Disclaimer: I do not own Star Wars, blah blah blah

Name: The Blue Lady of Mustafar
Author: aldocassidy
Characters: The narrator. Padme.
Summary: A glimpse at the ghosts that still reside on Mustafar after the events of ROTS, and a chilling look at life under the Empire.

Takes place right before the events of Return of the Jedi

The Blue Lady of Mustafar

It has been months now since I last left the planet of Mustafar, but I fear that my rational mind will not find closure until I write this. It is up to you the reader to judge and analyze the events that I observed and felt with my very own eyes, as I have long given up trying to reconcile to myself what I saw and what my brain has refused to process.

I guess it would be prudent if I were to introduce myself first. My name is Braa Nel. As of this writing I am twenty-seven years of age and have never suffered through any traumatic moments in my relatively short life. I am often told that my ability to analyze is my greatest gift and talent. If I were to analyze myself, I would freely admit that I have never felt anything close to pain or elation or anything in between in my life. Nor fear, either. Not until Mustafar.

I eat, I sleep, I work, I live. Sometimes I visit my parents at their apartment on Coruscant. Such visits are more of a labor of duty than anything else. I enjoy my parents' company; they are two very amiable and kindhearted individuals. Perhaps they would be my friends if I was older and they had not given birth to me. I feel no sentimentality when I am with them. I do not reminisce when I sleep in the room I grew up in or wander the streets where I used to roam as a serious and levelheaded little boy.

I have a family of my own too. My wife I met as a professional acquaintance on a job in the Duro system. We have two kids, an eight-year old boy and a five-year old girl. Do I love my family? I do not know the answer, and it is a question that I do not bother my mind with very often. As it is with my parents, I consider my wife to be a good person and a friend whose company I enjoy. Raising my children to become upstanding citizens of the Empire is a serious duty I feel that I owe to a demanding society.

I am a contractor and a surveyor of sorts. Currently I reside with my immediate family in the outer rim planet of Hoth in one of the apartment complexes of the local Imperial outpost. It is the job of my colleagues and I to survey and map out parts of the planet and determine whether or not it is suitable for colonization and settlement efforts as well as supervise the repairs on the damage that the recent battle between the Empire and the rebels had resulted in.

I am not a man who enjoys a surprise in his life. Honestly, I can say for certain that on the whole I am completely averse to any concepts of change. Therefore, you can imagine that I was not pleased when my superior informed me that I had been assigned to a preliminary surveying job on the volcanic moon of Mustafar.

I did not need a briefing to learn the background stuff on the moon. Everyone learns in history class that Mustafar had been a Separatist Base in the Clone Wars over twenty years ago, and that Lord Vader, a faithful servant of our Emperor, successfully invaded the base and executed the leaders of the rebellion. I grimaced at the thought of the heat, which I have never liked personally. Many of my colleagues dislike our present locale on Hoth, but I prefer it. I guess I'm used to freezing temperatures that were maintained constantly on Coruscant by the climate-controllers. I find comfort in the cold. I am quite uncomfortable in the heat.

Of course I had no choice but to take the job. Every man and woman of adequate intelligence knows enough not to say no to the Empire. I guess I was almost honored at the time to be given an assignment at a site with such a valuable historical background. The fact that they were paying me an additional bonus did not hurt. My superior told me to be careful. Several well-qualified men had already attempted the job, he informed me, and have all fled without explanation. Must be the heat, I told him. The heat can do strange things to a man sometimes.

Five hours later I had packed up all the belongings I needed, which wasn't much. I estimated that the job would take me only a day, two at the most. After bidding an unemotional farewell to my wife and telling my kids to behave and listen to their mother, I set off for the planet of fire.

Perhaps I should have taken notice when my analysis droid started to malfunction immediately upon landing on the planet. Droids are not common in the Empire, and have been looked down upon by upstanding citizens ever since the days of the Clone Wars, but scientists such as myself are permitted to use one on mobile jobs such as the Mustafar one. The particular unit I brought with me had served me well, perfectly, in fact, for many years, so you can understand my lack of comprehension at the gibberish it spewed out before its circuits fried. I cursed to myself for the inauspicious start of my day, but then I have never been one to pay heed to omens, good or bad.

Figuring that the high atmospheric temperatures had caused the droid to malfunction, I took the remaining equipment I had and stepped out onto the blistering surface. Though the molten lava was everywhere, I was surprised to find that it wasn't as hot as I had expected. Maybe my expectations were too high, but honestly, I rarely set expectations of any kind for myself.

