AN: There will be some important notes at the end regarding the last couple of chapters. FYI
xXx
Anakin sat down in the armchair across from Girth and looked over the confections he'd brought for Anakin to try this time. They were cookies. Very nicely decorated cookies.
"You know, you do not have to bring such... extravagant food to my sessions. I have never particularly cared as to whether what I put in my mouth looks pleasing or not." Came from living as a slave where you were lucky to get all the food you needed, to living as a Jedi where you got all the food you needed but little else, and then living as a cripple who could only eat through tubes. If it tasted good, he was fine. It could look terrible for all he cared.
Girth raised an eyebrow and smirked a little. "You find these look pleasing, then?"
Anakin shot him a dry, if fond, look. "Not particularly."
The mind-healer snickered a little. It sounded like chittering coming from the rodent-like being. "Do you like the taste of them?" he asked.
The former Sith looked down at the cookie he'd picked up, then raised it to his lips and bit down on it. "I find very few things unappealing," he confessed once he'd swallowed.
"Good," Girth responded with a smile. "I actually have an accord with a local bakery. They give me a good discount on some very high-end products."
"I see," Anakin replied. "If these are easier, then I suppose I have no problem."
"Alright. Let me know if you want something different, though."
Anakin nodded, but doubted he'd really ever have an issue. The initiates didn't often get sweets, but they had a rather large spread to choose from otherwise. Truthfully, the sweets here worked out just fine for him. He just hadn't wanted Girth to go out of his way to get things that were more expensive when Anakin was honestly just fine with nothing too. Whatever the drall brought didn't have to be works of art to please the initiate.
"So... about last week..." Girth said cautiously.
The former Sith sighed and launched right into it. He went over what had happened, what he'd royally kriffed up on, what had worked to help calm him down, what he'd forgotten, etc.
"Hmm," the mind-healer said once Anakin had finished. "It sounds like it was difficult, but it also sounds like you did a lot right. I mean, he didn't seem to really suspect anything, did he?"
"I honestly don't know," the initiate responded with a shake of his head. "I'd like to think not, but I'm not that naive."
"Still, you should focus just as much on what you did well as what you can improve on. You didn't outright give yourself away and you didn't fall apart in front of him. From what I understand, you actually held it together really well. That is to be commended. Not everyone can face their abuser with such aplomb."
Anakin snorted. "It doesn't feel as if I had much 'aplomb'." Still, hadn't he just told Obi-wan the same thing? That he needed to focus on the good as well as the bad? It was just… it really didn't feel as if he'd done anything right. This wasn't a padawan and his well-meaning master, this was Palpatine. Anakin had to be hard on himself because they couldn't afford mistakes.
Girth shook his head. "But you did. Perhaps your performance wasn't perfect, and perhaps some things will come back to bite us later, but for now, you did better than you thought you could and better than a lot of people do when facing their abusers."
"Most people who face their abusers have both parties on the same page with the similar amounts of information and memories," Anakin pointed out.
The drall sighed. "Perhaps, but you still faced him, and you still did so with calmness on the exterior, if not the interior. You did what you felt you had to, and that is nothing to scoff at, Anakin."
He was feeling a little uncomfortable with all the praise the other was heaping on him. Anakin always hated getting praised for something that he didn't feel he deserved. Of course, he hadn't felt like he deserved much praise since he'd fallen. Was that something else Palpatine had taken from him? The ability to actually feel pride in himself instead of just relief that he'd finally avoided screwing up altogether? Not that Vader had let that insecurity show either, but now that he thought about it... As Vader, if something succeeded, then it was business as usual. If something failed, then he was a failure and needed to fix it. There was no 'well done', even if the Emperor had spoken those words. 'Well done' meant he wouldn't get tortured or degraded or leashed in some way.
He hadn't grown up like that. His mother had heaped praise on him when he'd done something well. Obi-wan's praise had been much sparser, but it had still been there. He could remember a couple of times... although not much else. Certainly nowhere near as much as his mother. Was that where this mind-set had started?
Maybe he needed to change it. And maybe he could start by accepting that Girth might have a point...
