he thought to himself, and groaned again at the memory. Great line, Anakin. Why not ask her to tuck you into bed and read you a story and be done with it?
He sighed. Girls had been thin on the ground in Tatooine, but he had never really minded that. Lately though...with Padme...
Boss Nass hefted the boobah aloft in his massive hands.
"Peace!" he cried out.
As a declaration, it turned out to be rather wide of the mark.
Lots of things happened very quickly. Anakin could only piece them together afterward, but he knew certain things had to have happened, and the way he figured it, what had to have happened was this:
A blaster bolt was fired from the crowd that shattered the oversized boobah, releasing the pent-up electrical energy stored inside. Every droid in the immediate vicinity erupted in a shower of sparks. Though non-fatal to humanoids, the electrical discharge nonetheless earthed itself painfully through everyone standing on the Palace steps, including Anakin himself. His teeth clacked together and his arms and legs jiggled a little, and he slumped to the stone steps.
The Jedi present - including Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Mace Windu - recovered almost instantly from the shockwave; in fact, the latter pair seemed to shrug off its effects without so much as an effort. The Gungans were not so fortunate. Boss Nass and Jar-Jar were out cold.
Meanwhile, on the square before them, the huge crowd were scattering in fear. Music stopped, acrobats collapsed and they and the coloured banners were trampled underfoot as what had been a mass of joyful celebrating citizens turned into a stampeding animal concerned only with putting distance between itself and the shooting.
Except for a small group of people, moving toward them.
As his arms and legs began to work again and he struggled to his feet, Anakin found himself thrust behind Obi-Wan, his new mentor stepping between his Padawan charge and the group of newcomers responsible for this attack.
There was the snap-hiss of one, two, three lightsaber blades sparking into life beside Anakin as the Jedi present armed themselves in preparation for another assault.
And Anakin, looking from behind Obi-Wan, felt his mouth drop open as his ears carried an impossibly familiar voice to him. His eyes zeroed in on the source of that voice.
"Threepio?"
Clad in an unfamiliar golden shell though he was, left behind in Tatooine half-completed though he was, absolutely impossible though it was, nonetheless there he stood. Well, quivered would have been more accurate; he was doing his best to hide as much of himself behind two humans and a huge furry alien Anakin hazarded a guess was a Wookiee.
"Chewbacca?" he heard Yoda say. What that meant he couldn't guess, but the Wookiee growled long and low, and he saw Yoda's stance change, and some of that battle readiness he had been exhibiting fade.
"Why did you attack us?!" Mace Windu demanded. His stance had not changed an inch.
One of the humans stepped forward. Anakin saw to his surprise that he was quite a young man, not much older than Obi-Wan. He carried himself much more confidently than Obi-Wan did. And he ignored Master Windu's question completely. His eyes were fixed instead on the figure of Chancellor Palpatine, who had not yet risen from the shock of the boobah's explosion.
Fresh sounds assaulted Anakin's ears. Republic guards, reacting to the attack, were converging on the square. Within moments the group facing them would be surrounded on all sides by heavy assault vehicles.
The young one pointed. When he spoke, it was with contempt he made no effort to conceal.
"Three of the greatest Jedi Masters the galaxy has ever produced," he said. "And you stand by his side, not knowing who he is? What he is?"
Palpatine stood.
"Who are you?" he asked. He sounded intensely curious. And it was odd, but Anakin could have sworn the way he normally spoke had changed a little.
"I am Jacen Solo. And you are Darth Sidious. Sith Lord. Future Emperor of the Galactic Empire. Architect of the massacre of billions of innocents and the purging of the Jedi Order."
Anakin felt Obi-Wan's lightsaber-free hand tighten around his chest. Whether it was to stop him moving or whether it was simply an unconscious reaction to what his mentor was hearing, he didn't know.
