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Over at Tumblr, I said that when inspiration strikes, it strikes hard, and well ... yes.
title: The Jedi and the Sith Lord (10/?)
verse: Lucy Skywalker: my f!Luke AU, following from The Adventures of Lucy Skywalker and The Imperial Menace
characters: Luke/Lucy Skywalker, Anakin Skywalker; Tuvié (F-2VA), Ellex, (LX-3), Dr Izahay (OC)
stuff that happens: Vader rescues Lucy and discovers the full series of events, Tuvié faces consequences, and Vader stacks on another revelation.
previous sections: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine
CHAPTER TEN
Aiya.
Vader didn’t know if he’d said it aloud. Nor did he care; he looked around himself, then positioned Lucy in the narrow space behind his seat, grabbing at one of his emergency filters and pressing it over her face. Alarmingly, Lucy didn’t resist, but just blinked up at him. Her gaze seemed to have focused, at least.
“Hold this here,” he ordered, unsure if she could obey, or if the filter would even help after prolonged exposure.
His own breath came more harshly than usual, if only a little. He should have activated his own force field before fetching her, but between his urgency and the filters built into his helmet and mask, hadn’t thought of it. His head stayed clear, however, and he settled himself behind the controls without further hesitation, launching the ship off Lucy’s ledge and darting towards Bast Castle.
When he landed the ship inside the castle’s protective field and turned to recover Lucy, he found her still holding the filter over her face with one limp hand, but only barely. She looked dazed again.
He didn’t need the Dark Side—and certainly not the Light—to tell him that her time was running out. Then, everything he’d done would be in vain. And … never mind. It wouldn’t happen. Again, he lifted his daughter in his arms.
“Mmph,” said Lucy.
“Don’t waste your breath,” he advised her, and strode to the castle doors. When they swung open, he found his people in a disorder he would have harshly punished at any other time. In particular, F-2VA was holding a knife to the throat of Commander Zowan, a man who had never previously disappointed Vader.
“Where is she, you incompetent bag of flesh? What have you—”
Zowan choked and pointed at Vader.
His first instinct was to order them out of his way and cart Lucy to the medical bay himself. But his second thought was that speed mattered more. He saw LX-3 standing guard exactly where he’d left her and quickly deposited Lucy into her arms.
“Take her to the medical bay as quickly as you can. Tell Doctor Izahay that she takes priority over all other patients.”
“Yes, sir,” Ellex said, and rising up to her full height and securing her grip on Lucy, she hurtled in the direction of the bay.
Vader, ignoring the assorted disappointments around him and their evident fear, stalked after her. He made his way to the medical bay as quickly as his prosthetics would take him; by that time, Lucy floated in a bacta tank, Izahay standing nearby and jotting down notes on the screen in her hand. Ellex had taken up position by the door, glancing around suspiciously.
Vader swept past her and marched over to Izahay.
“Will she live?” he asked abruptly.
Izahay contemplated the tank with a cool professionalism that grated on his nerves.
“Perhaps,” she said. “Probably, I’d say. The exposure was limited, as these things go, and the bacta should be sufficient to repair bronchial and pulmonary damage.”
“Let us hope so,” said Vader. “You will live if she does.”
She swallowed.
After several minutes, he saw no point in continuing to watch Lucy, who would remain in bacta for a full half-hour before further examination. He turned on his heel and headed back to Ellex.
“Do you have an explanation?” he said.
“I have failed you, sir,” said Ellex, still scanning the hall. “I did not observe Skywalker’s escape with the organics. She seems to have used clothing near in colouration to their uniforms and a personal force field to obscure her presence among them.”
Clever. Not as clever as should have been required to escape, of course. But she had taken advantage of the chaos following the attack and seized her opportunity, as he supposed he should have expected of his daughter. Banishing all memory of his own history, he said,
“She is five feet tall. No one noticed her?”
“I believe her size allowed her to use the bodies of the other organics to conceal herself,” said Ellex. “We should have attended more closely to the details of the situation, however. If you decide to destroy me, I will not resist.”
Vader considered it. Ellex had served him well up to this point—better than any other subordinate. On the one hand, her failure had resulted in potentially fatal consequences, to Lucy and to his plans for her. On the other, total destruction seemed a waste of Ellex’s abilities and the resources he had dedicated to her over the years. She had not swerved from his instructions, at least.
“I have not yet decided,” said Vader. “Speaking of failures, where was F-2VA in all this?”
“You will have to inquire of F-2VA,” Ellex replied. “She did not choose to inform me of her location or the rationale for her actions. She did seem extremely troubled by their consequences, as you no doubt observed.”