"Thank you," he heard himself say, and it somehow felt just as hard as learning to express his emotions.
"You are welcome, Anakin. I would not speak so if I did not mean it."
"I know." He refrained from flinching away from the idea that Palpatine had been an abuser. He'd asked Girth not to call him that, but the mind-healer had very gently refused, stating that it was truth, and needed to be stated so. Avoiding it wouldn't change that fact. Anakin could see where he was coming from, so he'd dropped it, but it still made him a little uncomfortable. It was getting better, though.
"Well, you've gone over what happened last week, and you seem to be handling it well. Are you having any problems because of this?"
Anakin shifted a little. "Well, I did have some pretty bad nightmares." Although, none as bad as the first one that night Ahsoka had come for him.
Girth seemed to slump a little, his ears drooping. "I was afraid of that. It was one of the reasons why I was against this. You're opening up your psyche to some pretty deep trauma that you may not be ready for.
"But," he raised a paw to forestall Anakin's protest, "as you said, you may never be entirely "ready" for it, so I understand. Fortunately, you're doing what you need to treat your nightmares. Therapy and talking about them, trying to understand why your psyche is bringing them up, can help you understand more about yourself. Would... you like to share your dreams?"
Anakin felt himself shut down because no, he really didn't want to talk about those nightmares. He'd have to explain an awful lot that he'd prefer to never even think about again... but then, that was likely part of the issue. He'd come to realize that ignoring his problems wouldn't help... and he was definitely trying to ignore these now. He couldn't afford to keep doing that, not with Palpatine and his machinations to 'look forward' to.
"No," he said emotionlessly. "But I will."
"Only if you feel you can," Girth said quickly.
Anakin took a deep, calming breath and tried to release all of his anger and fear and worry to the Force. "I... will likely have to if I am to continue to... face him."
The drall didn't look terribly convinced, but he did motion for Anakin to continue. "If you're sure..."
The former Sith forced himself to think back on what he could remember of the dream. "To start, I was walking down the halls of the Death Star—"
"The what?" Girth asked, sounding alarmed. Whatever he was thinking, it wasn't bad enough.
Anakin sighed. This would take some explaining. "In the future, the Emperor commissioned a battle station. Initial specs had it larger than some major moons. Eventually it was cut back to the size of a small moon."
Girth's eyes went wide. "A movable battle station that large?"
Anakin nodded. "It... could destroy an entire planet." The flesh on Girth's lips lightened, signifying the drall had just gone pale. Anakin decided that he needed to drive the point home and that yes, this was an operational station. "I watched it destroy Alderaan myself."
The mind-healer swallowed and looked away as he tried to wrap his head around that. Meanwhile, Anakin tried very hard not to remember how he'd held the Princess – his own daughter – back while she watched her entire world explode.
Perhaps that was why she'd been in the dream on the Death Star? How nice of his subconscious.
"In any case, I was my current age," Anakin went on, "but was wearing the suit."
"The life-support suit you told us about?" Girth asked.
Anakin gave a single nod of affirmation. "That suit... it defined me. It kept me alive, but kept me a slave to the Emperor. I doubt there was a single sapient being who did not know it by sight or by sound."
"Sound?" the drall seemed to be regaining his composure rather quickly. Impressive. Although, he'd come to expect such from his mind-healers.
"Yes. My respirator gave off a very... unique sound."
"I see," Girth said, then sat back, waiting for Anakin to go on. He also reached over and picked up a datapad from the table at his side.
Anakin watched him for a moment before going on. "I... have never been that size in my dreams before while wearing it." Girth glanced up and nodded at Anakin to show he was still listening.
"I was following one of the Grand Moffs. He was initially in charge of the Death Star."
Girth cocked his head to one side. "Why him and not you? Weren't you second-in-command?"
It had been a sore point that the Emperor had given control of the station to Tarkin over Vader. Anakin hated that that fact still bothered him. He understood why everything had worked out that way, but it still annoyed him. Just as the Emperor had wanted it to, undoubtedly.
