darkforcerising | OPEN POST

Anakin enjoyed the break just as much as Obi-Wan did. The chance to see Luke more than once was something he hadn't thought possible before then. And the time, be it quiet, serious, sensual, ridiculous, spent with Obi-Wan was worth it alone.

And when it was done, he was ready to pick up the mantle of breaking the Empire.

"Ready."

He followed Obi-Wan in the maze of makeshift shacks. A refugee camp, left standing after the stormtroopers had swept through and relocated the majority of inhabitants. But, as with any unoccupied structure, it never really emptied completely. Mostly the remaining inhabitants were the stragglers or the most stubborn of individuals that refused to move short of death. And this planet didn't have the resources to fully doze this place. The stormtroopers had established Empire rule and then had moved on to the next planet.

He gave a slight nod to show he'd heard and understood, then shifted most of his attention into the force - and let the force into him. He wasn't overly on edge, just cautious. The terrain - and amount of dead ends and blind corners and potential hiding spots - didn't make anything here something to be done with half attention.

Again - not worried or on edge, but letting the force guide him and, at least, keep him from falling off a cliff, into a hole, or falling on his face tripping over scattered debris.

He did not have his saber in hand. He didn't need it, and it wasn't as though he had far to reach for it.

Anakin kept silent to keep from distracting them. They were in a half abandoned refugee camp built into the cliff-sides, it was distracting and dangerous enough without him splitting their focus.

As they went their way through the maze Anakin started notice something felt familiar. It was hard to place. But the deeper they pushed into the pick-up town, the more the feeling tensed into something tangible.

And it wasn't good.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Anakin said, his hand going to his lightsaber.

He still wasn't getting much that felt familiar to him, just something that was... not right.

He glanced at Anakin and nodded slightly in confirmation and stopped where he was, drawing his own lightsaber to his palm.

"Something's wrong," he agreed.

And then the hair on the back of his neck went up and he ignited the blade without conscious thought.

"It feels familiar..." Anakin said, now glancing every direction and finding every part of them possibly exposed due to the haphazard construction of the camp.

"I..."

That's when the first red lightsaber bloomed in the dark.

"The Jedi is already dead," he said, putting two and two together. This was like when he'd used Master Unduli to trap Jedi. He formed up with his back to Obi-Wan. "This is a trap."

A trap in a maze of unstable structures, on the edge of a cliff, surrounded by innocent people. Well, the Empire was learning fast.

"Well spotted," he drawled, sarcastically, spun his blade around exactly once, took a deep breath and then watched as more red lightsaber blades ignited.

"Well. We've sprung it, anyway." Job half-done, right?

No. This was a bad, bad feeling but there was no point dwelling on that. There was just time to get busy and fight.

Anakin had a brief flashback to the previous encounter with the Inquisitors - they had stormtroopers then. Now, he counted six red lightsabers - one already doing the stupid spinning.

No - this wasn't going to be like last time. Anakin made a silent promise.

With three of them going after him and three on Obi-Wan, and everything about the setting, they were pushed closer and closer to the cliffside.

Anakin found one opening and Force-shoved one of the Inquisitors back into the spinning blade of their companion. One down, two still to go. But killing one of them seemed to piss them off and they pressed their attack harder. One manage to graze his upper arm which caused him to falter. He was losing stamina - even with his own fight down to two on one. But the strike made him notice something just before they disarmed him - their blows weren't aimed to kill - just disarm.

He wished he'd noticed that sooner, he would have taken more risks. But he only noticed it a fraction of a second before another strike to his right arm, a cut that burned in an all too familiar way for him, and a kick to his chin led to him to falling to his knees and being disarmed.

They wanted him, not Obi-Wan. They wanted him alive. Which meant the battlefield could change, they could lose this battle and win another day.

He watched his lightsaber sail through the air into the hand of one of the Inquisitors.

Anakin had made a promise to Obi-Wan, even if Obi-Wan hadn't heard it.

"Obi-Wan!" he shouted to the man. They were right on the edge of the cliff, the man still had two opponents and he was clearly losing energy too. The bottom of the cliff wasn't that far to fall - for a Jedi. "Survive!" With the strength he had left, Anakin Force-shoved Obi-Wan back, over the edge.

