Chapter 2 Unexpected arrival
Bail Organa was usually a calm, patient man - one had to be when you are a Senator and Viceroy of a planet. His current state of nervous pacing was very unusual for the palace staff, there wasn't many things that could make the Viceroy nervous. If it made Bail nervous, then it had to be bad - whatever it was. Unfortunately it was worse than bad and they knew it.
"Your Highness, his shuttle will be arriving soon"
Soon was too soon for Bail, he hated being surprised and this was one of the worst surprises that could befall him today. When the Exactor dropped out of Hyperspace not even 15 standard minutes ago, he and much of Alderaan's peaceful populace were sent into an immediate panic. When Vader's flagship popped up over one's planet unexpected, it tended to do that. Especially to planets who harboured rebel sympathy.
Plastering on his Senatorial face he calmly approached the descending Lambda class shuttle, hopefully not to an untimely demise. It wouldn't do to get himself killed and leave his adopted daughter to an uncertain fate. The sea of white clad Stormtroopers followed by Darth Vader descending from the shuttle did nothing to ease his mind.
"Lord Vader, this is unexpected. For what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?" Bail calmly asked.
"You can cease with the pleasantries, Organa. The Emperor is displeased with the growing Rebel presence on Alderaan" Vader said bluntly.
"My Lord, my men are doing everything they can but the Rebels are like shadows in the night, blending in with everyone else"
"Your men are not doing enough then!".
It was more likely they were doing the opposite of removing the rebels Vader thought. "I am bringing my own intelligence operatives in who will be doing what your men have failed do to"
"But my Lo-"
"I did not come to listen to your excuses, Organa. You will fully co-operate with the investigation, is that understood?" Vader said as a statement, not a question.
"Yes, my Lord, completely" Bail said in resignation. He would have to be careful, Vader's reputation as brutal and efficient was not unfounded. Most of the Rebel cells in Alderaan had more than likely gone to the wilds as soon as the Exactor entered orbit, it would have been suicide to stay around.
Vader was frustrated, he hated how the Viceroy was right about the Rebels being like shadows. Several days had passed with little success, the intelligence they had come with proved to be useless as Moff Haskar. There were hints and traces of the Rebel presence, but they had vanished into thin air. What few leads they had, turned into dead ends. There was nothing more Vader could do but wait for his operatives to turn up more information. He wasn't a very patient man to begin with, but his patience was being worn dangerously thin. He thought perhaps it was time to have a 'chat' with Organa to see if he could get anything out of him.
Tossing the datapad to his desk in the makeshift office he had been given, he moved to find the Viceroy. Since his arrival, Bail had made himself as scarce as he could be to avoid any confrontation. Taking this as a small challenge to test himself, he stretched out in the force probing for him. The gardens. Yes, that's where he was. Although... He felt a slight disturbance. A muted speck of light in the force - it was small, but clear enough to Vader that there must be a force sensitive near the Palace. Focusing in on it, but not so much as to alert whatever it was he noticed something peculiar. It was moving, very fast. He quickened his stride.
The Dark Lord of the Sith looked out of place among the vibrant colours of the gardens, but that wasn't what interested him at the moment. It was the familiar whine of a swoop bike engine that piqued his curiosity. Moving up to what he assumed was some sort of stargazing balcony he located the source of the sound, and the disturbance. Sailing by at high speed, a swoop bike was being chased by 3 speeder bikes adorned with the crest of the Alderaanian royal family. It was rather odd that the speeders weren't simply firing at the swoop bike to bring it down. Whoever was being chased must be of some importance because the speeders hadn't fired a single shot. He knew if it were an intruder they wouldn't be getting so close to the palace with him here.
His musings were cut short when they disappeared into a tree line.
He was impressed by what he saw, the swoop biker didn't look very big - more like a child. But a child couldn't possibly hold the talent to ride with such grace and skill? A memory of him in a pod racer crossing the line in the Boonta Eve classic came unbidden. Quickly clamping down on it, he moved towards the disturbance he felt earlier. After what he witnessed, his chat with Organa can wait, this was going to be more interesting he thought.