"I had made my general... distaste for the project rather well known. Thus, he was to be in charge of the station, and I was to answer to him." That, and he'd let the plans for the station get stolen to begin with. It had been a punishment. Pure and simple. "I am sure at least part of the reason the Emperor did that to me because the plans to the Death Star had been stolen under my watch."
"He punished you like that often?"
Anakin looked to the side. "When I was lucky."
More silence and the former Sith decided to continue. "In any case, in the dream, we in turn were followed by a host of... the undead. I recognized them as people I had... killed."
Girth frowned. "You haven't spoken much of what you were forced to do under that man." What he'd been forced to do... what he'd chosen to do... what had happened... and he had to go through it? Anakin swallowed and realized that the mind-healer had been right. He hadn't been ready for this. He still wasn't. He probably never would be. Seemed to be a recurring theme in his life.
Still, Anakin scoffed at the comment, deciding to set the drall straight. "I chose to do just as much as I was forced to do. Do not delude yourself. I was not a good person, and while some of it came about because I was tricked and groomed, I still chose. In the end, I knew the right choice, and I chose the opposite anyway. I chose to kill the Jedi. All the Jedi... even the..." he stopped for a moment, gathered himself as best he could and finished the sentence. "Even the younglings. They were... leading the hoard of the dead."
The mind-healer just stared at him for several seconds.
"Do... they appear in your nightmares often?"
Anakin looked straight at him. "Yes."
"Do you regret your actions?"
The former Sith took a deep, slow breath again. "It... took me a long time to admit to myself that I regretted my actions from the very moment I took them."
"That is a good sign, Anakin."
He shook his head. "Regret or not, I still did it. I took those innocent lives who trusted me and..." His voice cut off, strangled.
Master Skywalker... what do we do?
Gah! Hadn't he gotten over this?!
Ha! Who was he kidding. You don't just get over something like that. You don't just get over being a monster. Once a monster always a monster. Once a killer, always a killer. Once a Sith—
"Anakin!"
Girth was standing right in front of him. Not touching him, not even very close (smart drall), but Anakin still found himself jumping and only barely stopped himself from throwing out a Force push.
"Listen to me, okay? This is part of learning how to heal," Girth said softly, sadly. "You have to learn to recognize when you will just push yourself too hard and go too far. If this is too much for you, that's okay. Not everyone can be strong all the time, and expecting you to be so is not only ridiculous but unhealthy. Sometimes it's after you've broken down that you can rebuild yourself better and stronger. Once you realize that you've made terrible choices and you vow to never make those choices again, that is when you will find your truest strength.
"It doesn't come all at once, and so if you can't go over something because you are not strong enough right now, tell me, please. I won't think less of you if you can't handle something."
Anakin swallowed and shrunk back a little. Girth was treating him far better than he should. More than a monster like him...
"I deserve it," he heard himself say. He felt sick remembering the eyes of those children, screaming and horrified and betrayed and so, so disappointed. He remembered the lights fading out of those eyes. He was rubbing his hands on his pants and shirt, trying to get the smell off of him, but he still could sense it – the scent of burnt skin...
"Anakin!" Girth said again, firmer but just as gentle somehow. His paws were on the arms of the chair. "You've hurt yourself enough over this."
He shook his head. "There is no enough! They trusted me – they knew me – and I still slaughtered them in cold blood. I took my lightsaber and..." His voice cut off again. Then he was leaning over the edge of the chair before he knew it, emptying the contents of his stomach onto the ground. He hadn't really revisited that memory since he'd come back in time. He'd remembered, and he knew, he hadn't blocked it, per se, but he hadn't gone through it. For good reason.
How can they forgive you?
Sidious' voice rang through his mind.
A soft, tentative paw was rubbing circles on his back. He didn't want to be touched – didn't want to hurt the one who would risk touching him. Part of him wanted to lash out, because old habits died hard, but he refrained because he craved it too; the comfort. He craved something he did not deserve and should not receive.
Girth spoke again, almost in a whisper, as if speaking any louder would hurt Anakin. He wasn't entirely incorrect. "I'm not going to lie, Anakin. What you did was horrible. Beyond horrible. It was a despicable act."
