ATONEMENT

There is no death. There is only the Force.

[c. 18 BBY]

Winter had fallen on Naboo.

It had been two standard months since the would-be revolution had been crushed. Queen Apailana, ringleader of that little insurrection, had been forever silenced by the hands of the legion he personally commanded.

Emperor Palpatine himself had gone back to his own homeworld and seen to it that every remaining trace of rebellion was stamped out from within its aristocracy. Each and every noble who so much as held a whiff of anti-Imperial sentiment was marked for death. He then had a puppet of his own installed upon the empty throne. But his Master had a great many things to attend to; and so, it had fallen to Darth Vader to weed out any stragglers.

Lord Vader did not take kindly to his task.

He could not speak out his mind for fear of displeasing the Emperor and so his frustration and rage he kept secret in his furnace heart.

It was not because the Sith Lord found such an assignment underwhelming.

He could not explain exactly what he felt when his ruined eyes beheld the lush, green and blue world of Naboo after such a long time.

He had thought in times past that he should have visited Naboo sooner. It was, after all, a planet that held so much for him.

It was also her world and final resting place.

It had been a little over a standard year since she had died. The Sith Lord would burn in his anguish when he thought of how it was his own hand that brought about that which he feared most in this life. His pain brought him power though; and while he had indeed grown more powerful than ever in just one year—a year in which the entire galaxy had come to fear the mere idea of him—the grief would always come back to haunt him.

For Lord Vader, existence and suffering were one and the same.

The Sith Lord could remember every detail of her, every miniscule thing...everything he had loved and still did.

His own injuries had prevented him from mourning her in person during her funeral.

A funeral which the entire planet had borne to witness.

A funeral which he would have burned the whole universe to ashes for, if only to see her one last time.

It had displeased him when he had discovered in his time there that she was not cremated, as per Naboo custom. It did not surprise him though that the Emperor seemed to have neglected informing him of this particular detail. Then again, his Master always did keep secrets to himself.

One day perhaps, Darth Sidious would pay dearly and die painfully in his hands.

But the reason for that secrecy was a necessary one between that of a Sith Master and apprentice. Reasons that eluded his own were to be expected.

But if Darth Vader had to be blunt, he simply could not begin to care. He knew where to go and that was all that mattered.

Only she mattered.

He had chosen that night because of the raging blizzard that had fallen on the capital.

Imperials and Naboo alike had taken shelter from the freezing storm. He was totally alone; a dark spectre in that black night, striding through an unyielding onslaught of snow and howling winds.

A lone pilgrim in the midst of nothingness.

Lord Vader himself felt cold, but it had nothing to do with the storm outside.

Another storm was brewing to which that snowstorm paled in comparison, one inside his being that grew stronger with every step he took. He could not even see where he was going, despite his helmet's capabilities. Then again, he did not need those.

Instead, Darth Vader had followed his heart.

His heart was with her and always will be.

It had never failed him even when they were stars apart—even as it began to freeze over in a cold dread beyond comprehension.

It was a fear that made the Sith Lord want to turn back; to escape the chilling, immobilizing pain he knew lay in store for him.

But a part of him...the part that he thought had died with her made him pound on.

The walk across the frost and snow-covered bridge felt like it took years, but at last he was there.

It stood at the end of the bridge, a white and pink marble edifice raised slightly and overlooking the immense Solleu River just before it terminated in a grand waterfall. It was surrounded by a small forest which was at the time swaying and creaking in the winds of the storm.

Vader knew that she could not have been lain in a more beautiful place.

The blizzard made sure that the structure's regular retinue of guards was absent, and it took only a small twitch in the Force to disable the automated security systems left behind. The Sith Lord then walked up the frosted white marble steps towards her mausoleum's two great silver-and-gold doors.

His hand quivered even as he willed the doors to effortlessly open before him and a softly lit, immaculately maintained, and beautifully crafted antechamber welcomed him. It made him recall her passion for architecture.

Lord Vader smiled despite his grief. She would have loved the designs had she seen them for herself.

He shut the doors and the blizzard behind him and all was quiet but for the heavy mechanical breathing that he was forced to endure. Inside, the cold tempest of fear grew and grew and his entire body trembled as he walked through a tunnel filled with her portraits.

He had believed himself to be free of fear, and yet...

He had never been more afraid.

Each and every one of the softly lit portraits seemed to look at him and judge him for how far he had fallen.

Everywhere he looked was a stab to his then hammering heart.

He could hear her voice clearly speaking from each and every one of them.

Anakin...they called out.

Her soft, quiet voice caused him more agony than when Dooku had blasted him with Sith lightning years and years ago.

Anakin...

More than after the same had severed his arm on Geonosis.

Anakin...

More than even the fires of Mustafar.

Anakin...

