This was written from the prompt which is a lyric from Repo: The Genetic Opera: Have I failed my daughter/son? Then let the father die! And let the monster rise! It takes a lot of inspiration from the father-child premise of Repo as well.
Hope you enjoy!
The shuttle shuddered around him. The lights flickered. His blaster sat hot and heavy in his hand, and Luke wished Commander Ante had taught him how to use it. He felt like he could hear shots in the distance, like cannonballs impacting, but there was nothing. It just made him queasy.
He could fly. He was a superb pilot, even if his father had never let him fly in high stakes situations before, for obvious reasons. And he wanted to make a difference. That was all he needed, surely? His job here was to be the getaway pilot. His allies would get in, get the job done, then get out, and Luke would get them all lost and hidden in the forest of buildings he knew so well. That was all he needed to do.
They knew what they were doing. They were well-trained—better trained than he, a random wannabe flyboy they'd pulled out of the academy, was. He could trust them, they could do this, and then he would fly away, scot free. And the galaxy would never be the same because of what they—he—had done.
The blaster was a mere precaution. Commander Ante had given it to him with a grim smile, and a shake of the hand. He hadn't told him anything about handling a blaster; perhaps they didn't expect him to need it. Luke was young, naïve, and optimistic—but he wasn't stupid. If things went south, and he did need the blaster, it wouldn't be for fighting his way out. That would be a lost cause, leading to a far slower death.
He wished he could have said goodbye to his father, though. If it did go wrong. Which it wouldn't, but…
The lights stopped flickering. That was because they went out entirely.
Luke swallowed. He threw himself out of the pilot's seat and huddled down against the console, feeling like—knowing—someone was in the hangar. Someone was looking around. He couldn't see the viewports from here, so hopefully they couldn't see him.
His blaster sat hot and heavy in his hand. When the time came, he would know how to use it.
Footsteps. Heavy ones. And a horrible rasping sound, like sandpaper against sandpaper, that made Luke shiver.
Keep his head down. They would pass him by.
But they didn't.
They stopped. The landing ramp of the ship was down—of course it was, they needed to make a quick getaway—so the heavy footsteps just strode right up it. Luke's brain sparked, and he smacked the button to close the automatic doors to the cockpit, locking them.
The footsteps, loud enough they echoed in his dreams, now, halted.
Luke took in a deep breath, tasting ice crystals on his tongue. It was so cold in here. It would damage the machinery.
But he forgot all about machinery when the blazing crimson blade thrust through the door. He screamed instead.
Vader had spent thirty years leaving and returning to Coruscant, and every time it was a new emotion upon seeing it. This time, it was relief. He desperately wanted to see Luke again.
He debriefed with Palpatine as quickly as possible—even interrupted one of his meetings with his courtiers to do it. Palpatine just seemed more amused than anything, especially as one Moff tried to object to Vader barging into their highly sensitive discussion and Vader had glared at him. He cowered back, wobbling in his burgundy robes. Vader could not smell anything through his respirator, but the way the Moff's companion tried and failed to disguise the disgust in his face indicated his fear had driven him to something else.
Palpatine was perfectly open about the fact he took pleasure in their fear. It fed the dark side, after all, and if Vader was the attack dog they all feared, they would never dare cross the Empire.
Even so, Vader himself took no pleasure in it. He nodded in acknowledgement of the exchange, gave his report, then swept out again. Being monstrous was a necessity, not a hobby.
He had quarters in the Imperial Palace—ones that he had rarely spent a night in. Only when he was severely injured and didn't want Luke to see. But he used them regularly, nonetheless, and now the moment he stormed through the doors they locked with a snap behind him. The hyperbaric chamber was right ahead of him, and he condescended to allow the droids within to remove his cape, his robes, his mask, his helmet. And with trembling hands, bleary eyesight, and lungs gulping in highly oxygenated air all on their own, he released the compartment for his other outfit and shrugged it on.
Black gloves, still, but padded to disguise the ungraceful durasteel grip underneath. An Imperial officer's grey uniform, unadorned with badges or stripes, with a dark jacket over it. His breathing mask, which wound around the lower half of his head and connected to a filtration system at the jacket back. And then, to top off the ridiculousness, thick-rimmed, circular black spectacles to help his eyes. A woollen cap over his scarred head, which tied under his chin, for when the flights around Coruscant got cold. Luke had knitted this one for him himself when he was twelve; while the colours were uneven, blue sliding into green and abruptly stamping yellow across the rim, with a red bobble, it was Vader's favourite possession.
He didn't wear the hat indoors. He was meant to be an aide, and aides had to wear their caps. So he wore a cap and dealt with the cold until he was outside again, breathing in the toxic Coruscanti air. The sun was setting on Imperial City; the grime and smoke in the air shone a murky gold. His spectacles fogged up as they always did before the myriad of coatings on the glass cleared it up for him.
He walked casually to his speeder in the hangar, as always finding the lack of staring from the stormtroopers strange, and climbed in. Eyed the winter day outside and thrust his head into his bobble hat. And then—finally—he went home.
"Luke?" he called. It wasn't loud; he regularly strained his voice when he tried to speak without his vocoder. Luke was always fussing over him for that.
He could sense him, and he could sense that the boy was already running downstairs. Untrained in the Force or not, he was well-attuned to his intuitions. "Dad!"
