SHE HAS HEARD OF THE WRATH OF DARTH VADER, has seen evidence of it in their never-ending war ( but not with her, somehow never with her ), can even feel the heat of it though she cannot understand why — or how. It is she who is angry, she who has fire coursing through her veins, flames licking at her skin & at cursed beating organ that won’t forget & somehow he knows it, for he is using her love as a weapon. FIRE ONLY BURNS BRIGHTER, heat raising to her cheeks & she’s had enough, heard enough & cannot take anymore without doing something FOOLISH ( either she leaves, or she hurts him — no doubt hurting herself in the process but she doesn’t care, she only wants to inflict the pain upon him that he does each time he mentions Anakin Skywalker. Righteous anger overwhelms the pain — her Anakin? Weak? ) Gaze hardens, voice cold as stone & just as harsh. ❛ Weak? Is that why you needed him gone? ❜ She shakes her head. ❛ No. Anakin Skywalker was strong, in ways you’ll never understand. ❜ & eyes look contemptuously at machination holding semblance of a man together. ❛ & I am finished. This was a mistake. ❜ She turns on her heel — NEEDS TO LEAVE & is glad for the silence he provides ( one he no doubt expects her to wait through but she can’t, won’t. ) — yet she doesn’t get far when toneless voice unforgivingly shatters her world. Footsteps still & she can’t see, can’t hear ( oh how she wishes she could not feel as well! ) — she does not even hear the crash of the communicator ( that she was still holding onto ) as it slipped through her fingers. ❛ No. ❜
She cannot turn, does not want to look at the monster who would tell such horrors — for the sake of what? Cruelty? Was this why Darth Vader was so feared, because he knew just how to dig up unhealed wounds & leave you bleeding? She does turn ( must, has to see the machine & prove to too-fast beating heart that HE IS NOT HIM. ) ❛ No. Anakin is dead. ❜ & she hates everything about the sentence — the way her voice still wraps around his name like an aching caress. The finality of death & the loss of her LOVE. ❛ You killed him. ❜ Yet why do words sound almost like a plea, why does she want him to admit to such heinous crime, why does she want him to be dead? ( Because the truth staring at her is far worse. )
SHE HAD BELIEVED OBI WAN, HAD TAKEN HIS WORD for it had been all she had ( & in part, it was what she had wanted to believe, needed to hear. ) Yet she had not known everything. Phantom pieces to a puzzle she had thought complete because the picture was horrifying & was better left as it had been. ❛ He would have found me. Anakin was a good man. ❜ Yet throat aches in cruel reminder of their parting goodbye — one that hadn’t been goodbye at all, for her breath had been stolen from her as she had looked onto the man she had loved to see a STRANGER ( a monster. ) Eyes WIDEN, lips part as if in a silent scream of horror. She takes a step back, head shaking in denial. ❛ You — you can’t be. ❜ Eyes shut briefly, lips pressed together as if to hold back the name that had risen to her lips. Yet broken sound voices it all the same. ❛ Anakin? ❜
❝ you speak too highly of a man you once betrayed. ❞ carefully spoken words are soft, calculated in the coldness of their delivery. how dare she once again lie? had she thought him as strong as she now claims, she would've surely trusted him — known anakin would do what was better for them. body stiffens in the limitations of black cage, suit not displaying what the being beneath it experiences. but it is there, the fire raging through his bloodstream, the iced fury gripping evey inch of charred skin. FOR A MOMENT HER SPEECH TURNS THE ROOM RED, FAMILIAR SMOKE CURLING AT THE EDGES OF HIS VISION. years might have passed yet his wounds still sting : they are deep and incurable, as much as he's tried to close them. padmé's return has brought nothing but obscure revelations he had been too blind to discover before — and perhaps amazement. HE REFUSES TO NAME ANY OTHER FEELINGS SHE MAY EVOKE. chooses to focus on the anger, the pain, the unforgiving wrath. once he would've destroyed this place, made use of such strong passion to obliterate what stands in his wake, however he is now able to excercise control. stop himself from hurting her like he did before.
the canvas of her face paints many emotions, a cruel symphony he cannot help but enjoy as resentment is clung to tightly. there's rage at first, replaced by disbelief, by hollowness and by grief. acceptance lurks underneath the shadows of marble features, accompanied by reaization, strange hope refusing its entrance. RESISTING IS OF NO USE. what he speaks is the truth — she's too intelligent not to see that. a fist rises, clenched as a finger points at her small frame. ❝ anakin skywalker died in the flames of mustafar — kenobi made sure of that when he mangled his body and left him to burn. ❞ if he could speak without aid, such statement would ignite a fire in his throat, choking him with sensations he struggles to keep buried. parts of him take pleasure in her horror, in the way her eyes open with begging doubt. ❝ i was there to take his place. ❞ and to rise from the embers a weak man had left, so disgustingly defeated by a betrayer. anakin — cursed name falls off her lips over and over again, the urge to correct her hot on his mind, though he refrains from doing so. pitiful question goes unanswered, for he has already stated what has become of their reality, the one that brought them happiness in another life. ❝ it is of no surprise that he deceived you. ❞ like poison his mechanical notes grow in volume, hate bright at the thought of his former master, at the reminder of mustafar and the night he lost everything. ❝ he turned away from me — just like you did. ❞ ah, the bitterness can almost go unheard behind robotic tone! yet it is there, seeds grown from the moment he'd realized those closest to him had been traitors.