HEROES AND VILLAINS By Kondoru.
Alternative ending to RotJ
Standard Disclaimers.
Thanks to Budgie for Beating.
Chapter Fourteen; Compulsory Enlightenment.
"Here we are." Said Zasti reassuringly. She had led the chained Leia from her cell to what she remembered to be a larger room, just before the Guard room that was the only entrance to her Cellblock. So far she had not left the limited space. There were four small cells, with a fresher and shower at the end. At the opposite end was the other room, Leia remembered it from her meetings with Mr Varo. Then there was the guard room but Leia had never been in there, (it seemed to be a pleasant place of music and conversing from what she had glimpsed through the door).
She was never let out of her cell unless handcuffed and legironed. Leia was resigned to fresher trips chained to a security droid. She had complained and the droid was replaced by an armoured sentient.
But that was better than using the absolute bare minimum excuse for sanitation that her cell had. A drain.
Nor did she dare complain about droids in the shower with her. Not after she was chained to a ringbolt in the wall above her head, and washed thoroughly by her droid warders. They had done a surprisingly gentle and through job, but one Leia wished to forgo in the future.
The door was locked and Zasti removed her subjects restraints.
There was a strange hairy thing hanging from a frame in the corner. One of Leia's new pets.
Ysalmiri
Leia's heart sunk. This could mean only one thing. But it was the one thing she had been expecting.
Sat in the chair was...Leia managed not to flinch away in discomfort, for Anakin was now limbless. He was wrapped in a blanket, and underneath she could see he was all bandaged up.
She stopped dead.
His scarred face broke out in a great big grin under the oxygen mask. "Hi daughter."
"What are you in here for?" Leia had to ask.
Her father managed to look innocent under his burns. "Um, hitting a pregnant woman."
"I thought you had turned over a new leaf?" Leia had been dreading hearing the news that Darth Vader was getting his metal wrists slapped. But then, now he had no wrists to slap.
"Yes, this was from before that." He sniffed. "I struck your mother, I'm sorry." He looked pathetic, "I begged to be punished for that. It's tormented me for years now. I was whipped and all."
She sniffed, "I thought the time you spent dead purged you of all guilt."
"Not everything." Anakin shook his head, "no not everything." He looked wry. "And I am also here to help you."
"Help me? How?" What was going on?
"I know Jedi training. I can teach you the ways of the Force." Basket paused. "When I was a youngling every kid wanted to be a Jedi….Have your generation changed so? What has Sidious done?"
His daughter said nothing to that. Bail had told her that the official teachings on Jedi were not at all true.
"Anyhow, I'm also here to teach you about how to avoid the Dark Side. Seeing as I have excruciatingly intimate personal knowledge of it." Anakin gave a rictus grin. Both of them knew full well that by this he meant he really was going to teach her the Dark Side…If she needed to know it.
"I'm no Jedi, -nor do I want to become one." Red protested.
"But you are Force sensitive." Basket regarded his daughter with hard eyes.
Leia nodded dumbly
"Do you accept me as your teacher?" He asked humbly
"I don't have a choice." Leia replied.
"You `do` have a choice, it can be Ashoka or your brother. You don't have to endure `my` company." Anakin paused. "In fact, say the word and it can be arranged that we never meet ever again. The galaxy is a big place after all."
"How are you going to train me?" She paused, "looks like you are a little..." Leia didn't know what to say.
Anakin raised an eyebrow, "helpless? Oh no." He gave a wry smile. "Though I have no Force now...Technically I `am` helpless and I hope you are going to assist a poor pathetic creature like me."
"Uh huh."
"Isn't this how you wanted to see me? Bereft of my limbs and without even the Force?" He asked her.
She didn't know what to say to that. This was her secret dream. But Anakin was taking it so mildly. It was frustrating. She wanted to see him suffer. Yet with her natural empathy, she was very pained to see anyone in such reduced circumstances, that and admiring of his strength in adversity.
"Do not be afraid to say it, Leia."
She wrinkled her lip thoughtfully. "Yes, I did want to see you rendered helpless, as you treated me so when you…Questioned me."
This was one of Anakins many sore spots. His guilt over his treatment of her when she was in his power. "But after all I did to you. You did not surrender. Adversity made you stronger." He said slowly.
"Hah!" Red grunted. "Even after all of the Alliance treatment of you…You did not cave in."
Anakin hung his head. "I was broken in years ago. Probably before I was born. I am a slave after all, and all the Force of Darth Vader could not change that."
Leia looked at the Ysalmiri. "Not even your furry friend?"
"The Ysalmiri is to help me as well as you."
"How?"
"Without access to the Force, you will no longer be affected by the Dark Side...Nor me."
"I thought you were clean?" Leia asked curiously. "Luke thinks so."
Anakin gave a shudder. "Clean? After all I did...and suffered. The Dark Side haunts my dreams still. I will never be fully clean." He sighed, "Every day is a battle for my soul." Anakin said sadly. "Luke is naive…and wrong….I may have made it to the surface of the ocean and now can at least breathe...But I'm still many hundreds of miles from dry land...And I suspect that dry land is desert." He paused momentarily to admire his simile. His daughter looked wry.
"Look at it as a spiritual equivalent of a medication vacation. It's uncomfortable, -yes, but we can get used to it, that and practice our meditation and spiritual exercises without distraction." He told her. "The Jedi temple used Ysalmiri as therapy for kundalini syndrome...And the Dark Side. They can be part of a punishment,-yes, But this is part of my atonement. I can ask for the beast to be taken away any time I please." He said "as can you."
