Yes…I know…I'm so evil… leaving you all hanging like that. XD
Well, I know there isn't much I can do to make you read the shoutouts, but I'm going to do them again anyway because I like to. Also, to save myself from the diabolical clutches of redundancy, I'm going to say thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far.
THANK YOU!!!
Shoutouts:
Elf: You never seem to fail being the first person to review. Yes, I don't like cliffies either, but I love to make 'em. You'll have to suffer through it…heh heh…
Kynstar and kayladie: My, my, you both sound so concerned. I wouldn't kill Obi-Wan off or anything…after all, I give him all the best lines, isn't that right? (grins) Yes, he is my favorite character. But everyone knew that already.
Smenzer: Yes, they would be pretty stupid if they were expecting his memory to return. But you must remember, it was an unprecedented event, and in any case, the Emperor has this undeniable tendency to underestimate his opponents. Probably because he's so darn conceited.
Kitkat: Purple prose, eh? I like developing my own style, but whether it's a good one or not almost remains to be seen…
Kyer: Oh, Obi-Wan's perfectly capable of taking care of himself, as we all know. I also begin to question Yoda's usefulness at this point…but I think I'm going to make him pivotal later on. And it isn't Obi-Wan who's going to need rescuing from Luke…
Luke and Kaial: Ten of you? Lessee…that's…um…that's…40% of you. Agh…math isn't really my strong point… And yes, part of the reason I did this fic at all is to show how much remains the same, despite the addition of a previously deceased character.
NathanPostmark: Yeah, for a while I was thinking, What the hell am I doing to him???? But no need to fear…chapter 8 is here.
All right, take a look at this: ~~~ Familiar, yes? Today it will denote a little flashback Mara has.
Get primed and ready for Chapter the Eighth.
~~~***~~~
Quantum Force
~~~***~~~
Excerpt from Perelandra by C. S. Lewis:
"'The world is so much larger than I thought. I thought we went along paths—but it seems there are no paths. The going itself is the path.'"
***
"Buying us time," snapped Leia as she hurried after Lando. "Buying us time! Why did you let him?"
"I couldn't have stopped him," he shouted back in a release of his pent-up tension.
Mara stumbled then, Chewie almost tripping over her. The Wookiee growled inquiringly; there hadn't been anything to trip over, and she didn't seem like the sort of person that would just stumble.
She kept running without an answer, thinking, Kenobi's in trouble, I know it.
They had talked before he had left her and Lando to join the others, and she mentally ran over their quick exchange.
~~~
Lando stood in the corner, his dark eyes flashing curiously at information withheld. But Obi-Wan was not about to share it with anyone until he deemed it absolutely necessary that the person knew.
He'd stood right in front of her by the wall on the opposite end of the corridor, looking straight into her eyes. She could read the gravity of the situation from him instantly. The look in his eyes was not stern austerity, did not speak of pushed authority. It was the look of a patient teacher handing over a firm trust in his student. "I need you to tell Leia something if I don't come back. And Mara…Palpatine must never know."
"Then I'm assuming you don't want Vader to know, either," she replied.
"That goes without saying," he agreed, and told her the message.
~~~
Mara reflected on it now. Indeed, if word ever got out to Vader or the Emperor…she couldn't imagine what would happen. A catastrophe, to say the absolute least. What an inscrutable trust Kenobi had placed in her.
Palpatine's connection with her was severed. He would never know through her; Kenobi's secret was safe.
After all, Mara kept many of her own.
Lando slowed his pace to stand by a side door. "Let's make it quick. No doubt there are stormtroopers everywhere by now."
Han drew his blaster and checked the charge as the door slid open.
"It's clear," Lando murmured to them, and they filed out into the hallway silently.
Mara tried to gather her concentration as they sped through the corridor. An unfriendly presence was nearby, the mind keen as a vibroblade and intent on discovering something.
Not something, someone, she corrected herself, after a closer look. Us.
Boba Fett stepped out a bare ten meters ahead of them and raised his rifle. Without conscious thought, she rose her open hand and pushed. The bounty hunter flew back a meter or two and landed heavily, banging his head on the polished floor.
