In Hyperspace, No One Can Hear You Scream
Darth Vader marched through the corridors on his flag ship, Executor, and was met with the unusual sight of his 18-year-old son, Luke, coming towards him. Outside the viewports it was permanently night with only the long white stripes that were the stars as they flew through hyperspace, but even by standard time it was the middle of the night.
"Luke, what are you doing up?"
"I couldn't sleep," the boy answered. "I feel wired."
Vader could guess why. Luke was finally old enough he could join the Imperial flight academy. He'd already enrolled, and starting next week when they returned to Coruscant, he would leave home to begin his training. Vader could appreciate his son's enthusiasm, all the same...
"You need to go to bed, Luke."
"I can't. I'm excited, I've been waiting for this for so long."
"I know, but you still have another week," Vader reminded him.
Luke nodded. "I know, and the waiting's driving me crazy. I wish it was over."
"It will be soon enough."
He wouldn't admit it to anyone, but the dark lord felt an almost hollow sensation behind his chest plate, at the thought of his son moving out and leaving the Imperial palace. For the first time in over 20 years, since he'd married Padme, who'd died in childbirth, he was going to be alone. That was a topic he preferred not to think about, he couldn't stop the day from coming, all he could do was be happy for his son as he began his training and started his own life.
"Lord Vader," one of the Imperial officers on the ship's crew approached the two of them. "Forgive me for interrupting, but we've picked something up on our scanners I believe you should see."
"What is it, admiral?"
"There's something approaching the Executor, it could be a ship."
"Could be?" Vader inquired.
"We're not sure, we tried to make contact but there was no verbal response, but we are picking up some sort of signal. We think it could be a distress code."
Luke turned to his father. "What could that be?"
"Go back to bed, Luke," Vader told him, and followed the admiral to the bridge.
"I told you to go to bed," Vader said when he returned and saw Luke was waiting for him.
"What's going on, Father?" Luke asked.
"It appears to be the wreckage of a ship," Vader said.
"Recent?"
"Not likely."
"But the distress code."
"Probably an automatic system with a 500 year battery," Vader commented.
"But what're you going to do?" Luke asked.
"We're bringing it in," Vader answered. "If there is anyone alive, I want answers as to what happened and where, and if there isn't, the technicians can determine if anything's worth salvaging."
It wouldn't do to ponder what in Darth Vader's mind there could be worth salvaging when he had the entire Empire and all its resources at his feet. Luke knew what the rest of the galaxy did not, that his father, long before he became Darth Vader, had been a slave on the planet Tatooine. When that was how you grew up, a poor slave family in the desert, a mindset to save anything that could be of use later was a first nature. Even 30 years later, old habits could be hard to break. Luke smirked, chuckling to himself at the idea that his father was basically a pack whomp rat. That certainly wouldn't do anything for his public image as one of the most powerful and deadly forces in the universe.
"Can I help when they bring it onboard?" Luke asked.
"No."
Luke actually pouted when he heard that. Vader was sure the boy wasn't even aware he was doing it, but he was, and behind his mask the dark lord chuckled to himself.
"Can I watch?" Luke tried again.
"Luke, they'll be working on it all night."
"I'm not a child anymore, Father," Luke insisted, "besides, I'm not tired."
Vader also rolled his eyes behind his mask. He knew he wasn't going to get anywhere arguing with his son.
"Very well, but stay out of their way," he told his son.
Luke was beaming from ear to ear. "Thanks, Father."
"And put on an anti-contamination suit, we have no idea where that ship's been."
"Yes, Father," Luke rolled his own eyes in like.
"It was a ship once upon a time," one of the Imperial officers told Vader about an hour later. "There's no way now of finding out what happened to it or even the name of it."
"Any bodies?" Vader inquired.
"That's difficult to answer, there was something fossilized covering part of it. Our first order was to run the standard decontamination protocols to make sure any viruses or space bacteria didn't get picked up in the ventilation system. From there we try to figure out just what it is we're dealing with, the technicians are examining it."
"Where's Luke?" the dark lord was certain he already knew the answer.
"He's sticking around to see what we find." The officer added with a small, knowing look, "Out of our way, naturally."
"Good."
The officer offered a faint smile. The entire crew on Executor knew Luke and had watched him grow up, they knew just how important he was to his father, they also knew the dark lord had raised his son to stand back and let the crew work undisturbed. It never stopped Luke from watching, asking questions, or offering to help. Over the years they'd all gotten used to it. It was obvious despite all attempts of the dark lord's upbringing, his son was going to do whatever he was going to do, it wasn't that he'd ever flat out defy his father, but the boy had his own plans for how he was going to live his life.