Yoda and Mace Windu had turned to look at Palpatine. And this was odd, too; the boobah explosion had long since fully discharged, but as Anakin looked at the Chancellor, it seemed for all the worlds as if little sparks of a kind of blue electricity were actually beginning to course through him…
"Deny this charge, do you?" Yoda said.
"THIS IS THE THEED DEFENCE FORCE. SURRENDER YOUR WEAPONS OR WE WILL-"
Click. The commander of the arriving assault vehicles was somewhat taken aback when his communications system failed completely, but not as surprised as he would be in the next few seconds when he and the rest of his forces discovered that their vehicles' motivators and weapons had gone the same way.
"Oh dear oh dear…" Anakin quite clearly heard Threepio wail. It was the only sound to be heard in a sudden hush of absolute quiet.
He saw the older man and the Wookiee advance on either side of this Jacen Solo, moving toward where the Jedi stood. Both had blasters drawn on Palpatine. He seemed not to have noticed their approach.
"Master Yoda. Master Windu. You can't tell me you believe this ridiculous charge?" he asked. Anakin frowned. He'd said that the way Sebulba protested his innocence when accused of cheating during races.
Anakin wasn't alone in finding the denial less than convincing. Master Windu's purple blade swung around until t was pointed squarely at Palpatine. The middle-aged politician stared at it and at he who wielded it –
"So be it," he said softly.
- and with that, he changed.
All traces of frailty and age dropped away. His shoulders straightened. His relaxed posture vanished to be replaced with a sense that he was coiled to strike, as if he were a caged animal straining at a leash. Anakin watched, fascinated and terrified in equal measure as Palpatine bared his teeth at the Jedi facing him. When he spoke, his voice was different; not the even tones of the lifelong politician, but a rasping growl filled with hate and menace.
"Fools," he spat. "Trusting, blind fools."
"Why?" Mace asked him. "Why betray the Republic?"
"He planned this all along," Jacen said grimly. "He used the Naboo crisis to be elected as Chancellor. And from his new office, eventually he will shift more and more power to himself under the pretence of fighting a war he himself will create."
"Who are you?" Palpatine asked him again.
Jacen smiled dazzlingly. "Me? I'm Jacen Solo. Time traveller. This is my father, Han, and his co-pilot Chewbacca."
"Hi," the older man – Han – said, and even waved to all assembled. He was close to where Obi-Wan and Anakin were standing now. Chewie growled.
"I'm the one who stops you, right here and now."
"Oh," and Palpatine's face fell in mock sadness, "I don't think so."
His hand shot out and closed around empty air, as if he were throttling an invisible assailant…and Anakin felt his lungs constrict inside his body, as though Palpatine's fingers had pierced his chest and were physically choking the oxygen from his system. Dimly, he realised that he was rising into the air.
"Let him go!" Obi-Wan cried out in anguish. "He's just a boy! You're killing him!"
Palpatine merely smiled wider and lifted his other hand. Padme Amidala, until this moment being restrained from going to Anakin's aid by the free hand of Mace Windu, abruptly felt the same incredible pain as her young friend rip through her own respiratory system.
"Make a move toward me and I snap their necks like tinder," he snarled. "Step away. Deactivate your lightsabers. Now."
Yoda and Mace Windu took a long look at each other, judging distances, times, odds. Jacen could see Mace's muscles tense as if readying to make a leap.
"No!" he said. "Everyone, do as he says. Please."
Reluctantly, the lightsaber blades swoooshed back to nothingness. Both Yoda and Mace stepped backward, allowing Palpatine more space. Suspended in mid-air now, Obi-Wan could only watch in horror as Anakin's pallor paled further. The boy's lips were turning blue, his arms and legs kicking helplessly, his eyes rolling whites. Amidala was similarly affected. Another few moments and both would be beyond saving.
Only Jacen's blade remained activated.
"Throw your saber to me," Palpatine commanded him. In his civilian politician's clothes, he had never imagined he would require the weapon; without it, he was defenceless, and he knew it.
"Take it."