I'm sorry!

He felt another blow to his head and his world went black.

Obi-Wan was losing energy in his fight, and doing so rapidly. He wasn't aware that the Inquisitors weren't fighting to kill Anakin, because they most certainly were fighting to kill him. One went down to his white blade, but it wasn't much of a reprieve.

It was a situation that would feel familiar once he had room to think. As it stood, he was aware of Anakin being injured, because he could feel pain flaring through their bond. That got enough of his attention onto Anakin to see him being disarmed and go down to his knees.

At that point he got more desperate in his own fight, but with two against one and him rapidly becoming exhausted, it wasn't all that useful.

Then he heard his name, felt an apology and was falling. He managed to be confused, frightened for Anakin and angry during the time he fell - which wasn't all that long - but he did in fact managed do what he'd been told to do.

Survive.

He lost consciousness shortly after Anakin.

When he woke, Anakin and the Empire's representatives had gone but he knew beyond all doubt Anakin was still alive. He could feel the thread of their bond in the back of his mind. There was not a single doubt in him as to what he was going to do, or even assessment of whether or not it was the right thing to do (who else he might be risking, what the Resistance could lose in losing them both, or what the Empire could find out if they had both).

He was going after him.

He was getting him back.

He had to climb the damn cliff again, which took time and left him dirty, scraped and bruised but he did not care. With Force and sheer bloody minded determination assisting him it was surmountable and he did so.

Then it was down to finding a ship and using it to follow their bond in the Force, that fragile thread between them. He was terrified and angry the entire time. Afraid that it would snap at any moment, afraid of what was being done to Anakin, angry that he'd been taken and had been hurt, angry at the fear, afraid of the anger, and just--

angry and afraid.

He stayed that way the entire time he followed that trail through space to....

A star destroyer.

He became more of both once he was onboard it.

When Anakin came to, he was lying on the floor of a featureless room with his hands restrained behind him in those shock cuffs that would do as advertised if he tried to use any means but the key fob to open them.

Despite the lack of trappings, the room was familiar, a cell. The kind found aboard space-faring vessels. His head was pounding, his right upper arm throbbed from two wounds, his jaw hurt. Did they have to kick him in the jaw? Well probably, he was well trained in the Force. He felt smug acknowledging how many Inquisitors it had taken them to capture him.

He didn't try sitting up just then, he waited for the light to stop hurting.

He took the time to think about a few things: how long he'd been out, where was the ship he was on parked (the ship vibrated with sublight engines, not hyperdrive), if Obi-Wan was alright... But he felt the man in the back of his mind, still very much alive, thank god. Realizing that Obi-Wan had survived was better news than any headache could ruin.

He sat up then, wincing the whole way. Why were arms so necessary? With gritted teeth, he scooted himself back against a wall for support. He was surprisingly out of breath by the time he made it - being injured would do that. He took some deep breaths and cleared his mind to focus on the Force and start healing some of his injuries - first up, his headache. It slowly started to fade, and was such a relief when it was finally gone.

Then he started wondering about the passage of time. How long were they going to leave him there like this? Were they waiting for someone to arrive? That would be an interesting interview.

To keep track of the passage of time he started singing Highway to the Danger Zone to himself, counting off each time he started over.

He was on the seventh time through when the door opened and three white-faced Inquisitors came in, stormtroopers flanking the entrance. He kept singing as he watched them come in.

"What are you doing?" the center one sneered.

Anakin didn't stop, he had a song to finish.

"Shut up!"

Anakin still didn't stop.

"I said-"

Anakin reached the end of the song and stopped, expectant.

This was clearly not how the Inquisitors wanted this to play out. The leader was thrown and there was a hesitant pause before he instructed the others to pick Anakin up.

"Hey!" Anakin shouted when they pulled on his injured arm. When he was upright, they pulled him along at a fast pace he found difficult to match given the pain in his arm and the concussion he was recovering from. But those seemed like insignificant details to his captors.

He took note of what he could see. The interior features, the personnel they passed. Their journey never crossed a window so he didn't get a look at their location - but maybe they were just parked in the middle of empty space for all he could tell. But after seeing enough, and with his headache now gone and he could stretch out with his mind to test the boundaries of the vessel he was on, he was able to conclude he was on a Star Destroyer.