He knew that he could tear the entire building down easily, if only to spare him that torture. But for all his power in the Force, he could not touch her. He had and always will be powerless in her presence. He endured and his entire form shook as he did...

Through the voices that called out his name.

Through that inescapable tunnel whose silent eyes watched him struggle.

Through haunted memories that clawed at his soul.

Through the icy storm of maddening dread ready to explode from his heart.

At last, at the end of the tunnel, he found her.

A rectangular sarcophagus of pristine white marble lay in front of him with the Royal Crest of Naboo embossed on its beautifully wrought surface.

The room where she lay was made of black and white marble, just as finely crafted as the rest of the building.

There were no artificial lights within the immaculately hand-carved grotto and what dim light from the outside world—a world he no longer cared for nor understood—passed through a stained glass window that held her image.

Padmé...

He noted the many garlands and bouquets of flowers that came from those who wished to pay her tribute in recent days. To his added shame did he realize he had brought nothing for her. The Sith Lord tenderly laid a hand on her sarcophagus when he softly stepped over to its other end, where her head should be.

The howling blizzard outside and the one inside him were now two things that had become one.

He could not bear to see her through his helm's artificial eyes.

He needed to do it with his own. He needed to speak to her with his own lips.

Hands shaking, Darth Vader took off the mask that was supposed to keep him alive and let it drop softly onto the bed of flowers in the floor.

Only the sound of tears softly pattering on the stone tomb accompanied husband and wife, united at long last.

The very sight of her sarcophagus strangled the breath in his throat.

"Padmé..." he whispered, his breath clouding in the cold air, "Padmé...forgive me."

Their memories came racing back with a speed that blinded him even as he closed his eyes against his tears.

"I am s-so sorry...," his ruined lips said, "if only I could..."

He had given everything. Everything for her.

"I only wanted...t-to save you."

Only for him, in his rage, to be the instrument that brought about her doom. He hated himself as much as he loved her. It was a hate that had kept him alive.

But now...

He could see her laying in state within the marble tomb with that small smile that made his heart bleed, every bit as perfect as the day he had first met her...

It was madness that she was both there with him, and yet forever out of his reach!

Thus the icy storm in his heart finally broke.

Vader's mechanical limbs gave out from under him and he collapsed on his knees.

He could not find the strength to stand up, clutching at the edge of his wife's tomb with his devastated face against the stone, wailing like a tortured animal with whatever was left of his voice. He attempted to will himself to die there and then, if only for a chance that they would be together the way they both had dreamed of.

To see her again, radiant, alive, and perfect...

To feel her touch running through him, and his through her warm, fragrant skin...

To experience her magic embrace...

To once again lock his lips on hers...

But the dark side of the Force was a cruel and unforgiving thing. His grief fed his suffering and his suffering fed his power. He wanted to let go of everything already, but his power would not.

He wept in frustration and agony, knowing that he could hate himself beyond hatred and still he would not die.

All the power in the universe he could have...and at one point in the past, he might indeed have had. No matter what he could have done and would ever do, he will never be with her again.

Vader realized, in his becoming, that he could never have saved her.

That he had failed her from the start.

He wanted to hate her; to forget and finally be free of what his Master had termed "the trappings of sentimentality".

Even that was beyond him. More than ever in his miserable life, he felt lost and helpless. Enslaved by a selfish power that was at once torture and sustenance.

A power that sapped him of his strength, his fear, his hate, and his fury until only horror and grief were left, gnawing at his soul just as fire had once devoured his flesh.

There were no words for what he felt.

He was no longer Darth Vader, the Lord of the Sith who had become the very embodiment of fear throughout the galaxy.

He was not Anakin Skywalker, the greatest of the Jedi who had given up everything and gone into fire to save the woman he loved.

He was only a man.

A broken man.

Then and forever.

He continued to cry out in despair and mourning and thus the Force wept with its fallen, chosen son.

The wordless lament to the one he loved began to calm the icy storm that had broken forth from inside him as it did the blizzard beyond the mausoleum's walls.

His remorse a silent requiem that echoed through the Force and beyond.

He felt like he had aged a thousand years, but at last he got up to his feet, gingerly taking his mask in one hand.

Vader's burned eyes hurt more than they ever did and the tears that ran from them had since turned scarlet.

Both outside and within, the blizzard had finally gone.

He could never come back to that place.

He was not worthy to be within her presence even in that indirect way. That was his punishment for failing her.

His atonement.

"Padmé", he choked while laying both hands on her tomb, "I will always...love you."

He made no sound while striding back out into the cold night, shutting the doors behind him.

Naboo's three moons were shining beautifully then in a cloudless sky; their silver light bathing her tomb with ethereal beauty against the stark landscape and the frozen, glittering deep blue waters of the Solleu.

Before he put the black mask of Darth Vader back on his face, Anakin Skywalker looked back and gave one last tearful smile for his wife.

Goodbye...and forgive me...