And he threw the saber end-over-end, aiming straight at Palpatine.
It was a fruitless gesture of defiance. Any Force adept would easily be able to stop the blade in mid-air and pluck the lightsaber from its suspended position. Once his, he would use his young hostages to his full advantage; it should, he reflected, even be possible to bury this entire incident upon their deaths. Blame it on the Jedi. Start the great Purge early...
Even as this thought occurred and he raised a careless hand to arrest the flight of the lightsaber, something slid to a halt at his feet. It looked like a military-standard issue backpack. The Wookiee must have thrown it at the same moment the lightsaber left Jacen's hand. As Palpatine registered its presence, he saw it cease to emit a soft blue glow from within.
Anakin and Padme dropped to the ground, gasping for air.
Jacen Solo's lightsaber entered his chest clean and true, exiting through his back and leaving a hole the size of a man's fist through him, a gaping maw directly where his heart had been.
He had time for one gasp, and to see the expression on Jacen Solo's face. And to know that the Sith would prevail, in one form or in another.
Chancellor Palpatine, once Senator, would-be future Emperor of the Galactic Empire, was dead before he hit the ground.
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It was a little time before Anakin began to process things normally again. His lungs flamed with each breath he took. He saw them take Palpatine's body away with the backpack close by it at all times, for reasons he didn't quite understand; but it was strange, because when the pack moved away, Anakin started feeling better almost immediately.
When some semblance of order had been returned to the centre of Theed, Anakin found himself in a small meeting hall inside the Palace. Padme was close by. He was glad of that. She had been so concerned over how he was recovering, to the point where he'd almost had to remind her that she herself had suffered a similar ordeal. The way she smiled at him…when she did that, for a few seconds he would stop thinking of his mother all alone on Tatooine, and the wonder of it was he didn't even feel guilty for doing so.
A lot of raised voices alerted him to the fact that an argument was going on around him. It looked as though the new Jedi - Jacen? - was on one side, and Masters Yoda and Windu were on the other. Yoda wasn't raising his voice, of course; but Mace Windu was coming pretty close to doing so. Obi-Wan wasn't speaking, but he was standing close to the two Jedi Masters, and from his face Anakin could tell he was on their side.
"Hey kid," a gruff voice said to his right.
"Hey," Anakin replied.
"I'm Han."
"You're Jacen's Dad?"
Han paused for a second before replying, which Anakin thought was kinda odd. Surely you either were someone's Dad or you weren't, right?
"Long story," he finally settled for. "You're...uh, you're Anakin Skywalker huh?"
He was looking at Anakin like Anakin was a power coupling about to overload. Anakin felt defensive and embarrassed at the same time. "Yeah. How did you know?"
Han smiled a crooked smile. "Another long story."
"You sure have a lot of long stories," Anakin observed.
Han laughed. Anakin decided he liked Han's laugh. "Tell me about it, kid."
"Anakin will decide his own fate. Not you!"
Anakin realised when the talking stopped and the last words penetrated that he was the topic of discussion. A suspicion formed within him that he may have been the topic all along.
He took a step back as the eyes of everyone in the room fell upon him, not seeing Han's expression of sympathy. "Let me decide what?" he asked, a little nervously.
Jacen approached him, knelt down. He was smiling too, and Anakin could see he was Han's son; the smile was identical.
But his eyes-
"Anakin," he said gently. "Believe it or not, we're family, you and I."
"We are?"
Anakin could see the consternation of the Jedi Masters behind Jacen. Mace Windu had a face like thunder. Yoda looked ruffled from his usual serenity. And Obi-Wan...he was confused, and scared. Anakin felt a chill. He had never seen Obi-Wan scared before.
"Yes," Jacen nodded. "We are. And families stick together, Anakin," he took a deep breath. "So I'm going to Tatooine. I'm going there to free your mother."