It had been a long time since he’d seen Tuvié draw a knife on anyone, much less a high-ranking Imperial officer. She must have been troubled, indeed.
Nevertheless, he could only consider her failure as exponentially greater than Ellex’s. He had told her to guard Lucy at all times, except when given an overriding command. Yet somehow, she had not been present when Lucy slipped out of the castle. It was a disastrous dereliction of her duties and orders.
“If anyone is going to be destroyed,” he said grimly, “it will be Tuvié.”
-
All that day, Lucy passed in and out of consciousness. By the time her thoughts approached something like coherence, she guessed that it must be well into the night.
Well, she hadn’t died, which was something. Her chest and throat hurt too much for that. She lay in a bed, less comfortable than the one she’d grown accustomed to, in a stark grey room. Peering around, she recognized the room as the medical bay where Tuvié had taken her to have Tisix inspect her eyes. But she didn’t hear Tuvié’s prattling voice.
She thought about going back to sleep, but something began to beep loudly.
“Ah,” said a voice—an organic woman’s voice. “I see you’re back with us.”
The voice was unfamiliar, but sounded decidedly pleased. Lucy squinted at the person attached to it. She was human or humanoid, with dark eyes and silver hair, though she didn’t seem that old: perhaps forty.
“Looks like it,” said Lucy. “Who are you?”
“Doctor Izahay,” the woman replied. “Tisix here and I have been caring for you. It was a very foolish thing you did, young lady.”
“I guess so,” Lucy said.
The Force felt much as it had in the other, mysterious chamber with the sphere: a nasty tangle of Dark and Light. Lucy did her best to pinpoint it, and only then made out a tall, bulky figure in the shadows.
Vader.
“You could have died,” said Izahay. Though only a few inches taller than Lucy, she then turned to shake her finger in Vader’s direction. “And Lord Vader could have, too!”
What?
Dimly, she recalled someone carrying her, and a mask pressed against her face. Had it been—
“I’m sorry,” said Lucy. She didn’t mean it, but nothing else came to mind.
Vader stirred at last. “I sincerely doubt that.”
She could only shrug. If he was going to hold her captive, he had to expect her to try and escape. Maybe he had expected it; he didn’t sound surprised or troubled at all. She wasn’t going to depend on that, though.
“All right,” said Izahay briskly, holding up a small, round device with a tube at one end. “Miss Skywalker, breathe into this as hard as you can.”
Puzzled, but not quite daring further trouble-making (at the moment), Lucy obeyed. A string of numbers passed through the screen at the top of the device.
“Hmm,” Izahay said. “Well, that’s a good sign. Was the breath painful?”
“A little,” said Lucy.
“On a scale of one to ten—”
“Uh, four?”
Izahay gave a faint smile. “That’s to be expected. Now, I’m going to give you some medication to inhale that should complete the healing process and prevent you from any further effects. Make sure you take it morning and night, and avoid speaking at high volume unless absolutely necessary.”
Lucy nodded.
“Your work has been satisfactory, doctor,” said Vader. “You may leave us.”
Visibly relaxing, Izahay nodded and strode out, pausing to talk in a quiet voice to someone—Lucy thought they sounded like a droid, though she couldn’t quite make them out from here—at the door. After a brief conversation, the door shut behind her.
Lucy glanced from the indistinct, but very large, droid at the door, to Tisix, to Vader. He often sent Tuvié away when he spoke to Lucy, so it wasn’t all that strange to see Vader without her around, but a hazy alarm nevertheless crept on her.
“Where’s Tuvié?” she asked.
Vader stepped forward, into the low light of the medical bay, and looked down at her. Nothing about him betrayed any emotion, not even the Force; it was too tumultuous right now to be much of a guide.
“She has been relieved of her duties,” said Vader.
Panic settled in Lucy’s chest and stomach, her breath jolting. “What do you mean, ‘relieved’?”
“I mean exactly what I said.”
“Did you hurt her?” Lucy demanded. “Is she all right?”
He made a more-than-usually ominous figure in the blurred dimness and shadow, looming over her bed. She had to crane her head back to meet his lenses.
After a long pause, Vader said,
“F-2VA nearly got you killed.”
“I nearly got me killed!” Lucy snapped back, then coughed.
“Lower your voice,” said Vader, “or I will lower it for you.”
Lucy wasn’t sure how he could manage that, but didn’t feel inclined to find out. She nodded.
“That is true enough,” he went on, “but you never could have made your escape without Tuvié’s abandonment of her duties.”
“But I’m the one who—”
Vader locked his hands behind his back. “Yes?”
