What Could Have Been Part III: The Destined Warriors

A Coward's Debt

       Luke

       His dad? How? Why? How?

      "Dad what are you doing here?" Luke asked with fear prominently on his face and in his words. Had he noticed that he called him stupid and reckless?

       "Making sure my son is still alive. Now tell me, what are you doing?" his father answered without the slightest trace of humor in his voice. He was mad. He must have heard the stupid and reckless part, Luke decided. "Okay Dad, I'm sure this looks bad, me disobeying Rex and all, but you have to look at this from different points of view," Luke suggested in a pleasant tone. "On one hand, I was careless, and idiotic and you have every right to be angry with me, but on the other hand, this was all in the spirit of exploration and I'm perfectly unharmed so you should actually be quite proud of me..."

       Anakin spoke through clenched teeth. "I only have one hand, Luke..."

       A fearful laugh escaped Luke. "Hey look, there's that sense of humor of yours, Dad!"

       Anakin turned back to his speeder. "That's it, you're coming back to Mandalore with me. It isn't safe here," he said in a growl-like voice. Luke gawked. He couldn't believe what his father had said. "Dad, I have to stay on Onderon. I have to complete my mission." Anakin didn't even look back. "Well then consider this a discharge from your assignment. We're leaving." Luke raised his eyebrows.

       "No, Dad."

       There it was.

       "Do you wanna say that again?" his father asked. This time, his voice was unrecognizable. There was some sort of inhuman, sinister quality in it that told Luke he had just started down a dangerous road on which he could not turn around. But he held his ground. "No, Dad," Luke repeated with a saturated defiance in his voice this time. "I'm staying here."

       Now Anakin was standing frozen; hunched over his speeder with one hand gripping the handle bar. It was his stillness that scared Luke the most. Any moment the fuse would reach its end and his father would blow. "You're coming with me and that is final." His voice told Luke that this was his last chance to back down.

       But Luke passed the point of no return anyways. The fire in his chest could no longer remain dormant. "Dad, I was fine before you got here and I'll be fine when you leave. When are you going to understand that I don't need you with me anymore?" His voice had snowballed into a moderate shout, but his father rebutted even louder. "Luke Skywalker, I did not fight my way out of a blockade, and fly across the galaxy for you to speak to me that way! Get on your bike right-"

        "When are you going to understand that I don't want you with me anymore?!?"

       It wasn't true. But Luke had still said it and it left a wound on his father, that much he could tell. This would have been a good time for him to stop but something had snapped and holding back was no longer an option. "You think Leia and I need you, but we don't, Dad. Everyone in the galaxy believes in us. Everyone except for the one person who we've been trying to prove ourselves to all our lives. For once could you just let us prove to you that we can do something on our own?" he asked with burning anger in his words. When his father didn't reply, he kept going.

      "No. Of course you couldn't. And I've finally realized why..." he said arrogantly as his father accepted the criticism. "You don't want to let us go because you're afraid. You, the Chosen One, the Hero with No Fear, is-"

        "That's right Luke!" Anakin shouted back; finally turning around. He trembled as he spoke and Luke listened silently as he did. "I am afraid. I'm afraid that I'm going to lose you and your sister. I am scared to death that I'm going to lose you two and it's been that way all your lives because I almost lost you before! I almost lost your mother before! I almost lost the only things that I had left and I couldn't let that happen, Luke! I'm afraid because I don't want to lose you the way I lost Ahsoka!"

       Anakin

       It was finally out. After years of screaming inside of him, the words had finally made they way into the real world. Those words that had haunted him day and night ever since he watched his first apprentice walk away from him as he did nothing. Ever since he held his son and daughter in his arms and promised them he would protect them no matter what. Whatever happened, he wouldn't make the same mistake again.

       Luke stared at him for a long time. For a while, neither of them said anything and the echo of Ahsoka's name hung in the air around them. Anakin found his anger defused and replaced by his ever remaining guilt for letting his first apprentice go. When his son finally spoke, he was no longer shouting, but his voice still contained the pure disappointment in him as it had before.

      "You're nothing but a coward."

      Anakin had never once been so destroyed by one single sentence. His son had always looked up to him, always tried to be like him. And now he had lost him.

      "I'm sorry, son..."

       With nothing left to say, Anakin returned to camp, and left for Mandalore.

       Woah! Oh no! What will happen next? Who knows? Don't forget to comment and may the Force be with you!