Entering the hangar, he overheard a man chastising what he assumed was the swoop biker. Getting closer, amusement slowly creeped into his mind by what he saw. The biker turned out to be a small girl dressed in ill-fitting blue overalls covered with oil and grime. Clearly this one wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty.
Obviously startled by his presence one of the men jumped into attention "My...Lord Vader, why...why are you here?" he stammered.
"I wish to speak with the girl" Vader commanded.
The man, a guard Vader assumed, was starting to lose his composure under the intense scrutiny of the Dark Lord. "B...but my Lord-"
"She is Bail Organa's Daughter" another guard piped up before his colleague got himself killed.
"Indeed she is" Vader replied coolly. "I wish to speak with her, you are dismissed"
The guards frantically exchanged glances with each other before looking back to Vader. Feeling the fear rolling off of them he decided to placate them before they did something rash.
"She is in no danger I assure you. Leave us" he said, lacing it with a force suggestion.
The guards quickly bowed and left the Princess on her own. She stood straight and regal as she could for her age, hiding the fear that she was in the presence of the second-in-command of the Empire.
"What do you want, Lord Vader?" she asked, with a slight tremble in her voice.
Obviously Bail had told her stories of him or she wouldn't be so fearful of him. Under normal circumstances he would be bathing in the fear coming from her, but now he felt it disturbing him.
"You have nothing to fear child, I am impressed by your piloting skills. Who taught you?" Vader asked as softly as his vocabulator would allow. It must have worked because she appeared less fearful and her pose slacked ever so slightly.
"One of Papa's friends showed me when I asked about them, I've been teaching myself since. He only taught me the basics" she said, quite proud of herself.
Vader changed his vision from Leia to the bike taking in the details he had missed before. It was a custom bike that was for sure, there were several different modifications to the bike that gave that away. The basic model looked like a Mobquet Flare-S, but it was definitely custom. Whoever built it was clearly skilled.
"Who maintains this bike?" he asked curiously, whoever it was might just find themselves with a better job than working for Bail Organa. That thought was quickly dismissed however.
"I maintain my bike!" she exclaimed, offended by the question. Just because she wasn't an adult didn't mean she wasn't as good as them.
"Impressive" was all he said. She wasn't an ordinary princess, not by a long shot. Princesses were supposed to be prim and proper learning the fine art of diplomacy and courtship. But here was a Princess who preferred riding and maintaining swoop bikes. She reminded him of his youth on Tatooine where he spent hours meticulously building his custom Pod Racer.
"Is it not very un-princess like to be working on swoop bikes?" he asked slightly patronisingly, interested in her response.
Her face blew up red at the question, childish anger emanating through the force. Her Governess patronised her constantly about how it was unladylike to 'fool around with machines', nobody seemed to understand her when it came down to it which frustrated her.
"You sound just like everyone else! All children have hobbies; building and maintaining swoop bikes is one of mine" she pouted, crossing her arms and glaring at the towering figure in front of her, forgetting what she had heard of him for a moment. She pulled a face when she heard a weird sound emanating from him until she realised it was his form of a chuckle; she had actually made Vader chuckle, if it could be described as such. Composing himself, he kneeled down and started to take apart the panels to see for himself how good her mechanical skills were.
"Hey stop that, you don't know what you're doing! You'll break something then I'll have to fix it!" she protested.
Another funny sound came from Vader, he was laughing again - that was the second time she made him laugh. She was starting to doubt her father's stories that he was some unfeeling monster - he really didn't seem all that scary.
"I have been building and maintaining all manner of vehicles far longer than you have been alive, young one" he said amusedly. Satisfied that he wouldn't break anything, she stepped back letting him get a good look. He had thought the bike was custom made, he didn't realise that it included the entirety of the inner workings. He had thought the basic model of the bike was a Flare-S; the frame almost surely was a Flare-S, but there were none of the typical Mobquet parts in it.
