The Death Star exploded behind me as I wrestled with the controls of my

ship.  Chasing the X-Wing down the trench had reminded me of so many

things, and I shook my head to clear it of the dreams of a man who no

longer existed.



The close quarters and the speed and the deadly seriousness of the race

reminded me of Tatooine, and of podracing, and when the TIE hit me and

sent me spinning, I thought of Sebulba flashing his vents.  And then the 

memory of spinning came--the first time I flew a fighter, when I was

nine years old.  When Anakin, long dead, was nine years old.



Not long afterwards, I became Obi-Wan's student.  He was barely past

apprenticeship himself, and he had been the rebellious student of a

rebellious master.  The Jedi Council should never have given me to him

to train; he knew I was dangerous and afraid and had been a slave--and

he had chosen not to see me for what I was, but only what his master,

his lover, had hoped I would be.



Now Obi-Wan, like his master, was dead.  I and my master still lived.

Obi-Wan killed my master's first apprentice in rage and loss, a rage and 

loss he communicated to me; a rage and loss which poisoned all his

teachings.  



Once, when I told him I loved Amidala, he warned me that love could draw 

one down the dark path as surely as hate.  I replied that Amidala could

do no such thing to me.  He replied, "You wouldn't think Qui-Gon could

do it to me, would you?  But when he died, I felt myself turning towards 

the Dark Side.  Only my promise to train you kept me from becoming...who 

knows what."



I had frowned and turned away.  I was jealous of his relationship with

Qui-Gon--although I had loved the Jedi Master, his Padawan had loved him 

body and soul.  And when I was the Padawan, I had hoped, perhaps,

that my Master would allow me the same intimacy he had shared with his

Master.



He never did.  And he never took another lover.



When I fell in love with Amidala, it didn't seem to matter so much.  But 

matter it did: my resentment was...deep and pervasive.  Qui-Gon I loved

as the father I never had; Obi-Wan I wanted to love as a lover.



The future is always in motion, I remember him telling me.  And I set in 

motion my own future, destroyed my marriage, destroyed myself, and

eventually destroyed my master.



But I still remember the joy.  And how I loved her, and him, and how he

loved his Master beyond anything.



And I remembered his death, as he looked at that blond boy and closed

his eyes--



That blond boy.



The one with blue eyes and the desert-burnt skin of Tatooine.



The one with my mother's cheekbones.



The one with Amidala's slender build.



The one who, I knew without a doubt, had been the pilot who I had chased 

down the trench.  The one who ran it as I used to run Beggar's Canyon in 

the pods.



The one who must be my son.  Anakin's son.



For a moment, I was proud of him, a father's pride swelling within me.



I remembered sensing in him the delight of finding himself in flight,

the sweetness of Force-sharpened reflexes, the untapped power of a Jedi

who has not completed his training.  I remembered the last time I felt

that orgasmic thrill.



In the silence of my cockpit, I spoke.  "Let's try spinning.  That's a

good trick!"  I pulled my fighter into a fast spin, and for one moment I 

was Anakin again, living for the pure joy of flight.