Chapter 27.

                                    

                                          
Vader's POV
                          
__________
                          
"Master?" I swayed, the world continuing to list and roll, churning like the waves of a stormy ocean.
                          
A steadying hand appeared on my shoulder, anchoring my barely floating boat. "I'm right here, Anakin." His blue eyes searched mine anxiously, a riot of very un-Jedi-like emotions flashing behind the worry.
                          
My eyes strayed down, but he moved my chin up, preventing my gaze from seeing what my mind already knew.
                          
"Don't look at it, padawan," he told me gently. "Not yet. We'll get through this together. I'm right here."
                          
I winced, flinching under her firm grip, raising my chin from my hands. "Asajj ...."
                          
"I know," she fumed, picking out piece after piece of glass. "I'm sorry, but you should have been more careful."
                          
I should have been more careful? It was because I was careful that I was like this. If I hadn't been careful, others might have ended up like me. But I just sighed softly and rested my chin on my hands again, trying to relax into my bed. My waist burned as I lay on it, allowing Asajj to tend my back, having already bound up the shallow wound across my stomach. 
                          
"Why did you have to get so injured?" Asajj continued, barely concealed fury tainting her tone. "We could have ended it right there!"
                          
"Ended what?" I asked a low voice, neither angry nor pleased.
                          
"We could have ended this whole thing!" She emphasized her sentence with a tug on a larger glass shard, and I sucked in through my teeth.
                          
"Be gentle, please!" I tried not to beg.
                          
She hummed disapprovingly but toned back her enthusiasm. Finally, she removed the last fragment and began cleaning the patchwork of cuts along my back. "You could have killed him." When I remained silent, she huffed. "Do I need to rephrase? Maybe you should have killed him? I think it would have been better for everyone."
                          
"I don't," I dared to say, though I kept my tone quiet and unobtrusive. "That's why I didn't kill him."
                          
She pressed the bandages against my back, but I didn't flinch. "How could getting rid of your greatest threat be bad?"
                          
"You're not wrong." My words were apparently too quiet to register in her consciousness.
                          
"If Obi-Wan was gone," she continued, getting pulled into the future of her mind's eye, "then you could enact your plans seamlessly! He wouldn't be stopping you, and you could rule the galaxy. You would be so powerful! Think of it, Vader!"
                          
"Maybe he's not my greatest threat."
                          
"We could have it all!" Her breaths came quicker as her excitement heightened. "After all this time, I could finally have everything I wanted!"
                          
"I'm not sure you'd find what you're looking for."
                          
"It would be you and me!" she enthused, stepping back, satisfied with her work. "No one could stop us ever again. All the power, all the fame, all the riches: it would be ours! And all the love," she added softly, helping me sit up as she gazed adoringly into my eyes.
                          
I looked down, pulling my shirt down and taking too long about settling it comfortably. "It may not be like that, Asajj."
                          
"Why not?" she cooed, her mood having suddenly switched. She sat beside me, linking her hand in mind as she gazed up at me. "With Obi-Wan gone, everything should just fall into place."
                          
"You talk as though he's already gone," I said slowly. Detaching myself from her, I straightened up stiffly, then went to the window, gazing across the sun-bathed town. Orange light contrasted with the blues of the city, and speeders whizzed through the air as they hurried to get home before evening struck.