Chapter 1:

One year later, the Death Star

Leia Organa's entire body ached. In this moment, pain was her entire existence, her mind unable to focus for longer than an instant on anything other than her acute suffering. How long had it been since the mind-probe had ended? Impossible to say. The sense of time and space gradually returned. She sat up. The cell though dimly lit, seemed to burn into her eyes like the surface of a sun. There was a knock on the cell door.

"Governor Tarkin will see for you within the hour. Make yourself presentable."

A fresh white senatorial gown, identical to the sweat drenched one clinging to her body was passed through the port on the cell door. Leia lay back down for a few minutes, trying to rest as best she could while recuperating from the lingering effects of Vader's interrogation; then she changed her clothes and decided she may as well attend to her frayed hair and her face. It was a welcome distraction, and presented the illusion of composure.

At the appointed time, Lord Vader opened the cell and waited for Leia to exit. Motioning to the left, he directed her down the prison corridor to an air-lift. "You could have prevented this. All of this. The deaths of your loyal crew and the pain inflicted upon your body has been wrought by your hand alone. The Empire dispenses only justice." She did not respond. "And yet," he said, as much to his own surprise as to hers "I am… sorry."

When they reached the viewing deck, Tarkin had his back turned to them, staring out the window, as Leia and Vader entered. Leia's heart pounded so thunderously it hurt. There it was, her homeworld, Alderaan shining blue just beyond the ostentatious trapezoidal window. Was this some twisted scenario designed for her interrogation? Leia overheard one of Tarkin's aides inform the Governor that their vessel had just entered the Alderaan system.

Leia summoned all her poise and discipline. She reminded herself that she was both royalty and an imperial senator. They would have to answer to the Senate and to the Emperor for her unlawful abduction and their reckless threats. "They're bluffing. They must be." she thought to herself. She would play the indignant diplomat.

"Governor Tarkin, I should've expected to find you holding Vader's leash," she heard herself say in a convincingly condescending tone. "I recognized your foul stench when I was brought on board," she said. "Charming, to the last," said Tarkin with a thin smile. "You don't know how hard I found it signing the order to terminate your life." Definitely bluffing, Leia thought to herself. Continuing in her bantering almost playful tone, she said "I'm surprised you had the courage to take the responsibility yourself."

"Princess Leia, before your execution I would like you to be a guest at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational." "No, he can't, Alderaan is too important to the Empire! The Emperor would never-" she thought to herself. "No star system will dare oppose the Emperor now," declared Tarkin. "The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers," said Leia, her immense dread now leaking into her voice. She knew exactly where they were, what this new "battlestation", this Death Star was capable of.

"Not after we demonstrate the power of this station," Tarkin replied. He moved toward her with terrible purpose. She could feel the bloodlust pumping through his heart from across the room.

"He can't do this! He's just a Governor! He's bluffing!" she thought desperately, grasping at the last straws of hope.

"In a way, you have determined the choice of the planet that will be destroyed first. Since you are reluctant to provide us with the location of the rebel base, I have chosen to test the destructive power of this station on your home-planet of Alderaan."

Her composure broken, Leia pleaded desperately for her homeworld. She insisted that they had no weapons, they were no threat to anyone. Tarkin towered over her, demanding that a military target be designated as a substitute. Leia volunteered Dantooine-the site of a now abandoned former rebel base, knowing that innocent lives would still be destroyed there because of her claim. Even so, Leia allowed herself to breathe a sigh of relief. Her home, and her family were safe, but only for those few precious seconds before she heard Tarkin's next command: "Continue with the operation. Fire when ready."

"Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration, but don't worry, we will deal with your rebel friends soon enough."

"He wants me to give up Yavin The order isn't real. This is all just a show," she thought to herself.

This was no simulation. It wasn't a bluff or an interrogation tactic. This was real."No!" she heard herself say desperately, helplessly. Then in the blink of an eye, she saw her world destroyed.

-

Leia had never felt such agony. She felt not simply the pain, she felt the annihilation, the intricately detailed, individualized death of every being on the surface. She felt the vaporization of millions of sentient minds at once, the destruction of ecosystems, the shattering of the planet's crust, in an instant that lasted an eternity. Her awareness expanded exponentially into an infinite cosmos unto itself, populated solely by obliteration and death.

Leia writhed and wailed on the floor in unparalleled agony. "Get her out of her immediately, I cannot bear the sound of that shrieking!" ordered Tarkin indignantly. At once Leia fell silent, her gaze fixed on the man who had so nonchalantly condemned everything she had once known to oblivion. All those feelings of pain and death coalesced around Tarkin in that moment, their gravity drawing everything into a supermassive nexus of pure aggression. Leia locked eyes with Tarkin. Some instinct deep inside of him told him that he was staring into the eyes of an apex predator completely beyond his ability to slay or escape. Desperately, the prey scrambled to find himself some means of escape. "I said take her away!" No-one moved. "Dammit Vader I said get her out of my sight!"

"I cannot do as you command." said the Sith lord.

Tarkin's voice began to crack. "You can and you will! Or I shall have the Emperor remove whatever parts are left of your original form so that at least I may have a droid that will execute the will of the-"

Tarkin's jaw dropped in terrified awe. He saw that his guards were lying dead on the floor, their skeletons snapped and contorted into unnatural positions. He felt his feet lift off the ground as Leia pulled him in, forcing him to look into her eyes once more. He struggled in vain to breathe. His entire body was under immense pressure. It took every last ounce of discipline for Leia to avoid snapping his entire body then and there.

Tarkin had spent longer than most in the company of Vader and Emperor Palpatine. Never once had he felt such anger, such hate, so much consummate suffering, as that which emanated from the being before him now. Unguided force lightning coursed wildly throughout the room. Vader's suit was disabled. All the guards were dead. It was just the two of them now.

"What... what do you.. want?" Tarkin barely managed to whimper. Leia replied not with her voice but through the force itself reaching directly into Tarkin's mind, "Revenge!"