Anakin trembled with the effort of staying still. The net he was in hissed at him, and he could feel its acid touch digging through the soles of his boots and the gloves on his hands to burn its way into him, but this was containable. He could stay like this, even if his muscles were quivering and the net small enough he had to squat to fit. He would live.
The net spat another load of oily darkness at him, and the cold of the Dark Side seeped through his boots. It burned as if the blood in his veins were freezing.
"There is no emotion. There is peace," Anakin whispered choppily. The acid burn of the Dark continued toward his heart. "There is no ignorance. There is knowledge."
He continued with the meditation mantra, trying to distract himself from Dooku's trap. He hadn't found the holocron. His lightsaber was somewhere on the floor, but he couldn't see it and couldn't concentrate enough to call it to himself.
Failure, a voice Anakin had heard since his padawan years whispered. Terrible Jedi.
It was as if the net's poison of the soul perked its head at this discovery of its target's inner darkness. Emboldened, it dove home and thrust into the deepest, darkest crannies of Anakin's soul.
He screamed. His grip on the net slipped and he fell from his carefully chosen position to be face down on the bottom of the net.
The cold acid of the Dark cheered at this sudden advantage and poured in through every pore. Anakin-
-shut down.
"General Skywalker?"
Anakin ignored it. Breathe in. Breathe out. The Dark pressed against his side and pushed daggers into his heart. He stayed as still as possible in his fetal position. Breathe in. Breathe out.
"Anakin?"
The speaker had changed, but the speaker had changed before. He would not succumb to the lies of the Dark Side, regardless of what face it exploited.
Swearing. Anakin ignored it.
Then the net jerked and fell away while Anakin remained in place. He blinked open his eyes to see Mace Windu, arm outstretched, holding Anakin in the air and pulling him away from the cut-open net on the floor.
"What's wrong with General Skywalker?" one of the clones asked.
"Look at me, Anakin," Mace Windu said.
Anakin complied. An expression he couldn't process passed over Mace's face.
"Sleep."
Anakin slept.
When Anakin next came to, he was in shipboard quarters on a GAR ship. Not his, but another Jedi's – General level quarters, too harmonious in the Force to be an Admiral's. He ran a hand over his cheek, trying to feel how deep the gouges were, only to feel nothing.
That couldn't be right. He stumbled out of the bed and to the refresher. His legs were trembling and he could feel poison drip through his veins, proof that the nightmare had been real. He reached the mirror, frantically pushing aside the oily slick of the dark that clung to his bones and shifted beneath his skin.
His cheek was smooth and unlined. No blemish had appeared on it, not even a reddened line.
Something rose in his throat and stopped just before it could enter his mouth, a lump of dread jammed in his windpipe. The darkness coiled around him as his heart hammered. He looked away from his cheek.
His eyes were a luminescent acid yellow. "No," he gasped, and stumbled back.
You are mine, little Jedi, the darkness revelled, pins and needles and burning oozing through his veins as the lump in his throat resolved to bile and he collapsed over the toilet. Nothing came out despite how much he heaved. Spittle gathered in his mouth to protect his teeth from acid that would not come, would not rise to leave now that it had burned its way into his soul.
The door opened. Oh Force, these were Master Windu's quarters, Anakin had Fallen and didn't-
"Oh good, you're awake," Mace said.
Panic welled in Anakin. Mace knew he was awake, he'd come here soon, he would come and see Anakin's eyes and throw him out of the Jedi like the failure he was and out of the airlock as he was a waste of oxygen-
"Anakin?" Mace opened the refresher door and Anakin reflexively glanced at him before covering his eyes in shame. "Ah."
"I'm sorry," Anakin uselessly said. He'd failed as a Jedi and a person, and what use were apologies when he had forever fallen to the Dark?
"The trap Dooku set was particularly cruel," Mace said. "I consulted with Master Che while you slept. If you are willing to wait until we've reached Coruscant, there are a few options for treating this. However, the longer you wait, the more time the extrinsic darkness has to entangle with whatever darkness was already within you."
Anakin's breath caught in his throat. "There's a way to cure this? But I thought-"
Mace knelt next to him. "There's always a way home, Anakin," he gently explained. "And we are seekers, not saints. There's a darkness within us all – the key isn't eradicating it, but not letting it rule us."
