The Child's Reflection
The first time he saw her, she was a mere shell of a human. Young. 'Half-formed' came to mind. He was in no place to even guess at her age; the last time he saw a child for more than a passing glance of a second - less, if he could help it - he was still a child himself.
She was a creature so unfamiliar that he found himself noting an infant's face, a height less than half of his own, a shape that gave no nod to either gender, and behind black strings of hair, a set of dark eyes that had seen more than the mouth below could put into words. They were human and animal at the same time. Knowledge and innocence. Reason and instinct.
She stood still as stone in front of him. Only her white hands trembled, wrapped around the cylindrical handle of a borrowed yellow lightsaber. The glowing blade rose up in the air as she lifted it, noticeably struggling with its weight, stepping in front of the pained gasps and retching coughs behind her. Despite her efforts, she did little to hide a wounded woman in the pilot seat of the ambushed courier.
"She escaped us on Dantooine, but the tractor beam retrieved the shuttle, my Lord. Upon your command, we are prepared to finish the job."
"You have your orders to dispose of the Jedi. Must they be given a second time?"
"Oh…we…there's just the… N-no, my Lord. I… Of course not, Lord Vader."
"This is hardly an obstacle worthy of hesitation. Dare I say, Admiral, I may have overestimated your competence?"
The Master would not approve of a Jedi being left alive in any capacity. Casting aside the gray-suited incompetence, he did it himself. Took the lightsaber from the child and threw her into the wall with nothing more than the raise of a black, gloved hand. Unceremoniously pushed the blade through the woman's skull. A quick finish.
He turned and descended the small shuttle's ramp, his ears giving preference to the sound of his own boots against the floor over the child's screams of grief. Calling her fallen guardian by her name, not by "mother" as he would have expected. Mother or not, the Jedi was eliminated and he left the inferior task of dealing with her young ward to the admiral.
And he never expected to see the child again.
The second time he saw her, she was descending the ramp of the Master's shuttle, clutching the right hand of the Master himself. Her beastly black hair tamed to fall in a pin-straight tassel at the back of her head. A moss green dress hanging loose on her small frame. Hopping two steps with each of the Master's one.
He met her eyes, and she hid herself in the Master's cloak.
"Just a form of insurance," the Master called her. "Lest you forget your place, Lord Vader."
And the Master told him to construct a new lightsaber, handing the old one to his new leech.
This time, he knew he had not seen the last of the child.
But the third time he saw her was years later.
He never thought he would return to the land where the part of him that was once human had lost so much, but he was there, and the child arrived soon after him. Political obligations. Keeping senators and people of power in their place. Dosing them with false reassurances of peace and order that he neither believed nor expected them to believe.
The child was less of a child now. He often found himself uncomfortable looking at her. Perhaps because she now had the courage to look back.
The child followed him to every meeting - the Master's instructions to her, no doubt - in a rather ridiculous fashion. Attempting to intimidate with her eyes and the Sith weapon at her belt, expecting her size and age to be overlooked. He had heard enough to know she had made considerable progress in her few years as the Master's pet, but her galactic reputation was nonexistent. His was intact.
In several instances, he could feel her watching him though. Trying to read him.
"You've been here before," she would say.
"I have been many places."
"Yes, but there was something here that mattered."
"You rest too much confidence in your intuition, child."
While she presented every question, every opinion, every thought that came to her mind, her silence in passing the royal family mausoleums rose the prickled hairs at the back of his neck. For one absurd moment, he feared she would notice it beneath his all-encompassing cloak.
To his relief, though, the child kept her thoughts to herself during the meetings.
He was welcomed by the words but feared in the eyes of every citizen he encountered. A parasite in their paradise with the power to make it all disappear. From sector to sector, planet to moon, the political excursion lasted longer than he'd hoped.
