The Blood of a Million

Chapter 1 - Fire and Ash

Author's Note: This is what you get when Revenge of the Sith is made after the Clone Wars... except in character. :') Now happy crying! :D

PS: I think the song Before You Go by Lewis Capaldi really, really fits this.

~ Rivana Rita

Also, this is a part of the Star Wars Playlist Challenge hosted by Riftwalker on ao3. I think it fits. :)

~ Amina Gila

He falls to his knees, denial screaming through his mind, crying out in protest against the image he sees before his eyes. The world around him feels far, far away, even Obi-Wan calling his name. He doesn't know if something is touching him or not and it doesn't much matter.

His padawan. This was his child. She...

"You have done well, my apprentice," Sidious's voice purrs in the background, from the hologram, and that's maybe all that matters. "Perhaps now you will be strong enough." Strong enough for what? He doesn't understand... "But your mission is not yet complete. Go to the Mustafar system and eliminate the Separatist leaders there. Then, the war will be at an end, and we can restore peace to the galaxy."

His padawan's voice. "Yes, Master." The one thing she always said to him. Not...

It feels like something just ripped his heart out.

This is hardly the first time he's seen his yellow-eyed padawan, Anakin reminds himself bitterly.

"Ahsoka is gone," he hears Obi-Wan saying, but it's too far away.

"No!" he yells. "She's not. She can't be. Not her. No. I just got her back!"

***

His heart is pounding as he walks through the halls of the Temple again. He barely had time to meet Padme again – for her to tell him that she's pregnant – before Master Windu shooed him off to the Temple. But now. Ahsoka. She's here. She's... grown up. They told him right before his last mission that she was rejoining the Order, for reasons she didn't explain.

They pause, staring at each other, eyes wide, before she runs to him, throwing her arms around his neck, all sense of age and maturity abandoned. He lets himself break down then, for the first time. She's back. His padawan – after everything, she came back.

He clings to her, holding her body tightly against his own. She's bigger now, taller, but she still fits here as much as she always has and will.

"Skyguy," she whispers, choking back a sob. "You came back. I feared the worst."

"It's okay," he promises, rubbing her back. "I'm okay. We're safe." And he wonders how he survived, general of the 501st, without the other third that was their leader. Without the third that made all of them who they are.

He didn't ask her why or what she feared. He should have, and he'll regret that for the rest of his life.

***

"Destroyed, the Sith must be," Yoda says, and Anakin shakes his head furiously. He doesn't cry because he can't. It hurts too much.

Obi-Wan shakes him slightly before he seems to finally get the point that Anakin literally cannot respond to him and settles down next to him. He wraps an arm around Anakin's shoulders, pulling him close. "What must we do?" Obi-Wan asks, despite the obvious pain in his voice.

"Go after the Emperor, I will," Master Yoda declares, and Anakin doesn't have the heart to argue. He knows that Palpatine is Sidious, but that's not what hurts him most. That's not what's occupying his entire mind. If he had stayed, this would never have happened...