Chapter Text
The last thing he saw in his life were the blue, loving eyes of his son. Eyes full of compassion. Compassion… something Anakin Skywalker hadn't seen or felt for such a long time. He longed for peace, for release. Finally, his pain would come to an end. He didn't even remember life without constant physical pain. Pain, that was even surpassed by his mental anguish. But he had been saved. Luke… his son had saved him. How was not really clear to him. Then for such a long time he had been so addicted to the dark side of the Force, that the light he now felt almost overwhelmed him. But the sacrificial, selfless love and forgiveness of his son had led to the redemption of Darth Vader. And Anakin embraced the death. The only thing, that awaited him now. It was almost like an old friend who took its place. Years of pain finally came to an end. His sad existence, finally took its deserved end. Everything was plunged into complete darkness as he lost the last traces of consciousness.
But the darkness didn’t end. Not at all. After a while he gasped for air. He couldn’t breathe.
If he was dead, why was he gasping for air?
Wasn't death supposed to be redemptive?
But there was something…A Shadow in the Force…A presence. But it didn't radiate the brightness of Luke. That purifying, healing power of the light side. No, this presence was much darker — darker than the Emperor himself. He cynically thought that he probably deserved to remain in the darkness given what he had done in his former life.
"Do you like what you saw? What you've become?” he heard a sneering, cold voice.
Horror flooded through him. He knew who the voice belonged to. He would have recognized this voice anywhere. The embodiment of the Dark Side. Anakin opened his eyes.
And then, he saw the Son of Mortis in front of him. He saw his red eyes and bald head. Saw his malicious smile.
The Force was exceptionally strong in this place. And this voice, this presence... it could only be the Son of Mortis - A Force Entity who inhabited this place. And this place was indeed the place he had hoped never to see again.
As far as he remembered, Mortis wasn’t even a planet. Whatever this place was, he only knew that he did not want to be here. And certainly not in the company of this presence.
And just as he began to process what all of this was supposed to mean, he noticed that he could feel his legs and his left arm.
Why did he have a body when he was supposed to be dead?
All of his limbs were still there...there were no interfering prostheses...except for the prosthesis he had worn since a defeat at the hands of Count Dooku at the beginning of the Clone Wars. The phantom pains he'd had for years...they were alll gone. How strangely light his body felt. How difficult it was for him to breathe without a suit, even though his lungs seemed to be working fine.
What the hell was going on? Why was he here? What was the meaning of all this?
"Anakin!" someone yelled.
Anakin winced. He knew who that voice belonged to.
Obi-wan?
His Master was still alive? Had he not struck him down all those years ago in front of his son. Back on the 1st Death Star, when Vader hadn't even realized he had a son? How much he had hated his former Jedi Master.
There was nothing left of this hatred, now... only remorse and grief.
"What have you done to him!" Obi-wan cried out in despair.
The Son laughed darkly. Almost worse than the emperor.
Why was he here?
It just couldn't be real…
But as if he had just read his mind, the Son only said, "Everything is real, Chosen One. Everything. But I see that despite everything you do not want to help me. I will have to take care of it myself." And already he flew away. Transformed into this dark figure.
Obi-wan rushed to him. Kneeling to him on the ground. Stars, he was so young. Not a gray streak could be seen in his blond hair.
Anakin blinked. He trusted the Force, but he didn't trust his eyes. This had to be a bad joke of the Force
"Anakin what did he do to you? Come I'll help you." Obi-wan helped him sit up.
"We've got to get out of here... Where is he going?" asked Obi-wan, totally baffled and tense.
"To the ship, I suppose," Anakin replied.
He remembered that he had gone there with the son back in his past. But Anakin was shocked to hear his own voice. For nearly 30 years he had lived with a voice corroder. And hearing himself felt more than odd.
Obi-wan's expression took on sheer horror. Anakin didn't understand why.
Obi-wan immediately picked up his Comlink. "Ahsoka! Get out of the ship! NOW! The son is coming to you. Don't let him escape with the ship! Do you read me!?"
"But I just fixed it, Master", the voice of his former Padawan student Ahsoka Tano was being heard.
"Ahsoka, if the Son escapes, we're stuck in this place. Come to our position! That's an order. Do you hear me!!! Hurry up!"
"Understood, Master," the young woman's voice spoke up again.
She seemed to understand the seriousness of the situation, which seemed to reassure Obi-wan somewhat. Because the man just sighed with relief at that.
Obi-wan helped Anakin to his feet. They were so wobbly that he almost collapsed again.
Obi-wan looked at him with deep concern. "Can you climb?"
Anakin only nodded.
"Come on."
They limped to the cliff where they began to climb. With the help of the Force, it went much better. And with his light 21-year-old body, everything was so much easier. He felt everything so intense, as he hadn't in years.
Slowly they climbed up the cliff.
After what felt like an eternity, a speeder approached.
"Took you long enough," was all Obi-wan said, addressing the young Togruta sitting on it.
Ahsoka only rolled her eyes.
Anakin wanted to laugh out loud. But he restrained himself.
How good it was to see them both alive.
"Couldn't come any faster..." she shrugged. "... Or would you have preferred that the Son took me back, again?" was her snippy comment.
Obi-wan gave her a horror-filled look, followed by another that said as much as and what about the ship?
"Don't worry, Master Kenobi. He won't get far without that," she said meaningfully. She held the inducing key of the ship in her hand and grinned mischievously.