When Vader turned around from hanging up his heavy outdoors coat on the rack, a teenaged ball of gold barrelled into him. He held him there, tightly, closing his eyes for a moment. He could not cry anymore, but he would have. Everything in him collapsed in the direction of his small, shining star, the warmth radiating into his durasteel heart.
"I thought you weren't coming until Taungsday!" Luke said. There was a faint hitch to his voice; Vader couldn't cry, but Luke could, and he was empathetic enough to cry over any emotion. Another feature of not knowing how to control his own Force abilities—but training him would be far more dangerous.
"The campaign was over sooner than expected. I was able to come home to you early." Vader did not want to let go, but Luke did anyway, taking his hand and tugging him up the stairs. His hair had grown out in the weeks Vader had been away; it tickled his ears now, framing his face in a way that betrayed Padmé's softness in his features. But his smile was as radiant and crooked as ever. "Hello, young one."
"I'm not young," Luke complained. "But—Vader let you go? I figured there'd be a lot of paperwork to deal with after… that."
Vader considered how to respond for a moment. "I was able to get away." He didn't have any qualms about lying to Luke, especially if it was to preserve his safety or happiness, but Luke's powerful instincts would tell him if Vader told him an outright lie. He did not want to risk raising the smallest suspicion.
Luke didn't question it. He just turned away and grimaced. Vader wouldn't have noticed if Luke hadn't lit up in the Force with nervousness like a traffic light flashing amber.
"Are you content with that?" Vader said carefully, as they emerged from the stairwell and into their living room. It was a cosy, comfortable place, done up in a middle ground between warm colours and Luke's favourite colours, though nothing too bright. Spending most of his time staring at a world stained red meant Vader disliked bright colours when he wasn't wearing his mask. But the yellow light streamed out of the lamps, casting their golden reflections against the floor-to-ceiling windows on both walls, and it was the same calm, homely apartment Vader always returned to.
Except for the vivid blue blare of the holoprojector, and the news report playing.
Luke's eyes blew wide, and he scrambled to turn it off. "Sorry. I thought I'd already done that."
Not fast enough to stop Vader from realising what he was watching, however. "Is that news channel licenced?"
"Of course it is." Luke responded too quickly. "We can't pick up illegal ones."
"That footage looked far more violent than standard Imperial channels would allow."
"Not all licenced channels are standard Imperial channels."
"I am well-aware of that." His tone added the and displeased, but Luke would have picked up on it anyway. He winced.
"I like seeing a broader picture."
"That is not what I would call propaganda."
"I know, I know." Luke flopped down on the sofa, kicking his slippers off before drawing his feet underneath him in a cross-legged position, and switched the holoprojector back on. Footage from Vader's most recent campaign on Mimban splattered itself across the holo. Mud, blood, and death were thick there; the image shook as a stormtrooper's bolt flew at the holocam and struck the photographer, who stumbled and dropped the cam in the mud.
"That," Vader said when the footage blacked out and the news reporter was back, "is certainly not licenced footage." He took a note of the station name scrolling in the corner—the Starry Gazette, a suspiciously innocuous name—for investigation. No licenced channel other than the ones thoroughly under Imperial control had been allowed to film there.
"You're not denying that it's real," Luke observed.
"I was there, Luke. Of course I know it is real. War is messy, particularly the war on Mimban. It is why Lord Vader was there for so long."
"And you with him."
"Yes. I am his aide." That was the only direct lie he could tell, and that was only because he'd been telling it for so long.
That didn't mean Luke wasn't watching him appraisingly. "A stormtrooper shot a reporter. An innocent bystander."
"That is unfortunately a danger of warzones. Getting shot. Which is why being sanctioned by the Empire is important, or else you risk walking in without adequate protection."
"That shot looked intentional. They're saying it was." Luke gestured at the screen, to where a Twi'lek woman was reading out reports of casualties from the campaign—particularly the civilian ones.
Vader waved his hand and turned it off. "You understand that channels like this will always try to present one version of events? They have a small amount of footage and are trying to spin fact into fiction out of it."
Luke was staring at the holo, now gone dark, and back at Vader. "It just turned off?" The remote was still in his hand.
"Perhaps you accidentally pressed the button," Vader offered. Luke looked unconvinced but put the remote down.
"Would you like something to eat?" he asked finally. "I have some leftovers I can make into soup."
Vader had not had any 'real' food other than nutripaste since Luke had last cooked for him. "I would like that." Luke knew that his accident—something too painful for him to talk about—had left him struggling to stomach most foods, so he'd taken that as an excuse to make soup the best food one could possibly have. "How many spices do you intend to put into this one?"
Luke was already chopping garlic. "As many as we have," he called over his shoulder.
"And how many is that?"
"Well, I went shopping earlier, so…"
"All of them?"
"I cleared out the supermarket aisle."
Vader laughed. It was a low, scraping sound that hurt his throat, but he always enjoyed it. It only ever happened in Luke's presence. "I think you feast with more luxuries than an emperor, sometimes."
"Judging by what his breath smells like, the Emperor only eats prunes."
Vader stilled.
"What?" he asked. It was a flat, half-angry tone—his default when he didn't know what to think.
"Sorry." Luke glanced up and gave him an apologetic look, before nearly chopping his thumb off and turning to look at what he was doing again. He poured oil into a pan, the sizzling loud and fierce. "I know no one is allowed to criticise him." There was a touch of sarcasm to his voice, but the apology was sincere.