Tears welled in Anakin's eyes. He shut them and shivered. The voice inside him screamed that he couldn't go back, he belonged to the Dark now and the only way open to him was diving deeper. He tried to ignore it. "What's the cure?" he asked instead.
"The first option is flooding out the dark with another sensation." Mace paused. "The one immediately available is orgasms."
Anakin's thoughts screeched to a halt. "What."
"I am willing to assist in this. I would rather you keep the clones out of it, but if you have another Jedi or natborn officer you'd prefer who is nearby, we can rendezvous."
"You're offering to fuck the dark side out of me?" Anakin asked, brain still jammed on the idea of Mace Windu offering to have sex with him.
"Of course," Mace replied. "Trust me when I say it is no hardship."
How could anyone bear Anakin? Even Padmé had broken ties with him after a short fling. He was damaged, broken; there had always been something wrong with him on a deep metaphysical level. The only thing that could be motivating Master Windu was some inhuman level of pity, some saintly grade of self-sacrifice. It must be the war. Why else would he care enough to fuck the damaged goods back to some level of functionality? Surely he didn't care for Anakin on a personal level.
Yet Anakin wanted nothing more than to be rid of this horrible feeling, and selfishly would sacrifice anyone and anything to do so. "Please," he croaked.
Mace held out a hand. "Come, then," he gently said.
Anakin let himself be led from the refresher back to the quarters proper. The horrible thing that had always lived inside him screamed as it stabbed needles through his heart, but Anakin was numb to the pain.
He was placed on the narrow bunk with surprising care. His boots had been taken off earlier – they stood at the end of the bed – but Mace still knelt before him to remove his socks. Anakin's eyelids fluttered shut as Mace's fingers trailed over his instep. He exhaled with a shudder.
Then Mace pulled off all of Anakin's clothes, one article at a time. Off came the obi, the trousers, the layers of robes, the underwear. He even removed the glove covering Anakin's mechno-arm.
Failure, the voice said. Anakin twitched his fingers.
"It is a stunning display of engineering," Mace quietly said.
"I was weak," Anakin said. "Weak and stupid and Dooku got the better of me and, and-"
"Failure is how we learn." Mace pulled something out of his pocket and began shucking off his own clothes. "Now, let us think about more pleasant matters."
Anakin exhaled as Mace, now naked, pushed him down onto the mattress. Mace was above him, solid and firm, and leaned down to kiss his lips. Anakin squirmed, opened his mouth and gasped at the press of lips against lips. It had been so long since anyone had touched him in a manner other than clinical.
A knee parted his legs and something cold and wet slid down his perineum. "Ah?"
"Relax," Mace said and slid the – it must be a lubricated finger – down to Anakin's ass.
It felt dubious against the external skin, but Anakin was just a useless failure of a Jedi. He did as he was told.
The finger slid in with little resistance. Anakin felt full and perversely satisfied, like some empty gap in the deepst depths of his soul had been filled. "Oh!"
"You'll get more soon," Mace promised, kissing Anakin's clavicle before sitting up so he could better pour lube.
Anakin did his best to not move, not think, just breathe and ignore the burning cold that had wedged itself in his heart. Breathe in. Breathe out. Feel Mace add more lube with his hand.
Then Mace pulled his fingers out and rearranged himself. What must be his dick poked at Anakin.
What was he, failure, Fallen, to decide what was to happen? He was a vessel for the will of the Force. He exhaled and willed himself open.
Mace's dick slid inside him. Anakin gasped as it pressed home, sensation erupting up his spine.
Then Mace began moving, and static surged in Anakin, every nerve ending tingling at this novel stimulus. His hands clenched on the sheets as this new sensation overwhelmed him.
It did not take long for an orgasm to rise from Anakin's pelvis up to where he threw back his head and down to where his toes curled. He breathed heavily and already easier.
Mace was doing something similar to Force healing. Anakin didn't really care pay attention, so he simply stared at the ceiling while come cooled on his stomach – until Mace touched his dick. "Wai- Oh kriff," Anakin said when he realized he had apparently skipped his refractory period fully and was half hard already. "Is this..."
"Jedi Masters study, amongst other things, ways to surpass the body's intrinsic limits with the Force." Mace somehow managed to keep a serious face despite telling Anakin that Jedi Master classes involved frantic masturbation, apparently.
"Does it only work once, or-"
"As many times as necessary." With that, Mace stroked Anakin's dick again, this time making it twitch until it was fully hard.
