The sirens of the Death Star's hangar bay echoed in his ears. He could feel the turmoil in the imperials as they passed around him and his son, completely ignoring them, surprisingly. There was no doubt; the tide of battle was turning the Rebel Alliance's favor.

At last, his son had stopped dragging him across the floor and Vader finally opened his eyes, being met with the vision his optical sensors generally gave him, but this time even more hideous than before. So cold, so full of darkness and… His son… He could see him, he realized, but only barely as the systems of his mask slowly failed. Luke pulled him up by the shoulder and held him firmly in place.

"Luke, help me take this mask off," he pleaded to his son.

"But you will die," Luke's voice came out pained.

"Nothing can stop that now," he said with resignation; it was the fate that he had chosen that led to this after all. He could feel his life support system failing as his breaths became even more weak and his lungs could no longer function without assistance. "Just for once, let me… look on you with my own eyes."

Through his visors he could faintly see Luke nodding his head. With delicacy, Luke did what his father had asked, first getting rid of the helmet that held the entire contraption in place, letting air escape through it, finally putting down Vader's breathing system. Not long after that, the dark mask finally came down and revealed the scared face of the most feared man in the galaxy, now turned into a frail man in his last moments.

He looked at Luke with his faintly blue eyes, now voided of hatred and the suffering he had felt for the past decades. Even though his vision was blurry and he couldn't make much of his son's face, the father couldn't help but smile as what he saw could only be described as the most beauty, he ever had the chance to see after all these years behind the mask.

"Now, go, my son. Leave me," he said satisfied.

Luke shook his head. "No! You're coming with me. I'm not leaving you here, I've got to save you!"

"You already have, Luke," he said joyfully, though deep down it pained him too that he couldn't stay more. "You were right… You were right about me…" he could feel it, the life escaping his body. The Force was calling to him, pulling him away from this realm. "Tell your sister… you were… right."

Luke… His son… He had done it, Anakin thought. He came back to save him from himself, from the darkness he had become. At his last moments of consciousness, Anakin thought about his life and how completely off the rails it went. He truly wondered when everything started to go wrong for him. If only he had made the right decision back then, perhaps he wouldn't have caused so much suffering to this galaxy. Anakin Skywalker had made so many terrible things in the name of the darkness that consumed him, but at last, his final decision was one he could proudly say he would never regret. He had rejected the darkness. He fulfilled the task that had been given for him so long ago, when he was only a child, and he did it out of love, not glory.

If only Padme was here to see him come back to the light. He wondered if she would ever forgive him. He wondered many other things too, like who his daughter might be, but… He felt it. There was no more time left, so he closed his eyes yet again. There was nothing to be seen anymore.

Padme… the name echoed across his thoughts.

I… am sorry.

And Anakin Skywalker was no more, and even before him died Darth Vader. There were no more Sith in the galaxy and balance was finally achieved.

The Will of the Force works in mysterious ways. Even the most talented and wise of the Jedi and the Sith could never even dream of fully comprehending it. No matter how one might try, one could never predict the Force's next move, let alone control it.

As memories invaded his consciousness, young Harry Potter begun to slowly and gradually realize that he was, in fact, a much different person than he had ever expected. At the age of 8, he already started to remember and to feel the pain that he had previously suffered and, as he became aware of himself, he became inconsolable. His relatives couldn't possibly have predicted such thing happening, so when he started crying silently for hours non-stop, they were all taken aback.

Well, aside from Dudley, who didn't understand what was happening at all and didn't seem to care that much.

At first, Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia weren't thrilled with Harry's sudden emotional outburst and promptly scolded him in their very Dursley fashion.

"Now, boy, we can't have you like that at all. You just sit all day crying and doesn't do your chores anymore. Do you have any idea how much do you cost to us, huh? Bottle up and start working already," Uncle Vernon had said and, deep down, Harry thought darkly about how familiar those words had felt to his ears.