It didn't matter. "That is not what I…" Vader shook his head. Focus. "You have met the Emperor?"
"Yeah? He was doing those charity tours of the local private schools a few weeks ago. I'm top of my class in political analysis, apparently"—Luke's sceptical tone was earned; that was the most blatantly false excuse Palpatine could have concocted—"and apparently of good stock, so he spoke to me for a few minutes. It made the front page of the school newspaper. I think Vader must be really impressed with your work or something, for him to have mentioned you and me to the Emperor."
Yes. Indeed. "Whether or not Lord Vader is proud of my work is a mystery I will never decipher." It was surprisingly easy, referring to himself in the third person so regularly. Even easier, in fact, than acknowledging that the monster who slaughtered civilisations and the single father who loved Luke Naberrie were one and the same.
But if Palpatine had gone behind his back to meet Luke…
His master knew about his son, of course. But he had never pushed his luck this far. He had never tried to lay his hands on the only person in the galaxy Vader cared about.
"Was it simply a formal greeting for the media?" he asked finally. It was quiet enough that he doubted Luke could hear him above the bubbling of the saucepan, but Luke always heard him.
"Seems to be. I think they're trying to boost their image by showing that they provide job opportunities or something. He offered me an internship as the Senator of Coruscant's aide—maybe it's something about showing that even children without noble blood can advance, maybe it's about showing that children should follow their parents into the workplace, I don't know. I'm still thinking about taking it up."
"Do not take it."
Luke jerked at the vehemence in his voice. He dropped his knife, looked at Vader, then fished it back from the floor.
Vader forced himself to calm his tone. Luke was not a soldier, and barking orders like he was on a battlefield would not help this situation. "I do not want you to follow the same path as me." It, again, was perfectly true.
Luke snorted. "What's so bad about being an aide? Don't get me wrong, it sounds boring, but—"
"It takes me away from you for weeks at a time," Vader threw back, a smile in his voice. Luke's chatter faded into a laugh.
"I'm fairly sure no one stays on Coruscant more than the Senator of Coruscant, Dad."
Vader thought of how many holidaying senators and officials he'd run into on Scarif, when last he visited. They came to a top-secret base… for the beaches. The arrogance. "You would be surprised."
"I'll take your word for it. But I don't think I'll take the role. I don't wanna be a media puppet." He wrinkled his nose as he threw the last few ingredients in the pot. Vader didn't recognise what they were.
"Good. That is a fickle career indeed."
"Says the guy who works for the spook who strangles people with his mind!" Vader waited to see if Luke connected the odd behaviour of the holoprojector with that comment for a moment, then relaxed when it seemed he did not.
"The majority of them find they quite deserve it."
Luke snorted. "You even talk like him sometimes. I was watching footage of him giving orders earlier and you really share some speech patterns."
Vader ground his teeth. "That is what happens when you spend seventeen years working with someone."
"I guess so." Luke finally turned down the heat and put the lid on the soup to let it simmer. "That's gonna be about half an hour. We can eat then, but in the meantime—can I show you something in the garage? My speeder started acting up and I can't figure out what it is."
"I hope you haven't been flying it to school despite knowing that something is wrong with it. That would be incredibly foolish." He gave him a hard stare.
"Hey, it's not like I have any other means of getting to school! No buses come to this block. And it's such a long walk."
It was. They were right on the edge of Imperial City, far beyond the school's catchment area. Luke had only been allowed in because Lord Vader had applied pressure to the administration to let his favourite aide's son go there.
"I will help you," Vader conceded. "But tomorrow, I will fly you to school."
"Even if we manage to get it fixed now?" Luke slipped his slippers back on and set a timer on the cooker.
Vader rested a hand on his back to guide him away. His son leaned into his touch. "Even then."
He couldn't help but notice the next morning that Luke's uniform was too small for him, with an inch or two of skin at the wrist and ankle. Luke had always been a diminutive boy, just like his mother, but it seemed that he had finally hit that stage of his growth where he grew and grew until no fabric could keep up with him. He'd had growth spurts before, but perhaps now he would grow taller for good!
Perhaps. Vader didn't know whether he wanted that to happen or not. He liked that Padmé's genes were so prominent in their son; it meant there was less space for his to work their corruption.
"Are you ready?" he asked, waiting for Luke to put down the spanner. He had, in fact, been ready for half an hour, if one ignored the fact that getting Luke out of the garage at any moment was a struggle.
"I'm ready!" Luke shuffled out, shoved his bag into Vader's—Mr. Naberrie's—speeder, and sat himself down in the driver's seat.
"No."
"Please!"
"No."
"I'll—"
"Will you let me pilot your speeder?"
Luke opened his mouth—then closed it again.
"Move, Luke."
Luke huffed, moved to the passenger's seat, and let them take off. He sat back, taking off the cap he had to wear as part of that dull uniform of his, and tilted his head so the wind ran through his hair.
The naked joy on his son's face whenever they flew never failed to delight him.
The journey was too short, even if it was at least half an hour in the morning crush, and they were hardly speaking at all. Vader was loathe to let Luke go from his side when he reached the brick of a school, but he wasn't given a choice. Luke caught sight of one of his friends, chirped a goodbye to his father, then leapt out of the speeder. He didn't even bother with the door.