Well, at least he'd finally realized the truth.
"That doesn't eliminate your own self worth."
He was still shaking and clinging to the side of the chair like his life depended on it, but he managed to look over at Girth. "What?" he asked.
"All life has worth. Even those who do the most horrendous things. All souls are precious."
That... made no sense. "I... take it you don't believe in capital punishment." Anakin couldn't accept that because Palpatine was too dangerous to live.
Girth sighed. "I... didn't used to. But now, yes, actually, I do. In extreme cases only. If it is ruled by one who has the authority to do so that a murderer is too dangerous, either to themselves or to others, to live free – or if their network would mean they're too dangerous to even live captive, and if their crimes are particularly heinous, then I will – very reluctantly – agree. I hate it. I despise it. But, sometimes, it has to happen. That doesn't mean they don't have worth, and I will try to their – or my – dying breath to help them find that worth if I think I have even a chance.
"But back to the matter at hand, Anakin, you are a good person who has made some monumentally bad decisions. Do you know why those decisions hurt you?"
Anakin frowned. "Yes..."
"Would you ever hurt those children again?"
He felt mortified. He'd barely survived doing that once. The idea of even attempting it a second time made him want to sick up again. "Never," he hissed, ignoring how his shaking increased. Then he took a deep breath, struggling to release his negative emotions – there were so many of them – to the Force.
"Then you understand something that few people will ever truly grasp: the weight of depravity. You know what it does to the soul, how it weighs down and tears down and what kind of damage it does to the offender."
Anakin just blinked at him for several seconds, feeling the truth of that down to his very core. "Far more than the act of being murdered can ever do to the victims." Which really said so much...
Girth nodded, still smiling sadly. "Exactly."
Silence between them for several seconds as Anakin slowly felt himself calm. "I... wish I had never learned that lesson, valuable as it may be."
The drall nodded in agreement. "I wish you hadn't as well. I wish no one had to learn that, not in the least because it is a difficult lesson to grasp, not just hard to swallow."
"Something that only monsters will understand."
"No," Girth's voice caused him to look over at the rodent again. His nose twitched in agitation. "It is something no true 'monster' can ever understand. They don't have the capacity or the strength to do so. If you understand it, then you are not a monster," his voice quieted again, "even if you've done monstrous things."
And he had. He'd done monstrous things. He'd actively tried to become a monster in the truest sense of the word.
But he did understand. He could grasp how horrible his actions had been. He could understand that he'd never fully heal because of it. It would always stain his soul... It could destroy him if he let it – it almost had. If not for Luke...
Luke, who somehow believed in him still. Who always had and always would, despite the fact that he didn't exist in this universe.
He felt tears come to his eyes and tried to hold them back, but they wouldn't stay. He couldn't keep them in. It felt like an overflowing dam about to burst inside of him, in more ways than one.
He wasn't a monster. He'd almost become one, but he wasn't. And that... that made him feel freer than anything else ever could. Not knowing what else to do, he leaned forward and rested his head on the drall's shoulder.
Then he cried. He cried in mourning for the children – for all their lost potential and their lost days and their lost joys and their lost choices. He cried for all they had been robbed of. He mourned for the other Jedi, shot down and betrayed by those they trusted most – framed and coerced and corralled into corners they had no idea how to get themselves out of. They hadn't been perfect. Some of them hadn't even been truly good, but they'd had their own worth and he'd taken it from them. So he mourned.
He mourned for the clones who had done the betraying, but had literally had no choice in the matter. Slaves until the end.
He mourned for himself – for the shining beacon he could have been had he just learned to let go. Had he learned how to not be a slave. Had he learned and realized and understood what the price for his power had really been. Had he just trusted the right person instead of the wrong person. He could have been great, but that was gone, stolen from him, and he mourned.
He even mourned for Palpatine, not because he deserved it – he still didn't – but because of what he could have been. The lives he could have saved and improved – the good he could have spread had he so chosen to do so. The loss would be felt for generations.
