Luke

"Oow, my head." Luke muttered as he slowly opened his eyes and found himself lying in a strange bed in a strange room. When he tried to sit up, the black-gloved hand of his father pushed him back down. The young Jedi turned his head so he could see his father's black mask. "What … what happened?"

"You were drunk, Son." Vader told him, a disapproving note in his voice.

"Drunk? But I couldn't be drunk!" Luke protested wildly and tried to sit up again. His father made no move to stop him but the crazily spinning room convinced Luke to lie still for the moment. Resting his head back onto the soft pillow, he sent his father a puzzled look. "How did I get drunk?"

"By eating General Solo's poison cake."

"A poison cake?" Luke thought back to the other night, his brow wrinkled with the effort. "I do vaguely remember a chocolate cake. Hmmm, it tasted really good! But what do you mean it was poisoned? Is that why I'm in the hospital?"

"It was Solo's lame attempt to poison the Emperor." Vader explained as he sat on the edge of Luke's bed. "Luckily for you, Son, there was no true poison in the cake. Unfortunately, he added a massive amount of caffeine and alcohol."

"I got drunk from a CAKE?" Luke stared at his father, finding it hard to believe. "Why, that's just stupid! I don't even like alcohol! I don't see how Han can drink that awful stinky stuff, but that cake on the other hand…"

"Enough about that cake!" Vader said, anger beginning to grow within him again. Drat, but having children was one disaster after another! "What do you remember about meeting Palpatine?"

"Palpatine! I met Palpatine?" Luke's mouth dropped open.

"Yes, when I found you in his Throne Room you were spinning around on his throne until you broke it."

"I don't remember anything like that at all." Luke admitted. "Was he trying to turn me to the Dark Side?"

"I don't know, Son. When I arrived he was playing Whomp Rat." Vader realized he was getting nowhere with this line of questioning. Perhaps a change of tactics was in order. "Tell me what you DO remember."

Luke closed his eyes, concentrating. Then a broad grin spread across his face and he crossed his arms behind his head. "I met the most beautiful girl ever!"

Vader narrowed his eyes. "You … met a girl? But I thought you can't speak to girls?"

"Well, I think she did all the talking. It's kind of fuzzy, if you know what I mean."

"Where did you meet this girl, Son?" Vader asked, concerned. All sorts of worries flew around in his head. Who knew what sort of woman his son had encountered while drunk and high on caffeine?

"On the street. She had a speeder, I think. Yeah, a bright red speeder and she told me to get in." Luke, unaware of his father's growing concern, still had the dreamy expression on his face.

"You let some unknown woman pick you up?!" Vader bellowed, shaking his fist at Luke. "Standing on the street like that! How could you do that?"

"Huh?" Luke blinked his blue eyes, confused. "What?"

"Where did you two go?" Vader demanded to know. "What did you do together?"

"I don't know!" Luke admitted, embarrassed. He was beginning to get the idea that his father thought they had DONE something together. At the thought, Luke's face turned even redder. "I'm sure we didn't do anything!"

"Luke, you shouldn't be letting strange woman pick you up. For all we know, she might have been dangerous!" Vader informed him, the Sith Lord calming down somewhat. "Now tell me what she looked like or can't you remember that? And I would still like to know how you ended up at Palpatine's Palace in his Throne Room."

Without warning, Luke shot straight up in bed. "I remember now! I was going to a birthday party!"

Vader groaned inside his mask. "No, Son. That was the message Solo had written on the cake! It was not Palpatine's birthday."

Frowning, Luke lay back down and grumbled under his breath.

"What was that?" Vader asked, unable to understand the mumbling.

"He's such a crook!"

"Solo?"

"No, Palpatine! He swindled me into buying him a present and I don't even LIKE him!"

Vader held onto his black helmet with both hands, groaning loudly. His son couldn't even see it had been his friend Solo that had cheated him and had made him sick. "The woman, please?"

"She had these amazing green eyes and long hair like flowing fire. Aaaahhhhh, she was gorgeous!" Luke closed his eyes so he could see her again. A picture of his dream woman formed in his mind. There she was once again, expertly driving the airspeeder through the busy traffic lanes of Coruscant. "And how she ordered me around … I wish I could see her again!"

Vader snatched the image from Luke's mind and bolted to his feet. "That's Mara Jade, the Emperor's Hand!"

"No, Father. She wasn't one of Palpatine's old, dried-up, wrinkly, alligator-skin hands! She was a GIRL! You know, a G-I-R-L? Don't you know what a girl is? You wanted me to meet one and I did!"

"AAAHHHHH!" Vader screamed in annoyance and used the Force to break the glass door on one of the medicine cabinets.

