How to Disappear (Anakin Skywalker x Reader)

Ever since you were a child, you knew to look behind your back. You weren't exactly sure when you had started to do it, but you guessed the habit filled in your lack of feeling in the Force. All you knew was that it made you overthink at times you shouldn't be thinking. Like that time during training when you could have sworn a ghostly hand passed over your shoulder, only to be smacked to the ground as the youngling sparring you landed a punishing blow. You vowed to never do it again. But you did. Time and time again. Old habits die hard.

Although, your strange sense of paranoia looked out for you.

Ironically, it was with Anakin. The person with the strongest sense of the Force. It was dark, and he was pulling you down the hallway, past the Padawan dorms out to the gardens. Out of habit, you spared a quick glance behind your shoulder. Under the dim light, the faintest shadow approached around the corner you had come from. Instinctively, you turned on your heel, the momentum swinging both you and Anakin towards the training rooms. Luckily, he had the mind not to question you as you both scurried away. It occurred to you that night that maybe some Jedi recklessly trusted in the Force.

Now, the memory churns away like an old hologram, flickering on and off until it dies.

Anakin.

Just his name held your thoughts hostage, like a throbbing headache that wouldn't go away. You hope he was safe. The last time you had seen him was before you were sent away on your mission.

It wasn't fair. Hadn't the two of you been through enough?

You needed to find him. You needed to know. But as the Force took you hostage, you couldn't pick and choose when and where you appeared.

And so, when a rosy cloud of blue tenderly nudges you from your slumber, you don't even question yourself.

Wordlessly, it guides you through sandy deserts, open seas, overgrown grass, all flashing beneath your feet. It feels like a dream, peeling back blurry layers as scenes grow more vivid, adding faint details no one would ever notice. But you do. All the time.

In the distance, something calls for you. You don't hear its rasping voice. There is no sound here, only feeling. A feeling of being needed, a gravitating sensation that pulls you to the light. You step into the star, relaxing into the gaseous purr. Behind the blinding light, it lurks—a shadow.

It scrambles around other shadows, running away from the light into a dark corner. Once it finds itself alone, it stops, bending over to clutch at its abdomen.

You watch curiously, waiting for that final tug to pull you those final steps closer.

When it stands tall, the scene begins to reveal itself to you. Cramped machines line a narrow path, tucked away in the heat of a vast factory. Dull silvers clash violently with thunderous noise as droids work on an assembly line. You notice weapons rolling down the metal belt and the looping buzz that drowns out the room. In the corner, you sense a static energy. It hides away in the deeper notches and bends of the factory. Passing by, unbeknownst to the droids, you search for the source.

You look between pipes, through vents, behind fans, only to find nothing. Still, that aching feeling sat pressed against your skull. Something or someone was here, waiting, watching, lurking. Steam from the engines flood the bottom of the room, pooling beneath your knees. The wisps of gray lure you deeper into the thicker air, far away from where any person would stray.

Just then, a hand reaches through the steam to touch your robes.

You pause.

In another universe, it would be a thread from your robes catching on a screw. A rueful moment passes at the thought.