"You cannot do that!" Mace Windu exclaimed. "It is against everything-"
"I don't care what rules it violates!" Jacen shouted right back, unrepentant, even as Anakin's head swam with what he had just heard. His mother? Free? With him? It was everything he wanted. He felt the tears come, could not stop them.
"You took a small boy, a child, from his home, from everything he knows, from the only family he ever had, because you think you can use him in some blasted prophecy?! The Jedi Order has the power, money, connections to free a slave in a backwater planet in a heartbeat - to reunite a homesick boy with his mother, to take that mother from a life of servitude and disease - and you stood by and you did nothing, you heartless bastards, did nothing until it was too late - and then you dared to condemn him for what he became?"
"You're talking about things that haven't happened yet!" Mace Windu countered. "It's insane!"
"It's destiny!" Jacen roared back. "That concept that the Force is so fond of throwing around, and you're so fond of talking about! Do you want to know your destiny, Master Windu? To be blasted out a window, dashed to pieces above the skies of Coruscant, minutes before the greatest massacre of Jedi in history! If that is destiny, if that is the will of the Force...then I will take great pleasure in breaking every rule in the Jedi Code!"
Silence echoed through the meeting hall. Jacen was breathing heavily, so loud and so forceful had his rebuttal been. With a final look of disgust, he turned from the Jedi Masters and back to Anakin.
"Will you come with me, Anakin?" he asked the boy, extending his hand. "We will free Shmi, you and I. And I will teach you how to wield your powers better than anyone else ever could. I promise you that."
"Anakin, please..."
It was Obi-Wan. He crossed the floor to Anakin, ignoring Jacen's hostile glare as he did so, and extended his own hand to the boy. "Anakin...don't go. Saving your mother would be using the Force for your own personal gain. Do that, and you risk becoming a slave to your emotions. Turning from inner peace leads to the Dark Side. That isn't the Jedi way."
Anakin stared at the two hands outstretched to him, one Jacen's, one Obi-Wan's. For a few long seconds his mind boiled with turmoil, and then his decision was made.
"You're right," he told Obi-Wan. He saw Obi-Wan smile, Mace Windu relax.
And then he took Jacen's hand.
"Maybe I don't want to be a Jedi," he said.
He said goodbye to Padme. She hugged him and told him to promise her that he would visit, which he did. He couldn't bring himself to say goodbye to Yoda or Obi-Wan. He felt Master Windu's gaze on him as he left that room, with Jacen's hand on his shoulder.
"We'll be back for Padme, Ani," Jacen whispered to him. "You just wait and see. Let's go get Threepio, huh? He's onboard our ship, waiting for us. And you."
"Do you have a fast ship?" Anakin asked, if only to stop thinking about the expression on Obi-Wan's face.
"Do we have a fast ship!" Jacen exclaimed. He winked conspiratorially at Han. "Mind if I run ahead with Anakin and show him the most beautiful hunk of junk ever made, Dad?"
Han didn't mind.
He and Chewie watched as Jacen and Anakin sprinted away, full of the energy of purpose. Han looked over at his oldest friend, his expression unreadable. Chewie growled.
"I hear ya, pal," Han said. He kept on watching until Jacen vanished into the distance.
"I have a bad feeling about this."
THE END
Author's Brief Note:
Yes, this is the end. Finito. Fin. Cue John Williams music.
It might be a bit of a cliché but I can only hope you enjoyed reading 'Galaxies Apart' half as much as I enjoyed writing it. It's the biggest story I've ever written and it changed so much from its original 10-year-old draft that it taught me an awful lot about the difficult art of storytelling.
Many, many thanks to everyone who took the time out of their busy day and their chaotic lives to type a review, however big or small, however detailed or otherwise. It means such a lot, as the authors amongst you will know, to see that little email popping up that says 'FF Review Alert'.
Now that the story is complete, please feel free to wax lyrical on your overall impression. Authors love reviews like cats love catnip.
I'm off to have a drink. Who's with me?
Laurence (Larbo)