Chapter 6 – Valediction

Vader was terrified.

Beneath him, crumpled in the sand, was a pile of robes. Rested atop it was that very lightsaber with which he was so familiar. The weapon which had robbed him of his limbs.

Its owner was nowhere to be found.

This was not how Vader envisioned their encounter unfolding.

It had begun well enough.

"Kenobi," Vader said. "We meet at last."

The old man was silent. He looked at him with somber sincerity. A gentle breeze caused his robes to sway, Vader's cape to billow.

"Where is she?" Vader asked.

Kenobi feigned ignorance. "She?"

"The girl. My daughter."

"Darth Vader has no daughter," Kenobi said. "He is not a man, but a machine."

Vader drew his weapon. He ignited the blade and brandished it menacingly.

"I will not play games with you," he said. "Tell me where she has gone."

"Away from you," Kenobi said. His lightsaber was grasped in his weathered hand. He made no move to activate it. Vader realized then that he had no intention to defend himself. Why? Did he not fear death?

"You will fail," Vader said. "Soon, you will be dead, and there will be nothing you can do to keep her from me."

Kenobi retorted, "If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."

It was a senseless thing to say. But that was how the Jedi spoke. They did not understand power, raw and tangible. They dealt in the abstract; in semantics, in truisms, in platitudes and aphorisms. Kenobi's threat was nothing but a lofty valediction. It was empty at its core, like the Jedi themselves.

And yet.

Vader didn't understand what happened. He had stepped forward, not as a foe, but as an executioner. Kenobi closed his eyes, the look on his face one of resignation, or rather, of peace. Vader did not stop to contemplate it. He sliced through Kenobi's midsection. The blade encountered no resistance at all. Kenobi's body simply… melted away.

He prodded the robes with his boot. Nothing. He reached down and picked up the lightsaber, considering it for a moment before clipping it to his belt. Had he succeeded? Was Kenobi truly dead? He couldn't be certain. How typical. Once again, his old master had somehow found a way to thwart him. Vader experienced no satisfaction, no catharsis, in obtaining his long-sought revenge. Instead, he felt more frustrated than before. Kenobi was gone, like a flame extinguished in the wind, and the girl was nowhere to be found.

She must be his priority. Kenobi was ancient history. She was the future. Together, he and his daughter would be invincible. As soon as he found her, all would be set right.

If he found her.

Δ Δ Δ

In contrast to their speeder ride from earlier, Luke was awfully grim this time around. He drove without speaking, eyes dead set on the empty horizon.

"Luke?" Leia ventured. "Are you all right?"

Why was she asking this? What did it matter to her, anyway?

"He's gone," Luke said.

"Ben?"

Luke nodded.

"How do you know?"

He did not explain. Leia did not need him to. She knew it was true.

"I'm sorry," Leia said.

Luke held his silence. A minute passed, and Leia was convinced Luke was not going to speak again, but then he said, "He's the closest I'll ever have to a real father."

Leia didn't know how to react to that. It wasn't the sort of thing one said to a stranger. Or at least, not the sort of thing Leia might say. Even with her closest friends – with Val, with Biggs – she was reticent. Out of necessity. Her past had to be a mystery to them, for their own good. Yet Luke was opening himself to her, mere hours after them having met.

Her lack of response did not seem to deter him, either. He continued. "I never knew either of my parents. My father died in the Clone Wars. My mother… I don't know anything about her. My aunt and uncle raised me since I was an infant. But they never treated me like their son. Not really."

Leia could understand that. She didn't know her birth parents either. And while the Organas treated her as their own, on some level Leia knew it wasn't the same. She didn't know what was missing, per se, but she knew there was something… else. Something she never had.

"When I was sixteen, Ben showed up one day and told my aunt and uncle that it was time. I had no idea what was happening. Nobody explained anything to me. Ben took me to his home and taught me about the Force."

The Force. Everyone seemed to be talking about it. Vader. Luke. Ben.

"What is it?" Leia asked.

"The Force?"

"Yeah."

Luke squinted. "Ben would be able to explain it better than me," he said, and Leia could hear the pain in his voice. A minute passed. She wasn't sure whether Luke was collecting his thoughts, or had merely decided upon silence. But then he spoke. "The Force is an energy field. It pervades everything. All living beings."

"I don't understand," Leia said.

"Neither do I," Luke admitted. "The Force isn't something you understand so much as feel."

"Feel?" Leia echoed.

"Do you ever feel people's emotions? Do you ever sense things before they happen?"

Leia was about to say no when she stopped. She did have that power, didn't she? When she was in the cockpit, she could see her enemies next moves before they happened. She could feel their confidence, or their panic. But Leia had always thought that was mere intuition, nothing more.

"I can help hone your abilities," Luke said. "Like how Ben helped me."

"Thank you," Leia said.

They drove on.

Leia looked to her right at the empty desert. The speeder moved so fast, the sandy sea was reduced to a yellow blur, the distant plateaus mere blotches on the horizon. She thought about Luke's explanation of the Force.

It made no sense.

And yet it made all the sense in the world. Closing her eyes now, she thought she could understand. Because she felt… something. What was it? Sorrow. Bitterness. Anger.

Did that come from herself?

No.