Vader fondly watched him go. Dozens of students were funnelling into the school at this hour, and he gritted his teeth as he saw Luke and his dark-haired friend approach the doors, only to be shoved out of the way by a larger group. Luke's friend stumbled to his knees, his datapad toppling out of his bag. Luke caught it deftly before it hit the ground, helped him up, then they tried again to enter.
He looked away before he could get any angrier. He had home-schooled Luke for years, getting private tutors and droids and everything he could afford before he realised that wasn't the way to go. Luke loved people. He was curious about everything. Vader needed to unleash him on the world of education before he unleashed himself on Vader's world of secrets. Too much time spent to himself, thinking, and he would figure it out.
Besides. Bullies or not, Luke was happier here.
But if they knew who they were really pushing around…
…they would only hate him more.
Vader was a monster. Luke's father was a good man. He could not betray or harm Luke by letting the world combine the two.
He gripped the controls and made to soar away, only for a loud blaring horn to stop him. A well-dressed butler skimmed past him, battering the side of Vader's beloved speeder. Vader took in a deep breath, then let one out. The morning sun was too bright on his spectacles. His bald, scarred head hurt from all the noise. But there were still students streaming into the school, and he could not do anything about it.
As he waited for the torrent of speeders to pass, a splash of colour caught his eye. A flimsi poster, flapping in the wind towards him. The Force nudged him, so he nudged the Force, and let it flap closer—until it plastered itself over his face.
He grunted, grabbed it off him, and peered at it. The colours swam.
Are you a bully and a murderer? its title read.
Vader frowned. The motion hurt him. He read on.
Do you really want to join the Imperial military? Look at the massacres and injustices the Empire has wrought. Ryloth. Lothal. Falleen. Don't you want to do something to stop that?
There was more inane, poorly written text, but before he could read it, Vader crumpled it in his fist.
First Luke was watching illicit news channels. Now he found blatantly absurd Rebel propaganda flapping about the school campus. Did insurgents have no shame, targeting the young minds of teenagers? He knew Luke was intelligent enough to eventually move past this phase, but it was worrying nonetheless…
The airlane was clear. The speeders were gone. He needed to move, now, if he wanted to get to the military presentation of their achievements on Mimban in time.
But Vader did not move. He could feel his son glowing within the school grounds and found he didn't want to leave his fate up to chance.
Not yet.
When he did arrive, his master was less than pleased.
"Lord Vader. Get out of that ridiculous getup and into your suit." Palpatine stopped him in the middle of the corridor to say that—Vader scanned the area with the Force to check there was no one in earshot. No one but the Emperor's guards, who kept any secret told to them. "You are woefully late."
"I had important matters to attend to."
"Flying your teenage son, who is perfectly capable of flying himself, to school?"
"I have been away for months," Vader shot back.
Palpatine's ire melted away. "Oh! Of course. My sincerest apologies. You know how I focus on work, work, work, occasionally, and forget how much family means to you."
Vader said nothing, hoping to be dismissed. He needed to get into his suit, so he could start the day.
Palpatine did not dismiss him. "In fact, I find myself thinking, Lord Vader. He is such a vital part of your life, and you are my dearest friend. I understand he is nigh on adulthood and can care for himself, but you are away for so long… Would you like to introduce us, so I can care for him while you are away? He would—"
"My son is not going to be trained or serve the Empire."
"Yet," Palpatine corrected. "You did promise he would be of use eventually. Such Force potential cannot be wasted! I can feel him from here."
Vader really, really hated that fact.
"It would be for his own benefit," Palpatine cajoled. "My friend, he is a young man, and he has power at his fingertips he can barely fathom. Latent Force abilities, when unrealised, can make one's life most difficult."
Vader stiffened—that sounded uncomfortably like a threat.
His master noticed. "Oh, come now. I admire your protectiveness, but that is a simple truth. Is he not emotional? Is he not open and empathetic? Training could solve these issues of his."
"They are not issues."
"Not yet perhaps. But it is something to consider. In the meantime, I am attending a performance at the opera tonight—you and your boy should join us. I would love to meet him."
"You already have, have you not?"
Palpatine scoffed. "In a media circus? That is far from adequate for the child of my dearest friend. Though I do recommend he takes that position."
"I have work to do," Vader said. He didn't want to open that debate. He realised he was still wearing Luke's bobble hat, and he swapped it out for his cap, clutching the colourful wool tightly as he deposited it in his pocket. Luke's love was wound through every stitch.
"I wouldn't dare keep you." Palpatine stepped back to allow him to pass. "But do think about what I have said, Lord Vader. I understand that you hardly want your son to know that you are a monster, and I have diligently kept this secret for you all these years."
Vader tried very hard not to flinch.
"But ultimately… he is your son." Palpatine smiled. "It is his destiny to follow the same path as you."
Vader's work was brutal and bloody. It always was.
Interrogating their prisoners. Reporting his atrocities to the Moffs who funded them. It lasted for hours and hours, until his last job—one last interrogation, newly processed, that they were concerned about. They needed Vader, the best of the best, to get answers out of him.
He was a young, blond boy, barely twenty. He looked like he should be at Luke's school, with his round face and well-kept fingernails; he was no hardened Rebel.
But he had snuck into the Palace, for reasons unknown, and had been transmitting information to accomplices outside of it. What were they planning? What had he been doing?
What strike would the Rebels undertake next, when they weren't busy corrupting Imperial youth?
He got nothing out of the boy. No matter how he pushed and pried, he got stutters and screams: plan, help, torture, no. Nothing of use. Nothing of importance that matched the crimson klaxon flashing in the Force. He left the boy a bloody pulp on the floor, his head caved in like an overripe meiloorun. The cleaners would sort it out.
And anyway: he did this for Luke. Every monstrous thing. Every wicked act. It was an acceptable sacrifice to make the galaxy one where Luke would be safe from the terrible forces that had turned his father into this. Stamping out the Rebels, by any means necessary, was the first step to that. Their posters were still blowing in the wind.
He needed to go home. He needed to relax, to be around his son, and remind himself why the galaxy was still a beautiful place. So instead of visiting the mound of paperwork on his desk, ignoring the pings of meetings on his datapad, he went back to his hyperbaric chamber and changed into his aide's uniform. The galaxy was cold, without his heat-regulating suit, but he liked seeing in more than one colour. He saw more clearly when he was pretending to be someone else.
But. There was still his other life, lingering on him, like always. His sense of smell was no longer quite so acute, but even so, he could distantly smell that Rebel boy's blood on his gloved hands.
He scrubbed them for half an hour in the refresher, gasping for air through his transparent breathing mask, which was so much quieter than his respirator, before leaving. Hoping that was enough.
It was a short flight home. He flew too quickly, recklessly, poorly enough that he would have grounded Luke for a week if he saw him partaking in such risky behaviour. What was important was that he got back home, staggering inside and having to brace himself on the coat rack.
Luke's querulous, confused call floated down the stairs. "Dad?"
He pulled himself upright, but not soon enough. Luke appeared in the stairwell, the light at his back haloing around the crown of his head. "Are you alright? You look—"
"Tired," Vader finished. "It was a difficult day."
Luke's face drew blank and pinched. Vader wondered what he was thinking but didn't have the courage to know.
He just accepted his son's embrace when he stepped down to give it to him, leaning into his sunshine. The galaxy might be cold outside of his armour, but it was warm here.
Luke sniffed, and Vader's half-artificial heart seized. Could he smell the blood?
Judging by the look on his face, he could. But he didn't comment on it.
"I love you, Father," he murmured into his chest. "You know that, right? You're wonderful, and work so hard in such a difficult job, and you always try to do what you think is right. You believe in what you do. I'm proud of you." He spoke in short, repetitive clauses, one after the other. They would have been a soothing balm to Vader's fractured soul if they had been based on truth.
But they had not, so the words fell cold and empty into the chasm of ignorance between them. And Vader could only hold onto his son for so long: after a while, Luke detached himself from their embrace, mumbling something incomprehensible, and trekked back up the stairs.
Vader went to bed early but slept poorly. His misery, his terrible feeling, his discomfort, crescendoed with every passing hour. He didn't consider it might be more than self-loathing until he rose from his oxygenated sleeping quarters at 2300 to try to meditate in the living room. As he did, he tiptoed past Luke's door… and paused.
It felt dark in there.
He pressed the button to open the door and peered in, careful to be quiet. But there was no need. No one was in the room. The bed was still made—untouched since the previous morning.
His heart began to race despite the painful twanging of his pacemaker.
Where was Luke?
He stepped inside and switched on the light. There was no sign of a struggle: everything was neat, all the furniture in its place. Even the pleasant floral scent of the air freshener whirred on, undisturbed. But Luke was not there—and nor were his boots, or the clothes he always threw haphazardly over his beanbag. A thought struck Vader and he ran, his heavy metal feet clanking and stumbling as he forgot how to walk in these soft, narrow slippers, down the stairs to their garage. Luke's speeder was gone.
Luke speeder was still faulty—
Where was he?
Where could he be?
It was fear, not reason, which found the answer.
Palpatine had extended an offer to Luke, a way to become closer to him. He had devised a way to meet Luke once. He wanted Vader to introduce them properly, he wanted his hands on his power, he wanted him under his thumb like his father.
He wanted to turn Luke into a monster. Luke was not a monster. He did not even know his father was one.
That would change tonight.
Vader stared around the garage. He had a sizeable collection of ships; he worked on them with Luke as often as he could, painting them assorted colours, teaching him how to fly every one. One by one, they crumpled like a Star Destroyer in a gravity well. It swept through the garage in a way of destruction before he threw them against the walls, pieces flying and clattering back to the floor. One stayed untouched. The one he needed.
Palpatine would use his secrets against Luke. He would turn him into something terrible. Palpatine would hurt his son, and if there was something Vader would never allow, it was for Luke to get hurt. He would burn out the sun. He would drown systems in blood. Anything, anything, to protect Luke.
And yet he had failed. Too soft. Too smitten with his gentle life. He had been too busy being a father, he had forgotten what kept it all together, and now…
He had failed his son.
It was time to stop being the soft father. Now, he needed to unleash the monster within.
There was a hyperbaric chamber and a replica of the suit in their apartment. Vader had never used it, ever meticulous. But he dug it out from a secret compartment in his bedroom and used it now. For the first time, a monster towered in their living room. His shadow stained the sofa, the stove, the sturdy dining table they ate at. When he lit his lightsaber, it shed red light on the cold night.