She hesitated, knowing that his appearance of calm might be deceptive, and some terrible punishment could await her, daughter or not. Certainly, she didn’t imagine that she could expect the tolerant treatment she’d … not enjoyed, but experienced so far. She hardly wanted to make it worse. But if Tuvié still functioned, she couldn’t let her get sliced up or blasted to pieces because of Lucy.
She hadn’t even thought of it at the time.
“I told her to get force fields to the other humanoids,” Lucy said quickly. “She wasn’t sure, she said she was supposed to stay with me—I’m the one who convinced her to go.” She dropped her gaze to her hands. “I told her that it was what you would want.”
Vader said absolutely nothing for a good thirty seconds. Then he said,
“You told me once that life was a series of choices and consequences.”
Lucy was already shaking her head. “I didn’t mean—”
“Perhaps you should think of that the next time you involve other sentients in your plots!”
“Tuvié is a very unique droid,” she protested. “Or was. You would sacrifice her just to make me suffer?”
It’s not fair! she almost exclaimed, but knew better than to think he cared about fairness.
Vader said, “I am still deciding that point.”
Her breaths came more easily.
“So she’s still alive?” Lucy asked eagerly. “Operational, I mean?”
“For the moment,” said Vader.
-
In the event, Vader gave F-2VA the very small credit of facing the consequences without protest, though not silence.
“You left her,” he said. “Why?”
“I—well, I—I considered it—the thought occurred to me, sir, that many of the organics would require assistance.”
“The thought occurred to you,” he repeated. “And how did this thought occur to you?”
The light in Tuvié’s optical sensors flickered. “I … I … I cannot say, sir. It simply did.”
She was trying to protect Lucy, he realized. Interesting.
“It was Lucy,” he said. “She convinced you to go assist others.”
Tuvié did fall silent at that.
“Did she not?”
She hesitated, then replied, “I cannot comprehend why she did such a thing. And in the middle of an attack, too! If she wished to experience those dreadful rocks so badly, she might have asked, on a safer occasion.” She shook her head. “I do not understand.”
Perhaps he should have given her a more advanced processor.
“That is not your concern,” said Vader. “You will no longer oversee her care. You will make no attempt to contact her in any way, nor receive any communications from her.”
Some part of her frame clanked. “Of course, but—I am to remain operational, sir?”
“It is possible,” he said, a new thought occurring to him, “that you may still be of service.”
-
When Lucy woke again, she opened her eyes to the sight of her bedroom. Everything seemed exactly as she’d left it, down to the purple gown pooled on the floor. But she’d only just yawned when the door opened and something cast a long, broad shadow across the room.
Lucy looked up, and then further up. An enormous black droid—easily seven feet tall—stood there, regarding her with dull red eyes set in a narrow head. The droid was covered in smooth plates and had several blasters attached to their arms. It didn’t seem a standard model, so Lucy was pretty sure she’d seen this particular one before; the droid had been one of the guards at the door when she snuck out.
“Uh,” said Lucy. “Hello?”
“Lord Vader will see you now,” said the droid.
Despite herself, Lucy brightened. “Ellex!”
Ellex had none of Tuvié’s integrated prosthetics, at least none visible beyond her plating, but she managed to glower nevertheless.
“Hurry up. He doesn’t have all day.”
Lucy, deciding against deliberately aggravating Vader or the killer droid in front of her, made her way to the wardrobe. As soon as she opened it, she felt overwhelmed; Padmé had left a governor’s ransom in clothes, and Tuvié almost always selected them for her. Repressing a flare of guilt, Lucy grabbed a dress that seemed manageable without Tuvié’s help.
“Are you planning on waiting until our star cools?” said Ellex.
Lucy rolled her eyes and hurried over to the fresher; she felt a lot weirder about undressing in front of Ellex than Tuvié. After a struggle with some unforeseen buttons, her hair, and sleeves meant for someone with thinner arms, she triumphantly emerged.
“Is Vader leaving again?” she asked.
“Lord Vader will inform you of his plans if he wishes to,” Ellex said, wheeling around to march down the hall.
Lucy had to lift her skirts and run to keep up. Tuvié had usually slowed down to match Lucy’s natural stride.
“Well, I’d be investigating that attack if it were me,” said Lucy.
“Happily,” Ellex returned, “you are not Lord Vader.”
Lucy remembered her vision and promptly shoved it away.
“They were Imperials, not Rebels,” she went on. “Something strange is going on. Why aren’t I locked up, by the way?”
“Lord Vader did not command it,” said Ellex. “Do you always talk so much?”
Lucy thought about it. “I don’t know. I always talked less than Tuvié.”
“That is an extremely low standard to meet.”