Han took the opportunity to snap off a shot, and Lando noticed his old friend was still against killing in cold blood. The stun beam washed over, rendered partly ineffective by Fett's armor but still strong enough to make the hunter collapse.
[Let's go,] Chewie suggested urgently.
"Great idea," Han replied, looking to Lando.
The administrator nodded and led them off into another passage. The city seemed to be a complex interworking of halls, making it feel as if there was no space for any actual rooms, though this was far from the truth.
Still, even Han was beginning to confuse his sense of direction as Lando took them left and right, across and over halls, through countless doors. "You going the long way, or something?"
"We're almost there. It isn't quite the shortest," replied Lando, who was starting to lose his breath, "but it's comparatively quick enough and I thought it might throw off any followers we pick up."
"No kidding."
Of the whole group, Lando was feeling the effects of a long jog the most; he just hadn't been getting much exercise lately. Why do I feel like that's about to change? he thought, and turned to rush into an anteroom.
Someone else had had the brilliant idea to rush around the same corner in the opposite direction; Lando collided with the unknown party and spun off, barely keeping his balance as the other hit the wall hard.
Leia's eyes widened in surprise. "Luke! What are you doing here?"
Luke pushed himself off the wall. "Leia? Han? I…" He stood for a moment, dazed by his impact with the wall as well as the sudden realization that his friends weren't in trouble, after all… "Oh, no."
Artoo wheeled up, whistling busily as he whirred around the corner.
Lando straightened, indignant. "Now what?"
"Ask questions later," Mara snapped. "Here comes trouble."
A company of stormtroopers filed into the chamber and began firing.
"Back," shouted Lando, though the order was needless. They had all taken cover quickly…except for Luke.
He stood in the middle of the antechamber, lightsaber blazing, deflecting every single shot that came within the reach of his blade. The effect of the display was awe-inspiring to a group that had never seen a Jedi on the defense, but now was no time to stare off in wonder.
Mara was nearly raging. Kenobi might have trusted her to accompany the group and carry a private message, but there was no way Han would have let her walk around freely with her weaponry. There was nothing she could do against the stormtroopers; she had no blaster.
Maybe the idiot in the middle of the room can do something about that, she thought, and tried to send a message without distracting him too much.
In response, five blasters came flying her way, their former users dead on the floor. Chewbacca had left his bowcaster on the Falcon, so she tossed one to him, and Leia received one as well. Han and Lando seemed to be faring fine on their own, so she took two of the three remaining blasters up and began pouring fire out on the troopers.
Leia watched in disbelief as Mara's seemingly random fire instantly killed every stormtrooper it came over, hitting precisely at weak spots in the armor and creating a small mound of dead troopers.
The company had been speedily dealt with. Luke extinguished his lightsaber and turned back to nod solemnly at Mara.
"You're Skywalker?" she inquired, without a trace of her usual abrupt harshness. Kenobi would be proud, she thought dryly.
He nodded. "Call me Luke." He looked at her expectantly, waiting for her to follow up with her own name.
"Mara Jade. I suggest we leave now," she added to the whole party. "Kenobi's not going to be meeting up with us."
Leia stared at her in alarm. "What?"
"He's…being detained."
The same look of panic crossed Luke and Leia's faces at the same time. Mara entertained herself with the far-fetched thought that they might be long-lost twins but got no humor out of it. Not now. She was almost panicked at herself for having the same feeling. Was she getting soft?
Steeling herself, she snapped, "There's nothing we can do about it right now. Besides, something tells me he's going to be fine. Let's go."
That was truth; she was feeling that even though Kenobi was now in all probability being held by Vader himself, the old Jedi would be able to take care of himself, somehow.
…She hoped.
***
He had briefly wondered, once, how long it took one to grow accustomed to waking up without knowing where one was. In any case, it hadn't happened to him yet. Dazed, he tried to remember what had made him lapse into unconsciousness in the first place, something that seemed to be happening alarmingly often.
Then it came to him in an instant as a surge of adrenaline took him, coursing through his body, and he stiffened, eyes snapping open. Blue orbs fell to a complex tangle of machinery, wires, and bare metal just below and in front of him.
Something among the intricate mess sparked and began glowing a heated red.