It irked him to remember of a certain scummy Toydarian slaver.

No matter how much they scolded him or trapped him in the cupboard under the stairs, Harry just wouldn't budge. What began to change the Dursley's attitude was when the boy suddenly wasn't all too keen on feeding himself anymore, not even when the Dursley started offering him food.

That, Petunia decided, was crossing the line. Something was terribly wrong with the boy and she couldn't get that feeling out of her head anymore, especially when she felt so… responsible. After all, what else besides her and her family could have caused such a reaction? The little freak couldn't just starve himself to death, no matter how strange he was, after all, he was just a child.

It led to a brief discussion between her and Vernon about the boy.

"I think… I think we are being a bit too harsh," she had said. Vernon looked at her a bit perplexed.

"Pet, dear, are you sure of this? If the boy wants to sulk, then let him sulk."

"That won't do, love. This is starting to get awful and dangerous. Have you seen how sick he has been looking? I have to force him to eat and drink water. If this continues…" Petunia's face went pale at the thought of what might happen. "Besides, if something bad happens, the neighbors will realize in no time."

Vernon, for all his dumbness, understood the implications. "We would be responsible for it."

That night, Petunia marched to the cupboard with a bowl of hot soup in hands and opened it after taking a deep breath. That night she resigned herself to take care of the boy while Vernon was out with Dudley. That night she explained to the silent boy that 'no, there would be no more cupboards, no more nights without dinner as punishment and perhaps even some proper clothes for him in the future'. Deep down, she felt guilty as she saw the child silently nod as she explained and insistent that he ate the soup.

By the time Vernon and her little Dudley was back, Harry's things had already been put on the spare room on the second floor and even though Dudley whined about it and threw a tantrum, his mom and dad held their ground on that decision.

What the Dursley family did not know is that Harry's mood wasn't at all related to any of their awful treatment, though he still resented their lot for it. No, it wasn't that at all… He remembered everything, from start to finish, about his previous life as Anakin Skywalker. It was like suffering it all over again, even vividly in some cases. Of course, he also remembered the light moments he had in life, and that was what ultimately let his now childish brain to at least cope. Harry Potter remembered and would rather remember than forget, even if it meant having painful memories to carry on his back. It was his burden.

Slowly, but surely, Harry went back to his old routine with the Dursley family, who certainly felt relieved that things were back to "normal". He scoffed at the thought and considered their less than stellar treatment of him, though this had certainly improved after the whole emotional turmoil fiasco that had happened previously. It still wasn't all that good.

However, with the new memories that Harry had acquired in the last days, he just couldn't bring himself to argue about it. He had caused much more suffering than that as Vader, he had lived so much worse as Anakin in Tatooine. Having a hard life wasn't something new, nor was something he thought he didn't deserve, not after everything he had done.

Harry got to go to school, study and eventually live on his own if he so wished. His arrangement with the Dursley was nothing but temporary. He was no slave, not anymore. For all that he's a child, Harry certainly felt a bit older and wiser. He could easily lower his head and bide his time. Sometimes he felt tempted to lash out against them, to show them his power and demand their submission, but… That wasn't his way, not anymore. He was tired of being tempted by such dark thoughts, as much as he hated being mistreated.

Still… That wasn't what bothered him. Harry privately asked himself, "Why? Why do I remember? What is the meaning of this?"

This world, he had never seen anything like that before. As far as he knew, he might be on a completely different reality. There was no life beyond this planet, no sentient species beyond humans, technology so much primitive compared to what he was around all the time. It was like taking a look at a pre-historic museum, but even those couldn't offer such a deep look into the past. The Force too felt different, and Harry wasn't even referring to his much lesser potential he had with it compared to Anakin Skywalker. No, the Force itself was different on how it acted, just familiar enough for him to tap into it, but still much foreign and as mysterious as ever.