He continued, too. Anakin groaned, clenching around Mace's cock still inside him, until he came again.
"You're just going to frip me until I'm knocked out cold?" Anakin feebly asked. He had two afterglows humming on his skin and his nerves twitched at the edge of overstimulation. Inside, he still felt cold despite the light sheen of sweat on his skin.
"Do you want me to?"
The voice inside him hissed poison, but apparently that was extrinsic. "Oh, you can try."
"I do rather like a challenge," Mace murmured in his ear and rolled his hips.
Stars bloomed behind Anakin's lids and lightning danced on his skin. "Oh kriff," he said as Mace licked a spot on Anakin's throat Anakin hadn't even known he had.
Take it, the voice hissed. Take what is yours, except Anakin was too busy being blissed out to figure out what it spoke of.
He was panting, head thrown back, and his legs rose from the mattress. His right knee knocked against the metal wall, but he didn't care when he could wrap his legs around Mace's hips and angle himself so Mace slid ever deeper, and oh Force, it felt good, his blood singed his veins as his heart hammered in his chest-
This time he saw the orgasm coming, pleasure rising to a crescendo and then erupting in a cloud of staticky sensation that made his ears ring. Anakin moaned and clenched down, triggering jittery aftershocks that made his legs twitch and flesh hand rise to Mace's shoulder as if holding on there would help ground him to a reality from which he had long since floated away.
When the sound of static had receded from his ears, he said, "I can't feel my legs."
"Should I call a medic for the spinal trauma or be extremely smug about my sexual prowess?"
"Oh, go kriff yourself," Anakin replied with a hearty roll of his eyes.
"I'm a bit busy kriffing you."
Anakin snorted. "Not currently." He rocked his hips to underscore the point and also because he was sort of looking forward to the next round.
"If you're so enthusiastic, perhaps you should do the work?"
"Hey, wait a minute-"
Mace pulled out and pulled Anakin with him as he sat down cross-legged. "Consider it an opportunity to have the motion be according to your exact preferences."
"Ha ha." Anakin let Mace guide him down onto his once more erect cock. It felt good going in; Anakin closed his eyes and relished every millimeter as he inched down. Force did it hit him well.
A bit of experimenting let Anakin find a place for his legs. He raised himself a bit, then let himself fall.
Oh kriff, this felt great. Anakin groaned and leaned a bit more forwards, where his hands were on Mace's shoulders, and fucked himself on Mace's dick hard as Mace groped at his ass.
Sparks rose from his tailbone up the inside of his spine. They hit nerves already on edge from the previous rounds.
Anakin did not so much plummet as explode: the Force sang as an echo of all he projected, pleasure blooming beyond the capability of his skin to contain, hands spasming on Mace's shoulders as static rang in his ears and his sight whited out. He was too big for his body, and for one eternal, glorious moment, he reached to the edges of the universe, and the universe sang back.
There was no self, there was only transcendence.
Yet, eventually, Anakin condensed from his eternal moment with the Force. What he could only describe as a phase transition of the self brought him back to his own body, wrung out and pleasantly sore, sitting in the lap of a wrecked-looking Mace Windu, head pillowed on the other's shoulder. Mace was gently stroking his back.
"Thanks for doing this," Anakin commented when he'd gathered his wits somewhat. "I don't think the Halls would have this nice a treatment."
"Trust me when I say this was no hardship."
Anakin leaned back so he could see Mace's face. Mace was looking back at him with a steady gaze, wholly serious. Anakin ducked his head. "I'm ... you liked this?" he asked, a quaver to his voice. He could almost fill in what the voice inside his head would snarl – except the words never came.
Before he could interrogate that absence, however, Mace gently cupped his chin and lifted it until they were making eye contact. "I did. You are attractive and charming, and your heart burns with justice. It was an easy choice to offer to have sex with you," He eyed Anakin contemplatively. "Is this self doubt something pre-existing, or do I need to rail it out of you?"
"I'm definitely up for another round." Anakin smiled. "Besides, wasn't the deal that you'd frip me until I passed out?"
"Force give me the libido of a twenty-something," Mace said under his breath, but obliged.
If Anakin didn't get his wish, it was because unconsciousness claimed Mace first. And when he walked on shaking legs to the refresher to get something to wipe them down with, the person looking back in the mirror might glow, but his eyes were a regular blue.