There was static on the comm link and they both heard Luke's muffled voice come over, "Father, you've got to see this."
Darth Vader reached for his comm link and asked, "What is it, Luke?"
"We found something," Luke answered. "These weird green eggs, dozens of them."
"Eggs?"
"They're huge, and there's something inside of them, they're...moving...they're...look out!"
There was a hiss of static and the sounds of a struggle and then the link went dead.
Both men rushed to the hold where the wreck had been reined in by the flagship's tractor beam. Before they reached it, however, they saw several men in anti-contamination suits huddled together and rushing towards them.
The rest were standing on either side of another member, holding him up, pushing him along.
Vader felt his heart pound against his chest wall.
It was Luke.
Something...there wasn't any other way to describe it except something, had shattered his helmet and was wrapped around his face.
"What happened?!" the dark lord demanded to know.
"We found a batch of eggs on that wreck," one of the men answered as they moved as one to make their way through the corridors, "they're viable, one of them opened up, that thing came out of it."
They were running towards the med bay, Vader stood to the side so they could get through but followed right behind them, his heart felt like it was pressing up into his throat. What had happened to Luke?
"What in the hell is that thing?" Vader demanded to know as he looked at his son laying comatose in a med bay bed with that thing still attached to his face, and a long tail wrapped around Luke's neck.
He was able to get a better look at, whatever it was, now. It looked like some crossbreed of a giant space crustacean, and two giant skeletal hands. Its long claws were wrapped tightly around Luke's head, completely engulfing his face with its body, only a few tufts of blonde hair were visible on top of his head.
"We don't know," one of the medics, a white haired man in his 50s who looked like he'd seen everything in the galaxy imaginable until now, answered simply as he finished peeling off his anti-contamination suit. "I've never seen anything like it. It appears to be sentient, maybe not in the sense we know, but it definitely appears to be aware. We've tried to remove it, and when it senses that, it tightens its tail around your son's neck. It's letting us know if we attempt to remove it, it will kill him."
"But Luke is still alive?"
"Yes, well, you can see he's still breathing, though it's not necessarily of his own volition. This thing, whatever it is, paralyzed him, and put him in a coma. For all intents and purposes, it seems to be supplying him with oxygen through..."
"What?"
"The scans picked up a long proboscis that's been inserted down his throat, stemming from the creature. It tries to strangle him if we try to remove it, but at the same time it is essentially breathing for him."
"Why would it do that?" Vader wanted to know.
The medic shook his head. "I don't know." He looked at the dark lord and said pointedly, "we're still running scans, can I speak to you outside?"
Vader wasn't sure what was going on but he followed the medic out into the corridor.
"What is going on?" Vader demanded.
"I'm not sure if that creature is capable of hearing, if it comprehends our language," the medic explained as he folded his arms against his chest, "but it can anticipate when we attempt to remove it. We've tried prying the claws off of your son's head, and all it does is tighten its grip. It has an alarming strength for something so small, I don't believe any number of us could get it off, it would only rip Luke's face off in the process." He sighed, "We tried amputating the claws, we got one off and it started bleeding acid."
Behind his mask, Vader's eyes widened. "Luke?"
"It didn't touch him, but it melted part of the floor and scorched part of the exam table, that's not an option," the medic told him.
This was unacceptable to Darth Vader.
"What is it doing to my son?"
"I don't know," the medic shook his head. "I think the only chance we have of separating the two is to carbon freeze both of them. Maybe during the thaw, the creature will lose its strength and let go. I'm not sure if it can be killed, or how, it has a perfect defense mechanism, you don't dare kill it, but if it's weakened by the freeze we may be able to trap it and study it and find out what it is and what it's doing to your son."
"Is there no other way?" Vader wanted to know.
"I'm afraid not. We won't keep Luke in hibernation long enough for sickness to set in, and we'll keep him in a controlled thaw, sedated so he won't experience many symptoms, heavily monitored for any side effects. Just as long as that thing can't possibly figure out what it is we're going to do."
Now Vader understood, that's why he wanted to speak out here.
They looked in the window of the room, and Vader looked over to the bay's carbon freeze chamber. It was generally reserved incase of an outbreak of a foreign disease that needed to be preserved and studied, but it was large enough to freeze humans. Compared to cruder freeze chambers, they could transfer Luke from the table right into it and the chamber would close on him horizontally. In theory it was all very simple, it would be over all so quickly. Vader felt his heart racing in his chest as he considered all the things that could go wrong, and it quickened its beats even more when he considered the alternative if they didn't try freezing that thing.
"Do it." As he said the words, he felt like he was condemning his son's very life.