He had been reborn, no doubt on that, but why? What had he done to be so deserving of a second chance at life and one so different from his own? He certainly wasn't under the impression that one good decision to rid the galaxy of a void of darkness was enough to put aside 23 years of atrocities in the name of that same void. He didn't have answers, so he did the only sensible thing he could possibly do about it. Harry meditated on this, for years to no end, receiving no answers from the Force until a certain July 14th of 1991.

That day started like any other in Harry's life, which was safe to say that it was pretty boring.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," Dudley had said the first time they met that day. Stonewall was the local public-school Harry would be going next September, finally getting of Dudley, as the boy was going to Vernon's old private school. "Want to come practice?"

Harry shot Dudley an unimpressed look and then smirked. "I wouldn't want to clog the toilet with your head, Duds, but if you insist." He obviously dipped before Dudley could ever process what he just said. As he arrived at the kitchen, he could see Aunt Petunia dyeing one of Dudley's old clothes in a metal tub in the sink, which Harry guessed it was going to be his new uniform.

Uncle Vernon and Dudley soon came in, both wrinkling their noses at the smell of Harry's new uniform, because of course they'd find it to be uncomfortable. Uncle Vernon sat at the table and opened his newspaper as usual. Harry didn't understand why this world still had newspapers when the television already announced the news, it was so inconvenient to waste money on paper of all things and he wasn't even going to comment on how slow news must go around.

Harry was thrown out of his musings when he heard the click of the mail slot and a flop of letters on the doormat. He stood up from his seat in an instant.

"I'm gonna get it," he said. Vernon just made a grumpy noise from behind his paper, but didn't oppose it. As Harry went to get the mail, he wondered how much time until people started to get those around virtually. If he was correct in his assessment of this world technology, perhaps it would be in a decade or two, give it or take it. Dudley himself had a personal computer or two, if he was remembering correctly.

Not that he used any of them…

Anyway, the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister Marge, who was taking a vacation on the Isle of Wight; a bill in a brown envelope; and — a letter for Harry.

Harry picked it up and stared at it for a moment, eyebrows raised in surprise. He couldn't think of anyone who would ever address a letter to him directly. Harry already had no friends before ever remembering his old life and, after that fact, he grew even more distant from the rest of the kids in his class. He also had no other relatives that he knew off — as far as he knew, his parents were dead since when he couldn't even talk and no other family member had ever tried contacted him. Yet there it was, the letter's address was clear and strangely accurate:

Mr. H. Potter

The Smallest Bedroom

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

The envelope was ticker and heavier than the rest of the letters, made of a yellowish material that didn't feel like paper and more like animal skin — parchment, no doubt — and the address was written in green-emerald ink. There was no stamp. Turning over the envelope, Harry saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding the letter H.

"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

"One can never be too careful around those, uncle," he replied easily.

Vernon snorted. "Just get here already."

Before going back to the kitchen, Harry carefully secured his letter on his underwear's side, as the Dursley would no doubt confiscate it if they ever knew it existed. He handed Vernon the bill and the postcard and went back to barely interacting with the rest of the house.

After washing the dishes from breakfast, he turned to Aunt Petunia and said, "I'm going to my bedroom." She just nodded, barely paying attention.

When Harry arrived at his bedroom, he locked the door behind him just in case and went to his desk to read the letter. It read as follows:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock,

Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Mr. Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress.

Well, Harry could guess this is where the fun begins.

"Wizards and witches," he said to himself deeply amused by the prospect of these words. He was referred as a wizard many times in past, as a Jedi and a Sith, and he certainly found the term to be ignorant at best and disrespectful at worse. Harry also was familiar with the connotation of these words in this world and yet he sensed that this letter was no hoax.

The Force, no doubt, worked in mysterious ways. These "wizards" were the ones to discovered how to harness it in some way. Harry wondered what could this letter mean to him, what would it change in the grand scheme of things.

Did they Dursley knew?

