Anakin had held office hours yesterday, and met any number of annoying people. Okay, just Durron, but that had been enough.

The one he'd been most interested in seeing hadn't deigned to show up.

So here he was, all Jedi serenity as he waited--again--for another grandson to arrive.

And waited. And waited. And waited.

	Jacen had been busy making people cry since he'd been in Fandom. Meeting Anakin had been on his agenda from the beginning, but it had been too tempting to make Darth Vader wait. Appearing in the doorway without so much as a hint of his presence in the Force, Jacen clasped his hands behind his back and looked on his grandfather.
	Anakin glanced up. Dark hair, Padmé's eyes--which should never look so cold--hints of Han Solo in the chin and bone structure..."Hello, Jacen," he said, cocking up an eyebrow. "Interesting trick. Why are you hiding?"
	"Does it unnerve you?" Jacen asked, his brown eyes looking Anakin over with keen interest.
	"Not particularly," Anakin replied. "I was never a Jedi who relied entirely on the Force to guide me."
	Jacen stepped forward, settling his hands on the back of a chair, trying to appear relaxed. "No, I'm certain you had other, more valuable methods of guidance."
	Up went the eyebrows again. "It very much depends on what time in my life you're talking about."
	"Oh, whichever you prefer to speak of." Jacen's face was all serenity.
	The hair on the back of Anakin's neck started to rise. "I generally don't speak of those twenty years," he said. "Why would you be interested in them?"
	"Who wouldn't be interested?" Jacen countered. "You are Darth Vader." He only used the name to see what sort of rise he could get out of the man.
	"I was Darth Vader," Anakin corrected. "And becoming a Sith Lord is hardly something to be proud of." He was probing carefully, not liking the direction this conversation seemed to be heading.
	"Like Aunt Mara was once the Emperor's Hand," Jacen added. "Enlighten me. Tell me what my mother's father would say about pride."
	"I teach ethics," Anakin replied with a smile that didn't touch his eyes. "I do an entire class on pride. In general, pride is at the heart of all great mistakes. When you set your heart on being highly esteemed, there is a fear that automatically comes along with it about losing that status. I've discoved that pride stops us from admitting we've made a mistake until we're so far down an unforgivable path that nothing can bring us back. What do you know of pride, Jacen Solo who stands in my office and reflects nothing in the Force?" Yes, that had been bothering him.
	Jacen's face broke into an easy, disarming smile. "And I thought it didn't bother you." Did he just ignore everything Anakin said? Yes.
	"You didn't answer my question." Anakin had been a teacher for twenty years. He knew when someone was avoiding a subject. And yes, he was avoiding a subject, too. Details.
	"Questions are often truer than the answers given," Jacen responded evenly. "I could tell you what I know of pride from a certain point of view, but now is not the time for a discussion of philosophy."
	Anakin was rapidly losing patience. "So what is this a time for?" he asked. "Because I'm hardly going to reminisce about the good old days when I killed people on a whim."
	That was too bad. Jacen could give his grandfather some pointers in how to sever emotional ties to be a greater Sith. "Tell me about Ben, I hear you've tried taking him under your wing."
	"I see him occasionally," Anakin hedged. "He doesn't seem to want to spend much time around a former Sith Lord. You've made quite an impression on him--he didn't even blink before heading home to help you with a mission." His fingers tapped against the desk. "What did you have him doing again?"
	"His job," Jacen said helpfully.
	"He's an apprentice," Anakin said flatly. "Any job that needs to be done should be done by you."
	"He's no mere apprentice," Jacen replied evenly. "Ben works for the GAG. It's his duty to follow the orders given to him by his superiors."
	"You really need to work on your acronyms," Anakin commented. "It's his duty to learn to be a Jedi from another Jedi. He doesn't need any other job."
	Jacen smiled. "You might consider taking that up with your son. Except, of course, in our universe Luke didn't save you." At least not that way.
	Anakin stared at him for a long minute. "Poodoo," he said flatly. "I might not have lived, but you'll never convince me that Luke--any Luke--gave up on me."
	"You haven't met our Luke." Of course, Jacen might have been biased there.
	Anakin's eyes narrowed. "Bet he sees right through you," he said. "Did you think you could come in here and see if you could make me--what? Force choke you? Make something explode?" He pushed back from his desk and stalked closer. "Do you really want to know about the dark side, young one? I'm not an exhibit at the zoo, or a machine to take apart and poke at. And you will show your uncle some respect."
	Narrowing his eyes in return, Jacen showed no signs of backing down and made no attempts to give Anakin space. "Or what?"
	"Or I'll teach you some," Anakin growled. "Luke has worked too damn hard to be second guessed by little punks."
	Jacen was torn. While he desperately wanted to see what the de-fanged Vader had up his sleeve, he couldn't risk showing his own hand. "We'll just have to make sure Luke finds the time to visit Ben next time." So it was a lie.
	"He's probably busy fixing your errors," Anakin decided. Something about this guy reminded him of...him. And not in a good way.
	Jacen scoffed. "Hardly." As if that would ever happen.