He had never seen this apartment through red lenses before. He felt like a bounty hunter. An assassin, intruding on a peaceful life.
So he flew out as soon as possible and made straight for the opera. That was where Luke would be—he could sense him, even, as he hoped his searching senses were telling the truth and not telling longing.
The opera house was lit up with projections of posters, videos, promotions for its current performance. Spotlights spun outside it, demanding a wide berth from the late-night commuters who swooped in crosshatched patterns over and under the indigo, crimson, gold beams of light. Vader ignored all traffic laws and shot right for it, cutting off a chauffeur trying to find a place to set down his speeder and causing an eruption of squawking among the staff of the house. The moment he emerged, they saw him and went silent.
He stormed up the red-carpeted steps, taking them two at a time like he had so many years ago, when he'd been late to his own friendly meeting with the then-Supreme Chancellor. It had sent him down his deplorable path. He wouldn't see the same for his son.
The waiters, ushers, attendees, flung themselves out of the way for him. One had the guts to try to be helpful—"If you are here to visit His Majesty, my lord, he is in the Moff Tarkin's box, not the Emperor's traditional box!"
…it was helpful. Vader let him live.
Tarkin gave a scandalised sniff that definitely disguised a surprised gasp when Vader barged in, in the middle of a trembling aria. They were high enough about the common audience that no one noticed his dramatic entrance, other than a few shellshocked courtiers in the noble boxes on either side.
Palpatine certainly noticed but pretended not to at first. When he looked up, his eyes shone with faux delight. "Lord Vader! I am so pleased you could join us after all! If perhaps a touch late. Did you bring your boy?"
Vader froze.
He looked around.
The box was occupied by Tarkin. A man and a woman in their twenties who might have been Tarkin's children or aides or simply wards. Palpatine. A handle of irritating courtiers, like Sate Pestage. But no Luke.
"Where is my son?" he hissed.
Palpatine frowned, rising from his seat. The audience did notice, then—this was one in his honour—and the singing faltered while there seemed to be some uncertain shuffling below, because continuing strongly. "Whatever do you mean?"
"He is gone. He must be—"
"I assure you, Lord Vader, despite my invitation, I had nothing to do with his disappearance." Palpatine smiled. Vader did not trust that smile. "I would never go behind your back in this way."
That was a lie, but Vader didn't have time to contemplate it. Luke was here, somewhere. In the building. And there was—
A bang.
Fire.
Screams.
—danger.
He snapped his head up. The Emperor's box, above and across from them, had exploded. Thick burning mahogany splinters rained down on the audience below. Velvet curtains billowed in the rising hot air, flames eating them to shreds. The audience shrieked and squirmed, hiding under their seats, climbing over each other, writhing.
Shouts of rage. Someone pointing.
A shot.
It just missed Palpatine, but it exploded on impact; he hurried away, singed and indignant. "What is the meaning of this!?"
Vader stared in the direction of where the shot had come. Hiding at the very top of the hall, perched on a clamp where the cables holding up the chandelier attached to the wall, was a silhouette. As Vader watched, they lifted their sniper rifle again and fired.
The courtiers had already been ushered out of the box, red guards closing around Palpatine like bulletproof curtains. The next shot hit the chair he'd been sitting in and exploded, raining ashes and splinters on the surrounding carpet.
"Lord Vader!" Palpatine gasped out. "I believe this is an assassination attempt!"
A third shot, hitting the wall of the box instead. Vader barked orders to stormtroopers, which rippled through the building like sound waves. They started firing at the figure on the cable, who slid down to the chandelier itself and hit amongst the tinkling diamonds, their murky face refracted into nonsense through the cloud of them.
It was a smart move. Blaster bolts ricocheted off the gems, unscratched and still beautiful, until the cacophony of diamonds shaking against each other drowned out the aria.
The woman finally stopped singing.
A stormtrooper materialised by Vader's side. Palpatine was gone now, somewhere, and it was just him, barking orders, dipping his hands in blood. "My lord, we have no hope of reaching him there with our shots, and the staff of the opera house will not release the cables until the audience are all evacuated!"
"I see," Vader said coldly. The audience were a thick mess of people, clumping around the door and fanning out like a snowflake. They streamed for side doors where they could, tripping over hats and bonnets and boot buckles and ballgowns. The staff let them in through staff doors, down dusty unused corridors, anywhere away from the falling, burning box and the blaster bolts that dropped into the crowd. Corpses were strewn about already, trampled and undignified in death. This would not be a quick evacuation.
Vader lit his lightsaber and threw it.
The loud buzz of it drew the Rebel's eye, and they screamed, staring at its approach. But it didn't hit them. Vader yanked it to the side at the last moment and sheared one, two, three, four, all the cables. The metal glowed red and sooty at the ends, like a severed wrist. Cables fell away—a Naboo giant squid releasing a victim.
The chandelier, heavy and laden with fortunes, dropped.
It hit the ground in a moment, snaps loud and grisly. The Rebel. The large circle of audience members they had fallen on. So many dead.
There may be more Rebels yet waiting to die. Vader whirled around, storming past horrified staff members and stormtroopers alike. Someone had emptied their stomach over the shining floor. He marched through it and tracked vomit and blood into the carpet on his rampage.
