i wanna know if im a good one

Redraw of this silly little thing I posted forever ago->

The Knights of Coruscant are an elite society, taking in young potentials born with the gold mark-- the mark of magic. For many it is lucky to be born with the mark as it can bring fortune to your family. Peasants cherish the child with the mark, hoping the knights will take them and bring good luck to the family name.

But not every mark is the same. Some are cause for exile. Some are excised.

While marks are not very common, every year the Knights spread out across the land in search of new potentials. Some villages are glad to give up their marked children, while others do whatever they can to get rid of them.

Anakin wasn't lucky to be born with a gold mark. His was a tri color seal. The mark of the unknown. Shmi, his mother, tried her best to hide him away. They were very, very poor and often ridiculed for their reclusion. They lived on the fringe of the kingdom just on the edge of a desert. They feared she was a witch or a shape shifter or that Anakin was a beast of some sort and despite the quiet life they lived, the rumors persisted. The truth was Shmi was an elf, often thought of as special in most societies, but Anakin-- he was half elf, half ... Something else, even if no one would see it. And the mark was even worse.

Shmi sewed clothes and sold them at the market while Anakin made trinkets and little gadgets that the townspeople used as an example of why they shouldn't be trusted. They never sold much.

And then one day after a kindly young man purchased one of Anakin's gadgets, he died. It was nothing more than the usual illnesses that caught on in their villages and towns, but everyone pointed their fingers at the the single mother and her son.

They narrowly escaped when villagers set fire to their house. They were forced into the desert where the Tusken rule. And the Tusken are often not kind to trespassers, especially those of the Kingdom that had persecuted them for centuries.

They spent years in confinement before his mother found a chance for her son to escape. Anakin didn't want to leave, but the choice was taken from him. His mother died as he fled, running as far as he could, running into a storm that should have killed him. And in that storm he realized his power.

He wants to vomit and cry and scream all at the same time, but his mind and body stay frozen in place. Would he? It's impossible to imagine it, striking down the boy he raised with the two lightsabers he trained him with, the ones that so naturally hummed in harmony with Anakin's own. They never felt exactly the same, but they did feel like fractures of something once whole and they were pleased to be together again. Obi-Wan never wanted a padawan, he can't imagine never having one now, never having Anakin. His toothy smile, choppy hair, and eager eyes; a boy with passion too big for his heart and a power barely contained within his small fragile body. It's no wonder the Sith had their eyes on him, no wonder his mind broke, he was all the galaxy in a paper bag.

"Not in defense of myself. But for others . . . yes." This time, he feels confident in his words and they only barely waver. He would do all he could to spare his life, but he wouldn't stand down. Not only because it was the right thing to do (he wouldn't know how to stop anyway), but because Anakin would hate him if he didn't. Would hate him even more than he does now had Obi-Wan stood by and watched him slaughter the defenseless and innocent.

He tries not to think about how he did. The 212th had been beyond far from Coruscant when rumors of Dooku's surrender and Palpatine's final grab for power collided, hundreds and thousands of miles away from Anakin with no way to reach him and only a thread-bare mentor bond to assure himself he was even alive.

Logically, Obi-Wan knows there is nothing he could have done in the moment, but there is nothing to spare him from the guilt of ignoring Anakin's need for help for all the years prior. Had he just been a better teacher, a kinder mentor, a more caring brother.

"I'm sorry, but it won't come to that. Ever." Because they're going to help him (those who could stand to be in the same room as him), the Jedi are done with abandoning their own, Obi-Wan would make sure of it. "Who you are- you don't want to hurt people. You aren't evil. I know that."

It would be a lie to say everything he's doing he's doing for Anakin's sake, but he's certainly a driving factor. The temple can hold him forever, but they won't want to, not when he's painted the walls red with blood of their own. The Lothal temple is far and out of the way, both easy to forget about and inoffensive. It will be well fortified and the Force will be quiet. Early on, he'd considered recruiting Rex—who likely wouldn't refuse a call to duty—but from what little Obi-Wan knows of their relationship, he was really more Ahsoka's Captain than he ever was Anakin's and inviting him might do more harm than good. To all three of them.

If Obi-Wan feels wretched at the thought of all this, then Anakin feels like he's sunken deep in to a black hole and he's been pulled in so far there's no way out. There's no way out of this room. There's no way out of his life. Anakin leans forward again, his face in his hands and let's out a frustrated yell.

He's on his feet before he realizes what he's doing. He almost stumbles before he catches himself.