He mourned for Padmé, who had her own vices and dangerous attractions, but who was still so pure and strong. He mourned for the woman who could honestly and truly rise above the evil of the universe and not let it drag her down. A woman who had been the epitome of what a good person was; who had been his anchor and he'd known it. He'd been set adrift when he'd lost her.
He mourned for his children and the lost days he could have – should have – had with them. All of those times he could have told them how proud he was of them or how much he loved them that had never happened – would never happen (which was somehow even sadder).
He mourned for all of the love and happiness lost through his choices.
It hurt. So much... and yet, it was a different kind of pain. Like something had been shoved in his soul and left to rot and fester, and he'd just reached in and torn it out, let all of the built up fluid and pus bleed away, leaving the hole open and gaping, but cleaner than it had been for more than two decades. It hurt... but it also felt good.
He didn't realize that he and Girth both received three separate calls; one from Siri, Yoda and Obi-wan respectively. Yoda called on behalf of the crèche, where a young Togruta had suddenly broken down crying and couldn't seem to stop. Obi-wan called because he got the feeling Anakin was hurting right now and wanted to know if there was anything he could do to help. Siri's only said seven words: "What do you need me to do?"
From the look on his face, Girth hadn't known now to respond because he hadn't known what Anakin would be alright with sharing. Instead, he'd sat there, patting the poor boy who was also a man who was also a murderer on the back while said boy allowed himself to feel the depths of his sorrow for the first time in almost a quarter of a century. There was a lot to let out.
Anakin didn't know how long he sat there, crying. All he really knew was that when he was done, he felt wrung out and gritty – like he'd been left in a proverbial sandstorm overnight. He felt rough and old and worn, but he also felt lighter than he ever thought he would.
Than he ever thought he should.
But wasn't that the point?
He finally lifted his head, feeling more than a little embarrassed and very childish – silly child body – but he felt... stronger somehow. He knew it wasn't some sort of miracle breakthrough, and it would take time to really rebuild, but now he felt he could.
It was a good feeling.
"Better?" Girth asked.
Anakin sent him a watery smile and nodded.
"I think that you've had enough for one day. Do you think you'll be able to handle the Senate tomorrow? It won't be difficult to falsify your illness for a day if not."
Part of Anakin still wanted to say 'yes', that he could handle it. But he'd just seen what happened when he pushed himself too hard and too far and was all too aware that right now, really couldn't handle it. Admitting that he couldn't didn't do any favors for his pride, but he couldn't afford to baby his pride. If he walked into that Senate tomorrow, he'd very likely collapse, and he couldn't do that.
Saying it aloud was even harder.
So he didn't. He just shook his head. Girth put a hand on his shoulder.
"I'm proud of you, Anakin. So very proud."
He didn't feel like someone who anyone should be proud of. He felt weak and vulnerable... but still stronger than he had been before, somehow.
It was a strange dichotomy.
He was seeing a recurring theme there too. Was all healing some kind of dichotomy? Or maybe just the acknowledgment of the conflicts within oneself?
"We'll call in to the Senate and apologize. Let him know that you came down with a bug and we're treating you. You may have to stay in the hospital wing overnight, though. Is that alright?"
If it meant he didn't have to go back to face Sidious, absolutely. So he nodded.
"Would you like me to call Siri? She can help you get checked into the wing."
He thought about it for a moment, realized that he really would like her company right about now and nodded again.
"Alright. Here," he handed Anakin a cookie. "I think you might need this."
He didn't laugh – he still felt too fragile to even try, but he did manage a smile as he took it with a nod of his head and bit into it while Girth sent a comm call.
"She's on her way. I'm guessing you're not up to talking?"
Anakin shook his head.
"Okay," Girth said softly. "Do you mind if I write a few more notes while this is still fresh on my mind and update Master Xio as to what happened this session?"
The former Sith paused in his chewing and thought about that. Then he shook his head.
"No, you don't mind?"
He shook his head again.
"Would you like me to sit near you or away?"
Anakin looked down. He didn't know why, but he felt that if he opened his mouth, the tentative calm he'd somehow managed to find would burst apart, and he wasn't ready to face that just yet.
"Near you?" Girth must have sensed that, because he was asking 'yes' or 'no' questions, thankfully.
