"Lord Vader, I don't think violence is the answer here."
Piett stood in the refresher, staring into the mirror, keeping his voice barely above a whisper. Luke was in his kitchen, holding a cold compress to his swelling, forming black eye, waiting for Piett to return with more adequate medical supplies.
"He may very well be a Jedi, Captain. You know they're traitors to the Empire."
Piett tried not to shudder at the barely restrained rage in Vader's voice. He wasn't sure what his superior's full history was with the Jedi, but he doubted it was friendly. Especially considering he did know for a fact that he'd spent a good portion of his career hunting down rogue Jedi and killing them.
"I know that, My Lord, but I'm not like you. I don't have powers to defend against a Jedi. If he suspects that I'm onto him, he may not only kill me, but he'll be long gone before you arrive to take care of him."
Vader was silent, save for the breathing Piett was a bit horrified to learn he was growing quite used to being in his ear, and finally he replied, "Fine. What do you propose?"
Piett tried not to react with relief. Not visibly, at least. Vader could still see him through the mirror, after all. "I propose that we approach this in a friendly, civilized manner."
"Friendly?" Vader scoffed. "When has that ever done any good for anyone?"
Piett refrained from wincing. "It's a good officer, bad officer ploy. If he does indeed turn out to be a traitor, then he won't suspect anything until you have time to show up."
He held his breath, waiting for Vader's reply. Finally, he hissed, "You will still ask him exactly what I tell you to, understood?"
"Yes, My Lord. Understood." Inwardly, he was at least grateful that he wouldn't have to be the one to hurt the boy. Luke was...weird, but he still seemed harmless. Even if he'd thrown Craig back fifteen feet.
Besides. Piett wasn't a fan of the idea of cleaning blood stains from his floor.
He grabbed the med kit and stepped out, heading back into the kitchen and lifting it up for Luke to see. "Found it."
Luke made a non-committal noise. He still covered his eye with a cold compress, but there was still dried blood spilling from his nose, and his lip was also relatively swollen. It would likely be double the size in a few hours, if untreated. Blood stained his white shirt, and there was also bruising and dried blood around his knuckles. Technically, he lost the fight to Craig, but he'd definitely given the man plenty of good hits. If he had joined the military, he wouldn't have much training to do to refine his skills, Piett thought.
As Piett set the medkit on the table and began pulling out supplies, Luke said, "This is a pretty nice place you've got here."
Piett waited for Vader to reply, but he didn't. Maybe Vader didn't care about compliments. Actually, he was pretty sure he didn't. So Piett didn't respond.
When he didn't, Luke added, "Seems like a lot for a maintenance worker. Unless the Empire pays you more than I thought?"
There was a note of suspicion in his voice, and Piett sincerely hoped Luke wouldn't bring up that he probably suspected the truth. He didn't think Vader would let him live if he found out about the caff shop.
Thankfully, though, Vader chose that moment to respond, and Piett gratefully said, "As I told you before. I saved before I applied for school."
"You did say that." From Luke's tone, Piett could tell he didn't believe him. "Maybe I should have just joined the military. I wouldn't be juggling two jobs…which I have to leave for in an hour, by the way."
By then, Piett had pulled out some disinfectant wipes and bacta patches. "Not with those injuries, you aren't." He repeated, though this time he fully agreed with Vader. Even if the boy wasn't a traitor, he would do better going home to rest. He also doubted the boy's boss would appreciate him stumbling in all injured like that.
"I don't have the luxury to not go." There was something bitter in Luke's voice, and Piett didn't miss the glare he threw his way. "But I guess you wouldn't understand."
Ah. The apology was starting to make sense, now. If he had to guess, Vader had probably made some less than sensitive comments about the boy's working habits in relation to his schooling. Piett doubted though that after the...display from earlier, Vader would be giving that apology.
Sure enough, Vader didn't. Instead, he said, "Ask him if he has any mentor figures."
It was a bit of a weird transition, but at least Piett wasn't beating the boy senseless.
"Luke. You haven't talked too much about you."
"I've said plenty, if you'd just listen occasionally."
"I know you are a farmer from Tatooine and that you worked on machines growing up. That's it. I think we have a bit of time to get to know each other." He wondered if Vader would care about the embellishment, but he was silent. "Did you have any sort of...mentor figures?"
He pulled Luke's hand away from his face and began dabbing at his wounds with the disinfectant wipe. Luke winced, but otherwise didn't complain. "What, like a teacher?"
"Yes."
Luke snorted. "Tatooine probably has the worst teachers in the entire galaxy."
"Everyone knows that." Vader snapped, and Piett had the mental image of Vader trying to strangle the boy through the screen. "Who taught the boy how to throw someone fifteen feet away?!"