It was Luke. This young man whom she barely knew. She felt his emotions so tangibly, it was as if they were her own. How?

The speeder began to slow. Grimy buildings dotted their surroundings as they reached the outskirts of a town.

"This is Anchorhead," Luke said. "We'll make a quick pit stop here."

"Why?" Leia asked. "Shouldn't we go straight to Mos Eisely?"

"Open up the glove compartment, would you?" Luke requested.

Leia did.

"I want to pawn off whatever we've got," Luke said. "It won't be much, but we're going to need every credit we can find to get a ride out of here."

Leia found a dusty pair of macrobinoculars, along with a glowrod and a sun-powered compass.

"Quite the haul," she said.

Luke ignored her sarcasm.

A minute later, they were pulling up to a blocky building made of sandstone. A sign above an open door frame, faded Aurebesh script chiseled into the rock, read TOSCHE STATION. It was about as decrepit a structure as Leia had ever seen.

"Stay here," Luke said. "I'll be right back." He scooped up the cluster of items and hopped out of the speeder. He climbed the stairs and disappeared into the building.

Leia bounced her leg anxiously as she waited. She should have insisted more forcefully that they not stop and continue driving. She didn't know why, but she had the sense something bad was going to happen.

But the minutes ticked on, and nothing happened. Leia allowed a small sigh of relief. She was being paranoid, that's all. It wasn't hard to understand why. The past few days had been terribly stressful. The past few years, more like.

Her thoughts shifted from the past to the future. Say they did manage to secure a flight out of here, where would they go? There was one option that came to mind. The little girl in her thought of it at once. She would be safe there. She wouldn't have to run anymore.

Coward.

But what was the alternative? She had no idea what she was doing, and it wasn't as if Luke knew any better. They were just two kids, the both of them. They were in over their heads. She needed to swallow her pride and do the sensible thing.

Go home.

If she could even call it that. Leia didn't know what Alderaan was to her now. Maybe it was nothing more than a refuge. Her parents wouldn't see it that way. They would demand that she stay and become their daughter again; they would make her become their heir. But it was too late for that. Bail was no longer her father, Breha no longer her mother.

Leia reached into the rucksack between her feet. She sifted through its contents before finding the cylindrical hilt of the lightsaber. This had belonged to her father. Her real father. What was his name? Leia hadn't even had the chance to ask Ben that simple question.

Luke emerged from the dusty building. Tucked under his arm was a brown sack.

"It's not much," he said, settling into the driver's seat. He offered Leia the sack. "Five hundred credits."

"That's not nearly enough," Leia said. She untied the sack and peered inside. "A flight out of here is going to cost us tens of thousands of credits. Five hundred isn't even a drop in the bucket."

"I'm trying here, okay?" Luke snapped.

"Clearly not hard enough!" Leia retorted.

While they argued, neither noticed an approaching vehicle until it pulled up right behind them. The pair looked in the window and collectively blanched. It was an Imperial troop transport, heavily armored and bristling with armaments.

"Luke," Leia said. "What do we do?"

"Just stay calm," Luke said. "Hide the credits."

Leia stuffed the sack into the glovebox.

Through the mirror, she saw two stormtroopers alight from the vehicle. They held carbines to their armored chests as they approached.

"Do they recognize us?" Leia asked.

"I don't think so," Luke said, his lips scarcely moving. "Otherwise there'd be more of them."

He made a good point. But either way, they were bound to recognize her at the very least. Could she cover her face somehow? With what?

The stormtroopers reached their speeder, one on each flank.

"Sir, we're going to need you to leave the area," the one on the driver's side said to Luke. "We're conducting a search."

"Yes, of course," Luke said, refusing to make eye contact. He reached to start the engine.

The stormtrooper on Leia's side of the vehicle stared at her. Leia kept her head bowed.

"Wait just a minute," he said.

Leia's heart jumped in her throat. Had he recognized her?

"What is it, Keller?"

"This one matches the profile."

The other stormtrooper walked around the hood to get a better look. In her peripheral vision, Leia saw Luke's fingers inching to his belt. Her hand darted out, grabbing his wrist to stop him.

"No," she mouthed.

"Ma'am, step out of the vehicle," the stormtrooper said.

Leia looked up. She didn't know what compelled her to say it, but with the utmost confidence, she told the stormtrooper, "I am not the person you are looking for."

She could not read his reaction on account of the mask. He was silent. Incredulous, perhaps. He was about to arrest her. But then…

"You are not the person I am looking for."

It took all of her willpower not to say "Really?" How had that worked? Were stormtroopers really that dimwitted?

"You will return to your vehicle and drive away," Leia continued, with that same confidence. "Both of you," she added, with a glance for the other one.

"We will return to our vehicle and drive away," they said in unison.

For good measure, Leia concluded by saying, "Good day."

"Good day," they echoed, dazedly.

The stormtroopers walked away.

Luke and Leia stared at the window as they watched the troop transport rev up and drive away.

"That was incredible," Luke gasped when they were gone. "How did you do that?"

Leia shook her head. "I have no idea."


Author's Note: I apologize for the short chapter, and for the long delay. What can I say? Life is busy. This sort of chapter is always the most difficult to write, when there isn't much happening. It's all logistics at this stage. Next chapter should be more interesting, hopefully!