Presently they came to an interrogation room - not surprising.

"Are you sure you should be conducting this interview?" Anakin asked as they shoved him into a chair. He eyed the spheroid droid in the corner with the needle appendages. "Surely you were told by your master to leave me to him." He cocked his head to the side and smiled. "Ooooh. You think you'll get something useful from me for him and he'll be proud of you when he arrives. Aww, it's sweet how you think you can please him. You can't, he hates all of you." He looked at the one to the left. "Especially you."

"Who are you?"

Anakin was about to answer when something like a blinding light flared in the back of his mind, a presence that had been distant was suddenly not very distant at all. He grinned. He swore at that moment to be as distracting as possible to make this work.

"Your mom's butt."

Obi-Wan... did not have a plan. That was a fact that he only registered as a potential difficulty when he had boots on the star destroyer.

He had determination!

No plan.

It wasn't the first time he'd found himself flying by the metaphorical (or literal) seat of his pants, of course. It wasn't even the first time he'd done so to get to and rescue someone he was attached to.

His usual method of handling these situations was reach into the force, lose himself in it and let him guide him. Usually it worked out.

This was the first time he'd done so against a Star Destroyer filled with Imperials - and the first time he'd done so while feeling anywhere this much fear and anger, or for someone he was quite so attached to - never mind all the history.

The first time he'd loved someone like this.

He reached for the Force and...

...couldn't...

...hold...

...it.

It was there, of course, but he was too full of emotion he could not let go of to really let it in far enough to be any real guidance or use. With the sound of people moving rapidly toward him, the situation became more urgent and more dire.

He wasn't going to let them have Anakin; it simply was not an option. He would not fail Anakin again.

I'm sorry went back across the bond to Anakin. His mental voice carried with it, more than anything else, a sense of defeat.

He reached for what was there, what he could hold and use. All the fear, the anger, the desperation, desolation, despair and hopelessness. All his frustration, and insecurity and self-loathing and grief and pain got pulled to the surface and the Dark got pulled in.

Then it all poured right back out in violence, blood, and death.

Nothing standing between him and Anakin was going to be alive by the time he was finished.

Anakin's head rebounded off the metal table, punishment for his smart-ass-ary. But he wasn't frowning because it hurt - it did hurt, sure - but when he sat up, the sour expression on his face was from the anger twisting him inside.

He could feel what was going on in that bond he shared with Obi-Wan, and he wasn't happy about it. He knew he should be horrified, but it was hard to feel sympathy for the Imperials. Of course not all of them knew the extent of the Empire's misdeeds, but some did. Enough did, that he didn't feel bad when the killing started.

But Obi-Wan losing himself, that did hurt to feel. He knew exactly why this was happening - the blame laid at everyone's feet, including his own. But it was the faces in front of him he blamed the most.

"I'll ask again," the lead Inquisitor said. "Who are you?"

He tasted iron on his tongue, the sickening tang twisting his stomach more.

He knew he was going to have to be more than a distraction, he needed to be proactive.

He silently and subtly reached into the Force and found his robotic arm, loosening fasteners in certain places. It was movement so miniscule, they didn't notice. And while he did that, he gathered the spit and blood in his mouth and then spat it at the man's face across from him.

"Go figure it out," and then to make things more unbalanced, he called the Inquisitor by his name. Not the name the man used now, but the name he used before he turned to the Dark Side. The room went eerie silent.

He kept the lead Inquisitor's glare, but still subtly in the Force, he switched focus and reached out for the lightsaber of the Inquisitor on the left. Not to pull it out of their hands, but he moved thing internally a fraction of millimeter here and then a millimeter there.

All the while, things were going to shit in other parts of the ship.

The door opened.

"Why am I being interrupted?" the lead Inquisitor shouted. The individual that came in was the fourth Inquisitor, and the look on his face said it all. "We have a situation, sir." The two dark side users exchanged looks and the leader finally stood up to speak with him outside.

"Stay here," the leader instructed the two Inquisitors still inside. "Make sure no one comes in or out." The door closed and everything was quiet once again.

Anakin waited until he heard hurried footsteps running away.

"I bet you two need both your arms," Anakin said.

