Chapter 7
A/N: Thanks for the reviews everyone, I appreciate it!
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Obi-Wan cursed as he swung his lightsaber. The sooner he could fight his way back to headquarters, the sooner he could contact Captain Friese and tell him that he was heading to Dagobah to meet Master Yoda. Yoda had called to him through the Force.
Obi-Wan wanted to call headquarters so that he could simply make his way to his fighter without stopping to tell Captain Friese of his departure, but his comlink had been blasted to pieces when he had instinctively threw it to block a blaster bolt. Cursing again, he sliced the head off an Imperial Stormtrooper, pausing for a moment to watch it sail over the sky and land cleanly upside down, reddening the snowy ground.
He lost himself in the battle. He was no longer Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi Master. He was the Force itself. The Force guided him. And this was truly the difference between Jedi and Sith. Jedi allowed the Force to use them, using the Force only to do the Force's bidding. The Sith use the Force to do their own bidding.
Obi-Wan backed off from the frontlines, turned, and sprinted to headquarters, yelling for men to cover his position as he did.
--
"Request permission to dock at main hangar bay. Sector six dash four three," Anakin repeated through the com. He shook his masked head. Were Imperials always this stupid, or was it just because he had been away from them for so long?
A response came from the Executor. "Permission granted. Stray from your course and be immediately destroyed."
Anakin sighed, and activated his voice vocabulator. "Do you realize to whom you speak to?"
The guard listened intently, and heard the mechanical inhaling and exhaling of Vader's suit. "L-Lord V-Vader?" he whispered incredulously. "Yes, sir, welcome back, we will secure your private docking bay for entry, sir."
Anakin liked being in power again. Now if he could just do something about that blasted Emperor...
--
"You're leaving?"
"Yes, captain. The Force bids me to go to Dagobah."
"But that's miles away!"
"Everything is miles away out here in space, captain."
"It's just an expression, Obi-Wan."
"Well it's a flawed expression."
Captain Friese gritted his teeth, and looked at the digital holographic representation of the raging battle outside. He had been counting on having a Jedi around for the duration of the Battle of Hoth. "Obi-Wan, you must stay here!" he ordered, looking up.
But the Jedi master was already gone.
--
Anakin settled into his hyperbaric chamber. As the robotic arms pulled off his helmet, he shook out his new hair. He reached out with his left hand and pressed the comlink button.
"Lieutenant, bring up the transmissions screen. Direct connect to frequency seven-eight-two-six."
"Yes, milord."
Anakin didn't bother to tell the captain to call him "Master Skywalker" for the upteenth time. If they wanted to refer to him as "his lordship", that was their problem, he didn't really care. There were more pressing matters to handle.
--
"What is thy bidding, my master?" Tarra's soft voice resounded in the empty room.
Emperor Palpatine continued to stare into the remaining unfinished portions of the Death Star. The whole facility would be completed in a matter of days. He smiled, then turned to his young apprentice. "I sense ... conflict ... within you ... Petra," he drawled.
"Yes, master. When I was in control of the Naboo attack, I ran into Anakin Skywalker."
The emperor held up a hand to silence her. "Yes ... I have foreseen it." He smiled. He could feel her pain and anguish. "And he was probably the greatest apprentice I will ever have."
Tarra seethed with anger. What about her?, she thought furiously.
A deep laugh resounded across the room. "What have you done, Darth Petra? What have you done that Darth Vader did not do?"
She thought back. She hadn't actually done anything other than the invasion of Naboo. Just training. "My training..." she blurted out.
"Lord Vader destroyed the Jedi for me. He brought me to power."
For you! Tarra almost blurted that out in her state of shock. So Anakin Skywalker did not betray the Jedi, after all. He was forced to do the Emperor's bidding.
It all suddenly tied together. Anakin did the Emperor's bidding in hopes of saving his wife. But before she could figure the rest of it out, she was suddenly struck with pain. Electricity surged through her slim body. A laugh again resounded in the room. "And now you are my apprentice, as Vader was once mine!"
Tarra cried out in pain. She was vulnerable to lightning, just like everyone else. Her recovery from Anakin's attack in the med center on Tatooine – the only med center in Tatooine, come to think of it – had been done without any electrical supplements. She had made a full recovery.
