16 The Epic: The Cracks in Vader's Armor (Sriluur)

Before Coruscant. Before Hoth. The cracks that allowed someone in.

Eva recalled that Sriluurian sunset, alone…squatting on a cliff overlooking the vast barren terrain. Her helmet in her hands, she was sick to her gut and fresh from her first hands-on kill. There was no end- no resolution in sight. The mission infiltrating the Rebel Alliance had gone on so much longer than originally promised. Vader knew she was ready to throw herself over the edge. With the device, he saw the deep, craggy expanse through her own eyes, and said nothing.

"Go away…" she whispered.

A death meant nothing to Vader anymore. But he was not absolved of emotion in that moment. Yes, Eva would have been completely dumbfounded if she had jumped off that cliff and hadn't dropped. He had power now. He could stop things from going badly. Old wounds ached while he recalled someone else so pushed to despair, she simply lost all will. For once Vader was more disturbed at his reflection, than at ease lashing out with the same hurt which he'd been damned.

Though great was his aggravation at the use of his time, he did not begrudge Eva for the impending drama. More than once his own thoughts had skirted the same. But there was the mission to consider and Eva being suicidal did much to diminish his arsenal of motivations. Not just the obvious one, to her own well-being, but threats of torture, threats to her family and Doum, all did no good if Eva were dead. His typical m.o. was failing in this instance, when Eva was showing the most promise to get him Skywalker. There was another treatment that drew excellent response, but he hated being made to participate- 'Think further back…Ahsoka.'

To get what he wanted, he'd have to be human. He would take Eva under his wing.

In the still moments of late evening, the next time Vader's low voice remotely directed Eva with some broken part, he granted her patience his closest officers never knew existed. And he quietly began the first of several recollections about, of all things, a teenage girl –'Snips.'

Vader had been a man of few words. He was direct and didn't elaborate, as though interaction with another being was onerous. The first recounts were simply factual, slow to unfold and heavily censored. "…A difficult start. I had a reputation for recklessness… recklessness which transcended into bravery when my skills caught up." Then growing in detail, enriched with perspective, through Vader's voice emerged another being entirely; a young Jedi equally confident, but with purpose built of hope instead of wrath. The galaxy had been his playground.

When Vader came to the room aboard the Executer where the devices in play were supervised (before he also had monitors installed in his quarters), it was Eva's progress he wanted to see. 'Be wary of self-fulfilling prophecies,' he'd tell himself as he looked on at the screen of what Eva viewed. He was gathering much more than a firsthand account of the Rebel's inordinate concern for their member's safety, and their shabby gear. And somehow he sensed this dilapidated backwater rebel base, this cluttered work table where a conversion regulator sat awaiting repair, were leading him to resolution- not just of the present conflict, but his own past digressions.

" 'His deeds will not…be forgiven, until he merits.' " Eva's voice interrupted his thoughts. For a brief moment Vader's breathing subsided, then returned long and steady. "Why did you say that?"

"It's written on your chest- the chest plate…I mean." She spoke softly as she tried to pry open the flight helmet to get at the regulator.

The words the Emperor had put there. Vader had long since attempted to translate the tiny lettering, below and divided among the three red rectangular buttons. But he hadn't been able the work out the middle line as it was actually upside down. Eva had glided right past his difficulty.

"Did it end badly with Snips?" The very order of the present, indicated it did.

"No. A stalemate."

In his story telling, he had painted all around an unmentionable time, something cataclysmic. A great schism when the galaxy's fate and his own life had turned in a seeming instant. She went on, "But they are all gone, the people from this time you've told me about?"

For a brief moment, he lost himself in Eva's voice, her disembodied presence. As though she were his own conscience speaking to him. "Nearly…with one, important exception. Their ways made them obsolete." Surrender already. When will the fighting be over? "They could not see what needed to be done. And I have always offered mercy for those who come with us."

"Was it worth the cost?'' her words slipped out. "I mean…did things transpire as you wished?" Now the galaxy was his hostage.

Did he desire to have his limbs lost and his skin incinerated ? The demise of his wife and kidnapping of his child? No, he wasn't going to go there…

Beyond the personal invasion, Eva simply wanted to understand. "You don't have be enslaved by your past. Or the present. It's not over yet. Your will is all that matters."

BONUS PARAGRAHS TILL END- REDUNDENT? IN OR OUT, SCOTT?

How could he relay any of his old uncertainty, with the way things had played out? And while his allegiance had flipped in an instant, Vader's mindset had not. He had doubts as he slaughtered children. He had doubts when he could not convince Obi-Wan to side with him. But that was long time ago. So far past the point of return, it mattered no more…

"Your guilt does not define you. You define your guilt," Eva whispered.

These tales, of close-calls in swashbuckling adventure during the time of the Republic with this 'knee-high' girl - they were the antithesis of the Vader Eva knew now.

Vader stopped speaking for a moment and held his breath- simply to silence the distracting respirator. The telling was all wrong, because his voice was all wrong. He had once heard Palpatine speak in different voices, but it was a Sith ability he hadn't taught. All the more disturbing as it was only perceived— a trick inside Vader's very mind.

Vader cursed himself and dismissed it all - the longing for his un-mechanized voice, his virile body… "The plate below," he added. "It's warped. You'll have to take apart the relay switch."

She looked down and saw that it was true. The soldering iron she retrieved failed to heat and she threw it on the table in frustration. "I guess we'll have to fix that too."

"I don't have time for this."

Eva sighed in defeat. Then she dared to ask, "Don't go."

When was the last time anyone had wished that of him? Silence fell but for the sound of his breath.