It might be, but Lucy wasn’t about to say so. She glared at Ellex’s back and hurried after her in resentful silence. By the time they reached Vader’s receiving room, she felt annoyed at the entire galaxy and just about everyone in it except Leia and Han.
They found Vader gazing out the window, his back to them. Typically fearless—but then, he had armour.
Without turning, he said, “Leave us, Ellex.”
Ellex betrayed none of Tuvié’s anxious hesitations, but simply swivelled on her heavy feet and marched away. Lucy waited until the door closed, then folded her arms.
“I’m not sorry.”
“A shocking development,” said Vader.
She wanted to say something else, throw further defiance into his face, but nothing came to mind. Then an echo of a thought came to her.
Valì.
Lucy shivered. Even now, she longed to believe it impossible. Her feelings—oh, people’s feelings misled them all the time! Maybe it only seemed so overpowering because of the shock, or because she’d been away from other people for so long, or it was a trick of Vader’s to sway her to the Dark Side. Anything but the truth she felt down to her bones.
If only she could talk to Ben or Yoda, find out whether they’d lied, and how much. They could tell her the real story, whatever it was.
They could have told me all along.
“I will be departing shortly,” said Vader, his attention not wavering from the poisonous view out the window.
“All right,” Lucy said. “How am I going to be imprisoned now? Is there a cell with my name on it?”
Our name, she thought, and then quickly added, maybe.
Vader said, “No.”
“Great,” said Lucy. “And when will you be back?”
Not that she cared.
“When my business is concluded,” he said.
“I hope that business involves investigating those Imperials who just attacked us,” said Lucy.
He shifted position slightly, which she decided to count as a small victory.
“What makes you think the attack didn’t come from your Rebel friends?”
“The Force showed me,” she said flatly. “They were Imperials.”
She felt a trace of satisfaction. An odd trace—it felt peculiarly dull and remote, as if it came from somewhere very far away.
Lucy’s brows drew together.
“You knew that already, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” He didn’t elaborate, but finally turned around to look at her, his lenses flickering red. “I assure you, they will pay for their little … maneuver.”
In her dryest tone, she said, “I never doubted you.”
“As for yours,” said Vader, “you will be supervised by LX-3 at all times, and your movements restricted. Ellex’s blasters are set to stun. I have given her freedom to use them at her own discretion.”
She considered this. Really, she’d expected worse. From all she’d heard, people around Vader died for a fraction of her misdeeds, and suffered for them when they didn’t die. People like Tuvié—
“That’s another shocking development for today,” she said.
Quietly, Vader told her, “You are on very dangerous ground, Lucy.”
At that, she could only laugh.
“Compared to what? The first time I saw you, you sliced your lightsaber through my friend and teacher. Should I expect something worse than that?”
“Obi-Wan and I had unfinished business,” said Vader. “This is a different situation.”
Lucy was almost there again, watching as her friend, her teacher, the last of the little Tatooine world she’d known, died before her eyes. She could feel her body shaking all over again.
“Unfinished business? Is that what you call it every time you kill an innocent person?” she demanded.
“I do not kill innocent people,” he said. “I kill guilty ones—like Obi-Wan.”
“Guilty? Ben?” Lucy shook her head. “What could he have ever done to deserve that?”
Vader’s hands clenched into fists, his rage almost a palpable thing.
“He left me to burn alive.”
“To—” She couldn’t even repeat it. “That’s not true. It can’t—he wouldn’t—”
“Do not tell me what he would or would not have done!” said Vader. “I knew him better than you ever will. In the end, he showed himself for what he was—a monster and a coward.”
Maybe he was lying about … about Anakin. Maybe he wasn’t. But he had to be lying about this. She’d known Ben. As a peculiar neighbour for most of her life, sure, but she’d still known him, and he’d been her guide and mentor in his last days and after them. She just couldn’t believe it.
“I’m not listening to this,” she said, backing away.
“Hide from the truth all you like,” said Vader. “That won’t change it.”
“It’s not true,” she insisted. “You’re trying to—you’re just trying to turn me to the Dark Side, aren’t you? I’m not fooled.”
“Yes, you are,” he said. “By Obi-Wan. But that is enough of this. Treat LX-3 with more respect than you did F-2VA and I should find you in good health when I return.” He pressed his hand against a panel on the wall.
“What’s that?” she asked suspiciously.
