Chapter 43- Claiming His Girl and Torture
Vader wrapped his arms tightly around Lena as she lost all consciousness. Granted, Vader had wished he hadn't had to drug his girl, but it was better this way all around. She would wake up in the quarters Calrissian had put him in and Vader could start to unravel the training Talon Orran had given her. Vader gently scooped her up in his arms and carried her down the corridor. His girl was light and easy to carry. Vader wondered if Lena had been eating properly. Vader knew that the Rebel Alliance had gotten rations, but how nutritious were they?
Vader entered the quarters and laid Lena on the settee, stroking her hair gently with his gloved hands. Her hair was like his angel's, except a little straighter. Unlike Padme, Lena obviously didn't have time for elaborate hairdos. Not even when she was the Princess Lena of Alderaan, she hadn't bothered. Vader wondered how the girl would feel when she woke up and found out she was the princess again. But this time of an empire. His girl would lack for nothing. He would be hard-pressed to deny her anything she could possibly want.
The door to Vader's quarters chimed. Vader used the Force to slide them open. Two ladies entered with a pile of clothes in their arms. "Lord Vader, Administrator Calrissian sent us with clothes for the princess," an lady the age of Anakin Skywalker's mother, Shmi, said with some deference.
"Of course. I'll give you an hour to dress her and fix her hair," Vader said as he left the room. He could punish Solo for endangering his daughter while he waited for her.
Talon Orran felt a sense of urgency halfway to Bespin. Something felt horribly wrong if what he was feeling through the Force was anything to go by. Usually he could feel Lena'a Force signature galaxies away, but this time her Force signature had been damped down significantly as if smothered by a heavy blanket. Talon then heard Artoo, beep to Luke through the open channel.
"No, Threepio's with them. Just hang on. We're almost there," Luke said. Talon hoped they got there in time. Vader couldn't be permitted to hurt Talon's girl. Talon wouldn't let him.
Vader watched as the stormtroopers attached Solo to a chair. The man would know what happened to anyone who endangered Vader's children. The chair moved forward as the console heated up and Solo let out a loud scream. Vader left the chamber to see Boba Fett and Calrissian. "Lord Vader," Calrissian said as Vader went to Fett.
"You may take Captain Solo to Jabba the Hutt after I have Skywalker along with his sister," Vader rumbled.
"He's no good to me dead," Fett said as Vader walked away and he and Calrissian followed him.
"He will not be permanently damaged," Vader said as a loud scream from Solo followed them down the corridor.
"Lord Vader, what about Leia, Lena and the Wookie?" Calrissian asked, causing Vader's anger to rise with the ease Calrissian was using with Lena's name.
"Lena Skywalker comes with me. The Princess and the Wookie must never again leave this city," Vader said as he stepped into the lift.
"That was never a condition of our agreement, nor was giving Han to this bounty hunter," Calrissian said angrily as he moved forward menacingly.
"Perhaps you think you are being treated unfairly?" Vader asked, with a slight threat in his tone which Calrissian took.
"No," Calrissian said in a low voice.
"Good. It would be unfortunate if I had to leave a garrison here," Vader said as he shut the lift door and made his way back to Lena.
He entered the chambers. Lena was wide awake and looking at him guardedly as the women played with her hair by piling it atop her head. "You are treating me fairly well for a prisoner, Lord Vader," Lena said in clipped tones.
Vader could have either smiled or cried. His girl had a dizzying intellect like her mother, but she had personality traits that was all Anakin. "Indeed, Your Highness. I wish to treat you like the princess you are," Vader conceded, touching her face tenderly with his hand. Lena looked at his gloved fingers as they stroked her cheek. To Vader's happy delight, she didn't pull away from him.
"But I am also a Jedi knight, Lord Vader. Protected by the will of the Force. You have never treated Jedi like you have me. Why don't you kill me like you did the younglings at the Jedi temple and my father Anakin Skywalker?" Lena asked sharply.
Vader felt his breath catch. His daughter had been told he murdered Anakin Skywalker? Vader wouldn't have believed it of Talon Orran to say that, but who else could have told her that? "Who told you that I killed your father?" Vader asked.
"Does it matter?" Lena asked with that infuriating Jedi calm and Skywalker obstinance that Vader had always hated when he was Anakin Skywalker.
"It matters, young one. I will tell you in a minute why it matters, but first, tell me who told you that I killed your father?" Vader said, keeping his fury down so as not to scare his daughter.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi," Lena said the words that Vader had been half-dreading.
Vader would have to pick his words carefully. This would make or break his relationship with his daughter. "You were lied to, child. I didn't kill your father. I AM your father," Vader said, stroking her face tenderly. A look of absolute shock covered his daughter's face. The shock cleared up as quickly as it had come.
"Don't think this changes anything, Lord Vader. If this is a feeble attempt to turn me to the dark side, you have failed. I am Lena Skywalker, a Jedi knight protected by the will of the Force," Lena said sharply. She doesn't believe me! Vader thought in consternation.
"Lena, search your feelings. You know it to be true. I AM your father," Vader said.
"Still doesn't change anything. I will never join you or your Empire. It was founded on blood. It will never have peace as long as the Rebel Alliance lives to fight you," Lena said. That was all Padme. It was what she would have said. Vader wasn't sure whether to be proud of his daughter's moral convictions or wanting to strike her for having Padme's beliefs in the first place.
"I don't know you any more! Anakin, you're breaking my heart! You're going down a path I can't follow," Padme's tearful voice from the last time he saw her alive entered his thinking.
Vader stroked her face absently for a long moment, lost in the past he was trying to forget, but it kept coming at him with ferocity. "If that is all you have to say, Lord Vader, then please return me to my friends. I'm done talking," Lena said.
Very well, Lena, but this conversation is not over," Vader said, removing his hand from her face.
"I know, Lord Vader, but don't count gundarks before they leave the nest,"" Lena said as Vader walked her to the detention block and pushed her in