"Where did you get the engine for this bike?" he questioned, he hadn't seen it before which interested him greatly.
"Well... I had to build the engine myself because Papa wouldn't buy me one. I just took the parts from the other bikes in the palace and from what I can get in the market and built it" she said.
"Very impressive" he said genuinely. Very few sentients were able to build an engine good enough to power a swoop bike at such a young age. Even fewer humans were able to do it.
"It's still a work in progress though. I can't get the cooling working on it properly. If I go too fast, it starts to overheat and stalls the engine; that's how they were able to catch me before" she said with a frown. Vader saw the problem with her current cooling - the radiators weren't in good positions to really vent out the heat from the main block. No wonder it was stalling when she tried to get as much power as possible out of it. It would need disassembling and fixing in heatsinks, but it was doable. He missed being able to tinker with machines and this was the perfect opportunity since he had nothing better to do.
"I see your problem little one, pass me the hydrospanner" he finally said. Leia was surprised to say the least and stood there gaping at the dark lord before coming to her senses and grabbing her toolbox.
Bail was a nervous wreck. First Darth Vader came to the planet to root out rebels, next he's 'talking' with his adopted daughter. He knew that Vader's efforts had been in vain to locate the rebel cells, most of them had disappeared without a trace thanks to Bail's quick thinking. He also knew this was going to make the Dark Lord impatient and frustrated, but he didn't think he would stoop as low as to use Leia against him. He would have sent Leia with his sister to the holiday retreat but, using security as an excuse, no one but imperial staff were to leave the Royal Estate.
He had hoped to keep the interaction between Vader and Leia to almost nothing, but something had interested him enough to dismiss the guards that were supposed to stay with her at all times. What if Vader found out that Leia was really his daughter? That thought stopped Bail's nervous pacing. If her true father realised it, then Bail would have failed Padmé and quite possibly lose his life in the process. With that thought he quickly made his way to the Hangar.
Bail wasn't too sure what to expect when he got to his destination, but this wasn't something he had envisioned. He had to take a double take to make sure he wasn't hallucinating it. Hunched over a swoop bike, his adopted daughter and Darth Vader were working on her bike. It was a rather peculiar sight; the towering black figure of Vader next to an oil stained princess.
"That's the last radiator installed, all we need to do now is put the engine back in" he heard Vader say. The scene looked almost as if a father was interacting with his daughter... A large spike of utter dread and fear surprised Vader, quickly turning around to locate it he spotted the Viceroy looking like he had seen a ghost. Leia, realising something had startled the Dark Lord, saw her adopted father pale as the marble of the palace floors.
"Papa!" she exclaimed, running over to him. "Lord Vader has been helping me with my swoop bike" she informed him.
"He has?" he choked out "that- that is wonderful to hear" the surprise in his voice showing clearly.
"Indeed I have, she has quite the talent for mechanics which is very unusual for a Princess" Vader remarked.
"She is full of surprises, but I am afraid for now it is time for dinner. Come Leia, you can attend to your bike later" Bail beckoned, taking hold of her hand to make sure she came with him.
"But we were just about to put the engine back in!" she protested to no avail.
"Leia you have spent enough time tinkering with that bike for now" he exasperated.
"Fine! Will you help me later, Lord Vader?" she turned and asked him.
"If I have the time, then perhaps Princess" he responded. Satisfied she was coming with him, Bail took her away from the hangar. Throughout this encounter Vader was puzzled and left with some very different questions to ask the Viceroy. It was obvious Bail didn't want him speaking with the Princess and had he not been curious about the Viceroy's initial spike of fear he would have dismissed it as a father being protective of his daughter.
He knew Bail feared him, as he should do, but that is not what he felt. He didn't even feel fear for his daughter being harmed, he had felt it many times from parents before. But this time it was different. He couldn't quite place it, but a subtle nudge from the force told him it was worth investigating.