He said, “Ellex, take her away.”
title: The Jedi and the Sith Lord (10/?)
verse: Lucy Skywalker: my f!Luke AU, following from The Adventures of Lucy Skywalker and The Imperial Menace
characters: Luke/Lucy Skywalker, Anakin Skywalker; Tuvié (F-2VA), Ellex, (LX-3), Dr Izahay (OC)
stuff that happens: Vader rescues Lucy and discovers the full series of events, Tuvié faces consequences, and Vader stacks on another revelation.
previous sections: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine
CHAPTER TEN
Aiya.
Vader didn’t know if he’d said it aloud. Nor did he care; he looked around himself, then positioned Lucy in the narrow space behind his seat, grabbing at one of his emergency filters and pressing it over her face. Alarmingly, Lucy didn’t resist, but just blinked up at him. Her gaze seemed to have focused, at least.
“Hold this here,” he ordered, unsure if she could obey, or if the filter would even help after prolonged exposure.
His own breath came more harshly than usual, if only a little. He should have activated his own force field before fetching her, but between his urgency and the filters built into his helmet and mask, hadn’t thought of it. His head stayed clear, however, and he settled himself behind the controls without further hesitation, launching the ship off Lucy’s ledge and darting towards Bast Castle.
When he landed the ship inside the castle’s protective field and turned to recover Lucy, he found her still holding the filter over her face with one limp hand, but only barely. She looked dazed again.
He didn’t need the Dark Side—and certainly not the Light—to tell him that her time was running out. Then, everything he’d done would be in vain. And … never mind. It wouldn’t happen. Again, he lifted his daughter in his arms.
“Mmph,” said Lucy.
“Don’t waste your breath,” he advised her, and strode to the castle doors. When they swung open, he found his people in a disorder he would have harshly punished at any other time. In particular, F-2VA was holding a knife to the throat of Commander Zowan, a man who had never previously disappointed Vader.
“Where is she, you incompetent bag of flesh? What have you—”
Zowan choked and pointed at Vader.
His first instinct was to order them out of his way and cart Lucy to the medical bay himself. But his second thought was that speed mattered more. He saw LX-3 standing guard exactly where he’d left her and quickly deposited Lucy into her arms.
“Take her to the medical bay as quickly as you can. Tell Doctor Izahay that she takes priority over all other patients.”
“Yes, sir,” Ellex said, and rising up to her full height and securing her grip on Lucy, she hurtled in the direction of the bay.
Vader, ignoring the assorted disappointments around him and their evident fear, stalked after her. He made his way to the medical bay as quickly as his prosthetics would take him; by that time, Lucy floated in a bacta tank, Izahay standing nearby and jotting down notes on the screen in her hand. Ellex had taken up position by the door, glancing around suspiciously.
Vader swept past her and marched over to Izahay.
“Will she live?” he asked abruptly.
Izahay contemplated the tank with a cool professionalism that grated on his nerves.
“Perhaps,” she said. “Probably, I’d say. The exposure was limited, as these things go, and the bacta should be sufficient to repair bronchial and pulmonary damage.”
“Let us hope so,” said Vader. “You will live if she does.”
She swallowed.
After several minutes, he saw no point in continuing to watch Lucy, who would remain in bacta for a full half-hour before further examination. He turned on his heel and headed back to Ellex.
“Do you have an explanation?” he said.
“I have failed you, sir,” said Ellex, still scanning the hall. “I did not observe Skywalker’s escape with the organics. She seems to have used clothing near in colouration to their uniforms and a personal force field to obscure her presence among them.”
Clever. Not as clever as should have been required to escape, of course. But she had taken advantage of the chaos following the attack and seized her opportunity, as he supposed he should have expected of his daughter. Banishing all memory of his own history, he said,
“She is five feet tall. No one noticed her?”
“I believe her size allowed her to use the bodies of the other organics to conceal herself,” said Ellex. “We should have attended more closely to the details of the situation, however. If you decide to destroy me, I will not resist.”
Vader considered it. Ellex had served him well up to this point—better than any other subordinate. On the one hand, her failure had resulted in potentially fatal consequences, to Lucy and to his plans for her. On the other, total destruction seemed a waste of Ellex’s abilities and the resources he had dedicated to her over the years. She had not swerved from his instructions, at least.
“I have not yet decided,” said Vader. “Speaking of failures, where was F-2VA in all this?”
“You will have to inquire of F-2VA,” Ellex replied. “She did not choose to inform me of her location or the rationale for her actions. She did seem extremely troubled by their consequences, as you no doubt observed.”
It had been a long time since he’d seen Tuvié draw a knife on anyone, much less a high-ranking Imperial officer. She must have been troubled, indeed.
Nevertheless, he could only consider her failure as exponentially greater than Ellex’s. He had told her to guard Lucy at all times, except when given an overriding command. Yet somehow, she had not been present when Lucy slipped out of the castle. It was a disastrous dereliction of her duties and orders.