"No fighting instructors, then? No one who taught you how to throw a man fifteen feet?" Piett asked, finishing up on disinfecting the wounds.
Under his touch, Luke stilled.
"Everyone learns to fight on Tatooine. If you don't learn, you won't last long."
"He does have a point but that is not what I'm referring to, and he knows it."
Yes. From the tone in Vader's voice, Piett could definitely tell Luke would have been in far more trouble if Vader were anywhere within strangling range.
"But you threw a man fifteen feet. I don't think that's something you learn on Tatooine." He said calmly. Conversationally.
Luke was quiet, not meeting his eyes. "No. I didn't learn that from anyone. I...don't know how it happened."
"Liar!" Vader bellowed, and Piett hid his pained wince by turning back to the medkit to grab bacta patches.
But Luke spoke again before Vader could continue, and there was an odd bitterness to his voice. "Who knows? Maybe my mother wasn't even human and whatever species she was had incredible strength."
Vader paused, working on controlling his rage just enough to process what information the boy had just offered up. The explanation was ridiculous, of course. Luke appeared to be completely human, and he didn't know many part humans with that kind of strength. No, it was definitely the Force.
But maybe...maybe the Force was something passed through his family.
"Does he not know his mother?"
Piett asked, turning back to Luke as he did so. Vader glared at the screen, at the boy who had tricked him so thoroughly. How had he not seen it before? He should have immediately started investigating the moment Luke had dashed after that duck with inhuman speed. He'd been so focused on his studies to spend too much thought on it, and now it had led to almost a critical mistake, one with disastrous consequences-
"No. I don't know either of my parents. But I can promise you, it wasn't my father. He was a navigator on a spice freighter."
That didn't sound like concrete evidence for not being Force sensitive, let alone not being totally human. But Vader didn't bother pointing that out. "Who did he live with?"
When Piett asked, there was a barely controlled disdain in his voice, and Vader vaguely remembered reading in Piett's file that he'd once spent quite a bit of his career chasing pirates and drug lords through the Outer Rim. He probably didn't take too kindly to the boy's parentage. Maybe that would make it easier, then, when Vader eventually had to show up to kill the boy.
Speaking of which…
On another data pad, he began keying in orders to prepare a ship for him. He'd go himself and kill the boy quickly. Technically, he should take him back to Mustafar and deal with him there, but…
"I lived with my aunt and uncle. My father's family. They're all totally human, I swear, but no one knew who my mother was, so I think that's probably my best bet."
It was looking less likely that the boy was related to anyone he might have known from his Jedi days. He wasn't aware of any Force Sensitives who worked in such a profession, and he doubted any of the Jedi women he knew would have had an affair with one. Hell, he doubted most of the Jedi he knew would have broken the rules as he'd done, but it wasn't impossible, so- "Ask him what he knows about his parents."
It was useless, and wouldn't lead anywhere, but if his Master found out that he'd killed the boy so quickly, he could at least say he'd followed all leads.
"Well. Like I said, my aunt and uncle didn't know who my mother was." Vader was barely listening. He was in the middle of choosing which ship he wanted prepared. His new TIE Advanced was probably the fastest, but it would definitely be noticeable when he landed on Eriadu, and he still had a cover he wished to keep. "Though my aunt said she thought she might have met her once. She didn't say anything more than that though, so I stopped asking."
"He's too chatty. Ask about the father so we can be done with this." He snapped irritably. He had this horrible image of him strangling Luke and the boy trying to talk through it anyway. No, a lightsaber would be much quicker and easier.
"What about your father?" Piett asked, still keeping that annoyingly friendly, even compassionate tone. As if he'd ever be friendly or compassionate to anyone-
"He's the only one I had any information on, though even that's not much. I don't think he and my uncle got along."
"I don't care-"
"His name was Anakin Skywalker, though."
Vader dropped the datapad. It shattered on the ground even as he whirled back to Piett's feed.
And stared. Really, really stared at the boy.
"What did you say his name was?!"
The words blurted out through numb lips. A roaring filled his head, even as he immediately began connecting the physical features with what had been bothering him since he'd seen his profile picture at the start of the semester.
The blonde, mop of hair that curled at the ends.
The eyes that were light enough to be blue.
Sun-kissed skin.
The same dimples when he smiled...the same cleft in his chin, the shape of his nose-
"Anakin Skywalker." Luke frowned. "Why? Do you know him?"
He'd been so bothered by Luke's profile picture because he looked like Anakin Skywalker.
He looked like him.
Because he was his son.
The Force screamed the truth of it even as panic seized him, and he gripped the arm wrests of his seat so tightly, the metal began to wine from the pressure his prosthetics placed on it.
He didn't care.
