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| Finding a Path - Solo | ||||||||||||
| Disclaimer: Characters and Premise are borrowed from the movie "Star Wars." | ||||||||||||
| "Markos, relax, listen to your inner self," Anakin admonished in a hypnotically soothing tone. "Yes, Lord Vador," He replied. That was Anakin's new name and rank, Darth Vador, Dark Lord of Sith. It sounded sinister to me, so I still called him Anakin. Sometimes I wondered what it meant but I was usually to busy too worry about it. Senator Palpatine's program required me to become an even better pilot than I already was. I was also being taught new maneuvers, ones that required a group of pilots to fly as one. That was easier than one might think. All you had to do was clear your mind of everything but the maneuver, then somehow we knew when to start a particular part of the maneuver. It wasn't timing. At first I had tried to time it, we all had, but Anakin had cured us of that. Now we just knew. It was like something outside of us was telling us, like we were all part of some greater whole rather than individuals. Every day it got easier to just let that outside force take control, and slowly it was becoming a part of us. Sometimes it bothered me. I felt like I was trapped in a fog, watching my body act, but not really in control of it. I never fought it very hard. Since I had come here what happened over Corellus didn't hurt anymore. It was like it had happened in another life time. "Now!" something whispered inside my head. Automatically I pulled up on my control stick. Without interest I noticed that I had been only a few feet away from colliding with another ship. After three months here I trusted the voice to warn me before a collision. Lately we had been getting much closer to the other ships. But nothing ever went wrong so why worry about it? After we completed that day's practice Anakin told each of us how we had done. I didn't pay much attention, I aways did well. "Han, did you want to speak with me?" Anakin asked. Startled I glanced around the room, all the others had already left. Anakin pulled off the gruesome battle helmet he now wore. Without it he looked more like the Anakin I had known on Corellus. "Has Trish been released yet?" I asked, for lack of anything else to say. "No, she will be terminated at the end of the week." It didn't really matter whether she had been released or not, either way she would still hate me. I started to leave the room. I was half way to the door when I realized what Anakin had said. "Terminated!" I nearly screamed, "You're going to kill her!" "She is of no further use to us," Anakin replied calmly, "She has already been interrogated." "Trish interrogated!" It made sense, she was a member of an enemy army, but I still couldn't believe that Anakin had let that happen to her. For the first time in over two months I was really thinking about something. "Anakin, we can't let them hurt Trish anymore!" I plead. "Han, I know you were friends with Trish before, but she fought against the Republic. Senator Palpatine can't release her to fight against us again," Anakin's voice was coolly detached. I felt like I was back in a depressurized airlock without my helmet on. Then I was drowning in memories of a hundred things people had tried to tell me that I had disregarded. *"When was the last time you saw Commander Skywalker?"* *"He's a Dark Jedi; he's gone power crazy."* *"I think Anakin's in over his head with Palpatine."* *"Skywalker changed when he got involved with Palpatine; he became the Senator's puppet. A lot of people who work with Palpatine end up like that."* *"Han stay away from Senator Palpatine and his new order, please."* *"I don't think you're making a good decision, Han."* *"The Republic has already asked too much of you."* *"We no longer live in a republic, we live and fight for an emerging empire."* *"Fight Ensign Solo, fight for the Empire you swore loyalty to!"* But I didn't swear loyalty to an empire, I swore it to a republic. *"Senator Palpatine is setting up a new order..."* *"Palpatine doesn't want people to trust him, he wants them to obey him. Can't anyone see that?"* *"There's no reason for us to stay on a sinking ship."* *"I'll look before I leap, I promise."* I had heard it so many times, how could I have ignored it? So many of my friends had tried to tell me Anakin wasn't the same. He wasn't even there anymore, there was just Darth Vador, Dark Lord of Sith, inhuman, behind the black armor and the hideous mask. I had known the Republic wasn't turning out right, but I had pretended it was. Like Trish and the Rebel Government. *"If you think standing by the Rebel Government is going to actually help, why is it doing this to you Trish?"* *"Things will get better."* *"She hates mirrors"* Because she hated seeing that she didn't really believe things would get better. I'd been hiding from the truth about the Republic, just like Trish hid from the truth about the Rebel Government. *"I'll look before I leap, I promise."* I'd really kept that promise hadn't I? "Han, is something wrong?" Vador asked. I stormed out of the room; he wouldn't help Trish. Vador didn't care about anyone who wouldn't help his Emperor. I had helped to change Corellus in a way that I couldn't live with. I didn't see any way to stop the Republic becoming another place I couldn't stand but this time I wasn't going to help it change! Vador and Palpatine were using all of the people in this program to help them create their empire! Well, they weren't going to use me anymore! In my room I tried to calm down, getting mad and not thinking wasn't going to help. Not thinking was how I got in this mess in the first place. Actually that's how the Rebel Government got in trouble too. Besides Vador and Palpatine didn't want me to think. They wanted all the people in their empire to be unthinking robots that just did as they were told. Ever since I'd entered this program I'd been the perfect citizen of their empire. Well that was going to change, from now on I was taking orders from only one person... Me! Now I had several goals, rescuing Trish, because I owed her that, and I wanted to get rid of the last debt I had to anyone. Then I'd need to escape myself and find something to do once I had. I certainly wanted to find something better than the Republic to support. *"Go search for your perfect planet, but you'll never find it, every planet has problems."