“If anyone is going to be destroyed,” he said grimly, “it will be Tuvié.”
-
All that day, Lucy passed in and out of consciousness. By the time her thoughts approached something like coherence, she guessed that it must be well into the night.
Well, she hadn’t died, which was something. Her chest and throat hurt too much for that. She lay in a bed, less comfortable than the one she’d grown accustomed to, in a stark grey room. Peering around, she recognized the room as the medical bay where Tuvié had taken her to have Tisix inspect her eyes. But she didn’t hear Tuvié’s prattling voice.
She thought about going back to sleep, but something began to beep loudly.
“Ah,” said a voice—an organic woman’s voice. “I see you’re back with us.”
The voice was unfamiliar, but sounded decidedly pleased. Lucy squinted at the person attached to it. She was human or humanoid, with dark eyes and silver hair, though she didn’t seem that old: perhaps forty.
“Looks like it,” said Lucy. “Who are you?”
“Doctor Izahay,” the woman replied. “Tisix here and I have been caring for you. It was a very foolish thing you did, young lady.”
“I guess so,” Lucy said.
The Force felt much as it had in the other, mysterious chamber with the sphere: a nasty tangle of Dark and Light. Lucy did her best to pinpoint it, and only then made out a tall, bulky figure in the shadows.
Vader.
“You could have died,” said Izahay. Though only a few inches taller than Lucy, she then turned to shake her finger in Vader’s direction. “And Lord Vader could have, too!”
What?
Dimly, she recalled someone carrying her, and a mask pressed against her face. Had it been—
“I’m sorry,” said Lucy. She didn’t mean it, but nothing else came to mind.
Vader stirred at last. “I sincerely doubt that.”
She could only shrug. If he was going to hold her captive, he had to expect her to try and escape. Maybe he had expected it; he didn’t sound surprised or troubled at all. She wasn’t going to depend on that, though.
“All right,” said Izahay briskly, holding up a small, round device with a tube at one end. “Miss Skywalker, breathe into this as hard as you can.”
Puzzled, but not quite daring further trouble-making (at the moment), Lucy obeyed. A string of numbers passed through the screen at the top of the device.
“Hmm,” Izahay said. “Well, that’s a good sign. Was the breath painful?”
“A little,” said Lucy.
“On a scale of one to ten—”
“Uh, four?”
Izahay gave a faint smile. “That’s to be expected. Now, I’m going to give you some medication to inhale that should complete the healing process and prevent you from any further effects. Make sure you take it morning and night, and avoid speaking at high volume unless absolutely necessary.”
Lucy nodded.
“Your work has been satisfactory, doctor,” said Vader. “You may leave us.”
Visibly relaxing, Izahay nodded and strode out, pausing to talk in a quiet voice to someone—Lucy thought they sounded like a droid, though she couldn’t quite make them out from here—at the door. After a brief conversation, the door shut behind her.
Lucy glanced from the indistinct, but very large, droid at the door, to Tisix, to Vader. He often sent Tuvié away when he spoke to Lucy, so it wasn’t all that strange to see Vader without her around, but a hazy alarm nevertheless crept on her.
“Where’s Tuvié?” she asked.
Vader stepped forward, into the low light of the medical bay, and looked down at her. Nothing about him betrayed any emotion, not even the Force; it was too tumultuous right now to be much of a guide.
“She has been relieved of her duties,” said Vader.
Panic settled in Lucy’s chest and stomach, her breath jolting. “What do you mean, ‘relieved’?”
“I mean exactly what I said.”
“Did you hurt her?” Lucy demanded. “Is she all right?”
He made a more-than-usually ominous figure in the blurred dimness and shadow, looming over her bed. She had to crane her head back to meet his lenses.
After a long pause, Vader said,
“F-2VA nearly got you killed.”
“I nearly got me killed!” Lucy snapped back, then coughed.
“Lower your voice,” said Vader, “or I will lower it for you.”
Lucy wasn’t sure how he could manage that, but didn’t feel inclined to find out. She nodded.
“That is true enough,” he went on, “but you never could have made your escape without Tuvié’s abandonment of her duties.”
“But I’m the one who—”
Vader locked his hands behind his back. “Yes?”
She hesitated, knowing that his appearance of calm might be deceptive, and some terrible punishment could await her, daughter or not. Certainly, she didn’t imagine that she could expect the tolerant treatment she’d … not enjoyed, but experienced so far. She hardly wanted to make it worse. But if Tuvié still functioned, she couldn’t let her get sliced up or blasted to pieces because of Lucy.
She hadn’t even thought of it at the time.
“I told her to get force fields to the other humanoids,” Lucy said quickly. “She wasn’t sure, she said she was supposed to stay with me—I’m the one who convinced her to go.” She dropped her gaze to her hands. “I told her that it was what you would want.”
Vader said absolutely nothing for a good thirty seconds. Then he said,
“You told me once that life was a series of choices and consequences.”
Lucy was already shaking her head. “I didn’t mean—”
“Perhaps you should think of that the next time you involve other sentients in your plots!”
“Tuvié is a very unique droid,” she protested. “Or was. You would sacrifice her just to make me suffer?”
It’s not fair! she almost exclaimed, but knew better than to think he cared about fairness.
Vader said, “I am still deciding that point.”
Her breaths came more easily.
“So she’s still alive?” Lucy asked eagerly. “Operational, I mean?”
“For the moment,” said Vader.
-
In the event, Vader gave F-2VA the very small credit of facing the consequences without protest, though not silence.
“You left her,” he said. “Why?”
“I—well, I—I considered it—the thought occurred to me, sir, that many of the organics would require assistance.”
“The thought occurred to you,” he repeated. “And how did this thought occur to you?”
The light in Tuvié’s optical sensors flickered. “I … I … I cannot say, sir. It simply did.”
She was trying to protect Lucy, he realized. Interesting.
“It was Lucy,” he said. “She convinced you to go assist others.”
Tuvié did fall silent at that.
“Did she not?”
She hesitated, then replied, “I cannot comprehend why she did such a thing. And in the middle of an attack, too! If she wished to experience those dreadful rocks so badly, she might have asked, on a safer occasion.” She shook her head. “I do not understand.”
Perhaps he should have given her a more advanced processor.
“That is not your concern,” said Vader. “You will no longer oversee her care. You will make no attempt to contact her in any way, nor receive any communications from her.”
Some part of her frame clanked. “Of course, but—I am to remain operational, sir?”
“It is possible,” he said, a new thought occurring to him, “that you may still be of service.”
-
When Lucy woke again, she opened her eyes to the sight of her bedroom. Everything seemed exactly as she’d left it, down to the purple gown pooled on the floor. But she’d only just yawned when the door opened and something cast a long, broad shadow across the room.
Lucy looked up, and then further up. An enormous black droid—easily seven feet tall—stood there, regarding her with dull red eyes set in a narrow head. The droid was covered in smooth plates and had several blasters attached to their arms. It didn’t seem a standard model, so Lucy was pretty sure she’d seen this particular one before; the droid had been one of the guards at the door when she snuck out.
“Uh,” said Lucy. “Hello?”
“Lord Vader will see you now,” said the droid.
Despite herself, Lucy brightened. “Ellex!”
Ellex had none of Tuvié’s integrated prosthetics, at least none visible beyond her plating, but she managed to glower nevertheless.
“Hurry up. He doesn’t have all day.”
Lucy, deciding against deliberately aggravating Vader or the killer droid in front of her, made her way to the wardrobe. As soon as she opened it, she felt overwhelmed; Padmé had left a governor’s ransom in clothes, and Tuvié almost always selected them for her. Repressing a flare of guilt, Lucy grabbed a dress that seemed manageable without Tuvié’s help.
“Are you planning on waiting until our star cools?” said Ellex.
Lucy rolled her eyes and hurried over to the fresher; she felt a lot weirder about undressing in front of Ellex than Tuvié. After a struggle with some unforeseen buttons, her hair, and sleeves meant for someone with thinner arms, she triumphantly emerged.
“Is Vader leaving again?” she asked.
“Lord Vader will inform you of his plans if he wishes to,” Ellex said, wheeling around to march down the hall.
Lucy had to lift her skirts and run to keep up. Tuvié had usually slowed down to match Lucy’s natural stride.
“Well, I’d be investigating that attack if it were me,” said Lucy.
“Happily,” Ellex returned, “you are not Lord Vader.”
Lucy remembered her vision and promptly shoved it away.
“They were Imperials, not Rebels,” she went on. “Something strange is going on. Why aren’t I locked up, by the way?”
“Lord Vader did not command it,” said Ellex. “Do you always talk so much?”
Lucy thought about it. “I don’t know. I always talked less than Tuvié.”
“That is an extremely low standard to meet.”
It might be, but Lucy wasn’t about to say so. She glared at Ellex’s back and hurried after her in resentful silence. By the time they reached Vader’s receiving room, she felt annoyed at the entire galaxy and just about everyone in it except Leia and Han.
They found Vader gazing out the window, his back to them. Typically fearless—but then, he had armour.
