I was suddenly in a broad field of golden grass which seemed awfully familiar, and therefore set my nerves on edge. It was ridiculous that such an attractively idyllic location could unnerve me so.
Especially when a visit to the Palpatine-era Chancellor's Suite had done no more than quicken my pulse and cause a momentary spike of alarm.
Nothing was threatening me, and there was nothing in view to suggest anything sinister was going on.
Simply irregular patches of grass grown dry and golden about half a meter high at most. Stalks of it swaying in the soft breezes coming along every so long amid the occasional clusters of varied wildflowers.
The sun was bright, but the warmth on my head, face and shoulders was very mild. Like one of the warmer early spring days on any reasonably temperate world.
Maybe it was the fact so much of my current surroundings were relatively uniform, or at least repeated variations on a highly similar theme.
Whatever the case, it took me several seconds to notice even dried grass should be more vibrant-seeming than this stuff, and that the sunlight wasn't so much gentle as a fraction of it's usual intensity for providing this much visibility.
Looking up at the sun, then at the nearest bits of my surroundings confirmed my new impression. Everything was much more faded and washed out than it should be. It was just difficult to notice as much, because wan and washed out when compared to what? Me?
"What were you expecting? You intrude upon what remains of one of the happiest days of my life. Wearing his face, but with nothing of him in blue eyes I know better than the brown eyes I've seen in the mirror all my life.
What did you truly expect you'd find, here of all places?" A woman's voice chided me. There was emotion in the compelling voice prompting me to spin and bring the speaker into view, but the tiredness overlaying that emotion diffused it.
Rather causing Padme Amidala's normally appealing self to seem as washed out and thinned as this place.
Seeing me looking at her, and noticing I was as yet at a loss for words, she cocked her head slightly and seemed to study me in turn. Some inner fire which had been mitigating the fading to some degree seemed to be going out the longer she watched me, and I had the sense it hurt her to look at me, yet she couldn't stop herself.
"You are one of the most immediate beneficiaries of my presence in this galaxy, Senator. There was no future where your beloved didn't end up doing worse than I have.
I may not be anywhere close to perfect, but it's going to take more than a basic attachment-crisis to cause me to go over to the Sith" I replied in a quiet, considerate tone. It disturbed me profoundly, how much the sadness in her deep brown eyes tugged at my emotions. Making me want to do something to lessen it.
I'd avoided this woman like she had the Candorian plague, because it wasn't simply a specific personality in this body which was incredibly attracted to her.
The night of the ball in Theed, after Dark Woman and I had captured Dr. Vindi, I'd run into Padme and found myself in need of a cold shower, plus hours of meditation to distance myself from the idea of Being Stupid in a Galactic Way.
"Let me guess: You want to defeat the Sith, reform the Jedi Order, then bring a new and lasting peace to the galaxy.
Not for the sake of the quadrillions. For the people you've come to love" Padme replied lightly, her mood suddenly shifting. The arch look she was giving me more distracting than I was comfortable with.
"I thought you were just condemning me for stealing your beloved's life? I get a lot of that, you know" I protested with a bit more emotion than I'd intended.
The sudden shift in this very beautiful woman's demeanor had thrown me in a way it had been a long time since I'd last dealt with. Now, I took a couple of steps back as I fought to regain my status as a detached observer.
"Maybe I was too blinded by the memory of what I'd lost to see how very much like him you really are. If your motivations are so similar, perhaps this isn't a matter of usurpation.
You're the most powerful mortal Force-sensitive ever, after all. This persona which seems to have replaced my Anakin might simply be the way you regained control over a life where you had no control.
My Anakin, but as seen from a slightly different angle in a series of mirrors. One possessing more information, more borrowed lived experience, so therefore greater patience and emotional maturity" Padme theorized quietly.
A little smile like a girl with a secret on her face, as one finger toyed with a loose strand of hair which had escaped her swept back bun.
I took another step back as her words roused doubts inadvertently fed some time ago by my Master. When I'd finally told Dark Woman my consciousness originated.
"Somewhere the Force was considered imaginary, and where there had never been Force-sensitives" she'd asked a question as reasonable as it was troubling.
"If your personality comes from beyond the reach of the Force, then how could the Force be responsible for bringing you here?"
I still didn't have a good answer to that question, but I knew one thing. My ignorance concerning some of the Force's deepest mysteries didn't make me some artificial veneer stretched thin over Anakin-I-Fucked-the-Galaxy-Over-Skywalker. Memories of my first life might be getting a little dim and a lot fuzzier by this point, but I still had a great many of them.
"Your brow furrows exactly the way it always has when you're troubled by something you don't see any answer for. In fact, the longer I watch you, the more I see of my beloved" Padme remarked evenly. Her voice having grown a little husky in that.
"I'm an intelligent, driven woman, but my passions are running away with me" manner that came across with such emotional impact from her.
I started to open my mouth to refute everything she was saying, when the incisive mind which had ruled a planet cut across me.
"Besides, you're being awfully capricious concerning which era of this galaxy you consider worthy of protection. For all those midi-chlorians, you're still mortal. If you don't accept my love, then there will never be a Skywalker or Solo dynasty.
What's the point of destroying Darth Sidious, his new apprentice, Maul, Ventress, and all the other recently freed Dark Siders? The Lost Tribe of the Sith, or Darth Krayt's One Sith will just eternally oppress the galaxy for lack of Skywalkers and Solos to rise up against them."
I took several more steps back. Not wanting to admit she had a point, because doing so was going in the wrong direction so far as resisting her went.
Now, Padme's voice turned downright seductive. "You've gained so much perspective and experience, Anakin. You know exactly how things went wrong before. Tell me you don't want what Tutso and Bultar have.
Tell me you don't want someone who will be on your side no matter what. Someone who will be all yours, only yours. That's one thing you've never had, the love and support of a woman like me."
Her words painted a picture as alluring as it was terrifying. I knew I wasn't some inexhaustible wellspring of inner strength and moral resolve. I'd just recently been working through a serious, blazing anger related to a possible threat to a "mere" best friend.
Padme interrupted my musing by advancing on me with a smile equal parts hope and vulnerability as she sensed me wavering. I took another step backward, but it wasn't as long as my other retreating steps, and even I could tell it was half-hearted.
"Yoda and the rest of the Jedi have already removed Palpatine from a position where he could whisper in your ear like some devil from the netherworld of the Force. Besides, you aren't so young and inexperienced you'd set us up for failure by trying to keep our relationship a secret.
The Jedi Order swallowed eight public marriages from Thracia Cho Leem, and she was a bigamist besides! They certainly aren't going to expel the Chosen One for one violation of the Jedi Code. Not so long as we refrain from trysting in the Room of a Thousand Fountains.
No one's going to try and use my possible death as a means of turning you to the Dark Side. Why are you fighting so hard against being happy? Is the knowledge you've done your duty going to be a comfort when you're old, worn, and alone?" Her pleas were soft entreaties, because I'd stopped backing up.
Padme had drawn so close now, I could smell the scent of her hair. I'd always thought her devastatingly attractive, and the thought of what awaited Jedi when they were too old for active service anymore had always seemed a grim thing. Poor reward for a lifetime of service, indeed.
Why was I fighting her this hard? Wasn't I going to try and break the no-attachments rule over my knee anyways? Images of the kind of life Padme was describing played through my mind with all the vividness of something I was seeing or even taking a visceral part in.
Strangling my hesitation, and fanning the flames of the ache I felt whenever I looked at two of my closest friends.
A memory came to me of a voice. Dim and doubtful, it plucked at the sleeves of my attention because it was my own. The sound of it causing me to hold up a hand and prevent Padme from coming any closer. She frowned, but stopped and looked at me with a look of hurt she was obviously trying to hide flitting across her face there and gone.
"I think it would be easy for me to grow arrogant and prideful, Master. I just want to remember the gifts the Force has given me should be enough for anyone!" They were words I'd spoken on Tynna.
At the time, my Master had made me see that I'd made of these words a rationale for self-effacing behavior which left no room for taking pride or satisfaction in any of my achievements.
Now, they stood as a stark warning against everything I was entertaining. Poorly considered to the point of being reckless, this was everything I'd criticized my predecessor for.
Dressed up in a more reasonable sounding justification reliant on the premise that my meta-knowledge automatically made me capable of handling pitfalls he had been undone by. It was an unconscionable risk to take.
Especially with someone I knew hadn't been the least little bit willing to call "me" out on my worsening mental/emotional state.
"No. I'm sorry, but the path your beloved walked is not mine. You make a fair point about the future's need for the Skywalker and Solo dynasties, but committing to a life-path I know to be fraught with terrible danger, and on the spur of the moment no less? That's madness, and, regretfully, nothing I can take any part in"
I told this lovely young woman with all the determination I could scrape together. A huge part of me was screaming recriminations at the rest of me inside my head.
I couldn't deny I felt like a fool in some ways for refusing Padme, but I'd made my choice and intended to stick to it.
Padme made as if to move closer despite my words, but I went over her head in one great bound and landed like a cat on the opposite side of the clearing perhaps twelve or thirteen meters away. She turned in my direction with one hand outstretched, and a pleading heartbroken look of anguish twisting her lovely features.
...
Hey guys can you throw some power stones to Elevate the ranking.
=========================
if you want to read ahead of the public release you can go to p@treon :
p@treon.com/Rage_moon