They were not hard to find. The Rebels were in the audience with their own blasters, ready to fire in their own ways; they killed as many allies and civilians as they did stormtroopers, until Vader roared through and killed them. This was a waste of time. There was an attack in this building, and he needed to get to his son. He killed indiscriminately, no matter how well-dressed or respected the victim, to get this over with as fast as possible. The Force stung like a punch to the torso with every death, and for a moment Vader wondered how Luke was feeling this. What was happening.
Where was he? Why was he here, if not with the Emperor? Had Palpatine enticed him out, then Luke had refused to play his games and he'd been dismissed? Had he been lured here to be manipulated after the show? Or…
A gaudy scrap of flimsi waved in his mind.
Luke had behaved so guiltily, yesterday, he realised. He had not been able to see it for his own guilt, but…
A warning flashing through the Force. A demand. Palpatine. Come—protect—Rebels—
Vader ignored it. He groped around for the thin, undeveloped thread that tied him to his son, and tugged on it until it nearly unravelled the mind attached.
The hangars.
He began to run.
If he was involved—if stormtroopers or other Imperials got to him first—
Palpatine's presence exploded at the back of his mind, shrivelling as fire and metal raged through his fragile body. It was like roots ripped from every corner of his mind. It was like rotting fruit finally removed and the area sanitised, the flies lingering but fleeing with every passing moment. It was a liberation he hadn't felt in two decades.
It meant nothing to him.
He ducked out of the crowd, down a side hall, shimmering strands of gold leading him where he needed to go and a bloodthirsty beam of light mowing down anyone who stopped him. The staff hangars were right at the back of the building and the place got emptier as he went, until—
Furtive whispers. Running at full pelt. He turned.
Four or five people, mostly human, turned a corner to rocket down his hallway. They saw him.
The Rebels.
The first one barely had time to blink. Her head rolled and bowled her companion in the face, knocking him back as he skewered himself on Vader's saber. The next two fell in one clean sweep that slopped their guts over the floor. The last scrabbled for his throat as he was lifted off the ground, tears flooding down the sides of his face. He hit his head hard on the ceiling, blinked dizzily, and then went flying across the room in a suitably ignominious end.
Vader strode farther down the corridor, and into the hangar. He scanned the cavernous room.
So many ships. Only one of them held his son.
He marched up the lowered landing ramp—the engines were running hot, ready to escape. As he did, there was the vicious hiss of a door shutting, and he whipped his head around to see the door to the cockpit closing. He smashed his hand against the controls. Locked.
He'd have to do this the difficult way, then. He thrust his lightsaber through the metal.
Luke screamed.
The lightsaber carved through the door as if it were cake, metal shavings clinking to the ground, then the door threw itself off its hinges and smashed into the viewport on Luke's left. Luke ducked, heart hammering, and stared. That was transparisteel, but the force of the throw had bent the metal door and sent spiderwebbing cracks through the viewport…
He threw his gaze back to Vader just as he stalked in. Luke stared, fear freezing his blood in his veins and his brain for several precious seconds as Vader stopped, regarding him intently.
"Luke—" Vader's voice thundered out, but Luke didn't even stop to wonder how Vader knew his name before he snapped up that blaster his didn't know how to use and fired.
One. Two. Three. Four. He lost count of the bolts he unleashed, his sights were a blur of red, and Vader's lightsaber was a blur of red as he deflected them with terrifying speed. They peppered the console, the walls, the floor, pinged off the windows. Not one of them hit him.
"You do not know how to use that thing—"
A few fruitless tugs of the trigger yielded a sharp beeping, the light on the side blinking. Empty of charges, he supposed, a stupid blaster meant not for battle, but for desperate times. He threw it at Vader instead.
Vader caught it in his left hand—and crunched it in his fist. It was half its size when he tossed it aside. Luke wanted to cry from horror.
"What do you think you are doing?" Vader demanded.
Luke shook hard. He couldn't answer. He shouldn't have joined this plot so quickly and easily, he was only seventeen, Commander Ante had said himself that if he didn't want to risk his life this early he could step back for now and he could join up when he was older and trained, he shouldn't…
"Why are you not at home, Luke Naberrie? Why have you joined a Rebel plot to kill the Emperor?"
Luke's shaking legs collapsed underneath him; he almost bashed his head on the controls as he went down. He didn't.
Because Vader caught his arm.
His grip was hard, burning hot, and left soot on Luke's shifting sleeve. "Do you have any idea—"
"My dad doesn't know!" he burst out. That must be how Vader knew him, recognised him. Maybe not through family resemblance, his dad's scars obscured their resemblance quite a bit apart from their eyes, but it would be just like him to have a holo of Luke on his desk while he worked. "He has nothing to do with this, he's loyal to you, I lied to him—"
Vader shook Luke—no. Luke cried out expecting a shake, but Vader just gently deposited him in the pilot's seat before his legs gave out again.
"Answer my questions."
"What?"
"Why are you here?"
The moment Luke's brain deigned to work, his fear vanished.
He glared at Vader even through his tears and balled his hands into fists. "It's the right thing to do."
"Party to a terrorist assassination attempt of a legitimate monarch?"
"I…" Luke had not scored very highly on his political analysis class at all. "No, but—Palpatine is evil. A monster. So are you. The Empire—"
"Needs leaders, not martyrs."