He tried to push himself off the near-vertical board he leaned back on, but was arrested by the straps that held him in place. Those same straps retained him to the board as it gradually pitched forward, closer to the heat.
As the pain blossomed, he tried to ward the agony off with a technique he had learned long ago…and found it nearly impossible to concentrate. His still-fuzzed mind betrayed it to him; he'd been drugged, deprived of his greatest weapon. Now the pain was free to lance up his nerves, his muscles jerking spasmodically as numbing electricity passed through them.
It wasn't the Force that had been taken away, only his means of accessing it. He could still feel it in the back of his mind, and tried to draw himself into it, retreating from the agonizing torment.
It was his worst mistake. Vader was there, filling him with a waking nightmare. He was trapped, forced to relive the Purges over and over, seeing Jedi murdered from Vader's own perspective, many of them his own comrades. Killed, burned, tortured, desecrated.
Vader made one of them Luke.
That made Obi-Wan writhe; he grasped at his blocked concentration, trying to overcome the drug by sheer will.
Vader retreated from his mind in surprise; Kenobi was regaining his focus, slowly and steadily. Every little bit more exponentially increased the rate at which the drug was burning off. Kenobi was actually cleansing it from his system, creating it into a different chemical. A chemical opposite to its predecessor: it actually had nutritional qualities, now, if only to add to Vader's enraged incredulity.
The torment was beginning to lose its effectiveness. Thoroughly angry, Vader gestured for an aide to turn the thing off, and Kenobi was reverted back upright, panting and disheveled.
The Jedi's head lolled to one side, and his eyes struck the Sith with their incisive clarity. "You struck me down," he said between gasps. "I warned you."
The lidless eyes of Vader's helmet were the last things he saw, the burning lethal rage inside the last thing he felt, when the aide came up on the other side of him and stuck the needle into his arm.
***
It was a short trip to the carbon freezing chamber. Still, Vader was impatient. Kenobi was already starting to awaken, but that was all right; he'd feel the freezing, then. Besides, it was more convenient for the victim to be able to stand as their minds were jettisoned into the chilling realms of hibernation.
Everything was prepared and ready. All that remained to be done was the actual process. If Kenobi survived the freezing, he would be taken to the Imperial Palace, to Vader's master. The combined power of the two Sith would break him, would beat him to the floor, something Vader had long envisioned. He was sure Palpatine would be more than willing to undertake the exercise, noting who the clone had primarily broken allegiance with. No doubt the Emperor would employ his new shipment of pirahna-beetles from Yavin IV somewhere in the process. The insects would take a long time to kill Kenobi, eating away at flesh until the victim died of general internal exposure and blood loss.
Vader reflected on the inventive homicidal tendencies his master had always had. Of course, Palpatine had suppressed it during his days as Chancellor of the Old Republic, but now that he was Emperor, he occasionally used his incredible power as an entertaining toy.
***
Obi-Wan, carried on a stretcher by a pair of aides following after Darth Vader, was waking slowly of his own account, busily tracking the effect of the conditioned word deep inside his brain. The conditioning had been cleverly implanted, and Obi-Wan could see why Han had had such concern over the possibility. But the Force was with him, and he began to eradicate the darkened spot. It washed away very slowly; he was worried he might not have enough time.
Obi-Wan's eyes opened gradually as he continued the inner process, his eyes adjusting quickly to the darker state of the room they had just entered.
Red-orange lights cast a menacing gleam to the chamber's main features. He was carried down a short flight of steps and set down on the floor as he heard the thump-thump-thump of troopers marching in. Vader was taking no chances.
It's too bad for him that there are still some things he can't control, Obi-Wan thought blearily as he was hauled unceremonially upright by the aides.
Vader's distinctive respiration could be heard at the other side of the pit in the floor. "Put him in."
In? wondered Obi-Wan. In where? He tried to get a sense of it from the surrounding sentients.
Carbon freeze.
I've got a bad feeling about this, he decided as he was shoved forward onto the circular lift, and reached out into the Force once more.
***
It was done. Vader again emerged the victor.
He watched with a sense of triumph as the mist sealed Kenobi from sight; a coffin-like object rose up out of the pit, a relief of a human protruding from one side.
