Enjoyed Killing (Anakin) — a short story

I’m flying. Happy days. Happiest hours and minutes. It doesn’t get better than this. I’m out on the outside edge of the formation because — the Force is hinting that I should be. And then it starts sparkling ‘’behind’’ an asteroid. Hmm. I peel off and adjust my thrusters to maximize steering because I’ll need it for navigating through the bigger rocks bobbing around these gigantic ones. R4 reports, ‘Deflector shields to maximum!’ and I say, “Thank you, my friend.” “Anakin!” my Jedi master calls, in the Force and not. “Just — going to take a look at something, one second Master.” “Anakin, you do understand what an armed ‘escort’ means don’t you? We aren’t here for sightseeing!” he chides me. Master Kit Fisto laughs enthusiastically, almost more than a Jedi should. I like him. Great fighter. His padawan on the other hand — “Get back here, Skywalker!” young Nahdar Vebb screams at me. I — do ‘’not’’ like him. If only because he’s clearly just scared, has heard stories about my ‘recklessness’ and thinks I’m going to endanger his life. I won’t. He’d be checking this out too if he could feel the Force like I can. His fear and dislike bother me so much I reach out and slide the left elevator on his console a few degrees down. This subtly affects his thrust and puts his Jedi Starfighter into a slow roll. I can hear Master Fisto laughing even harder as his padawan cries, “Oh no! Okay! What’s happening?!” over comms while Obi Wan tries to calm him, and I grin but conceal my satisfaction in the Force. And on that point, where are you trying to get me to go, eh Force? Cause, I’m kinda — getting pretty far away from the others… R4 says our ship’s power cell is one quarter depleted already, draining rapidly just keeping micro-asteroids from turning us into a sieve. Hmm. Not going to last nearly as long out here as I’d assumed. I pull in over the most impressive nearby asteroid to see if there’s less space-debris closer to the colossal ones. There is, but what floating rocks remain are sharper and harder, requiring more circumspect flying. “Dammit!” I wince as a huge hunk of stone comes from behind and nearly caves in my canopy and poor R4’s head too. Our shield barely rebounds it. ‘We won’t survive many more of those!’ he warns me. So I reach out, and sense, the hail all around us, and begin making the rapidest and most precise inputs I can, tossing, bobbing and shimmying through every obstacle and requiring that I push the fighter almost to max speed even despite the incessant impediments. But the Force guides my hands as I feel it, shining through me. “Wahoooo!” my little droid says which makes me smile. And then a moment later the smile vanishes from my face and R4 falls deathly quiet. Oh… Hmm. So. That’s not supposed to be there. Uh-oh. There is a mine — a ‘’huge’’ mine — hanging out the side of one of the largest asteroids. It’s in a sheltered valley, almost entirely hidden by shadow. If the Force hadn’t guided me here this ‘’exact’’ way I never would have seen it, even if I was looking (which I wasn’t). My heart sinks as I notice the Separatist crest emblazoned on the freighters waiting in line to be loaded after which my throat goes completely dry. ‘Interceptor craft inbound!’ R4 bleeps, just as my proximity sensors wail registering signals of droid and other fighters. “Not good!” I mutter, having started to shut down power to everything except the console in an attempt to go unnoticed but booting it all back once I know the jig is up. “Master Obi Wan?!” I cry over comms, to much static. Well — ‘Are we in trouble?’ R4 asks. “Took the words out of my mouth, little buddy! Hang on!” And then it’s all I can do to avoid the missiles and streams of green and red as what feels like a whole squadron starts chasing me, flying better than I would have expected and certainly better than I would have liked. Damn! Damn! Why don’t I ever listen to Obi Wan?! He’s always warning me this kinda crap’s gonna happen and I’m always sure he’s dead-wrong until — A blaster bolt clips my wing as I spiralize my thrust, jink and duck backwards to avoid a few locked-on missiles. Glancing over, I see something leaking. “Not good! Not good! Get some sealant on there, R4!” He starts preparing to do so while I squeeze through the tiniest gap I can find, noticing with relish one of my pursuers ripped their ship apart trying to follow. The remaining fighters, however, just fly over, and an instant later I’m back to dancing around a hairsbreadth