Note: I originally posted this story as the beginning of a longer story but it turned out to be much more difficult to write from this point. However, I do still like the idea of a small glimpse into how the artifact mentioned here ended up where we saw It in Episode VII and I am quite pleased with the atmosphere and tone of the scene itself which is why I am reposting this as a one shot.
Chapter 1
The smuggler
Dathomir. Somewhen after the Battle of Endor
Stepping into the twilight of the dingy, confined bar at the outer confines of the trade outpost after the bright daylight was like stepping into the night and the smuggler slowed down her step, partly to adjust her eyes to the shadows, partly to get an overview over the colourful assortment of traders, travelers and traffickers from all corners of the (mostly less civilized) parts of the galaxy before stepping in herself. There was the reassuring weight of her blasters against her hips with each step, resourceful companions that had saved her life more than once, but she could tell at first glance that her bipedal, slender frame would draw attention more likely than not – and attention was not something she liked to draw to herself, not ever. She did not remove her scarf which she had loosely tied around her face against the strong wind, making her head appear large because it was hiding her lekku and ignored the stares of more than one creature when making her way to one of the more remote alcoves. Behind a counter, the pale face and piercing eyes of a woman followed her ever step. The witches of Dathomir might look very similar to herself in form, but the Twi´lek smuggler sure as anything wanted nothing to do with them. With a little luck, this strange planet with its slightly off feel would soon have seen the last of her.
The place had seen better days. It reeked of the sweat of rancor herders and their beasts and the kind of drinks that would give her kind hallucinations, at best and severe issues at worst, but the stuff was good to get some species into a benevolent mood which might be practical when bargaining.
The smuggler averted her eyes at the indignant growl of a creature almost twice her size and five times her weight. She had no name for it, but eager not to cause a scene that could only end badly for her, chose a body language of symbolic retreat. Luckily, it worked. Again, attention was not what she was seeking so it was relatively easy to swallow her own annoyance. A fight was not what she was here for. She had to deliver her bounty, cash in for it and then she would hike right to the systems closer to the centre of the galaxy – finally. The cash would be enough to ensure that she would not have to keep herself afloat with far too little cash and far too much dependence on the goodwill of people with a far worse reputation than her, who would gruntingly take her in as a working passenger aboard their probably mostly stolen or illegally traded vessels. The value of what she was carrying with her today would finally give her some liberty to travel the galaxy like she had always wanted and it would get her out of the vermin infested holes that were most of the planets in this part of the Outer Rim, where nothing ever happened and where the things that did happen, happened mostly in the lawless corners or under the cover of crime ignored for bribes.
She didn´t want to settle down, she hoped she didn´t have to wait for long. The smuggler had made quite clear that she would not wait, but to her indignation her contact had reacted with a nonchalant audacity that there would be no need to. On top of that he had indicated, once he knew what she was offering, that there was no escape from this meeting and if she wouldn´t show there would be ways for him to acquire what she carried. She didn´t much mind. Some people´s junk can be other people´s treasures and if that junk brought her big money that was all the better for her. The smuggler had a vague understanding that what she was carrying had a meaning that went beyond what the item was, but that was where it ended for her. She didn't care for the sentimental objects of others. To her, such notions were useless.
She scanned the crowd, spotting a Hutt, still rather young judging by the size of him, following her with his eyes before diverting his attention elsewhere while a small group of Geonosians kept to themselves in their insectoid chatter in a corner of the bar. Homeless, she thought to herself, their home planet fallen victim to the Empire, sterilized during the Clone Wars. All she knew about Geonisians was what she had grasped of her own limited travels. Seeing a few of them either meant they were refugees and therefore better not to be associated with or traders of illegal goods both animate and inanimate – which also meant to better steer clear of them.
The smuggler found her way to the darkest of the alcoves, trying to sort in the chatter of different tongues. It was nothing unusual to her to not hear a lot of Basic, for in such place people preferred to not be listened in to. Despite herself, she immediately felt trapped as soon as she sat down and made sure that she did not corner herself in so she could run if necessary, because despite her cocky behavior, any smuggler with proper savvy would probably have had no more than a pitiful smile for this youngster with a lack of experience.
"Right on time I see, Twi´lek. Where is what I came for?"
The voice bore no accent at all, clearest Basic as far as she could judge and addressing her by species rather than name instantly bore a trace of insult. It belonged to a hooded figure she had not even spotted sitting to her right at the very same table she had just sat down at. The smuggler jumped, instantly cursing herself. Truly fearless smugglers did not start like that, but wherever had this fellow so suddenly come from? She could have sworn that she had not seen him arrive. Had she been that careless?
Her grip on the bag to her side tightened. "My payment." she demanded.
The ominous figure did not even move for a moment, but she could feel eyes bore into her that she didn´t even see. It was the most unpleasant feeling she had ever experienced. She could feel her hand loosen its grip, could feel her fingers grab the fabric of the bag, ready to present it to its new owner.