It was interesting, the sensation he had felt when the freezing had taken place. Instead of a slow decline of awareness, as he had thought he'd feel from Obi-Wan, there had been a brief flicker, like a candle being blown out.
He stalked up to Kenobi's frozen features, inspecting the Jedi's last mask.
Strangely enough, the expression Kenobi had imprinted on the carbonite was one of composure, not that of a trapped animal in the slightest. Vader had expected the latter, even for a man of incredible self-control like Obi-Wan.
On impulse, he reached out to lightly tap against the carbonite shell.
Dong-dong-dong-dongggg.
Strange. It sounded…hollow.
His pulse quickened as he looked to the life monitor implanted on the side. It showed no sign of life whatsoever.
No…
Vader probed inside the carbonite with all his power, and felt only a lingering tendril of Kenobi's presence. In sudden trepidation, he punched the release controls as the stormtroopers and aides stood in silence, looking on.
The carbonite slowly melted, collapsing in to reveal a cavity.
For the first time in decades, Vader wanted to scream, keeping silent only for the sake of reputation. He knew Obi-Wan was still alive; he would have felt his death had it happened. Kenobi had escaped the coffin; the candle had been blown out only to flicker to life elsewhere. Even living, the man was still a ghost.
There was only one explanation; Kenobi had rediscovered an art lost eons before the formation of the Old Republic, an ability out of myth.
He had become a needle-tipped thread in the fabric of space-time.
***
Torn, Luke remained in the doorway as the others started outside, having reached the Falcon's platform at last.
First Leia noticed, then the others as she turned back to go to him. "Luke…I know you want to find him, but there's no way we can get him back right now. Mara's right—"
"No," he interrupted. "I can stop Vader. I have to go. If I don't, Ben's going to die."
"Luke!" she cried after him as he turned and ran back into the city. Leia couldn't bear the thought of losing both him and the general in one day.
A pained look in his eyes, Han started out to the ship again.
"Han!" Leia yelled angrily. "We can't leave Luke!"
He wheeled around at her. "He brought his X-wing here. If we're leaving, it's now or never. Are you coming?" he snarled at them all, but especially Leia.
Artoo tootled miserably at the calculated possibility of losing his owner.
Leia sighed, sympathizing, and put her hand on the top of his dome. "I know. But Threepio's waiting for you on board."
The droid perked up incrementally and followed after Han, the rest of them trailing behind as well. Their pace quickened considerably when another company of stormtroopers made an appearance at the door, blasters firing.
"Come on," Han shouted, pointing them up the boarding ramp and waiting until everyone was inside. Then he sprinted up the ramp, his heel coming up a moment too late. Han stumbled inside as he closed the boarding ramp, smelling burnt leather.
The Falcon whirred to life; he figured Chewbacca had already reached the cockpit when he felt a slight but telltale push of inertia. They had lifted off quickly, decidedly a good thing under these circumstances. He hobbled to the cockpit, wincing.
Leia met him halfway. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine," he growled, brushing past her. But to his surprise, he found Chewie was still heading for the cockpit; the Wookiee had been one of the last ones in. Lando's flying, then?
No; he rounded the corner and saw Lando, Mara, Artoo and Threepio in the main hold. His eyes widened, and he rushed to the cockpit, forgetting about his singed heel for a moment. Who the hell is flying?
Chewbacca gave an enormous bark of joy when he opened the cockpit door, and practically leaped inside.
"What…?" Han limped in after him.
Obi-Wan sat at the controls, his hands guiding the Falcon up out of the atmosphere.
"How'd you get here?" Han exclaimed, his words echoed by Chewie.
"I folded myself through space-time. You'd better sit, now," said Obi-Wan.
The ship began shaking under atmospheric turbulence and Han stumbled back into one of the navigation seats while Chewbacca let himself fall into the copilot's chair. Despite his attention drawn to the pitching of the ship, he'd noticed that Obi-Wan's voice was considerably hoarser than last he'd heard it. Teleportation? he wondered, ignoring Obi-Wan's ragged voice for the moment. How'd he manage that?
The door shot open, framing Mara. Han looked back at her and was startled; it was the first time he'd ever seen her smile with such genuine openness. Too bad she doesn't more often…but I'd better not tell Leia that.