"You got to help me find her!" Luke added as he reached for his father's hand.

"No, Luke. You must stay away from her! She's the Emperor's private assassin! She's dangerous!" Vader gripped his anger again, trying to hold it under control. How in the galaxy did this ever happen? It was a nightmare! His poor, naïve son and that red-haired beast! Why, she would eat him for a snack and spit out his bones!

"But I don't want to stay away from her!" Luke protested loudly as he held onto his father's mechanical hands. "Besides, I think she likes me!"

"Jade likes no one, get that through your head. She's unfeeling, cold as Hoth ice." Vader's mind moved like a ship in hyperspace. What had Jade been doing there, in the same place Luke had been? The only answer was that she had been sent. Was his son a target of the Hand? Or had Jade only been sent to pick Luke up and take him to Palpatine? Since he was still alive and relatively unhurt, the second might be possible. Still… this was not good at all. "Forget about her."

Luke crossed his arms over his chest, pouting.

"Hey, Kid! How you doing?" Han walked up to Luke's bed and ruffled his blond hair. "We were really worried about you. Got yourself good and drunk, huh?"

"I guess. I really don't remember much," Luke told his friend. "Except for this girl I met. Except I can't see her now because she's an assassin."

"An assassin!" Han exclaimed, laughing. "Boy, Luke, you sure got some rotten luck!"

"It's not funny, Han. I want to see Mara again! Father knows her but he won't cooperate! He has her confused with one of the Emperor's old moldy hands!"

"Look, Kid, can I borrow your father for a moment? There's something we need to discuss." Han motioned to Vader and they moved to a quite corner of the room. "Look, Pops. I'm trying to collect some money from this guy and since you can see him and I can't…"

"NO, Solo. I will not go along with your idiotic schemes." Vader shoved a finger into Han's chest. "Do not make me angry, Solo, or what happens next will not be my fault."

"But…"

"NO." Vader stalked away, going back to Luke's bed.

Han stood there for a moment, his smuggler's brain clicking. "Stupid Sith! There HAS to be some way to collect that money…"

Turning around, Han glanced into the cabinet with the broken glass front. Could there be something in there that would enable him to see that old guy, the one Luke was constantly blabbing to? "Crazy old coot probably isn't dead at all. I bet he found some way to make himself invisible. Yeah, that's what he did. People that are really dead don't talk to anyone…."

Reaching past the shards of broken glass, Han pulled out several bottles. He peered at the labels but the words on them didn't tell him anything. Heck, he couldn't even pronounce them. The vials with pills in them he discarded right away, for they would be useless. But the giant bottle filled with some odd liquid, now that held possibilities! "Yeah, this will do nicely!"

Turning so his back was to Luke and Vader, Han unscrewed the bottle's cover and grimaced. A horrid stench rose from the bottle and its thick pink ooze. "Bleah! This stuff smells worse than a dead rancor on Tatooine! Glad I'm not sick."

"Hey, Kid! Is your friend around?" Han asked as he casually strolled up near Luke's hospital bed, the open bottle hidden behind his back. All he had to do was fling the pink liquid onto the invisible guy and he could catch him then! "You know, that invisible one?"

"You mean Ben?" Luke asked, surprised Han was taking an interest in his old mentor. "Sure, he's standing right next to Father."

Han hurled the bottle in Vader's direction, the thick pink liquid flying all over the Sith Lord's black helmet and mask. Thick gobs dripped down his armor and arms, coated his chest panel of blinking lights.

"SOLO!" Vader bellowed as loudly as his mask would allow. "I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"

"Uh-oh!" Han barreled out of the room, his boots slipping on the pink slop. He almost fell but grabbed onto a wheeled bed at the last minute. The bed started to roll and Han leaped aboard it, steering it out into the corridor. If he could get the bed moving fast enough…

Wiping the pink stuff off the eyeholes of his mask, Vader started to run after Han. But one of his boots stepped onto the bottle and he lost his balance, falling to the floor where he landed in a large puddle of the stuff.

"Father! Are you all right?" Luke asked, worried. "I don't know what came over Han. He normally doesn't act that way at all."

"I am all right, Son." Vader slowly got to his feet, disgusted with his appearance. The Sith Lord could see his reflection in the shiny surface of one of the medicine cabinets and it was … horrid! No, it was worst than horrid! It was …

PINK.

Yes, the pink medicine had coated Vader from head to foot and now he was totally pink. It was unacceptable! How in the Force would he get back to his quarters without anyone seeing him like this? It was a nightmare of the worst kind! If his men saw him like this…

"Father?" Luke asked.

"What?"

"Do you have any more of that yummy cake?"

To be continued…