The two remaining Inquisitors were clearly the least experienced. They gawked at him a moment before the one on the right side said, "No talking... Jedi scum." Ya, inexperienced, out of their element, nervous. It all showed.

Anakin obviously wasn't going to listen to them.

"I haven't had my right arm a long enough time that I really don't needed it-" he grabbed his right metal hand with his left and twisted both physically and in the Force and then his right arm came loose. He held it up, "See," the movement and the sound of some parts falling were enough of a shock that it stunned the Inquisitors long enough for him to act.

At the same time the one on the left tried to ignite their lightsaber, Anakin used the Force to slam the one on the right into the wall preventing them from doing the same. The lightsaber, internally compromised, exploded. Being prepared for the bloom of fire, Anakin blocked any energy blasted at him. He was on his feet, spinning around the table and in the remaining Inquisitor's space before they'd had a chance to do more than lift their hands to deflect the heat of the explosion. Using his arm like a dull knife, or rather a bunch of dull knives, he stabbed the long bits of metal into the throat of the Inquisitor. With them out of the way, he picked up their lightsaber and dispatched the stormtroopers stationed outside coming in to see what the noise was about.

He held the lightsaber up with the Force and cut the shock cuffs off of him. Then he summoned the parts of his arm that had fallen to the ground and Forced them all back into place.

"Okay... time to go find my rampaging boyfriend."

And bring him back from the Dark Side.

The interesting thing was, that even in this state Obi-Wan wasn't seeking anyone out. Oh, he was doing things to living, breathing, people that he'd only done to droids (like lifting and crushing them with the force) in the name of expedience, but even as far gone as he was-

He was quite simply cutting a path directly toward Anakin.

All he wanted was to get to Anakin and get Anakin out. If the bloody idiots had the sense to run, he wouldn't have gone after them. Instead they kept coming to him. It was infuriating. The depths of the fury added to his fear. What he was doing and how added to his self-loathing.

He was a mess.

He was also uninhibited and all but unstoppable.

Until Anakin stepped through the door of his interrogation room.

At which point he stopped immediately.

Anakin stopped, turning off the lightsaber.

Obi-Wan stood at the end of the corridor, surrounded by bodies.

Anakin checked both directions before starting slowly towards Obi-Wan. He wasn't afraid. He just knew what it was like on that side of the Force. And he wanted back as quickly as possible.

"Obi-Wan," he said gently, trying to smile and not let the memories of Mustafar cloud his mind. "You did what I said. You survived."

He frowned at Anakin, then looked down at the lightsaber in his hand and... turned it off. Because Anakin had and because Anakin was in sight and while battered and bruised was in one piece.

"I want you out of here."

He was still just a complete mess of emotions that were feeding in on themselves - but his objective hadn't changed.

"I know," Anakin said, stepping over bodies now.

He held out his hand for Obi-Wan.

"Take my hand, Obi-Wan." His mind was reeling with what to say because he didn't know.

He hadn't been able to talk Ahsoka back from the Dark Side on Mortis - she'd died. He wasn't going to kill Obi-Wan. He'd only come back from the Dark Side on Tatooine after he'd killed all the Raiders of the tribe. There was a whole ship full of Imperials, plus two Inquisitors. And Anakin knew that could take a while.

He could feel Anakin's... upheaval? Albeit not clearly. He wasn't even feeling himself very clearly - or, rather, was feeling so much, including outright shame, that nothing was clear.

He frowned faintly.

"Why?"

He didn't much think he should be touching Anakin.

He really wanted to, though and he was as emotion driven right now. Which meant shame and 'don't' was at odds with worry and 'do'. Both of which were at odds with his burning desire to destroy everything< that had any part in taking Anakin away from him.

He took the hand anyway but not so much out of decision but because of what his strongest want in that second was. It could change in a heartbeat - or less.

Edited 2020-03-08 06:37 (UTC)

Anakin swallowed back his own fear turning in his stomach.

And when he spoke, "Because I want to know you're real," his voice wavered his eyes stung. He started blinking against the tears and the memories of their roles being reversed.

When Obi-Wan's hand touched his, Anakin pulled the man in close, dropping the lightsaber and wrapping his arm around the other man's body.