Then the lightning stopped, and the pain subsided.
"You are dismissed."
"Very good, my master."
--
"Anakin?"
"Yes, master. I have recovered the Executor. The men have pledged their loyalty to me, and have renounced the Emperor."
"That easily?"
"Well, it took some ... persuasion to get the stubborn ones on my side," Anakin said, glancing to the side where two Imperial officers lay, their necks distinctly broken.
Obi-Wan frowned in hologram. "You don't need to –" he started, but Anakin cut him off.
"Obi-Wan, the ends justifies the means. Anyway, I contacted you to ask you something else."
"Anything, Anakin."
"What do you know about Force healing?"
"What?"
"I've tried for years to heal myself, but it doesn't work. I can breathe on my own for a few minutes, then I go all dizzy. I need to learn how to heal myself completely, master. Teach me."
And that is what Obi-Wan did, for the next two hours.
--
Montu Kiljek startled awake from his deep meditation. He had felt pain. Extreme pain. He felt the presence of a Sith Lord. And he felt the familiar force signature of his old padawan.
"Tarra," he mouthed. Then he rose, grabbed his lightsaber, and sprinted out of the room.
--
"You will let me have your starship," Montu Kiljek spoke, waving his hand out subtlely.
"... what, are you kidding me? Give you my starship? Just let you have the Millenium Falcon? Heck no, the Falcon's mine," a boy who couldn't be much older than 14 responded.
Master Kiljek frowned. Either his Force powers were diminishing, or this boy's stubbornness was stronger than he thought. "Is she fast?"
"Only the fastest ship in the galaxy."
"I'll pay you 100 credits to fly me somewhere."
"100? Are you crazy? The fastest ship in the galaxy and you offer only 100? That's an insult, that is! 500!"
"500 is too much pay for a galaxy taxi, you know that."
"It's not a galaxy taxi! It's equipped with weapons to blast those bloody TIE fighters out of the sky!"
"200."
The boy was firm. "500."
"200," Montu said, waving his hand again.
The boy looked at Master Kiljek. "200 it is. C'mon, let's go."
The two clambered on board.
"So, my name is Han Solo. Where you headed?"
Montu frowned. "I'm not sure, actually."
Han's mouth opened, and it hung there, giving him a perfectly stupid appearance. "You don't know where you want to go?"
Montu shook his head. "No, I'm afraid I don't." Han shook his head, and fired up the controls, muttering about crazy old men.
--
Anakin sat in his private quarters, in his private hyperbaric chamber. He had asked that nobody disturb him, and he sat quietly, his every fiber of his being focusing on his lungs. His breathing would be healed.
He had done the same thing for months, and could slowly feel his progress. His lungs had become stronger, to the point that he could stride out of his hyperbaric chamber and walk around, seeing things on the Executor with his own eyes for the first time since ... ever. As long as he did not over-exert himself, he could breathe fine. But if he ran, or trained, without his breathing mask, his lungs would be bombarded with a searing pain and he would stop breathing to stop the pain until he could return to his hyperbaric chamber and seal the room breathing pure oxygen again.
His eyes opened. Flicking a few switches, he depressurized the room strode out, his mask off, and all circuits on his suit turned off. He stubbornly strode into the training room, activated the blaster droids, and began training.
One minute passed. His breathing was fine, his vision unclouded. His heart was not racing as fast as it had been the day before.
Another minute passed, then another. Anakin, still without his mask, continued to swing his lightsaber in fluid motions, deflecting the blaster bolts the droids sent at him.
An hour later, Anakin raced from the training, back to his hyperbaric chamber, where he placed his mask back on, breathing in oxygen as his lungs seared with pain. Then he repressurized the room and removed the mask. He had always hated his mask.
He smiled. In a few days or so, he would have been able to have full use of his lungs. He closed his eyes, and focused once more, on the tissue in his lungs, slowly putting the alveoli back together.
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A/N: END CHAPTER 7! I won't be able to update for awhile, as I'm going on a short vacation for the next week or so. Then school will start, and things will be pretty hectic. I will try to continue updating throughout the school year. After all, I do need to procrastinate all day any – errr ... I meant every now and then. Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter!