Chapter Text
Sabé stepped into the familiar flowing forms of the martial art technique taught to all guards of the Nubian Royal Court. The Dancing Crane was a technique that focused on short, swift strikes that incapacitated the assailant immediately. The graceful arcs of the arm and leg movements looked deceptively like a dance, but could very easily kill the average sentient without much effort. The style suited Sabé’s preference for the use of small blades in close combat perfectly. She was competent with a blaster, but it didn’t have the same intimacy.
Sabé jabbed her fingers into a Hutt Cartel member’s throat. He choked and grabbed at his neck. Sabé quickly slashed his throat, a hot spray of blood splashing across in the face. She tasted metal. Sabé twisted sharply and swept her leg underneath her next attacker, tripping him up and using his weight to shift his center of balance to throw him over her shoulder. He landed on a jagged piece of pipe, his torso impacting wetly as he sank onto it. In her periphery, Sabé could see Vesper shooting at a trio of men. Her aim was precise, hitting them each in the forehead with every shot as she ducked and weaved around their return fire. Artoo zipped around, beeping wildly as he attempted to avoid capture by enemy forces.
Sabé was focused on two things right now: survival, and finding Padmé as quickly as possible. She had seen Eirtaé’s and Rabé’s bloodied corpses amongst the rubble, but Padmé’s form was notably absent, thank the gods. Sabé didn’t know if she was merely rotting away somewhere else or if the supposedly infallible Jedi had saved her. Either way, Sabé would grieve once she had completed her mission. She had to maintain her composure for this battle, even if all she wanted to do was break down and weep. Rabé and Eirtaé had been her her sisters-in-arms, her best friends, her family . . . Sabé blinked tears away and viciously severed the spinal cord of her next attacker. The Rodian died with a surprised look on his face.
“We need to find the others!” Sabé shouted as she brought her leg up for a high kick. She meant Padmé and Captain Panaka, but it sounded like a more unifying goal when phrased like that.
“Agreed,” Vesper replied, spitting a . . . needle (good gods) into the eye of an assailant who’d somehow managed to wrangle her onto the ground.
Sabé needed to learn how to do that from her as soon as possible. She resolved to ask Vesper about it later. Right now she needed to finish off the blue-armored Mandalorian approaching her. She quickly became lost to the heat and chaos of battle, expertly incapacitating all who dared to fight her.
Sabé was toeing the corpse of what seemed to be the last living Cartel member when she felt the slight kiss of a blaster bolt sting her face. She twisted, noting the fallen body of a sniper slumped over a slab of adobe. He’d been positioned perfectly to take her out. The shot could have come only from one other being in the vicinity—Vesper. The Twi’lek’s blaster was still held aloft in her hand, smoking slightly. A little smirk twisted at the corners of Vesper’s mouth.
“Thanks,” Sabé said, meaning it. It was good to know when someone was watching her back.
“No problem, queenie. Let’s get moving—that bastard Riyan owes me thirty wupiupi, and better be alive so he can pay up.” Vesper sauntered off, hips swaying.
Sabé flushed. The tight pants Vesper wore did nothing to disguise the sinuous curves of her body, and Sabé found her eyes drawn to the thick swell of her ass. Artoo beeped from beside her, jerking Sabé out of her ill-timed reverie. Oh gods. This was so not the time for this—she had a Queen to save. She broke into a run to keep up with the other woman’s longer strides, Artoo following close behind.
Shmi missed her son. She missed the precocious child who spent his free time playing with his friends and dreaming of being a pilot. She missed her Ani. That wasn’t to say she loved this new one any less—she simply cared for him in a different way, one that was no less deep or meaningful. It was just that it was hard to reconcile the two at times. He had gone from being a bright, childish boy one day—to a cold revolutionary the next. This Anakin didn’t need to be mothered, and certainly wasn’t dependent on her for anything. It was somewhat disheartening, to suddenly find herself not really being essential to the welfare of her own child. Shmi had motherhood thrust upon her in the most unconventional of ways, and it was wrenched from her grasp much the same. She and Anakin spent as much time together as they could, but it wasn’t like it used to be.
The strange metamorphosis Anakin had undergone had fundamentally transformed both him and their relationship. Shmi had adapted quickly, changing the boundaries and norms of their interactions. Anakin was averse to overt displays of affection, but easily welcomed a hand on his arm or a casual brushing of shoulders. She discussed politics, battle strategies, and Tatooinian economics with him. They frequently ate meals together, and he was pleased when she spent time down in the workshop with him. It was nice, having him be her equal. But she still longed for her baby boy, and her grief over his disappearance lingered.
When Shmi first saw Anakin in the suit, she thought, This is who he truly is. He towered over her small form, his massive figure dwarfing her completely. They stared at one another, the gleaming lenses of his mask meeting her soft, brown eyes. The only noises were the harsh exhales of Anakin’s respirators and Shmi’s thudding heartbeats. A hand—large and dark, covered hers. Shmi held it close to her chest and let out a low sob.
“This is the real you, Ani. You’re not my baby anymore. You’re more than the body you inhabit—I’ve known that for awhile now. It still hurts though—seeing you like this, despite all the good it’s brought our people.”
“You know I still care deeply for you.” Anakin responded, sounding pained.
“How could I ever forget? It still doesn’t change my feelings. Emotions are fickle things, Ani—I can’t control the fact that I miss my little boy. Being a mother was the only thing that kept me going through the years . . . and now you don’t even n-n-need me.” Shmi stuttered, wiping the wetness away from her eyes.
Anakin disentangled their hands and pulled Shmi into a rare embrace.
“I would raze worlds for you, mother. I may not need you the same way a child does, but without you . . . I would be lost in ways you aren’t fully capable of understanding yet.”
She wouldn’t understand, not for a very long time—but today had given her more insight than ever before. Anakin’s fury was a palpable thing, and the way he slaughtered the cartel members like animals was horrifying to watch. Shmi had seen Anakin angry before, and she was no stranger to violence—but this was him enraged on a level she’d never seen before. He crushed men and women into pulpy, oozing masses; he cut through bodies with the practiced ease of a veteran killer; curling tendrils of shadows disappeared his victims into the unknown. The depravity reached new heights when Anakin spotted a Dug attempting to drag Padmé’s body away from where she had fallen. The girl’s head was bloodied, and she appeared to be unconscious. Anakin had been carving a grisly path to the girl since they had been separated in the blast, and his stance became even more aggressive at the sight.
“My Padmé . . . how dare you touch her!” Anakin growled, clenching his hand into a fist.
The Dug was lifted off the ground, the flesh of his stomach torn asunder by an invisible force. His body blossomed open like a terrible, gory bloom; guts spilling out onto the ground as he was slowly folded inside out. His tortured screams rose and rose in pitch—until they cut off abruptly. Anakin released his hold on the corpse and ran over to where Padmé lay, gathering her up in his arms and stroking her hair.
Shmi stood frozen in horror. She hadn’t been present for Anakin’s original takeover of Mos Espa—Anakin had feared for her safety and made her promise to stay hidden, to which she had reluctantly agreed—but if this was the kind of horror his powers could unleash upon others, she could only imagine the brutal vengeance he’d personally inflicted. Anakin had always been prone to emotional outbursts, and this was no different. Though it was so very odd how attached he was to the girl. She may have been a queen, but that mattered little in Anakin’s eyes. There was something else to her . . .
Suddenly the Jedi Padawan burst onto the scene, gasping for air and visibly injured.
“Y-you’ve got her? Sh-she’s safe with you? I sense that my Master is fighting a dark presence—he needs me there.” Redness trailed from the corner of his mouth as he spoke.
The boy looked so very young, his eyes wide with poorly concealed fear. Shmi couldn’t help but feel sorry for him; the likelihood that things were going to turn out well for him were slim.
Shmi hated being right. She hovered over the prone forms of the boy and Padmé, blaster cocked. Anakin was engaged in a vicious battle with the horned-sentient, blades clashing thunderously with every strike. It was the first battle she’d seen him in where the opponent actually posed a challenge, and it was astonishing to watch Anakin up the ante. His strikes were harsh, yet fluid; his stances refined and minimalistic. It was a sharp contrast to the complex movements of the other sentient, who was flipping and twisting about, dual-ended blade spinning madly. Despite the other’s obvious prowess, the battle didn’t last long—the moment the sentient made even the smallest of mistakes, Anakin struck. The sentient’s head rolled across the ground, body sprawling awkwardly. Anakin strode over to the corpse and plucked the extinguished blade from his hands. He stood there for a moment, seemingly basking in the glory of his kill. Then he let out a deep, low chuckle.
“We need to find Vesper and Sabé. We will regroup and head back to base, where I will heal the injured.” Anakin said after a beat, picking up Padmé and the boy (Shmi really needed to learn his name at some point).
Anakin seemed to sense where they would be, so Shmi followed behind as they made their way through the bombed out streets of Mos Espa. Ash, dust, and corpses marked their path as they searched for the others. However, by the grace of the gods, the damage seemed to be confined to the north side of the city, as Shmi could see no smoke rising from the other sectors. It was still the worst attack they’d faced in a while. It seemed that the Hutts were throwing everything they could at Tatooine in a last ditch effort to retake the planet. Shmi knew Anakin would eventually overpower them, it was just the matter of how many lives were going to be lost in the process that worried her.
“Vader! Shmi!” Vesper ran towards them, Sabé and the little astro-mech droid close at her heels.
They all looked a little worse for ware—Vesper’s face was littered with small cuts and was beginning to bruise; Sabé’s makeup was smeared with blood and dust, her once elegant and convoluted hair and clothes in disarray; the droid dented and dirty. Sabé looked immensely relieved at the sight of Padmé.
“How did the others fare?” Vesper asked. There was an anxious gleam in her eye.
“We are the only survivors. Everyone else was killed in the initial blast aside from the Jedi Mast Qui-Gon Jinn, who was killed in battle later on.” Anakin answered tactlessly.
At least he wasn’t cackling madly like earlier—though Shmi still could have smacked him for his insensitivity.
“No! It can’t be true!” Sabé shouted, stepping forward. “You’re lying! I know it—I k-know it!” She broke off into a long sob.
Vesper, who had been staring blankly at Anakin, was jerked out of her reverie by the noise and tentatively wrapped her arms around the smaller girl. Sabé leaned into the embrace and let out a low wail.
Anakin shifted awkwardly, and Shmi knew that under the mask a pained expression had crossed his face. He never dealt well with overt emotional outbursts of others very well, despite his own penchant for them.
“I am . . . sorry for your loss. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, and I regret that things turned out the way they did. We can retrieve the bodies later and give them a proper burial, after I heal Padmé and Kenobi.”
Sabé extricated herself from Vesper’s hold, and wiped at her eyes.
“F-fine. Let’s go.”
Obi-Wan drifted back to awareness slowly. The edges of his vision were hazy, dream-like. The world looked soft and unreal. His eyelashes were gluey and wet, clinging together as he blinked. The indistinctness of his surroundings came into clearer focus. Dark, low ceilings; no windows—he sucked in a breath, and the air was stale. Underground, then; most likely back in Vader’s base. Obi-Wan sat up, swinging his legs onto the floor to come to a standing position. He felt for his lightsaber, but it was gone. This was . . . unfortunate, but not the most pressing matter for Obi-Wan to tackle. He just needed to find Qui-Gon and then they could—a-a-and then they could—Obi-Wan fell to his knees, the events of the past few hours rushing back all at once. He blindly reached out for Qui-Gon in the Force, but found nothing. Felt nothing. There was a fathomless abyss inside Obi-Wan where Qui-Gon used to be, devoid of any light or comfort. No, No! An anguished moan crawled its way out of Obi-Wan’s throat. Their bond was a broken, aching stump of a thing—and it burned like a live-wire inside him.
He grasped wildly for the comforting tranquility of the Force, but it instead twisted and scorched its way through his veins. Obi-Wan shuddered at its intensity. It was unlike anything he’d ever known before. The serene fluidity he’d become accustomed to was nowhere to be found now. Only the pressing agony of his loss, and the fiery blaze of the Force. Obi-Wan clutched at his face and clawed at his eyes. Whywhywhywhy? Why could he find no peace? Why was his only comfort in the wake of his Master’s death stolen from him? His emotions were spiraling violently out of control, but when he attempted to release them into the Force, they were reflected and magnified. Obi-Wan had never experienced such an intensity of feeling before, and it pressed down upon him with a palpable weight.
“There is no emotion, only peace. There is no emotion, only peace,” Obi-Wan muttered fervently to himself, but it was futile—his grief persisted.
His eyes burned, and a dark well of despair bloomed within him. Suddenly, the truth of it all struck him then. It was as though the floor had dropped out from beneath him, leaving Obi-Wan was frozen in horror. He had fallen. He had given into his weaknesses. He had been warned about this his whole life, and yet he had still given in—stupid, pathetic creature that he was. He had given his entire life up in a single, thoughtless moment; letting his impulsiveness rule him for once, giving into it—and now he would pay the price until the day he died. He could never be a Jedi again, all because he wanted to save his Master. Qui-Gon’s softly smiling face came to mind, the way their bond made Obi-Wan feel complete, safe, loved. Qui-Gon had been his role-model, best friend, and father figure all in one. He was all Obi-Wan had ever known. And now he was dead, Obi-Wan having both failed to deliver justice to his killer and honor his memory. He was a complete and utter disgrace. Obi-Wan staggered to his feet and lashed out uncontrollably with the Force, sending the bed flying against the wall. It crumpled on impact and the broken mess tumbled to the floor. The ease of the action and the power behind it was jarring. He stumbled back, suddenly fearful. This was the call of the Dark Side; this was its power. It had an instinctiveness to its use that the Light lacked. Obi-Wan stared at his hands. Lives will be extinguished with these. The thought came out of nowhere, but Obi-Wan was certain of its truth.
A knock at the door broke his contemplation. It was apparently only perfunctory, seeing as the partition opened before Obi-Wan even had a chance to respond. He wanted to comment snidely on the breach of decorum, but was abruptly stopped when he saw who his visitor was. A young boy with gleaming orange eyes stood there, expression unreadable.
“I think it’s time for us to have a little chat, Kenobi.”