Angels Would Fall

by Kathye (dubghall@aol.com)

Rating: R
Category: Song-fic, angst
Archive: Yes to MA and to the Seraph's Glade http://members.aol.com/ChunTianShi/index.html)
Summary: Qui-Gon returns from the dead.
Feedback: Is a gift to be treasured. On or off list, it is gratefully accepted.
Warnings: Song-fic, bad things happen to good people, good people do bad things
Notes: I first had the idea for this story when I mis-heard one of the lyrics from Melissa Etheridge's song "Angels Would Fall". I've used the error in the lyrics below, with the correction at the end of the story. Since then, someone else has already posted a story using these lyrics and this title, but I wanted to do it anyway.
This story is brought to you today by Sudafed induced insomnia and the Halloween wind moaning outside my window. This story was quickly written and is un-betad, because my betas are asleep like good girls and dislike songfic anyway. You have been warned.
Disclaimer: "Angels Would Fall" was written by Melissa Etheridge. All Star Wars properties belong to George Lucas.

I am fallen.

I feel nothing as I say those words. When I was first sundered from the light and given to darkness, I raged, I screamed, I destroyed. But even if all you can feel is loathing, hatred, then at least you can still feel. Master Yoda was wrong. Fear, hate, and anger may lead toward the Dark side, but the true way of the Dark is nothingness.

My Master knew this and just as he broke me of hope, he eventually broke me of hate. Now I am the perfect, empty vessel, ready to do his will.

I am fallen. And it is your fault.

the hope that's wrapped around me
is cutting through my skin
and the doubts that have surrounded me
are finding their way in
I keep it close to me
like a holy man prays
in my desperate hour
it's better that way

I do not know how they took me. I remember dying in your arms on Naboo. When I closed my eyes, I expected that my essence would dissolve and I would become one with the Force. Instead, I woke in an empty room, chained to the wall. The man I would come to call 'Master' told me that I would become one of his greatest weapons.

I scoffed. I would never turn.

He tortured me. It was years -- I'm sure it was years. But no torment that he devised ever touched me. I clung to just one hope -- that one day you would find me again. He had told me no one would come for me, that all thought that I was ashes, scattered on a Naboo breeze. I did not believe him. Surely, you must have known that I was not dead. Even now, I had thought, you were searching the galaxy for me, and you would never rest until you rescued the man who you had claimed to love.

And one day you did come. I heard shouts, explosions, the sound of a lightsaber. Then the door to my cell opened and you stood there. It was the happiest moment of my life. You cut through my chains and freed me from the collar that kept me from the Force. But when I tried to embrace you, you pushed me away. You told me that my deformities, after years of torture, disgusted you. You sneered at me for being too feeble to rescue myself. You told me that you had not come for me, that you had come to this place tracking the Sith lord for another reason, that you had been happy to be free of me, that you had another lover and wanted me to stay away from you, forever.

I broke. All the rage and hatred that I had been holding at bay for all those long years filled me. I used the Force to jerk your lightsaber away. I reached for you, and I snapped your neck. Then I tossed your body to the ground and I raped it.

When I was done, I looked up to see my Master there. He slowly started to applaud me. I looked down at your body again, and realized that my mind had been confused. This was not you, but some unfortunate actor. A doomed, innocent boy.

And I wept, for the last time in my life, for I knew that I could never return to you again.

And then my true education began.

so I'll come by and see you again
I'll be such a very good friend
have mercy on my soul
I will never let you know
where my mind has been
I've crept into your temple
I have slept upon your pew
I've dreamed of the divinity
inside and out of you
I want it more than truth
I can taste it on my breath
I would give my life just for a little death

I have been watching you, you and the boy. You are every bit as perfect as I remembered you being. I've been stalking you for months now, following you from planet to planet. Now you have returned to Coruscant. Now I am to fulfill the purpose that my Master has given me.

I am to come to you with some miraculous tale of survival and escape. You will believe me, and take me in your arms. My observation of you has shown that you have no new lover, and that you mourn me yet. You will accept me without question, rejoicing in my return.

Poor fool.

You will take me back to your rooms and you will let me fuck you. No, you will beg me to do it. And afterward, when you lie sweaty and sated next to me, you will feel that the universe has regained its balance. And then I will destroy you.

Perhaps, instead of killing you outright, I will bind you and take you away, so that when the time comes and I trigger the explosives that I will place at the heart of the Temple, you will begin to know some of the despair that I have felt all these years since you abandoned me. You will feel the death cry of hundreds of Jedi, the old and the young, and you will know that it is your fault, because you could not love me enough.

And maybe I won't kill you then, either. Maybe my Master will let me keep you and train you again. I'm certain that I could teach you what he taught me.

Or maybe I will kill him, instead. I could rule the universe in his stead, with you by my side. Such a sweet thought.

so I'll come by and see you again
I'll be just a very good friend
I will not look upon your face
I will not touch upon your grace
your ecclesiastic skin
I'll come by and see you again
I'll have to be a very good friend
If I whisper they will know
I'll just turn around and go
you will never know my sin

A dangerous thought. He has agents watching me and will know if I betray him.

I am beginning to think, though, that he has made a mistake, in letting me see you again. As I watch you, I find myself... feeling. I can feel the love I once had for you returning. Perhaps I am not as damaged as I thought I was.

Oh, my Obi-Wan. How I wish I could warn you. I want to talk to you just one more time, but don't dare. If I touch you again, I will never be able to let you go. I know that I am not strong enough to truly defy Palpatine. If you try to protect me, I will only betray and destroy you all in the end. And I can never let you know what I've become.

I know what I must do. I breathe deeply of the polluted air, and feel a small bit of hope. How amazing, after all I've been through, that I would be able to feel love and hope again. You have indeed saved me, Obi-Wan, though you will never know it.

Far beneath my air car, I can see the glow from some smelting furnace. Even he will not be able to resurrect me from that.

All I have to do is fall one last time.

angels never came down
there's no one here they want to hang around
but if they knew
if they knew you at all
then one by one the angels
angels would fall

End note: In the first line of the song, the word "hope" should be "rope". I liked "hope" better.