"Yes, that's for sure," he whispered to himself. They were afraid of his freakiness, as they called it. No doubt they feared what they couldn't understand. The Force was no magic, but it was very much mystical so it certainly seemed like it at first glance.

So, what should he do about it?

The Dursley, aside from the kid, certainly knew more than they let on. It would be wise to know more about those mages before ever thinking of writing a response letter. Harry didn't know what kind of people these wizards and witches were.

Harry had decided. He marched out of his room and down the stairs where the Dursley were with his letter in hands. Dudley was watching TV, not even paying attention, while Vernon was still on his newspaper and Petunia was doing chores around the living room.

He cleared his throat loudly, gaining Vernon and Petunia's attention and held the letter high for them to see. "I don't suppose any of you know something about this Hogwarts school for wizards and witches, right?"

Judging by how Petunia went as white as a paper sheet and Vernon suddenly look sick, that seemed to not be the case.

"I suppose you do, then."

"Boy! Get here right now. Give me this letter right this instant," Vernon's voice boomed, but Harry didn't have time for this. He raised his hand and concentrated. His talent with the Force was greatly diminished in his new life, but he knew his techniques and his connection was more than enough to do this.

"You will sit down," Harry's voice came out as authoritative and Vernon immediately stopped in his tracks and sat back at the chair. Harry turned to Petunia next and waved his hand. "Tell me about those wizards."

Petunia suddenly felt compelled to do as Harry said and clicked her tongue. "Of course, you'd be just like her, wouldn't you? My sister."

Ah, so this is what the treatment was all about after all: Jealousy.

"My dratted sister, being what she was, of course you'd be just like her. Oh, she got a letter just like you and disappeared of to that… school! Our parents were delighted when they learned they had a witch in the family. Lily this, Lily that! I was the only one who saw her for what she was — a freak!"

She stopped to draw a breath and off she went on a rant again. It seemed that Harry had opened a dam full of things she had been wanting to say all these years.

"Then she met that Potter at school and they left and got married, had you. I always knew you'd be just as strange and as — as — abnormal. She then went to get herself blown up and we got landed with you."

Harry could feel a mix of sadness and resentment coming from the woman and, on that moment, he truly pitted her. "So, they didn't die in a car crash."

She scoffed and said bitterly, "the only thing that they ever gave me was a letter that came with you saying that she had died."

That… wasn't very nice, Harry thought. He could feel that Petunia felt like she deserved much more than a simple letter about her sister's death, and he had to agree. Leaving a letter to inform such thing wasn't tactful at all.

"I could say that you never seemed to strike me as a jealous and bitter person, Aunt Petunia, but I'd be lying," Harry said calmly and then waved at the Durley direction again, this time to both of the adults. "You will let me go to this school."

Both adults immediately pushed back this suggestion, which greatly displeased Harry — that had been a simple enough idea to implant without struggle before. He had to push through the Force with much more intent than he expected to make them comply.

"Fine! At least we'll get rid of you for most of the year," Vernon spat angerly. "But no magic inside this house, boy! And I'm also not paying for you stuff, you're on your own."

Harry ignored him and marched out of the room, but not before glancing at a wide-eye Dudley who had just watched the entire thing unfold. Harry smirked at his cousin and winked before going to his bedroom yet again.

His response letter was short and to the point, a reflex of his military experience, detailing his situation with his relatives and lack of relationship with magic. He requested assistance from Hogwarts in how to proceed next.

"Now, how do I send this?" Harry asked himself putting a hand of his chin. The acceptance letter instructed him to send an owl of all things. Where would he even find one right now? Owls were a nocturnal animal, weren't they?

There was a sound at the window and Harry turned to see an owl staring directly at him. For a moment, Harry looked surprised before shrugging it off and opening the window.

"I guess this is for you. Could you send it to Hogwarts' Headmistress?" Harry asked politely. The owl chirped and grabbed the letter of his hand, flying off as soon as it did.

Harry watched as the owl quickly disappeared in the horizon.

"Let's see what this is all about."