"Kenobi," she said. "I might have known."
Chewie saw a faint smile spread across the Jedi's face—then Obi-Wan froze.
"What?" asked Han worriedly, afraid something inside the Falcon had malfunctioned.
"Luke. I sensed him before. Where's Luke?" There was no mistaking the sickened anxiety in his voice.
"Oh…he's down there, looking for you." Han's heart sank at his own words.
Obi-Wan stared off into the stars, gripping the controls so hard his knuckles turned white. He remembered vividly the scenes Vader had pushed into his mind, and now it could become reality.
Wait…there had been something else he'd felt. Vader had withheld from him the thought that these things would never come to pass, but Obi-Wan had found it all the same, still familiar with the basic workings of Vader's mind after all these years and changes.
That thought had meant Vader felt a connection toward Luke.
Oh, no. No… Obi-Wan's anxiety twisted into full-blown dread; he made himself push it out of his mind. Despair is of the dark side.
But the question remained: When did Vader learn Luke is his son?
Chewie's concerned grunt brought Obi-Wan back out of his thoughts. They were in orbit around Bespin, and Obi-Wan would not be able to arrive soon enough to help. Teleporting back was impossible; he'd exerted too much energy from folding to the Falcon in the first place. All he could give Luke now was his support.
Deep inside, the primal anger that was his by right of human inheritance stirred. All his days in the Temple had been centered on that one thing, on quashing the monster inside him. A similar monster resided in everyone, and Obi-Wan had never been an exception. But he recognized this ire as not an uncontrollable rage; it was the wide-eyed conjoined companion that whispered confidentially into Obi-Wan's ear: If Luke dies, there will be hell to pay.
***
Darth Vader felt a grudging satisfaction as he watched Luke rise into the chamber, borne by a small round lift. This was one part of the plan that had worked out, anyway. He had muted his respiration machinery for a minute and stood in the thick silence that was suspended in the strange-smelling air.
Keeping his eyes trained on his son, Vader allowed his breathing to start up again. Indeed, this boy was powerful. "The Force is with you, young Skywalker. But you are not a Jedi yet."
Others would have been deterred by the voice; Luke was drawn by it. He made his way to the stairs, ascending warily to stand perhaps two meters from Vader, reaching out to see if he could get a better idea of what he was up against.
Vader delayed, standing as a statue, waiting for Luke to make the first move.
The wait seemed to exert a forcible pressure on the boy; he evidently could not keep still much longer and ignited his lightsaber.
Vader brought up his blade in response, easily parrying Luke's first few attacks. Then Luke's offensive began to progress considerably; Vader probed the Force more carefully. "You have learned much, young one."
"You'll find I'm full of surprises," Luke said through clenched teeth.
Then Vader found the source. Kenobi had the outright brazenness to feed strength to the boy. Outraged, Vader's defensive tactics shifted to offense quickly, pushing Luke to the floor. A flick of the wrist and Luke's blade flew out of his hand, the boy tumbling down the stairs. Luke moved just in time as Vader's feet connected with the ground where his head had been a moment earlier.
Rolling up, Luke centered his weight, keeping a vigilant eye on Vader as his mind searched for his lost lightsaber.
"Your destiny lies with me, Skywalker. Obi-Wan knew this to be true."
"No…"
***
Obi-Wan heard Luke's unknowing denial as if he was there himself, and it pained him.
He had known. Vader was right, but not in the sense that the Sith lord spoke the words. Obi-Wan had known for over a decade that Luke's destiny was closely intertwined with his father's, though exactly how he'd never been able to see. One way or the other, Luke would develop his abilities, maturing his potential, and Vader would be an influence in it.
Like the flexible plane of space-time had laid itself before him to distort with the Force, so now various avenues were exposed to his mind, showing him a thousand possibilities. But all these thousand were produced from two main beginnings. One of the roads in the fork was, though narrow and winding, brilliant with light and power. The other lay cast in darkness, broad and downhill but littered with stumbling stones. The dark path had a foul stench of abused power and twisted pleasure, where the lit way shone pure of these hedonistic values and inviting anyone who wished to partake.