Without turning, he said, “Leave us, Ellex.”
Ellex betrayed none of Tuvié’s anxious hesitations, but simply swivelled on her heavy feet and marched away. Lucy waited until the door closed, then folded her arms.
“I’m not sorry.”
“A shocking development,” said Vader.
She wanted to say something else, throw further defiance into his face, but nothing came to mind. Then an echo of a thought came to her.
Valì.
Lucy shivered. Even now, she longed to believe it impossible. Her feelings—oh, people’s feelings misled them all the time! Maybe it only seemed so overpowering because of the shock, or because she’d been away from other people for so long, or it was a trick of Vader’s to sway her to the Dark Side. Anything but the truth she felt down to her bones.
If only she could talk to Ben or Yoda, find out whether they’d lied, and how much. They could tell her the real story, whatever it was.
They could have told me all along.
“I will be departing shortly,” said Vader, his attention not wavering from the poisonous view out the window.
“All right,” Lucy said. “How am I going to be imprisoned now? Is there a cell with my name on it?”
Our name, she thought, and then quickly added, maybe.
Vader said, “No.”
“Great,” said Lucy. “And when will you be back?”
Not that she cared.
“When my business is concluded,” he said.
“I hope that business involves investigating those Imperials who just attacked us,” said Lucy.
He shifted position slightly, which she decided to count as a small victory.
“What makes you think the attack didn’t come from your Rebel friends?”
“The Force showed me,” she said flatly. “They were Imperials.”
She felt a trace of satisfaction. An odd trace—it felt peculiarly dull and remote, as if it came from somewhere very far away.
Lucy’s brows drew together.
“You knew that already, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” He didn’t elaborate, but finally turned around to look at her, his lenses flickering red. “I assure you, they will pay for their little … maneuver.”
In her dryest tone, she said, “I never doubted you.”
“As for yours,” said Vader, “you will be supervised by LX-3 at all times, and your movements restricted. Ellex’s blasters are set to stun. I have given her freedom to use them at her own discretion.”
She considered this. Really, she’d expected worse. From all she’d heard, people around Vader died for a fraction of her misdeeds, and suffered for them when they didn’t die. People like Tuvié—
“That’s another shocking development for today,” she said.
Quietly, Vader told her, “You are on very dangerous ground, Lucy.”
At that, she could only laugh.
“Compared to what? The first time I saw you, you sliced your lightsaber through my friend and teacher. Should I expect something worse than that?”
“Obi-Wan and I had unfinished business,” said Vader. “This is a different situation.”
Lucy was almost there again, watching as her friend, her teacher, the last of the little Tatooine world she’d known, died before her eyes. She could feel her body shaking all over again.
“Unfinished business? Is that what you call it every time you kill an innocent person?” she demanded.
“I do not kill innocent people,” he said. “I kill guilty ones—like Obi-Wan.”
“Guilty? Ben?” Lucy shook her head. “What could he have ever done to deserve that?”
Vader’s hands clenched into fists, his rage almost a palpable thing.
“He left me to burn alive.”
“To—” She couldn’t even repeat it. “That’s not true. It can’t—he wouldn’t—”
“Do not tell me what he would or would not have done!” said Vader. “I knew him better than you ever will. In the end, he showed himself for what he was—a monster and a coward.”
Maybe he was lying about … about Anakin. Maybe he wasn’t. But he had to be lying about this. She’d known Ben. As a peculiar neighbour for most of her life, sure, but she’d still known him, and he’d been her guide and mentor in his last days and after them. She just couldn’t believe it.
“I’m not listening to this,” she said, backing away.
“Hide from the truth all you like,” said Vader. “That won’t change it.”
“It’s not true,” she insisted. “You’re trying to—you’re just trying to turn me to the Dark Side, aren’t you? I’m not fooled.”
“Yes, you are,” he said. “By Obi-Wan. But that is enough of this. Treat LX-3 with more respect than you did F-2VA and I should find you in good health when I return.” He pressed his hand against a panel on the wall.
“What’s that?” she asked suspiciously.
He said, “Ellex, take her away.”
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Still loving this. Loving how you're tugging at and weaving with the strands of actual moral complexity in Star Wars when it thinks it's a story of clear moral absolutes. Also loving the setting-building around Bast Castle.
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Thanks! The fun of writing for SW is ... there are so many cool or at least intriguing concepts that aren't always executed very well or carried through, so it makes it really interesting to, well, tug at the strands and try and fill in the blanks. And the Lucyverse is definitely where my most central SW feelings go!
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Yes, this! (I have. So. Many. Feelings. About the mess the galaxy is probably in at the end of TROS. SO MANY.)
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