"Not very kind to not introduce yourself to me, isn´t it?" The voices belonged to a male, possibly a human or if not that, something humanoid, but that much she could grasp from his figure under the heavy black garment. The smuggler opened her mouth, closed it. "Raúna." said, hearing herself utter the name she usually didn´t give to anybody. She was Ka-Ree, the smuggler with tales that spread the galaxy, who boasted of places she had never been to. Ka-Ree, her self-fashioned legend to mask what she really was: a fine smuggler, a fine adventurer who had never even gotten beyond the Outer Rim. No, Ka-Ree had traded with the Hutts and tricked them. Ka-Ree had family in the highest ranks of the Empire if threats needed to be made and she could be quite convincing about that. But Raúna was a liar, little better than a mediocre story teller dreaming herself to places more civilized than this. Raúna was who was sitting at this very table, already lifting her bounty onto it to present it to her strange customer, because there was that little voice in her head suggesting that if only she did, that strange feeling would stop. The feeling that bored into her mind. The feeling that stripped away courageous, witty Ka-Ree and left behind Raúna, the coward.
"Raúna." It was as if her opposite wanted to rub in that he had so easily gotten her to tell him who she really was. He did never tell her a name in return. Apparently, courtesies did not go that far and she could not even feel indignant about it because as soon as she had placed her bag on the table and let go of it, the feeling ceded, but it didn´t completely leave, staying watchful, observing her like a beast of prey.
The stranger reached across the table and the smuggler watched as his ashen grey hand touched the fabric of the bag. A sigh escaped him. "Aah. You did not lie. That was wise of you, smuggler girl."
She swallowed. "I am honest about my trade."
"An honest smuggler, now isn´t that one for the eternal archives." He didn´t chuckle. She wasn't even sure he was physically able to chuckle, but what reached her was the hard to describe mental equivalent, a phantom of ridicule touching her mind, making her recoil.
"Endor, you say?" he prompted.
"The natives were more than glad to be rid of it." There was a bit of pride in her voice as she said that, a pride she would never have admitted to anyone under normal circumstances. The pride that she had been witty enough to see the worth of an object and acquired it with ease while someone else – someone dumber – had gotten the short end of the bargain. It had been that way with the Ewoks, superstitious and short sighted they had babbled to her about a bad ghost disturbing the trees of their ancestors and the peace of their shamans. She had feigned sympathy and they had given her useless trinkets in honour of her brave deed of freeing them from an evil that, to the smuggler, was no more than stupid superstition.
"And you are not?" Amusements, not in the other´s voice but again in his mental touch, as if he was deliberately disturbing her with that, unsettling her.
"I don´t believe in ghosts." she said, steadfast as she hoped. "I believe in money. And I believe that one person´s bane is another person´s treasure."
Silence again, a silence she could not bear. The stranger was drawing this meeting out for the mere reason that he enjoyed demonstrating that he did not feel threatened or watched in a room full of shady creatures. And indeed, when the smuggler looked around she noticed that, strangely, nobody was looking their way, as if they were not present at all.
With the gesture equal to how someone else might throw leftovers to a street rat, he flicked a small satchel onto the table. She grabbed it, opened it and found her pay. Double. Enough to cross the galaxy and back. Her future, here in this little alcove, her ticket to any place to start over. But the stranger´s sinister mental presence was watching her joy like a predator holding down its prey. What should make her jump for joy made her feel slightly uneasy. She stored the satchel hastily and, following her instincts, got up and left the bar, never turning back.
The stranger watched her leave, his face, hidden under the hood, without expression, every muscle of his features in perfect control, even though his fingers, slightly trembling as he opened the bag the smuggler had left, betrayed that what he had just purchased was of higher value to him than he would ever have admitted. He had seen it. Perceived it in the strange ways of the Force, the mysteries forever hidden for the majority of the members of so called sentient species. He knew this object would be important.
His fingers touched cold, scarred metal, bent leather, gone rigid from the flames, black material that had blistered in the heat and hardened into asymmetrical tooth like shapes. He closed his eyes and willed the Force to flood through him. It came easily, obediently, at his bidding. Showing him something that made his lips wrinkle in mild disgust. Had he not seen this thing in his visions, he would have discarded it. The leftovers of a coward, a renegade, someone who in the end had turned out too weak for the purposes he had been intended for. But he had foreseen it. Though there was no trace of evil, no trace of what the simplicity of the fallen order of the Jedi had called "the dark side", the helmet of Darth Vader held a history of its own.
A history of cowardice.
A history of so called redemption.
It was high time that, after his shameful death, the former Sith finally came to serve his true purpose.
Author´s note: To me, the person in the bar is Snoke. Maybe he´s somebody else for you, but that is up for you to decice.
Disclaimer: I watched the movies and I love them. This fanfiction is based entirely on the movieverse and some additional research, it does not consider the expanded Star Wars universe of novels, games etc. Also, no profit is being made from this story, this is merely me being nerdy. :)