It was one way or the other, and the choice was Luke's alone.
The battle moved quickly, playing out in his mind; Luke jumped from the pit, clinging to tubes hanging from the ceiling and, finding his lightsaber, leaping off.
Vader was on to him quickly, employing techniques Obi-Wan hadn't seen before, which meant they were of Vader's own development or exclusive to the Sith.
Likely both, Obi-Wan decided, knowing in the latter scenario he likely would have recognized something, and tried to catalog the movements for use in any possible future fight as he kept giving his support to Luke, who was coping better than expected.
Through Luke, he heard Vader's words: "Obi-Wan has taught you well. You have controlled your fear…now release your anger."
Luke only became more cautious at the words and realized his foolhardiness; he moved into the defensive position Yoda had drilled into him, readied for the coming onslaught.
Quick moves were exchanged as Luke pushed Vader back, unsure of whether the Sith lord was getting wearied, or if he was merely playing with him and tiring Luke out before striking.
"Only your hatred can destroy me."
If Vader's plan was the latter, it was working. Though he kept stepping back at Luke's blows, his part defensive, part offensive positioning was nearly flawless.
Luke complemented a dazzling combination with a midair flip over Vader's helmet, though his strike at the Sith's back was met immediately by the blood-red blade. Despite his frustration to slip past his foe's defenses, he managed to maneuver Vader back onto a ledge.
Vader lost his balance, falling over into the manmade chasm that held the outer rim of pipes. Luke peered down, trying to make out where he had landed, but the lack of light didn't permit him. He deactivated his lightsaber and dropped down into the unknown, Obi-Wan's mind following along.
***
It was dark in this part of the city.
The door had shut behind Luke, accentuating the feeling that there was no turning back. Whatever was down here was his to deal with, now. His eyes widened to accommodate for the darkness as he investigated all corners from his position.
Vader was waiting.
It happened so quickly, his mind hardly kept up; suddenly he was being battered with fragments of machinery torn off the walls and hurling themselves toward him. He managed to dissect a few with his lightsaber, but it was too much to keep up with…
One hunk of metal crashed through the window, breaking the barrier between higher and lower pressure. The very core of Cloud City was hollow, a perpetual gale tearing downward past the numerous gantries set up in the massive conduit. Luke was sucked out of the window and bodily hurtled out into the tubular chasm, his fall fortunately cut off by one of the gantries. He managed to haul himself up to the solid surface and lay there, gasping, his hands gripping the edge as he gazed down the city's main to oblivion.
***
Still careful to supply Luke, Obi-Wan now turned a covert attention to Vader, intending to cautiously monitor him for the rest of the duel, looking for the Sith lord's next move.
What he actually found was of far more interest. Vader was not only armed with his blade and the power of the Force, but with simple fact as well.
No, no, it's too early for Luke to know… But Obi-Wan was helpless to change Vader's intent. Any such intrusion would immediately be noticed, and the Falcon's location would be quickly revealed, only delaying the inevitable by perhaps a few minutes. It was far too late to tell Luke to abandon the fight; the young man was cornered. There was nothing Obi-Wan could do to stop the words from coming.
He kept an acutely attuned connection with Luke, opening the channel even more and letting Luke recognize where this extra support was coming from, feeding it through calmly and steadily. This was a foundation Luke could trust to rest on.
Luke ventured into a tunnel that connected the gantry with the rest of the city, his silent lightsaber firmly in his hand. If there was a way back up—
Vader came out of the shadows, his blade blazing to life and swinging at Luke, who was by now hard pressed to defend himself. All thoughts of offense had been driven from Luke's mind as he sought only to protect himself from the unstoppable driving progress of the red blade, and he realized Vader had been toying with him earlier.
I should have known, Luke thought desperately, searching for more support from his mentor.
As if on cue, Vader's mechanical voice wove itself into his mind. "You are beaten. It is useless to resist. Don't let yourself be destroyed as Obi-Wan did."
By now Luke had backed far onto the gantry, the wind buffeting his face as he took a headlong swing at Vader's shoulder. It actually nicked through the armor, rising a small column of smoke before Luke was forced to defend himself again. Vader's attack was losing its earlier finesse; his sword came slashing through three metal cylinders that held up an instrument complex and the wind carried the machinery off, pushing it upward like a snowflake at first and then letting it drop.