"How can you say any of this when you can't even look at me?" Not that Anakin can look at himself. He doubts he would recognize himself in the mirror. His chest feels tight, his head feels stretched to thin. How many Jedi had he killed? How many of them begged for their lives? Not as many as he could have. "Every future I've seen... There's something wrong with me. I keep seeing them. I'm never going to stop seeing them."

Part of him realizes he's not making any sense and he snaps his mouth shut. He shakes his head, uncaring how off kilter it makes him. Does it matter if he were to believe Obi-Wan? Hasn't he fought his inner demons all this time and failed? He should have been able to kill Palpatine. He should have been able to resist him. He should have been able to stop himself. He's stronger than Palpatine, he's stronger than any singular Jedi that's ever lived, he shouldn't have fallen so hard and so easily.

So why had he? Why was he so disgustingly weak?

The Republic wants a scapegoat and Anakin, who could not be proved guilty of collusion against the state, but could be proved to be a confidant of the chancellor and a traitor (murderer) to his own people, would be a tempting pick. They want an easy trial with a neat bow on top, they don't want to examine their own corruption and untangle its roots. They'd want to kill him; say he is a Sith no different than 'his Master' and silence his voice.

It isn't safe to let him go, in fact, it's about as unsafe as it is to keep him confined to the temple. They've taken precautions, of course, they've moved their younglings to a refuge off planet with a platoon from the 442nd and they've sectioned off the different halls with varying guards and troopers at each door. Ideally, they'd have moved all non-essentials to a safer location, but they have none. The council finds it unwise to split into smaller groups and no where is large enough and fortified enough to house them all. At least, not yet.

"Would you kill me?" The question escapes him without thought. He hasn't the faintest idea why he asked, he already knows the answer.

Perhaps Obi-Wan just needs to hear it for himself, pointless and disrespectful and self-centered as it is.

"I mean right now. Do you want to?" His back is turned as he speaks. "A real Sith would. A real Sith will never stop and that is why we kill them, there is no other way."

He had to believe Anakin could heal; Quinlan had healed. He was never as Fallen as Anakin, but surely they could use his healing process as an example, a protocol going forward. They would need it, the war had broken them too thoroughly and Anakin wasn't an anomaly, a disease, but a symptom.

"You have another way. You might not have our trust, but you have our mercy."

It would be impossible to say if Anakin was wholly aware of his actions while taking them—not even Anakin's own word is to be trusted—but Obi-Wan would hope without Sidious' influence, this would have never come to be. So there has to be hope. Sidious is dead so there has to be hope.

It was all gone now. His respect. The hard earned trust that Anakin sometimes barely believed he got. He knew they looked at him with suspicion even all these years later and now, now, they could shake their heads and say I never trusted him, I knew he was wrong all along.

The question snaps him out of his rumination. He lifts his head, blinks at Obi-Wan's back, the knee jerk response on the tip of his tongue. And then it recoils, like he's pulling himself back into the hermit shell he's created. Is the answer so simple?

It is simple because-- Anakin would do anything for the people he loved. For the ones he cared about. He would raze the entire galaxy if it meant saving any one of them. Even at the cost of everyone else. Even when he wants nothing more than to save everyone. To keep them all safe.

"No," Anakin says finally, but the answer is hollow. "But I think you're wrong. ...I know you're wrong."

Jedi. Sith. Just two sides of the same coin. For one second he'd seen it: he'd understood everything. Light always casted a shadow, no matter what. Darkness couldn't exist without it, but neither could the light exist without the dark. In that second he'd seen what he could do, what he could be capable of.

It was in that moment right before Sidious had broken his confidence. He'd been so close. His rage had been righteous, his purpose so clear. Palpatine had been in his grasp and then he played into his fears. Anakin felt something burrowing deep in his mind and--

Again it's Obi-Wan's voice that snaps him back to reality. Try as he might, he can't really remember everything after that. It's bits and pieces all out of order, out of context. Nothing he would say could help his case. Obi-Wan's words hurt. They're a stab wound in his chest. You might not have our trust. It doesn't surprise him, but it hurts all the same.

How long had it taken for them to really see him as belonging? He'll never have that back. What does Ahsoka think of him? Padme would never look him in the eye again. He hasn't taken a look out of that barred window for weeks now. At first he'd dared--denial of his own actions making him pace like a captured lion. The anger had come quick on its heels-- anger at Sidious, at the Jedi, at Obi-Wan. At himself. Until finally it had turned into this. All lack of desire to even acknowledge the outside world.

It doesn't matter what he does from here on out. He's lost everything and to gain it back would take another lifetime.