𝐃𝐀𝐘𝐋𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 | Anakin Skywalker

six

Erin sighed and scratched her forehead, "Have you heard that saying, that everything can be ruined in a split second?"

"I heard Han say it," Luke replies even though it was a rhetorical question.

Erin ignored him and ran her fingers over the flat surface of the gold locket.

"That was what happened, it was the beginning of everything"

• • •

Erin wiped her oily hands clean and then stuffed the rag into her pants pocket as she looked at her jet.

"Erin" Anakin breathed out the woman's name.

Erin turns to Anakin, quickly noticing the crimson-stained Jedi suit, as well as his hands and part of her face.

"Shit, Anakin," Erin rushes to catch up, "what happened?"

"I killed them," Anakin tells her grimly, "every single one of them." Anakin took Erin's hands, staining them, "not just men, women, children too. They are like animals and they are killed like animals! I hate them!"

It was the look in his eyes, I should have known, but we became accomplices once he spilled all the blood of those innocent people on me.

Erin finished cleaning Anakin up and sat down next to the boy.

"It's not your fault" Erin tells him referring to the death of Anakin's mother.

"What?" Anakin says still lost in his thoughts about him.

"It's not your fault," Erin repeats.

"I know" Anakin with a sigh avoiding the chocolate colored gaze.

"It's not your fault"

"I know," Anakin mutters.

"No, no. Listen to me" Erin takes him by the chin so that her eyes meet, "it's not your fault"

Anakin jumped from Erin's grasp, "don't do this to me, not to you, Erin."

"It's not your fault" she repeats herself firmly taking a step closer to Anakin.

Anakin wanted to yell at Erin, tell her to fuck off her, but when he looked at her face he knew he could never yell all those things at her, so he just pulled away from her as he choked back tears.

"It's not your fault" Erin keeps saying.

Anakin wiped his hand over his face and then threw himself into Erin's arms, "I hate that you can make me feel so vulnerable but I love it at the same time," he says between sobs feeling Erin's fingers run through her hair.

They stayed for a while, hugging, hugging, just the two of them.

"Anakin!" Padme yells as he walks towards the ship.

Both boys separate and look at the agitated senator, she looked like she just ran a marathon.

"A message from obi wan," Padme says with agitated repair, her eyes drifting to the girl Anakin is still clinging to, "oh hi, I'm sorry I walked into your ship like that."

"Nah, don't worry," Erin tells her with a kind smile, "I guess should go now."

Padme looked between the two guys before realizing that she was redundant, so she stepped outside to give them time to say goodbye.

Anakin ran his hand over the back of his neck, "about what happened..."

"Hey, it's okay," Erin pats his arm, "it's okay to have feelings even if the Jedi say it's not okay."

Anakin runs his index finger in a caress along Erin's cheek, "I'll see you in a few moments"

"That's how it will be," Erin says with a smile.

• • •

"The second time I quit it wasn't my choice," Erin tells them.

Leia watched as Erin's fingers trembled on the glass.

"Apparently the Separatists were planning to gain more ground by taking a group of humans and transforming them into super soldiers" Erin takes a swallow from the full glass of whiskey, "I didn't know being a gambling addict and an alcoholic qualified to be part of that stupid experiment."

"What are you talking about?" Luke asks confused.

"They took me, I don't know for how long, I don't know where. I only i will never forget the way they tortured me."