"None of us were supposed to die! That's what I'm for!" Luke gestured at the controls—then a thought struck him. He dived for the ignition—
And Vader's lightsaber sprang to life right into the controls. Luke scrambled out of the chair, away from it, as it carved its deadly path right through the bowels of the ship's mechanics. He was sweating at the heat of it even from here. The door was gone, the edges of where it had been cooled, so he made to back off… and was stopped in his place.
"You are not getting out of this by any means."
"Then just kill me, if you're planning on it!"
"I am not going to kill you. Who put such Rebel ideas in your head? Who taught you to hate the Empire?"
"I taught myself. It's called critical thinking." Luke crossed his arms over his chest and spat on the ground. "My mother stood up for what was right, and my father is a hardworking man who taught me to follow in her footsteps. That's what I'm doing now."
Vader said, "Your mother was killed, Luke. Her footsteps are dangerous."
"Is that a threat?"
"It is a piece of advice."
"I'm not afraid."
"I think you are. But you…" Vader faltered, and now Luke narrowed his eyes. "You are very brave."
Luke took a step forward and found himself free of that invisible force. "Why aren't you killing me? You always kill Rebels."
"You are no Rebel, young one."
"You kill civilians too—" Luke cut himself off. "Young one?"
No.
It was… surely it was a coincidence? Or if not, his father could had picked it up from his boss—but when would his father have had occasion to hear Lord Vader say young one?
"Who are you?" he asked.
"You know that perfectly well."
"I don't think I do. Take off your mask," Luke said.
Vader stiffened. "I do not think you are in the position to be giving orders, Luke."
"I'm giving them anyway."
"Apparently so. I will not remove my mask."
Luke said, "Because you need it to breathe?"
"…yes."
"Like my dad."
"Much like your father, yes." Luke opened his mouth, but Vader clearly hoped to forestall his next observation with—"Why do you think I hired him? We have that in common."
But it fell flat.
The implications, the truth it was trying to sell him… Luke's instincts told him it was nothing but utterly false. It was a lie.
He said again, quieter, "Take off your mask, Lord Vader."
And, to Luke's own surprise, Vader did indeed reach up to remove the back part of his helmet, lifting it from his head. His scalp was bald and pink-white, with rivers of scar tissue criss-crossing the skin. There was a particular scar Luke recognised.
When Vader removed the mask from his face, and Luke looked into his eyes—bleary yellow, different to what he'd seen before, but still recognisable—there was no doubt.
Luke stumbled back, colliding with the wreckage of the door and gripping it tightly. The sharp edges bit cuts into his palm; rivulets of blood streamed to the tips of his fingers and drip, drip, dripped to the floor. Vader—his dad—had a cleft in his chin, just like Luke's. The nose was the same as always, the noble brow, the shape of the eyes… but the chin was always covered by his breathing mask, and Luke found himself staring at it.
Finally, Vader heaved a breath and shoved his mask back onto his face. The cycle of the respirator—so rasping and ghastly, its absence had been a blessing—filled the cockpit again as he fitted the helmet back over the top. Any trace of his father's face vanished behind the monstrous façade.
"You…" Luke got out, then gaped. He slipped, cutting his palm even deeper, then stumbled forwards, staring, glaring. "You—"
"I kept this a secret from you for your own good," his father told him.
"How? You're—"
"A monster," Vader agreed readily. The resolution in his voice was more chilling than regret would have been. "It is necessary."
"Necessary?"
"You have no idea of the dangers of the galaxy. You have no idea what I have been shielding you from, all these years."
"So you decided to become one of them?"
"I will do anything to keep you safe," his father informed him, his vocoder booming it out as a proclamation. "I will lie. I will kill. If I have to be a monster so that my son need not follow that path… so be it."
"Why would I follow that path?" Luke glanced at his own hand, the blood staining it. His own blood. "You— you've got those messed up powers, do—"
"You do."
"I—"
"This Rebel plot of yours has already killed hundreds of stormtroopers, your Rebel compatriots, and far too many innocent civilians who simply wanted an entertaining night at the opera."
Luke blanched. "Killed?"
"Did you not feel their deaths?"
"I— I felt queasy and scared, like I could hear distant cannonballs."
"That was it."
Luke could barely see for the tears, now. "What?"
"This night has seen many dead," his father continued. Despite his monologue, he did come forwards to hold Luke again, to close his hand before it was totally drenched red, to guide him back into the pilot's chair. He wiped a tear away from his cheek. "Fortunately, the Emperor was one of them."
Luke blinked. "Fortunately? I thought you served him."
"I told you. There are many dangers you know nothing of. One has now been eliminated."
Shaking, Luke bowed his head and shook it. "How can you be so calm about this?"
Vader knelt down beside him and took his hand in his. It was a comforting motion, despite the situation, and Luke hated himself for this. "As I told you. I am a monster. And you, despite significant emotional turmoil, are alive and unharmed."
He tilted Luke's chin up, and Luke stared at his father. The side of him that had always been hidden from him.
Luke knew, distantly, that no parent showed their child when they were upset. Adults cried, but not in front of kids. Their innocence was to be protected, and in desperate times, desperate measures had to be kept a secret as well.
Vader's tone dropped and became pleading. "What else could I wish for but this?"
He knew that, but it made it no easier to realise that his father was not the good man he had idolised him as.
The touch on his chin and cheek was affectionate, even if the hand was hard and unyielding. Luke leaned into it, smearing civilians' blood on his cheek. His own tears washed it away.