from death as rocks shatter from the onslaught of ship-to-ship missiles and blaster bolts. “I can’t shake ‘em!” I complain to R4 who warbles and beep-beeps that he’s activated the distress beacon, “Okay but we’re not going to last much longer out here unless I can come up with something — !” I begin, as two of my pursuers explode and three of the other craft adjust course to meet the new threat. “I’ll thank you to take your targeting reticles off my padawan!” Obi Wan bellows, his fighter streaking over the nearest asteroid and sending the formation scattering, followed a half-second later by Master Fisto who’s either singing or ululating a battle cry. “Oh my!” Obi Wan adds, catching sight of the illegal mining operation, “Well what have we here?” “That padawan of yours must have some sharp instincts, Kenobi!” Master Fisto says, sending the pirate craft into spins that precede detonation with some impeccably well-placed fire. “Good job, Skywalker!” Padawan Vebb says to me, as he soars past, charging towards the fresh interceptors that just got scrambled. R4 cheers, ‘That was close!’ and I hate to admit it but I agree with him. Especially noticing the new fighters that had been coming to join the chase. My minutes remaining alive out here were severely numbered. “Thanks for the help,” I confess sheepishly. But rather than enjoying the relief of getting to live and fight another day, I instead feel guilty for messing with that younger padawan’s controls earlier. Shouldn’t have done that. Why am I so petty all the time! Thankfully R4 snaps me out of this melancholy by asking, after sealing the wing up, ‘Aren’t we going to help?’ “Oh yeah, they’ve earned themselves some payback,” I tell him, sending power to the engines and feeling the thrusters roar behind me. I think of my Jedi master’s battlecry of, ‘Take your targeting reticles off my padawan!’ and a sad smile crosses my lips. ‘Are you alright Anakin?’ “I’m fine, R4. Hey, great work managing the shields back there buddy. I owe you the biggest thanks of all.” ‘We’re in this together, Anakin! I’ll always be there for you!’ “I don’t deserve you R4. Now, cannons to maximum firepower, if you wouldn’t mind. Let’s go kill us some Seperatists.” ‘Cannons to maximum firepower!’ he woop-woops in the affirmative and then beeps, ‘For the Republic!’ Yeah. Brave little guy. For the Republic. But mainly, cause they shot at me. Shot at ‘’us.’’ Which is unforgivable. Nobody gets to put my friends in danger and live. No droid, no pirate, no traitorous scum and no blend of them. My eyes darken, my ship rumbles and I set up a few chases with the Force as much as the controls, unconscious of most of it. Just thinking — They almost killed me. Shit, they almost killed R4! And with that, it hits me — THEY. TRIED. TO. HURT. R4. Then I’m not sure who I am. Or what I am. But my ship’s nose goes where I want it to, and my shots end up where I guide them to and I barely have to think or exist, I’m the death that stalks all of you. It was your mistake, to provide yourselves as targets for my amusement today. Because — I am amused. So so very amused. I make ships explode like that’s what they were built to do. I flick blaster bolts into thrusters at first, but once I’m warmed up, right through cockpits! Crushing their shields with my power and guiding the bolt through their heads or just against their breathing apparatuses if I can, so that a few are left suffocating in empty space. I fly right by and make eye-contact, whether dead or dying. If the latter, I watch them as they suffocate. I see humans and Weequay and Ugnaught and Pykes and I smile at the corpses of each and every one. I’m not even sure what I’m doing to defeat their shield the split-second needed for my bolt to cross it. Just, squeezing till it pops? But when I’m close, I reach out and deactivate their defences to blow them away once I’m far enough out. Don’t want to leave any military equipment still intact, personnel included. R4 warbles a sad note and it snaps me out of whatever — uh? — whatever — I was doing… “Everything okay buddy?” ‘Let’s get back to the other Jedi, Anakin.’ I look over my shoulder and see that the clean-up operation is complete and the three friendly starfighters are in a loose defensive alignment, waiting for me to join them. Hmm. Why do I feel… guilty? And annoyed with R4? And — not good? — about myself? What did I do that was so — oh. I enjoyed killing them too much didn’t I? Yeah. That’s why R4’s sad. I enjoyed it too much. Dammit.