"And you?"
"I've got a medical team with me. They are setting up a surgery, bacta tank and cybernetic workshop as we speak. My time in here isn't just penance for my treatment of your mother, I'm taking a break from helping the Alliance" he gave a happy smile," -I will be healed at long last." Basket looked around. "Oh, by the way, you have volunteered to clean my bacta tank in between sessions."
"I thought I was in charge of your waste disposal?" Red was getting used to this aspect of her reform.
"I'm hoping for a future in which I am able to eat and excrete all by myself." Anakin said with genuine optimism. "By the way, daughter, my potty needs emptying."
Leia said nothing to that. But she did do the job. However Leia thought about emptying it over her unwanted fathers head while she did so.
Next day they had a visitor. It was Ashoka Tano.
"Well, well, well. If it isn't my Snips?" Anakin said smugly.
Ashoka gave him a big hug. "This is the happiest day of my life. I never dreamed I would get you back. I mean, there isn't much of you left, but even that is amazing."
"Thanks for believing in Anakin Skywalker." Basket said. "I have returned from Hell, and I have certain truths to reveal...Even Demons can be saved, Hell isn't forever...Damnation isn't eternal, but the Force is."
"Getting like Yoda in your old age?" growled Leia. She had heard a lot about the notorious Jedi Grandmaster from Luke.
Ashoka and Anakin laughed. "That's just like Yoda."
Basket gave a big smile. (He had a beautiful smile, and of late was using it more.) "
"Anyhow, we are in an ideal place to begin training, we have endless time, a non-distracting environment, and the two best teachers in the universe."
Leia shook her head slowly.
After a light lunch Anakins pet warder came in bearing a cloth bundle.
"Here are your new clothes." Rene said with a curious smile on his face. He was getting used to Governor Norran's two very unconventional prisoners…The notorious Jedi.
Red took the bundle. It was a brown nerf wool robe. She looked at her lone parent. Just like Anakins. Now she was some Jedi's lackey. Very funny.
"I'm your Padawan now?" Leia asked.
Anakin shook his head firmly, "-you start at the bottom. Initiate." He smiled. "Padawan Ashoka, you must whack my initiate twice, once for speaking out of turn, and once for assuming status she has no right to."
"Yes Master." And Ashoka picked up the switch and gave Leia a couple of gentle taps with it, enough for her to feel it through her robes but not to hurt.
"Ashoka! Stop it, Anakin, you're a nerf herding..." Leia went off on one of her unprincesslike tirades. (Something that had stood her in good stead during her time in the Rebellion.)
Her rant was halted by Ashoka hitting her in earnest with the stick
Leia groaned inwardly and bowed down. "Please accept my apologies master."
"Do you think I should wash her mouth out with soap?" Offered Ashoka mildly.
Anakin shook his head. "Next time. She gets one warning. And that's more than you will get from a Sith."
So, Leia's unconventional Force training had begun. Leia herself was very cool on the subject, and yet she was still curious about experiencing what both her Father, Ashoka and Luke felt.
Anakin was firm. He drilled her mercilessly, training her to control her breathing, to meditate, and to be newly aware of her surroundings. Ashoka took over with the Force practice away from the Ysalmiri. Anakin was always kept well within the strange creatures Anti Force aura. If he resented this, Basket gave no sign.
Reds life was no longer a pleasant diversion of peace and tranquillity; she spent some hours a day doing her Alliance paperwork. (Basket was busy with some scheme of Mon Mothma's to sort and release Empire prisoners…Very ironic Leia thought. Anakin didn't talk too much about it with her, but she gathered he was very smug over his progress. Lady Mothma herself had little to say, only that her arch rivals work was going very well. Leia had to laugh at that, Darth Vader was very efficient).
The rest of her time, aside from feeding and cleaning up after Anakin. (He was getting used to both ends of his system, much to Reds not very secret relief. He had put on a bit of weight. Leia had lost a bit, possibly due to stress, her medic had advised. She did not feel stressed any more though).
Some days she had to fast. Governor Norran had words with both Ashoka and Anakin over this. He was very concerned over his inmate's health, possibly too concerned, as he refused to let Han visit or have any contact with Leia. "He has a criminal record." The Governor had told a grumpy Leia "I wouldn't be doing you any good to have contact with known criminals, would I?"
Mon Mothma had spoken to him over this delicate subject, pointing out that General Han Solo was a loyal member of the Alliance. The Governor had sent her off with a flea in her ear.
One morning Leia was tetchy, Anakin had suffered a messy night, and she as usual had to deal with the nasty ecofact that was the remains of Darth Vader. Ashoka was away with Luke. Basket was jealous of both Luke and Ashoka. (Leia could guess why though Anakin was a galaxy away from being physically interested in his old Padawan, his doctors had reassured him that one day he would have those functions again. "Like I care?" Anakin had growled at them). Basket and Red were embarked on a morning of snapping at each other.
"Slave driver!" Leia accused after Anakin was being demanding over a spoonful of gruel. Leia was engaged in feeding both herself and her nemesis. She was forgetting how much this would hurt her father.
Anakin looked miserable. He was silent for a long moment "Say I'm tough? Be glad you will never be trained by a Sith."
Red shook her head sadly. She still was an enemy of her father, but living with him had given her new respect and indeed admiration for the crippled old Force user. He never gave up, even as helpless as he was now.
Leia now knew where she had got her will of durasteel.