What the Empire wanted was simple. There was valuable energy to be mined and extracted from the volcanic activity of the moon, and below the surface and the lava lay rare minerals that could be used for industrial and military purposes. My job was to survey a very specific tract of land that would become an installation similar to what we have back on Hoth. The one rarity of my mission was to also include space for a monument on the installation's grounds commemorating Darth Vader's final defeat of the Separatists. Ignoring my discomfort with the temperature I took out my equipment and started matching up my holo-blueprints with the land itself.

It was getting hotter, I thought. Hotter, compared to what I felt when I first stepped out of my ship. The air seemed to be condensing too, as my breathing mysteriously became more labored by the second. It seemed as if the air that I breathed in was an invisible form of the lava that flowed around me, congesting in my nostrils and lazily procrastinating any efforts to reach my lungs.

Then the wind picked up. A very unnatural wind, I thought then and still believe now. According to my datadisk wind on the moon of Mustafar is extremely rare as the result of a thin atmosphere. Any winds that did exist were only small breezes. And yet this wind felt like a Kaminoan monsoon, and to my increasing chagrin it blew heat onto my face, as opposed to cooling me down.

A strange fear began to creep into my heart. I do not retain many memories from my childhood, but to the best of my memory, it was the first time I consciously felt any sort of fear. Why was I afraid? I still cannot tell you. Perhaps it was the unexpected that scared me. The wind that shouldn't have been. And of course, the heat.

The fear brought to my mind's attention the startling realization that I was completely and utterly alone on this moon. Think about that. An entire world, and you're the only one in it. What would happen if my ship failed to take off? I would be stuck here by myself to die. No one to talk to, no friends to enjoy my company and vice versa. If I were to slip and fall into the lava no one would hear my screams. It horrified me to realize how insignificant I am, and it pains me to write those words even now. I can handle with the concept of being unimportant. (Honestly, who really is important these days, other than the Emperor or Darth Vader?) Insignificance was different though. Being insignificant meant no one cared about you.

I crouched down not only to begin my work but also to hide from my thoughts. The wind still blew, and the air seemed to still rise in temperature. I took out my auto-measurer and marked a spot on the ground according to the holo-blueprint when suddenly I noticed the wind that stopped. Silently, I lamented to myself that it would have been so much better had the heat departed along with the wind. Everything seemed so still now. At least in appearance. As I knelt I felt in the air vague and subtle tremors that unexplainably were more turbulent than the lava itself.

It is at this point where my story begins to depart from all realms of reality that I used to live in, acknowledge, and was comforted by. Let me explain to you before you read any further that my career has brought me to many different places in this Galaxy, and that I have never witnessed anything that my mind could not explain. Sure, I hear stories and legends being passed around, but to me they have about as much credence and credibility as a man who says that the rebellion will overthrow the Empire within a year.

Some people have tried to convince me of the existence of some kind of force that encompasses all of us, and that one can use it to perform a few magic tricks. They say that the Jedi Knights of the Old Republic used this magic to control the Galaxy. Such stories obviously are laughable. I ask my would-be teachers to show me proof. Where are the records of these incredible feats of magic, I ask. Where are the holovids? Where are the magicians themselves? As always they mumble some pathetic excuse about the Empire destroying all records and killing off all the Jedi. Right, I reply. Like I'm supposed to believe that the Empire is evil or something. The only evil, I tell them, resides in the Jedi that used magic tricks as a front for their child-killing cult and their ambitions for Galactic domination. The Jedi are dead now, I say, and that can only mean that evil is dead.

Perhaps magic is too trivial a term for what happened to me on Mustafar, but it is the best I can come up with. I found myself paralyzed by the heat, unable to move. Oh, trust me, I tried, but not a muscle budged. This chain of events began to really annoy me. I checked my vocal chords to see if I could still speak, and I could. So I yelled out in frustration. Honestly, I just hated the fact that I could not control anything on this planet. Not the temperature, not the equipment, not even my own body. Still paralyzed, I felt the blueprint that I held in my hand being tugged away from me by some unseen force. Show yourself, I yelled out to the uninhabited moon. Stop your little tricks and reveal yourself!

My body finally moved. In fact, it violently lurched forward as the holo-blueprint literally flew out of my hands into the windless air. I stood up and approached the tantalizing piece of equipment dangling in suspension, resting on a surface of nothingness. This was it, I thought to myself. I told my brain to stop playing tricks on me. I would take that holo-blueprint into the grasp of my hand, and then everything would make sense again.

Angrily my arm jerked into the scalding air towards the holo, but it adeptly eluded my fingers only to angrily smash down onto the ground into a million pieces (and I know, objects don't feel anger, but that holo-blueprint sure did seem angry). And there it was. Irrefutable, physical proof. Something told me that there was no going back to the rational world that I had enjoyed for so long. Doors seemed to close with a passionate ferocity and finality.