It was human instinct that distracted Luke's eye to glance at the tumbling complex, and Vader seized the opportunity.
The red blade came in, severing Luke's right hand just below the wrist. The hand dropped away with the lightsaber still in its grasp as Luke cried out in agony and disbelief, staring at the horrific stump for a moment before tucking it under his left arm and working his way to the cluster of machinery that hung precariously at the end of the gantry, standing only on a metal ring and gripping desperately at a single handhold.
Vader came to the edge of the walkway, rendering any retreat Luke might have made impossible. There was nowhere to go.
The Sith lord held out his hand as a token of offering. "There is no escape; don't make me destroy you. You do not yet realize your importance. You have only begun to discover your power. Join me and I will complete your training. With our combined strength, we can end this destructive conflict and bring order to the galaxy."
Luke's voice edged onto hysteria as he tried to find a better position. "I'll never join you!"
Still irrevocably connected, Obi-Wan knew what was to come, and slumped down in his seat aboard the Falcon, tasting a dish that had been served to him before. The bitter sensation of failure.
Vader continued, knowing his words were being delivered to a second audience. "If you only knew the power of the dark side. Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father."
"He told me enough!" Luke choked out raggedly, unable to ignore the searing pain at the termination of his right arm. "He told me you killed him."
Up in orbit, Obi-Wan squeezed his eyes shut.
"No. I am your father."
***
Obi-Wan suddenly shouted hoarsely, wondering if it was an apology or a denial: "It wasn't meant to happen this way!"
Chewbacca jumped and stared at him, moaning apprehensively.
Leia had slipped in before and now reached out to grip the side of the pilot's chair, turning it sideways so she could see him. "What happened?"
He stared into her eyes, wide with helpless anxiety. "He…Luke…he's alive. But…we have to go back down."
Han sat upright. "What? Why, where is he?"
"He's cornered." Obi-Wan didn't dare close his connection with Luke now, but it hurt him immeasurably to keep it open. All he felt from Luke was frightened betrayal. "He's going to let go…we have to go now."
Han took over the controls and twisted the Falcon into a steep dive back towards Bespin, and Cloud City.
Obi-Wan searched as the Falcon dropped into the atmosphere, speeding towards the jeweled city on the horizon that eclipsed the sunset. "I'm going to the top hatch." He took Leia's hand for a moment. "Show Captain Solo the way to Luke."
"What…?" She was startled.
"Keep an open mind, and you'll know where he is." Obi-Wan left the cockpit.
Flustered, she turned to look out the window as Chewie glanced back at her and uttered a question.
Han was frustratingly bewildered. Obi-Wan hadn't even told him where Luke was supposed to be… "Chewie, keep your eyes on the sensors."
"Wait." Leia stared out as she felt a strange connection click in. "Wait. He's on the bottom of the city."
"What?"
"Just go," she snapped. "And release the lock for the top hatch."
As they neared, to Han's amazement, he saw a human form hanging onto one of the hundreds of weather vanes that protruded from the city. "Hey…"
The form as well as the weather vane dropped down to jerk with a stop, starting to swing.
Leia's eyes widened in panic. "Hurry, he's falling!"
"I know, I know!" Han gunned the engines as Chewbacca roared for Luke to keep holding on.
Even though it was outside of the ship and too far away to hear regardless, all three could have sworn they heard an ominous snap as the weather vane finally broke off under pressure it was never meant to bear.
"Luke!" Leia screamed as he and the vane tumbled down, quickly obscured by the clouds underneath.
The Falcon groaned as Han pitched her into the steepest dive he dared.
Chewbacca glanced at the sensors and Han learned a new Shyriiwook profanity just then as the Wookiee barked in shock.
Luke was rising, up and out of the clouds.
Another sensor reading showed that the top hatch was being opened.
Coming out of the gaseous mists, they saw Luke simply hovering in mid-air.
Han shook his head. "First teleportation, and now this…" He gestured out to his airborne friend. "I don't know what your general eats, but I want some for breakfast tomorrow morning."