He moved his left hand up to grab the man's wrist, hoping the touch there might help the man find the life-line to pull himself up out of the Dark. "Come back to me, Obi-Wan," he said in his ear.

Stay with me.

Edited 2020-03-08 06:47 (UTC)

He flinched when Anakin pulled him in - flinched like he'd been physically hit - air even left his lungs in a sudden rush.

There was so much... stuff in his head, that almost none of it made any sort of coherent sense.

It didn't actually get better when Anakin's hand wrapped around his wrist and there was that voice in his ear. Both shocked him back enough to realize what he had done and absolute and utter horror and self-directed hatred.

He knew what Anakin was trying to do. He could feel the pull of it as clearly as he could feel his pulse against Anakin's fingers and the warmth of Anakin's breath against his skin. He even remembered pretty clearly the first time Anakin had done that, for him.

He was pretty firm in the idea that having failed to save Anakin he wasn't allowed to be saved by Anakin. ...He actually kind of wanted to die. Which fed back toward confusion and disorientation and fear and despair and-

He was breathing though, and at least starting to try to settle himself down. He wasn't really succeeding, but an effort was being made.

"Love. Cool motive." He very tentatively brushed his fingers over Anakin's cheek. "Want a star destroyer?"

And Anakin was sure that because he'd failed Obi-Wan (and the rest of the galaxy) he had to save him (and the rest of the galaxy) now.

But he felt the slight change, and his heart just about broke from the weight of his emotions as he realized how tightly he was holding back. Relief was coursing through him now, and out of him - it seemed like he was crying more now than when this started. He found Obi-Wan's mouth and kissed him.

He lifted the Inquisitor's lightsaber with the Force and opened it to get the crystals.

He grabbed the crystals and then Obi-Wan's hand, trapping them between their palms.

"Help me purify them." Because doing so was pure Light and Obi-Wan needed that right now.

It was only with the relief that he really became aware of Anakin crying. He hated it. He hated himself for his role in making it happened. He hated Darth Vader, everyone on the ship, and the Empire, too. They'd all done this.

He didn't hate Anakin.

And he tried to get that under control, too.

He watched Anakin pulling the crystals out, then felt them hard and sharp between their hands, cool but warming rapidly between their combined body heat.

He brushed a tear away from Anakin's cheek with his free hand, and shook his head slightly. "If I could manage that I wouldn't be here." Here being in the Dark. His voice was oddly flat, like that much emotion cancelled itself out, somehow, in expression.

The irony of saying that though was he knew, knew damn well what he would have said to someone else. Recognized it for what it was - fear of trying again, and shame and then the self-feeding the nature of the thing. His empathy for Anakin on Mustafar had never been higher.

He wasn't feeling excessively violent at the moment, but he also knew very well that was because there was noone here but Anakin. ANd he hated that.

"Just.... Stop." Not stop doing anything in particular, and his grip on Anakin's hand around those crystals was solid and tight. Just. Stop. Stop was the only clear thought in his head, but it was... too much a request to be as simple as 'go away'. Stop what was happening? Stop him? Stop trying to help? Make it stop? That he was abruptly near tears himself and not even aware of it said... probably all of those things and more.

Edited 2020-03-08 14:32 (UTC)

“No,” Anakin said, tightening his grip on Obi-Wan’s hand. “One of the biggest lies the Order taught us is that if we fall we can never get back up - that’s wrong! Right now, it doesn’t matter what got you here, it’s what you do next.”

Try.

He tried not to sound too desperate, they were still on a ship with Imperials. They weren’t out of this yet. But Anakin resolved that whatever happened, if they lived or were killed here, he would stay by Obi-Wan’s side through it.

“Darkness cannot drive out Darkness, only Light can do that. The trick Qui-Gon has been trying to teach you these past months is love.” Hate had kept him alive after Mustafar. It was how Sith achieved their version of immortality. Love was how you lived enterally in the Light.

“I don’t care if I do most of the work, all you have to do is try. Just love me enough to see how much I love you no matter what you did just now. Love me enough to forgive yourself and love yourself.”

Love me enough to live.

He was pretty sure what Qui-Gon was trying to teach him was about being able to let go of everything, actually, but he was not so far gone that he didn't see the practical applications here.

Even if what he'd done here was the result of doing anything but being willing to let go.