Then the auto-measurer that I had left on the ground lifted itself up. I still think that this may have been the heat playing tricks with my eyes, but I could have sworn that it glowed a ghostly blue. I watched with horror as it approached me. Feelings that I had never experienced rushed through my body. Frustration, anger, hatred all mixing into a volatile concoction that I had never known to exist before.

And my auto-measurer swirled and danced in the air with such a velocity that my eyes could not even begin to follow it. That was where it was all coming from, I sudden realized. All these feelings that I was experiencing came from the glowing blue stick that used to be a simple tool of mine. I cannot tell you what led me to this conclusion. Certainly I had no proof of my convictions. All I can say is that it was what I felt, and strangely, my feelings held more truth than the physical world around me. If only I could grab the stick and have it under my control again, the feelings would subside, I knew, and all would be well again.

I approached the blue-stick cautiously, without fully realizing or knowing what I was afraid of. Suddenly, the glowing rod seemed to be aware of my presence. It struck at me before I could even blink. I can't explain what happened then except to say that I felt death…many times over. The rod slashed at me, through me, repeatedly, and every time it did I died.

How can one explain death? I know I can't. Don't forget, until I stepped onto that deserted planet I had never even experience life before. I guess all I can say is that it felt so final. I do not know what was worse, the apprehensive fear right before the moment of death, or the eternal hopelessness afterwards.

Inch by inch I collapsed onto the ground with the rod attacking me from above. I finally stopped struggling and closed my eyes to accept my death when everything stopped. The physical actions, I should explain. I was clutching in my hands an auto-measurer that did not give off a blue light anymore. It was as if nothing had happened. I was still alive. I had no marks on my body. But my heart spoke to me for the first time in my life, and it told me that nothing was the same. The heat still seemed to gain in intensity.

I had to escape it all. The heat, the emotions, the entire moon itself. Damn the job. My sanity was more important to me. I clutched my auto-measurer in my hand as if it were the last shred of rationality I still had in my possession and ran back towards my ship. What stopped me from leaving right then and there was this unimaginable feeling of sadness I felt, and again I collapsed on my knees from the heavy burden.

Standing ahead of me was a beautiful woman that glowed as blue as the 'object' that had attacked me. She floated several inches above the ground. I could not tell the details of her face, and yet I felt her entire soul. It felt like death, but unlike the deaths experienced, there was still a very dim glimmer of hope.

Annie, Annie, is that you?

I found myself unable to reply to this beautiful creature that did not seem to belong on this hellish world. All I could do was shake my head.

The lady began to hover towards me, regarding me almost in a manner resembling a sympathetic curiosity.

He's almost here. I could see the outline of her face now, and the tears that dotted it. Her hair was dark, somewhere between black and blown. It reached down far below her shoulders. She wore what seemed to be an elegant but simple blue dress. Her mouth never moved an inch, but I could hear her all the same. I know it. I can FEEL it. My Annie is so close now. He is almost back.

Her ethereal body radiated a light that I had never seen before. One that was far different from the eerie orange light of lava that the entire moon was bathed in.

Again, I felt myself unable to move. The lady was now right in front of me. She reached her hand onto my shoulder. Her other hand, I noticed now, never left her chest as it clutched some kind of trinket that hung around her neck.

Tell him that I will wait for him. I will wait forever, until my little Annie comes back to the light. Back to me.

She disappeared. I ran without any further hesitation back to my ship. I didn't care where I set my coordinates to. Somewhere far away, that was all that mattered. I cried during the entire journey through hyperspace.

I supposed that by now you are shaking your head in disbelief. You ask me, where is my proof? Where is the physical evidence I can present to you that would explain the unexplainable?

I wish I can offer you physical proof. I wish that I could bring to you a glowing auto-measurer that moves by itself, show you a holo-vid of the entire scene, or reveal to you the scars and marks I had suffered from the strange attack. But I can't.

I know I am not crazy. And yet I know that Mustafar had not been some imagined delusion. Where's the proof? I tell you the evidence is in my heart. The heart that now holds feelings that I could have never have imagined before Mustafar. The heart that has not let me return to Hoth because of the incredible shame I would feel when I see my family again. The heart that now holds memories of the incredible warmth I had felt when the ghostly blue lady had touched me. A warmth that was similar to the heat, and yet it was completely different in that I did not feel uncomfortable in it. Yes, comfort I felt, and it was that comfort that scared me even more than when I had died many times over.

Nothing is the same now. I do not know what to feel anymore except for the sweat on my skin. Uncertainty, maybe? The only fact that I hold to be true today is a feeling that very soon the entire galaxy will go through what I just went through. Great changes are coming, I tell you, and nothing can be scarier.