75Prompt fill for (AngelQueen, Connwaer49, Aki no Kitsune, and Brievel who asked for an initial Darth Vader reaction to the Queens.
Ghost
It was impossible.
He knew it was.
He had seen Her body himself, had been to Her tomb.
And yet.
Vader stared at the holo, completely fixated on the women in the image, his breathing echoing loudly in the silent room.
He remembered that day.
The day he burned.
It was the day She had looked at him so desperately, eyes wet with tears. The day She had backed away from him with fear on Her face, with betrayal and heartbreak and desperation in every line of Her body. The day that She pleaded with him, begged him to stay with Her, to love Her, to let Her love him in return, to be a father to their child, to leave with Her.
The day he killed Her.
He remembered that day.
Remembered the anger and the hatred and the betrayal he felt when Obi-Wan had stepped out of Her ship. Remembered the way he had reached out and squeezed. Remembered the way Her hands flew to Her throat and the surprise in Her eyes and Her gasped pleas. Remembered the way She fell bonelessly to the ground, sprawled out on the durasteel landing platform, breathing shallow and reedy.
He loved Her.
He would always love Her.
And he killed Her.
Not in labor like his visions had shown him, for he had seen Her body still swollen with child, but by his hand. Two lives extinguished in a moment of blind rage, lives that he had always sworn were more precious to him than anything and he'd snuffed them out like they were nothing.
And now he stared at the ghosts projected before him and tried to pretend that his heart wasn't clenching in his chest, that his stomach wasn't sinking, that a chill wasn't lacing up his spine, that his regulator wasn't working overtime to keep his breathing steady.
She was dead.
She was dead because he killed Her.
She was dead because he killed Her and now Her ghosts were haunting him.
She was dead because he killed Her and now Her ghosts were haunting him and burning the Empire he had worked to build to keep Her safe to the ground.
He'd done it for Her.
He'd taken their war torn galaxy and reshaped it into something that would protect Her.
Yet when he'd tried to tell Her of it, to make Her see how glorious and wonderful it was, She had backed away from him. She'd shaken Her head and looked at him like She'd never seen him before. She'd looked at what he'd done – out of love for Her, to protect Her, to save Her – and said no.
She'd said no.
He hadn't listened.
And now the Empire he had built for Her was burning.
Oh they were small fires, easily put out and seemingly insignificant considering the grander scale, but he knew – for She had taught him oh so long ago – that even the smallest of sparks could grow into a raging inferno.
Why couldn't She understand?
Why couldn't She see what he had built for Her?
Why did She haunt him like this?
How could She not see how much he loved Her? How much he still loved Her even after all this time?
And yet.
He'd always been fire. Fire and passion and a burning tangle of emotion that refused to be extinguished.
She'd always been water. Rare and precious and necessary for life. She was willful and spirited and spoke Her mind. She was freedom personified.
She hadn't feared fire.
She'd never feared fire.
She'd never been afraid to burn.
And as he watched Her ghosts move with all the grace and ferocity of a storm, he wondered if She even could.
I rather like this one.
Until next time,
~Elri