Force how he had missed that karking grin. How he had missed her. Yet he had hated them both. Obi-wan more than Ahsoka. Ahsoka for fighting against the empire he had built.
He had wanted her by his side. As well as his son. Luke. How foolish he had been. If there was someone who had completely fallen to the light side, it was her.
Perhaps it had to do with the life essence of the Daughter. The Daughter of Mortis; another Force Entity they had encountered here on Mortis. She had been The Embodiment of the Light Side. But she had died at the hands of her brother the Son. She and Ahsoka...and only through Anakin's younger self's pleading had The Daughter transferred the last of her life force into Ahsoka and had revived her. If he remembered Mortis correctly, this must have already happened...The Daughter had already died. Which once again highlighted the strong presence of the Dark Side here on Mortis.
"Anakin, is everything all right? What did he show you? He clearly wanted to corrupt you," Obi-wan said, very concerned.
"If he wanted to, he would have just done it," Ahsoka said totally calm without excitement, at the awful thing she had just said.
No 16-year-old would ever have said such a thing. Probably none who didn't face the horrors of war every day.
She looked at Anakin with narrowed eyes and eyed him critically for a moment.
Since when was she so calm? He had not remembered her like this at all. In his memory she was the opposite of calm and calculating.
Obi-wan also seemed slightly taken aback by her answer. He scratched his beard. "We should go to the Father. He will know what to do," Obi-wan pointed out.
The Father…the only one besides Anakin, that had been able to control his children.
Ahsoka simply nodded and accelerated the speeder to full speed without anyone needing to say a word about it.
By the Force, he had forgotten how small she used to be.
When Vader had sensed her presence near Lothal a few years ago, he hadn’t recognized her in the Force at first. But then he had realized who had been behind the whole rebellion, and it had made him livid. She had faked her death. He had to find her, and kill her personally.
He hadn't been surprised that she had survived the Jedi Purge. Although he kept wondering how the hell, she had made it out alive.
He had gone to the moon where she should have met her death, and there in the old shipwreck, he had found it; her old lightsaber. He had taken it with him. Hoping to find her faster with it.
However, she had become one of the Rebel Alliance's most important intelligence agent, he had no idea. But he hadn’t been very surprised about it either. He always knew that there must have been a Jedi behind it. His inquisitors although had never managed to catch her.
Only on Malachor did Ahsoka face him. She had been exceptionally strong in the Force. But she had been foolish to think she could save him. He didn't knew why she had done such a rash thing. He also never knew if she had survived Malachor. Something strange had happened there, right before his eyes.
She had vanished into thin air, shortly before Vader had fallen through the floor of this giant pyramid. But that was a long time ago. And he had underestimated her. She had been stronger than he would have given her credit for. She had fought bravely, and yet he had sensed her desperation. Her Desperation at not being able to save him.
During their Duel, though.. she had come to terms with her death.
Fuck, he had done so much to her. He had taken everything from her. And all because of a lie from a crazy psychopath.
None of this had happened yet, and he knew he didn't want to do it to her again. She didn't deserve that.
Despite everything, she had always been a good friend, even if he had just been a stupid young man. When she had left the Order back than…before she even had s chance to become a Jedi Knight…it seemed more like a personal failure to him. Only because of her the Jedi hadn’t granted him the rank of a Master. He had blamed the Council for it. For Everything. They had taken her away from him. He hadn't been ready to let her go. But she had given him no choice.
When he thought about all that now, it had been the only right decision she could have made. It had probably saved her life. Because less than a year later he had destroyed the Jedi Order.
What an idiot he had been. Surely, the Jedi had been blinded by their arrogance, but they certainly hadn't deserve to die like that.
Few had survived that day. A few of the temple guards had become inquisitors. As well as a few surviving Padawans.
Could he have broken the young woman in front of him?
Maybe… probably, everyone was broken at some point. Anger at himself and his stupidity flared up within him.
They came to the place where the Father, the third deity of Mortis, had his temple. Anakin still remembered that. Also, how crazy the eyes of this ancient creature had been. A being that, as far as he remembered, embodied The Balance in the Force. Whereas his children embodied the Light and the Dark side. But the Son had killed the Daughter and thus weakened the light side. It was only thanks to the Daughter’s compassion that Anakin had been able to bring his Padawan back from the dead.
And there, the Father was already waiting for them. And if Anakin remembered it correctly, the Father had stabbed himself and Anakin then had stabbed the Son.
The Father made a movement with his hands, and Ahsoka and Obi-wan fell unconscious to the ground.
There they were, those eyes that Anakin couldn't place. “My children have broken the rules of space and time. What's done is done. You know what to do. The One brings balance between light and dark," was all the old man said.
Had he seriously just been given a second chance?
How the hell was he supposed to do that?
But Anakin didn't have time to process what this all meant.
The Son appeared a second later. His darkness omnipresent.
And just as Anakin remembered, he was the one who finally stabbed the Son, while the Father had previously judged himself.
Anakin lost consciousness after thag again, only to wake up shortly afterwards in a familiar cockpit.
The Twilight, his old freighter during the Clone Wars. A ship that had always served him well.
Beside him, Obi-wan and Ahsoka stretched and shortly after they looked at him questioningly.
He wanted to explain what just had happened when the Communication channel opened. "Generals…Generals, do you read me?"......