The initiate nodded. That would be difficult, though, because while he didn't fill out the entire armchair, there certainly wasn't enough space for himself and the drall to fit comfortably. He went to get up, because while he didn't really want to move, he wanted the closer contact. He could sit on the floor while Girth took the chair.
"No, no, don't get up," the mind-healer said, holding out a paw. "I don't mind sitting on the ground. It's actually very comfortable for me."
Anakin frowned.
"I promise I'm not exaggerating. Drall rarely have furniture to sit on in our homes. Even the elderly tend to prefer the ground."
The former Sith's frown didn't lessen any, but he did sit back in the chair again, nursing what was left of his cookie. The drall came and sat in front of the chair. Anakin felt himself relaxing against the soft fabric of the furniture piece.
He wouldn't have to go see Sidious tomorrow. He wouldn't have to uphold his facade and try to pretend he was stronger than he could ever truly be. Just for a little while, he could look at the broken remains of his life not try to force it into a shape of some kind - he could let it be.
For the next several minutes he just sat there, contentedly in quiet, while waiting for Siri.
xXx
Sheev Palpatine stood staring out the window and into the Coruscant evening. He had the evening off, and had initially meant to go train, but then he'd gotten the vision. It had been vague, but without question, there.
A room, round and dark, but somehow out of focus. Children, speaking, even if he couldn't quite make them out – either their words or their faces. But they trusted the figure from whom the vision stemmed.
And then a lightsaber – a blue lightsaber – ignited. The blade flashed again and again as the children, now trying to get away – running in fear to no avail as they were cut down in cold blood. Then, the figure turned and left their cooling bodies behind.
It hadn't been Palpatine in the vision, and the whole thing had seemed to come to him as if through the Force's equivalent of static.
He didn't know who it was, although he suspected Vader. That felt right, but made little sense. Why would he get something like that from Vader? Was it a vision? A memory? It felt like a memory.
But that, too, made no sense because the children had most definitely been Jedi. As much as that pleased him, he knew that no single Jedi had fallen to a point where they would have killed those younglings without the rest of the galaxy knowing. The most logical conclusion was that it had to be a vision of events yet to take place.
Or it was a memory of the distant past.
That theory was looking more and more likely.
A Sith displaced in time should not be difficult to find... and yet, he was almost impossible to track down.
Had techniques that kept one hidden been lost to the modern Sith? With the rule of two, it wasn't that unlikely. How frustrating. Especially because he couldn't seem to track down a single Sith in history who fit the bill who wasn't accounted for.
Maybe he needed to send Dooku to check on those remains that did fit the bill – once the man fell, of course. Because that was only a matter of time.
But there was still something off here. Something he was missing... and he hated missing things. It happened so rarely these days. If only the vision/memory had been clearer. If only he could have seen the room more clearly, or even the children's faces. If only he could have heard what they said when they spoke to the figure with such trust...
He would have to go back through the Sith artifacts and archives and look for a techniques that would explain this – that would answer questions instead of bringing more up.
And he would find them.
After all, he was Darth Sidious, and Darth Sidious doesn't lose.
AN: A couple of things: People wanted to know why Shmi was being targeted by Fett in the last chapter. She isn't an actual bounty, more of a personal project. Jango wants to know how she's connected to Luke Lars and the Jedi and he's bound and determined to find out. He's not the type to just leave well enough alone if he isn't forced to. If you want more information or a refresher, check out the beginning scene of Chapter 3. Basically, he wants his answers and since he now has the Clone project he's technically a part of, and the children are too young to really train, he has the time to follow them
Also, some people were saying that Anakin never met Jango, so why would he want Jango of all people? A. He knew the clones. He put his lives in their hands almost every day during the clone wars. B. He knew Boba. No, that doesn't mean he knew Jango, but it gives him a very good idea as to what Jango would do. He wanted a Fett for this job because he knew he could trust the true Mandalor (yes, I know that's spelled wrong, I was sick when I wrote this, deal please).
As always, thank you SO MUCH to my amazing Beta Readers, Khalthar and Carradee. You guys are amazing!
