Category: POV
Disclaimer: Lucas owns all this Star Wars stuff. As if anyone could
think otherwise. I own this little story. Go, me!
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Contains spoilers (most minor, one major) for The
Phantom Manace.
Summary: Darth Vader's thoughts at the end of A New Hope.
The Death Star exploded behind me as I wrestled with the controls of my ship. Chasing the X-Wing down the trench had reminded me of so many things, and I shook my head to clear it of the dreams of a man who no longer existed.
The close quarters and the speed and the deadly seriousness of the race reminded me of Tatooine, and of podracing, and when the TIE hit me and sent me spinning, I thought of Sebulba flashing his vents. And then the memory of spinning came--the first time I flew a fighter, when I was nine years old. When Anakin, long dead, was nine years old.
Not long afterwards, I became Obi-Wan's student. He was barely past apprenticeship himself, and he had been the rebellious student of a rebellious master. The Jedi Council should never have given me to him to train; he knew I was dangerous and afraid and had been a slave--and he had chosen not to see me for what I was, but only what his master, his lover, had hoped I would be.
Now Obi-Wan, like his master, was dead. I and my master still lived. Obi-Wan killed my master's first apprentice in rage and loss, a rage and loss he communicated to me; a rage and loss which poisoned all his teachings.
Once, when I told him I loved Amidala, he warned me that love could draw one down the dark path as surely as hate. I replied that Amidala could do no such thing to me. He replied, "You wouldn't think Qui-Gon could do it to me, would you? But when he died, I felt myself turning towards the Dark Side. Only my promise to train you kept me from becoming...who knows what."
I had frowned and turned away. I was jealous of his relationship with Qui-Gon--although I had loved the Jedi Master, his Padawan had loved him body and soul. And when I was the Padawan, I had hoped, perhaps, that my Master would allow me the same intimacy he had shared with his Master.
He never did. And he never took another lover.
When I fell in love with Amidala, it didn't seem to matter so much. But matter it did: my resentment was...deep and pervasive. Qui-Gon I loved as the father I never had; Obi-Wan I wanted to love as a lover.
The future is always in motion, I remember him telling me. And I set in motion my own future, destroyed my marriage, destroyed myself, and eventually destroyed my master.
But I still remember the joy. And how I loved her, and him, and how he loved his Master beyond anything.
And I remembered his death, as he looked at that blond boy and closed his eyes--
That blond boy.
The one with blue eyes and the desert-burnt skin of Tatooine.
The one with my mother's cheekbones.
The one with Amidala's slender build.
The one who, I knew without a doubt, had been the pilot who I had chased down the trench. The one who ran it as I used to run Beggar's Canyon in the pods.
The one who must be my son. Anakin's son.
For a moment, I was proud of him, a father's pride swelling within me.
I remembered sensing in him the delight of finding himself in flight, the sweetness of Force-sharpened reflexes, the untapped power of a Jedi who has not completed his training. I remembered the last time I felt that orgasmic thrill.
In the silence of my cockpit, I spoke. "Let's try spinning. That's a good trick!" I pulled my fighter into a fast spin, and for one moment I was Anakin again, living for the pure joy of flight.