Unbidden, a memory surfaced, one he tried to forget.
"Ani...I'm pregnant."
He'd been so drawn to the boy because he was his son. Perhaps Luke had been drawn to him because the Force also nudged him that way. Not a non-existent friendship bond, but a familial bond, one that even now, he could feel at his core, drawing him to the boy.
But how? How was this possible?! And what brother-
Lars.
His mother...his mother had remarried. The man's last name had been Lars. He'd had a son, too, who he barely remembered now. He couldn't even remember the man's first name, but Lars-
"Why do you go by the name Lars?!"
It was such a stupid question. It was hardly important, now that he knew the truth. But had Luke gone by his real last name, he would have figured out the first day and they wouldn't have had to play this game!
"Um." Luke was definitely giving Piett an odd look, and Vader couldn't remember why. "Lars is my legal name, since that's what my adoption papers list me as." Adoption papers?! Rage welled up inside him at the thought that someone had stolen his son, taken him to Tatooine, of all places, and handed him off to pathetic, lowly farmers- "Actually, it's kind of funny. When I found out my father's name, I went by Skywalker for a while. I told all of my teachers and friends behind my uncle's back."
"Why did you stop?!"
Again, the thought of strangling the boy immediately entered his mind, a gut reaction, but he quickly threw it away in horror. The thought that he'd been about to order a ship prepared so he could go kill his own son-
Luke had the audacity to sheepishly rub the back of his head. The movement made him wince. "Well I was hoping my father wasn't really dead. Maybe he'd come back if he knew I was waiting for him. But it was stupid. When my uncle found out, he made it clear my father was dead, and my aunt seemed sad that I didn't want to use their name. And I mean, they were the ones who raised me, so I felt bad and eventually dropped it. I didn't want them to think I didn't love them or appreciate what they'd done for me."
Luke's words tore him to shreds and he wanted to throw his rage across the galaxy to destroy those who'd taken him from him. If he'd kept the name, he would have used it in his introduction the first day, and the very thing he'd hoped for would have happened. If he'd only kept it-
Stars, his son thought he'd been a navigator on a spice freighter. He thought he'd been a drug smuggler!
"What do you know about the Force?!"
The words were out, and he sincerely hoped they didn't scare him off, and even Piett hesitated when he repeated the question-
Luke gave Piett a genuinely confused look. "What's that?"
Vader stared at the screen.
The Force...rang with truth.
Luke had no idea what the Force was.
He was the son of the most powerful Force sensitive to ever live, and he had no idea.
"Nevermind." His mind was still whirling. He felt like he was on the verge of a panic attack. If the suit wasn't breathing for him, he was sure he would have stopped breathing.
How had this happened?! He was sure Padme had died, he'd even checked to make sure the baby had been buried with her-
Kenobi.
Rage filled his chest, so fast and hot that the chamber around him began to shake. His throat was tight, but he managed to snarl out, "Do you know an Obi-Wan Kenobi?!"
Even as he asked, he knew that didn't make sense. Obi-Wan, if he had stolen his child, would have trained Luke from infancy to become a Jedi, to kill his father. But it was already evident that Luke knew nothing of the Force…
And sure enough, Luke still seemed puzzled. "No. I don't know an Obi-Wan Kenobi." Then the frown deepened. "I wonder though if you mean Old Ben Kenobi…"
He couldn't help but smack his hand against the face of his helmet.
"Of course it's the same person!" For as smart as Luke had already proven himself to be, he could be quite foolish. Then again, he had found him trying to capture a wild duck to keep as a pet.
Stars.
His son had tried to capture a duck to keep as a pet.
He...hadn't dared to think about what his child might have been like, not since he'd confirmed the baby supposedly dead, but he'd never once, in his wildest dreams, thought he'd ever have a child who would do that.
His son knew nothing about the Force. He knew Obi-Wan, but apparently not well enough to know who he really was. He was such a bright ray of sunshine that he constantly gave him headaches. And apparently, his son kriffing loved ducks.
Somehow, that only made him want Luke more.
"Well, how was I supposed to know? Jeez, Firmus, do you know my father? Is Ben some kind of friend of his? What the hell is this?!"
Luke was glaring at Piett, now, but Vader didn't care. He did care that he was again upsetting his son, his son who'd just told him exactly where Obi-Wan had been hiding all these years, right under his nose...He had so many more questions. There was so much to do. The first item of business of course was to kill Obi-Wan, then maybe Luke's guardians...no, not them. Luke would find out, and it would cause a rift and he had no desire for that, even if they'd taken his son from him. No, he'd need to convince Luke that their wrong deserved death, then he could take care of that, but he'd need to take Luke first-
"No. I do not know your father."