The child remained in his company, but her presence grew less intrusive as months passed. She was even an asset to some audiences—adding a connection of humanity that he simply could not provide himself. And she could lie. He did not know how old she really was, but for their purposes she became twelve, fourteen, fifteen, eighteen—each time suiting an elaborate personality she played. Gaining sympathy from the more peaceful governments while ensuring tact and resilience for the powerful ones. She understood which crowds were hers to play and which were his. When to stay silent and when to take over for him. They grew into a newfound social respect, but never a full trust. They both knew the dangers of that. Just as they both knew the dangers of this mission.
Detonators had been planted on both their transports. Food poisoned. Attacks in the city streets. But both he and the child avoided each attempt on their lives by staying one step ahead. Seeing what was coming long before it arrived. Never even having to warn each other, because they both felt it.
Until only she was attacked.
A Senator, with lust for younger company. By the time he sensed the child's fear, she had already rendered her attacker unconscious. The room was in shambles. Her nightgown torn. It was clear what would have transpired had she not been able to handle herself so adeptly.
"I have it under control," she had assured him, draping a sweater over her gown. "Don't let his confidence from dinner fool you—he's weak. Just…help me get him back to his room. The risks far outweigh the benefits of taking care of things your way. He won't be any trouble."
"He will."
"It's not like it's the first time something like this has happened—sometimes it's part of the business. He was just too—"
"I don't want to hear it."
"Vader, he's a Senator, you can't just—"
And he plunged his lightsaber into the Senator's head.
The last time he saw her, she was on the floor of the Master's throne room. Unmoving. He didn't touch her, but he could still feel the cold. The emptiness.
"So beautiful—even in death. Like a queen. Wouldn't you agree?"
The Master knew full well how his word choice taunted his apprentice. Savoring it. But he wouldn't offer his Master the satisfaction of a reaction.
"A form of insurance, remember?" the Master said. "You have forgotten your place. This is the consequence."
"Of course, my Master."
"Now remove her."
He lifted the small, limp body into his arms. Her eyes slightly open, but unblinking. Her lips parted without a breath. Her black hair as monstrous as it was the day he met her—a victim of the Master's lightening no doubt.
He carried her out of the throne room, his mind plagued with the last words he had exchanged with her.
"Do you even realize what you've done?!" the child spat.
"My conscience is clear."
"Conscience?! You HAVE no conscience! You didn't THINK! This is politics, Vader! You just ruined any chance of loyalty from the entire planet!" She grabbed at her hair with exasperation, then brought her hands to her anger-hot cheeks. She tried to level her breathing. Allowed herself one more glance at the murdered senator. "Gods…did you have to do it like that?"
Only then did he realize he had killed her guardian the same way, years ago. The day they met.
And only then did he feel remorse for it. The child noticed. Scanning him, the way she always did.
"What are you looking for now?" he demanded. "An apology? I will not apologize for defending the Empire."
"I know you won't." She paced in his direction. Looked up into his mask, as if she could see through to his human eyes. "But you see, you didn't defend the Empire. You defended me. Which you and I both know is far more dangerous."
"I did no such thing."
She scanned him one more time. Knowing. Somehow.
"Of course."
He wondered if the outcome would have been any different, had the child not insisted to be the one to tell the Master what happened. Had she spun the story to guilt herself? To guilt him in full? Had she told the truth? He looked down at her body, lying limp in his arms, as if she could still provide him with an answer.
He brought the child to his personal shuttle, and lay her in his chambers, swaddling her body in a white sheet. Closing her eyes with two gloved fingers before covering her face. He set course for the nearest planet, where he would fashion a funeral pyre.
He had done the same with the woman from Tatooine.
There was a time where the Master told him that he could stop people from dying. He believed it, too. The Master let him believe it. Preyed on his vulnerability. His naivety.
Just like he had done to her.
Perhaps it was a good thing that she never grew into the person he had let himself turn into. Put in a black mask and a suit—molded into a monster when he had just become a man.
He knew the choices he made had led him down this path. A path void of redemption. There was no point in turning back now.
Death was a sweet gift to the child with a similar fate.
But he would have to live with what he had become.