* *"You're crazy Han, you just got rid of one government, and now you want to get involved with another. Me, I want freedom."* *"I just want a government that hasn't gone off the deep end." "Han, I hate to disappoint you, but every government is run by people, and if enough of those people have problems they can drive the whole system round the bend."* Maybe they were right. Maybe planets and governments were just asking for trouble. But what else was there? *"Planets aren't safe, or stable. They're always changing, growing, and dying. But space is always the same."* I could always get a ship, a small world of my own. *"A lot of those people like the action out on the borders, so they're perfectly happy staying there. The rest of them get mad, quit and become the best smugglers in the galaxy."* Yes, I'd had the answer all along. I'd become a smuggler; except I didn't know how to become a smuggler; or where to get a ship; or how to get off this base without getting caught, especially if I planned to take Trish with me. ============================================================== The next day I learned that a smuggler named Lando Calrissian was being held on the base, and that his ship, the Millennium Falcon, was impounded here as well. But I'd still need a distraction while I rescued Calrissian and Trish. What if I rescued all the prisoner on the base, there were over a hundred. With all those people running around loose no one would have time to bother with me. ============================================================== It was five days since I had realized what was going on and now I was ready to make my escape. All my stuff was on the Falcon, and I had set it up so that I was stationed in the detention area today. Due to a little computer malfunction (that I had caused) I was the only person on duty for the next three hours. It was all too easy to take the keys and start opening the cell doors. I had memorized the numbers of the cells Calrissian and Trish were being held in. I came to Calrissian's first. As the door slid open I shouted, "Hey Calrissian, we're escaping, you and I and a friend of mine are taking your ship." Calrissian shrugged, "It's your escape plan; but I've got to ask, why my ship?" "I'll explain later." "It's your plan," he repeated. "Is the Wookie the friend you were talking about?" I stopped releasing prisoners long enough to look around and notice the Wookie, "No, he can come and go as he pleases." Several cells later we found Trish Del. "Trish, I'm going to rescue you," I announced. She walked slowly to the door of her cell, "Why Han, how kind of you. After you made sure I'd get caught!" "Look, I didn't want to, but you attacked me!" I yelled. "Now I'm getting you out of here, so you had better just come along." "With you, you must be kidding." Trish laughed. "I'll find my own way out, thank you." "You'll never make it," I exploded. "I know the base; I have a plan, you don't!" "I'll take my chances; it's better than being stuck on a ship with you!" "Look you two," Calrissian broke in. "We are in the middle of escaping from a prison, we don't have time for this. Now lets go back to my ship and then you can fight." Trish turned to the smuggler, "I'm not going anywhere with him!" "Fine," Calrissian snapped, "Good luck escaping. Goodbye." "No," I commanded, "she's coming with us." "I am not!" "Yes you are!" "Am not!" Calrissian and the Wookie looked at each other in disgust. "They sound like a couple of five-year-olds," Calrissian commented. The Wookie barked an affirmative. Then Calrissian grabbed Trish by the shoulders and the Wookie grabbed me. "Come along now children," Calrissian remarked as they guided us down the hall. "Can you lead us to the Falcon?" Calrissian asked me. "Sure." At that point Trish broke free of Calrissian and ran down the hall. I would have gone after her but the Wookie stopped me. At the corner Trish stopped and turned back to us. "Sorry I shot at you Han," She yelled. "Clear skies." "Clear skies Trish," I replied. "Ask the turbo-lift to take you to docking bay E." "Thanks," Trish yelled before disappearing down another hall. I lead the Wookie and Calrissian to docking bay B and the Millennium Falcon. Just as we reached the ship's ramp a being stepped into the ship's entry way. "Stop!" He ordered. "So close, we were so close," Calrissian sighed. I stepped forward, my blaster drawn. "Anakin?" I asked my blaster lowering. He wasn't wearing his battle armor, and for the first time since he left Corellus he really looked like the Anakin Skywalker I had known. Anakin was as shocked as I was, "Han, you did this?" "I had to, Garic was right, the Republic isn't the same anymore. Senator Palpatine is changing it so he can have more power. So he can control more people. Palpatine is like the Colonists, he wants everyone to be his slave." "Palpatine can give us power Han," Anakin objected. "I don't want his power. I just want to be left alone, I'm sick of governments. I've tried three. One tried to make me a slave, one tried to kill me, and this one asked me to attack my own world. Now I just want everyone to leave me alone!" "Han, I promise I won't tell anyone what you did, then you can go back to the Senator's program. You are just having a..." "Listen to me Anakin, I don't want to go back!" I screamed. "I think you're making a big mistake Han, but I won't stop you," Anakin walked away from the ship. "I don't believe this!" Calrissian exclaimed. "Come on we don't have all day," I snapped. I wished Anakin hadn't shown up. I didn't like knowing that Darth Vador hadn't completely destroyed Anakin yet. Knowing that made me want to stay, but I had already discovered I couldn't fight the Senator. He had some sort of weird power over people that I couldn't understand. | ||||||||||||