He was also absolutely sure that forgiving himself, much less loving himself, was an impossible proposition. Impossible enough for him to not even be able to figure out how that was a possibility, or to even make an attempt. He wanted to ask Anakin just how much Anakin had forgiven himself.

The thing was, he did love Anakin and he did love Anakin enough to do the thing there that he understood, and that was try to reach back toward the light.

Because Anakin was right. The idea that someone who fell was lost forever was a lie. He knew that (now).

He had the same problem he'd had before, only more so: He couldn't hold onto it. He couldn't get far enough away from fear/anger (and now hate, grief, self-loathing, and other things he'd let bubble up to get to Anakin) for long enough to be able to keep any sort of focus or grip. It felt like trying to hold onto a fistful of water.

But he absolutely did try, and he kept trying, even if it kept slipping out of his grasp.

Edited 2020-03-08 18:43 (UTC)

What was love but letting go?

Obi-Wan trying was enough for Anakin. He'd pull them the rest of the way.

He reached for the Force and started pulling it through the crystals in their hands. He reached for Obi-Wan's presence in the Force, pulling them together, weaving himself into Obi-Wan as much as the man would let him. It was here he felt all of Obi-Wan's negative emotions - the hate and self-loathing he was intimately familiar with because of his own experiences. And he knew why Obi-Wan clung to them. He acknowledge them, tried to let Obi-Wan know he understood.

Let go.

He started pulling more of the Force, but made the target wider: them. The Light was warm at first, like a welcoming glow, but it grew steadily hotter until it reached the level of painful. The crystals in the palms of their hands felt like fire - he'd know - but when he looked, there were no flames. He'd survived immolation before, and he knew with certainty only found in the Force that they would survive this.

He gripped Obi-Wan's hand tighter, tugged him closer in his embrace.

The gray surfaces of the corridor walls, ceiling, and floors started to reflect a brilliant white, and it took Anakin a moment to realize it was them who were casting the light. As the light got brighter, he closed his eyes. Nothing outside of this mattered.

He didn't stop pulling the Force until he felt Obi-Wan touch it, grab it, and find a steady grip. He wouldn't stop until he felt Obi-Wan was back. He knew Obi-Wan would never be the same after this, but he'd never been the same after his fall either. Sometimes things changed, but it would still be okay. Because he was here, with Obi-Wan, and he wasn't going to leave him again.

Obi-Wan let Anakin weave them together, but not deeply. Enough for there to be connection, yes, and for that connection to be solid, but no more than that. Enough for him to know what Anakin was offering was empathy, rather than sympathy, but really entwining he couldn't stomach the thought of.

For Anakin's sake.

The same reason that he allowed himself to be pulled in closer, but ultimately put a hand up on Anakin's shoulder and maintained some physical distance even while allowing himself to be held. He just... couldn't accept more than that.

Even when Light started being pulled through him, surrounded him and burned from the inside out, made him shake, made him sweat, made his teeth clench hard against it, felt it quite literally burn away not just dark but shadows. He felt half-blinded and certainly there were tears streaming from his eyes, unchecked and silent.

There was just that little bit of distance he would not let Anakin across.

He did, however, even holding that space solidly manage to find a proper grip on the Light, in the force, and distance or no he returned Anakin's grip on him, both physical and metaphysical.

He kept holding on until the burn faded and light faded enough to allow him to see again, and see Anakin within the brilliant white light and... well, in spite of everything else and the fact that both he and the relationship felt utterly wrecked he absolutely, utterly, loved Anakin.

It hurt, the way Obi-Wan maintained the distance between them after months of sharing level of intimacy that could best be described as living inside one another.

Changed.

Anakin knew Obi-Wan would be. He would need to find a way to accept it.

Having Obi-Wan back was enough, it would be enough for a while... And if they never reached that level of intimacy again? Well, it would still be enough because Anakin loved him. Having him back in any way was enough when you loved someone.

He didn't let go yet. He needed to be sure about what Obi-Wan could handle.

"Do you think you can fight beside me? Enough to take the ship?" Obi-Wan had already taken out so much of the crew. But if he wasn't up for anything more, Anakin wouldn't push it. "Or just enough to get out of here?"

Lemme know if you need me to change anything

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