Anakin was up working on the speeder long after he put Leia to bed. It wasn't that he was afraid to sleep anymore; his nightmares had long since stopped. He simply wasn't tired yet.

But he could barely focus on what he was doing. He couldn't stop thinking about his and Padmé's decision to cut off all communication with each other. That day when they had that scare with the Empire due to their devices being hacked, they had been panicked, barely able to think straight. They had been hasty in making such an important decision. Destroying the old comlinks had been the easy way, not the best way.

The worst part was, many alternatives would have been available. Anakin probably could have found a way to secure his device's information, just like he did with the Z-95 Headhunter. Or maybe they could have just used devices that weren't comms. Just about anything would have been better than never being able to speak to each other again.

Now, they had no way to find each other if they did ever decide that they were no longer in danger from the Empire. Leia could never even hear her mother's voice, and Anakin could never know what his son was like. To ever find each other, in such a huge galaxy, without knowing each other's location... the odds were practically insurmountable.

In his heart, Anakin wanted to believe that he would see Padmé and Luke again; he wasn't sure he had ever accepted that they were probably gone for good. But it seemed as though sheer mathematical probability was screaming at him, Your fate is sealed. You will never see your wife and son again.

All of this was thanks to the Empire, and quite possibly the Jedi Order.

His desires in life had always been simple; they revolved around people rather than pleasure or wealth or power. And yet, the few things he wanted had always been denied him. He had wanted his mother to be safe, but she died a cruel death. When he longed for respect from Obi-Wan and the other Jedi, they only watched him with a frowning, critical stare. And now, half of his family was gone.

Anakin wondered if all this could have been avoided if his two mentors- Palpatine and the Jedi- hadn't turned on each other and forced him to take sides, and if the Empire had never been formed. What was the problem with the Republic, anyway? Had the Clone Wars left it too weak to salvage, or was there some bigger, more complex reason?

These thoughts had him so preoccupied that he was forgetting all about his project. He just wanted to do something.... Challenge the Emperor, take down the Empire, destroy anything in his way.

He watched a little rat scurry silently across the floor. Without really thinking about it, he seized the creature with the Force and lifted it into the air, tightening his grip on its neck. The rat squirmed and writhed, its jaws agape as it tried to breathe. Its beady little eyes seemed to bulge out of its head.

Somehow, it felt so good, so satisfying, to use the Force without trying to stifle his emotions, to just let it all out...

"Daddy, what are you doing?"

Leia's voice, though barely above a whisper, could have been an explosion in the silent room. Anakin turned to her, startled.

Her gaze fell on his clenched fist and the still-choking rodent suspended in the air. The expression on her face was unreadable. "Please put it down," she whispered.

He knew she was right. The rat, though a pest, did not deserve to be tormented by the Force this way. Slightly alarmed with himself for doing such a thing, he let the creature go. It was still alive, and it scampered away; Anakin was thankful he hadn't killed it.

"Leia... I'm sorry..." he mumbled, unsure of what else to say. Why did she have to come in when he was in one of his weaker moments? "What are you doing up?" he finally asked her.

"I was thirsty. I got a drink, but I couldn't go back to sleep.... Why were you doing that?"

"It's kind of a long story. Are you sure you want to know?"

"Yes!" Leia pouted slightly, as if she were offended by the idea of not knowing the whole truth.

Anakin sighed deeply and walked with her back into the house. "It's just... I was angry. And you know that we're not supposed to get angry."

Leia nodded and took a seat on the living room sofa. Anakin sat next to her.

"I just couldn't stop thinking about the Empire, and all the bad things they've done, and how much I miss your mother and Luke. And all that anger had to come out somehow, and so I guess I had to use the Force on something."

"But, you're not allowed to kill things with the Force, right?"

"That's what the Jedi say. If you use the Force to kill or hurt things, that's called the Dark Side."

Leia's eyes widened as this new information clicked in her mind. "So... the Force can be bad sometimes?"

"Sort of. It has a Light Side and a Dark Side. The Jedi use the Light side, but some people, like the Emperor, think the Dark Side is a good thing."

"How come?"

"Well, probably because you can use your emotions with the Dark Side. You don't have to hide fear or anger or hate. With the Dark Side, those feelings actually make you stronger."

"So, with the Light Side, do you have to be really happy and really brave?"

Anakin smiled slightly at Leia's rationalization. Bravery and happiness, in her mind, were probably the literal opposites of fear and anger. If only it was all that simple.

"Not quite," he said. "The Jedi want you to use no emotion. No happiness, no sadness, no hate, no love. Only peace and calmness. But that's hard. It's hard to be calm sometimes."

"That doesn't make sense." Leia scowled, deep in thought. "If you don't use your emotions, you're not very powerful, are you?"

"True, but the Jedi aren't about power. The Sith are."

"But if they're not powerful, how do they beat the bad guys?"

Anakin laughed softly. "That's a very good point. I guess that's why we used to have hundreds of Jedi and only two Sith. But, some Jedi, like Yoda and Mace Windu, were very powerful."

"Then they're not being very good Jedi, if Jedi don't want to be powerful!"

By Leia's logic, Yoda and Windu were the worst Jedi. But they were supposed to be the best, and Anakin realized he didn't fully understand why.

"The Jedi make no sense," Leia went on. "I'm glad I'm not one."

But Leia did have a small amount of Force-sensitivity; Anakin had seen her talk about how she knew what some people were feeling even when they weren't around. If she really wanted to, Leia could probably be a Jedi.

"I think it's time for us both to go to bed," Anakin told her. "But maybe someday, you'll invent a better way to use the Force."

Anakin didn't know if the Jedi were right or the Sith were right. Whether he used the Light Side or the Dark Side of the Force, it somehow felt wrong. Surely, the Force didn't exist just so Jedi and Sith could mold it into their own creations... did it?

(Author's Note: Anakin knows the Dark Side is bad but it still seems better than the Light Side to him! I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I know lots of people are reading this, but only a few are commenting, so if you're here I'd love to hear from you! :) Please continue to vote and comment. Thanks for reading!)