	Anakin glanced towards the holo of Rory he had on his desk, pursing his lips. "That kind of arrogance is going to lead straight down a path I don't think you want to go," he replied.
	Following Anakin's gaze, Jacen's lip curled into a smirk. "A path littered with wives who die in childbirth?"
	The door to Anakin's office slammed so hard the wood cracked through the middle. Anakin's hand hadn't so much as twitched. "Care to repeat that?" he hissed, stepping close into Jacen's personal space.
	"Oh, I'm sorry. Have you not had that vision yet?" Jacen asked, voice completely unapologetic.
	Anakin's eyes blazed. "You lie. You don't even know her. Why would you be getting visions?"
	"Perhaps," Jacen allowed, staring Anakin down. "But if I was lying, why would you seem so worried?"
	"You tell me," Anakin gritted. "You seem to think you know me so very well. Trying to push me to see how far I'll go? That interested in seeing the dark side?"
	"Amazing," Jacen said, utterly disappointed. "Like Luke, you're far too concerned with light and dark." He would gain no insight here.
	"Because we're both smarter than you?" Anakin spat. "There's light and dark, young one, whether you decide its the facets inside you or manifestations of the living Force." He gave him a flat stare, then stepped closer. "Did you really think you can stand here in my office and expect me not to see through you?" he whispered. "Dark side wannabe. Idiot."
	"Wannabe? You have no concept of what I am capable, old man!" Jacen glared, unable to hide the anger in his eyes in the Force.
	"I brought down the entire Jedi Order, enslaved trillions, killed more people than I can remember and destroyed your mother's planet," Anakin said, flicking his fingers to propel Jacen into the nearest wall. "Go ahead. Impress me."
	Possessing what he considered complete mastery over the Force, Jacen slowed his progression toward the wall and sent a push of his own right back at Anakin. It was a pity destroying this Anakin Skywalker wouldn't be enough of a sacrifice to elevate Jacen to full Sith status.
	Anakin didn't move, except to raise an eyebrow. "This is what they're teaching Junior Darksiders these days? Pathetic." He waved his hand, this time putting some real effort into it, and his desk went racing towards Jacen. "Why won't my family learn from my mistakes?"
	And that would be the desk shattering into pieces as Jacen mentally tore in half to avoid contact with his person. "You mean the blind weakness that was your downfall?"
	Anakin snatched the holoprojector out of the air and rested it carefully on a shelf without breaking eye contact with Jacen. "Yes, that," he snapped. "But it looks like you've replaced it with your own blind weakness."
	"I am ready to make the necessary sacrifices," Jacen snapped back, sending a chair soaring toward Anakin.
	"In exchange for what?" Anakin snarled, snapping the chair back to its component parts. "A life where everyone hates you? Which is generally a good hint you're doing something wrong."
	"In exchange for bringing peace to the galaxy!" Jacen nearly spat the words as he hurled bits of broken furniture like knives at his grandfather. "And I won't have to kill off all the known Jedi in the universe to do it!"
	"How awfully magnanimous of you," Anakin shouted, deflecting the furniture shards into the ceiling. "You can't make the galaxy do anything--that's just a Sith recruitment..." Realization dawned in his eyes. "Who's teaching you?"
	Jacen hadn't expected that question. "That's quite an assumption, grandfather."
	"It's right, though, isn't it?" Anakin said, eyes wide. "No relative of mine is going to settle for half-assing his descent. You complete moron."
	"I only learn from the best," Jacen allowed.
	"Palpatine's been dead for years," Anakin snarled, wishing for his lightsaber, "so that's not true. What half-trained jumped-up darksider thinks they're an actual Lord of the Sith? The last two real lords died on the Death Star."
	Jacen snorted, "You've been gone a long time." Wouldn't Vergere and Lumiya just love to hear Darth Vader's opinion of them.
	"I was hoping this had gone with me," Anakin said, casting out with the Force and looking for...well, he wasn't sure. Some kind of darkly familiar presence, maybe. "The power isn't worth the sacrifices. Step back from the edge and whoever it is that thinks they're Sith." Anakin's pep talk could use some work.
	"You know, Ben was right. Talking to you is a waste of time." Jacen concentrated, curious about an ex-Sith's strength in the Force and his own abilities in comparison, and attempted to look inside Anakin the way he'd once looked inside Ta'a Chume.
	He hit ridiculously high mental walls. "Are you kidding me?" Anakin screeched, stalking closer. "Stay out of my head, and away from Luke's son." He twitched his fingers, intending to lift Jacen off the floor. "In fact," he gritted, "get off of this island before I do something I'll have a hard time explaining to your mother."
	And that was an excessively surprised Jacen, scowling and lifting off the ground to hover toward the door. Maybe he was helping with the propelling just a little. "This is not the end!"
	"It better be," Anakin hissed. "Get the kriffing hell off of my island. You've got fifteen minutes, and then I'm coming after you. And the weapons ban doesn't extend past the campus." He gestured with his hand to shoot Jacen through the—ow, still closed--door.

[OOC: Topic of conversation NFB, but the fight would be hard to miss. No IC interaction possible, OOC comments are love.]