For Piett, that was true. He would have been too young to personally know Anakin Skywalker. And he didn't miss the disappointment in Luke's face, but Vader would tell him the truth when he brought him back to his ship. That was a conversation best done in person, not through a third party.
Besides, if the Emperor were to find out…
The Emperor.
He felt as though ice water had been dumped over him. Reality stared him cold in the face.
If the Emperor found out...if he brought Luke back to his ship, and started training him…
He'd kill Luke.
Or worse, he'd make Vader do it.
"Well." Luke's voice brought him out of the spiraling thoughts, and he was horrified to see him standing. He had bacta patches over the worst of his injuries, but there was still far too much swelling. "This has been...fun, but I need to get to work."
Panic seized him, and he grabbed the edges of the screen. "No!"
Naturally, when Piett repeated it, his voice squeaked, and Vader wanted to throttle the man for embarrassing him in front of his son.
"I told you. I can't afford to call out, and even if I could, I should've done so hours ago. I'll get in trouble." The look Luke leveled at Piett was enough to briefly remind Vader that prior to all of this, he'd been angry with him, but Vader ignored it.
"You are injured!"
"Well, next time maybe don't pick a fight."
"I did not pick a fight! Besides, all military personnel are trained in combat, you did not need to step in!"
"Then next time tell me that before I jump in to defend you." A small smile tugged at the corners of his lips. "Actually, that might have been interesting to watch."
That...sounded like something he'd say. His son was more like him than he thought. His chest warmed at the thought, and that only made him not want to lose sight of the boy even more. "I will pay for your schooling!"
Luke snorted in disbelief. "With what money? And don't tell me you saved. I don't buy it."
With his money. He had plenty! Wasn't it his fatherly duty to pay for his son's schooling?! It was the least he could do after years of not being there for him-
But how could he explain that without revealing the truth?
Maybe he should tell him. But the thought of the Emperor finding out…
He had to admit. Leaving Luke as Luke Lars, freshman Engineering student on Eriadu was a pretty solid cover. At least until he could figure out what he'd do to rectify the Emperor issue.
Then...then he'd bring Luke home. He'd tell him the truth. They'd figure out what the next steps were after that.
But that didn't mean he wouldn't figure out how to rectify the money issue as soon as possible.
When Piett didn't answer, Luke shook his head and rolled his eyes. "I have to go. I'm not going to be late over this. We'll work on the project tomorrow if you have time."
Project. Yes. Project. He'd...almost forgotten about that. He would definitely need Luke on Eriadu to complete that for his grade, anyway. At least, that's what he told himself to keep the sting of being separated from his son buried.
"I have time." He'd make time. For Luke. Anything for Luke. He had so much to do to pave the way for bringing Luke home safely, but he'd make time.
"Good. Meet me at The Screaming Bean at eight in the morning. I have the early shift tomorrow."
He was liking this two jobs thing less and less. It was already quite late, when did Luke ever have time to study?! The money issue was steadily climbing to the top of his new list of things to do. But he didn't wish to enrage his son further, so he simply replied, "Fine."
Luke nodded and headed for the door. Vader wanted to order Piett to stop him, to detain him until he could arrive...but the reminder of the Emperor was still fresh in his mind, and he forced himself to refrain.
He knew where Luke was. He was the only one who knew of his heritage. It would have to do.
Just before Luke got to the door, though, he stopped and turned, an odd look on his face. "You're sure you don't know Anakin Skywalker?"
"No." He replied, firmly, grateful the boy didn't know how to detect a lie in the Force. Would it even work if said through Piett? He had no idea.
Luke stared at Piett for a moment longer, then shrugged and left the apartment.
Piett and Vader stared at the door in silence for a moment. Then, when he was sure Luke wasn't coming back, Vader said, "You will find that Craig from earlier and you will kill him tonight. I will handle the cover up." It would be easy. Too easy. "Before you do, I want you to find out if he told anyone else about what Luke did. If he did, kill them too."
Piett was quiet for a moment. "It will be done, My Lord." Then, another pause. "What about Lars? Or I guess, should I say Skywalker?"
Vader's hands clenched into fists. Leather creaked quietly as he did so. "Never mention this conversation. Ever again. To anyone. Not even the Emperor."
Piett's response was immediate. "Yes, My Lord." Vader got the sense that he meant it, too.
Loyalty. Even after everything he'd been put through...the man was loyal. Yes. Vader was definitely starting to like this captain.
Not that he'd ever admit it.
"Does this mean you don't believe he is a threat?"
Oh, technically, Luke was a threat. That was precisely why he was keeping him where he was until he could remove the man who'd want him dead because of it. But for all Piett would need to know…
"I need him to ensure I get full marks on my courses." He said. "I can't exactly do that if he's dead."
Perfect excuse.
