#got high

"Take Me Back To Eden" ~ Quinn Hughes + Sleep Token ~

Concept: Luke goes back in time, meets Anakin and Obi-wan during the clone wars. They are stuck on some planet and have to hike to some place where they can be picked up by a rescue ship. Anakin knows about Luke and Darth Vader. Discuss!

——

“Sometimes I forget. For a short while. Then suddenly, boom! I remember again.” Luke looks at his black shoes now a slightly pink tinge from the red dirt.

“I’m sorry.”

Luke jumped in shock, like he forgot that anyone was listening.

Anakin looked back at him. Eyes a deep blue in the night.

He looked. Intense. Like a storm raged behind his eyes. Luke could sense the waves of emotion rolling off of the man: grief, sadness, anger.

Luke reminded himself to talk to Anakin about how to make stronger shields. He almost had to pinch himself at the concept of teaching his father force tricks.

“I’m sorry that I’m making this journey difficult.” Anakin looked into the flames and bit his lip suddenly only 23 again. “I can stand at the back of the convoy if that helps.”

Luke can’t help but smile, his face softening in a tight fond smile. Still sad.

“It’s alright.” It’s quiet and simple but sure.

They sit for a while staring into the flames.

Luke breaks the silence again,

“I can’t imagine that it is easy for you either.” He looks towards Anakin.

The taller man tilts his head confused.

Luke elaborates, “I mean seeing me.”

Anakin sits back blinking, like he just realized that he had feelings too.

“Oh! I mean…I haven’t really thought about it.”

Anakin lied turning to look where Obi wan had gone to the other side of camp to grab something.

Luke huffed a laugh, “Sure.” before turning to the flames.

Anakin turned his eyes but his shoulders still faced away, like he was deciding whether or not to engage with such a forbidden impulse as to talk about your feelings.

Luke felt like he was talking to a caged animal. The man was so clearly flooded with emotions and yet he was so afraid of them.

He had seen the same thing with his students. Those who came with trauma. Both petrified of talking and desperate for help.

Anakin was dying for someone to listen to him.

“Sometimes it’s normal. Like I will forget and then suddenly I will hear Ben’s voice, or see your face and then it’s like being sent back through time again.” Luke looks up at the man only to find Anakin facing him again.

The same deep dark eyes boring into him.

“It’s not painful. I don’t suddenly remember the grief…it’s just shocking. Like the ground has opened beneath me for a second.”

Anakin finally nods, his shoulders lowering.

Luke can’t help it when his smile turns sad again.

“I guess we are both haunted. Haunted by Him.” Luke looks his father straight in the eye. “I am haunted by my past. And you, by your future.”

A chill suddenly ran through the air. They both shivered even though they are sitting by a roaring fire.

Anakin looks away first, straight into the fire.

They sit quietly for a while, as Luke watches the taller man’s mind spin in circles. He can almost smell the panic.

Luke turns his head towards the stars. He begs the stars for help and suddenly it comes to him.

“Sandis Nenoleeya” Luke says softly into the night.

(Spirits Away)

Anakin recognizes it immediately. An old phrase. One he had heard his mother say hundreds of times. A Tatooine phrase, a prayer really, to clear a room of bad spirits.

“It’s good to say, any room you enter.” Shmi would say, “just in case there are people who mean you harm.”

Anakin hadn’t heard it since he left her all of those years ago.

His son smiled at him, placed his hand on his shoulder and walked away into the night.

Anakin broke into tears.