CANTO II
"Love, that exempts no one beloved from loving,
Seized me with pleasure of this man so strongly,
That, as thou seest, it doth not yet desert me."
~ Dante's Inferno, Canto V
"Ani…what have they done to you?"
He turns from the window in astonishment—no one came to the observation room with him, no one was there when he arrived, and he has not sensed anyone enter.
His astonishment is not lessened to see the palely flickering form of Padmé Amidala, staring through the window with horror in her eyes.
His first thought is wrath—cannot even death put an end to her meddling?—but his second is delight.
"Welcome, my dear." He sketches a tiny bow. "How kind of you to join me. There are so few these days who can appreciate the extent of his…transformation."
She shakes her head slowly, putting a hand to her mouth. "Oh, Anakin. What have they done to you?"
"The Jedi?" he says, deliberately misinterpreting. "I agree, dear lady. How horribly crippled he has been by their weak philosophies, their emasculating moralizations, their pitiful traditions. Leaving him hacked to pieces and burning to death was hardly more than par for the course, I fear."
He favors her with a vicious smile. "The only true favor you ever did him was to give him back to me. As you see, we have not been idle these past several months."
She drops her hands, takes a deep breath. "There is still good in him."
You'd think death would lend some perspective, or resignation at the very least. "You are mistaken, my lady. Would you like a demonstration?"
He presses a com stud, speaking to the droid in charge of the training supplies. "A subject from our most recent catch. Any will do."
A few minutes pass. Below, the armored-laden form continues stumbling through new katas; and with each misstep, each loss of balance, each miserable reminder of the athletic grace he has lost to Kenobi's blade, the rage swells and bellows. Padmé sways in its gale, weak pitiful shade, while he spreads his soul to it like a sail, teeth baring gleefully as its tearing force funnels power to him. Good. Good.
A door in the training room wall opens. The supply droid shoves through a bedraggled child in the remnants of a Jedi tunic and retreats quickly, locks engaging behind it. The Padawan cowers as the nightmare figure before her slips to one knee mid-swing, howls in fury, blasting several square meters of wall to shrapnel with the force of his frustration—stills—and only then notices her.
Once more he presses the com stud. "Lord Vader. It seems we still have a stray or two to put down. Finish what you started."
There is a long, terrible silence.
There is a high-pitched shriek, and a blur of darkness and blood-red light. The spirit of Padmé Amidala closes her eyes on tears like drops of crystal.
There is a long, terrible silence.
"There, my dear." Exhilaration surges through his veins. Such power. Such rage. Now that the crisis of survival has passed, he has begun to wonder if Vader as he is now might not be an improvement on his original design. He turns to her, all cruel solicitation. "You have seen him for yourself, as he truly is. Your thoughts?"
Her broken heart glitters across her face, wet and open like an abdominal wound. But she meets his eye, unflinching, unyielding as she was in life.
"You have not won. He is not yours. There is still good in him."
He can afford to laugh. It's the best joke since Yoda tried to kill him five months ago.
tbc