Originally written for the tumblr prompt:

Vader down au where luke's x-wing lands directly beside Vader's tie-fighterand vader has to fend off the rebels while tending to a heavily concussed luke (doesn't help that he constantly has to "protect" his son from rescue attempts )

Warnings for: temporary blindness, implied possible character death, graphic description of injuries, violence. Seriously, this got dark, take care of yourself.


The crash billowed fire around him and for a moment Vader could not remember where he was, which battle was being fought. So many starfighters crashed over the years, so many of them with a bright, beloved Force signature by his side—but this was not Obi-Wan, or Ahsoka, or any other Jedi. This was a half-Jedi. This was his son.

He erupted from the cockpit of the starfighter just before it exploded. Molten shards of metal embedded themselves in his cape and cooled in the ice of the dark side around him to spines, jutting from his back. He drew himself up to his full height and shrugged most of them off, strips tearing through his cape until it glowed from smouldering embers, flashing metal, and flapping threads of armourweave. The fire still flickering around the remains of his starfighter misted in the eye plates of his mask, deep crimson.

Another explosion. This one on the other side of the starfighter, balls of fire erupting from the fuel tanks, in the direction of—

Luke.

Vader stormed forwards, through the smoke and flame, until he emerged with the metal shards still perched on his shoulders, bright orange, his cape and suit shimmering yellow, the fire parting for him like kin. The boy's starfighter was in no better shape than Vader's, burning and belching thick, dark smoke into the unblemished blue sky, with one key difference: this pilot had not abandoned his craft.

This pilot was slumped over the controls, the transparisteel of the cockpit shattered and embedded in his face, arms, and neck, unmoving.

Another burst of flame. Vader glanced where it was—on Luke's ship, near where he thought the fuel cells might be. He thrust out his hand and wrenched them from the mess of twisted metal, casting them into the sky just as flames consumed them.

The explosion lit up the ground bright enough that Vader's lenses struggled to adjust for a moment, but when they did, more poor luck had befallen him: Luke was awake. Awake, and blinking dimly into nowhere.

At least, Vader thought, he was alive.

He stormed forwards, like a wraith of fire and death, and seized the metal struts still encasing the cockpit even with the transparisteel shattered between them. He tore them clean off and threw them aside, grabbing Luke by the collar of his flight suit. Luke let out a cry of pain.

Vader didn't register it until he'd lowered him to the ground and was able to fully understand the extent of the damage.

Minor and major burns littered Luke's hands, licked up his leg where the flight suit was nothing but ash, splashed over his face. The shattered transparisteel and metal had shredded much of what was left of his exposed skin, and the flight suit where it was still intact—two or three pieces were still embedded in his neck. His helmet was dented at the front from the force of the impact, and Vader did not know what damage could have been done to the head underneath. And Luke was still staring around wildly, unable to locate where his rescuer stood.

"What can you see?" Vader boomed.

Luke shouted and scrambled back on lacerated hands. The orange dust that coated Vrogas Vas had already settled around his injuries, turning red with blood. "Vader!?"

"You can see nothing?"

"You— you blinded me—"

"I must assume it is temporary. You were looking at the fuel cells when they exploded."

"When you blew them up!"

"I saved your life, young one." His voice turned biting, the temperature plunging with the force of his fury. "After you so recklessly tossed it away!"

"It would be worth it to take care of you!"

"A thousand of my lives would not be worth yours!" Vader snarled. That Rebel mindset would be the death of his son. He marched forwards and seized Luke's collar again, yanking him to his feet—gently. As gently as Vader's brutal hands knew how to be, at least. "Can you stand?"

Luke's need for Vader to catch him on the way down answered that.

The boy stared blankly in the direction of his right foot. Now that Vader looked at it, the boot it was in was crushed, with flesh that looked concerningly pulpy seeping out of the tears.

"I…" Luke said as Vader laid him back on the ground. "I… what happened…"

Vader ripped the leather of Luke's boot apart and peeled it off his foot. Despite everything he had seen in his violent life, he would have vomited, had his digestive system still been that competent. Luke screamed.

"You are lucky to be alive." The vocoder disguised the fierce trembling in Vader's natural voice.

"I don't feel lucky!" Luke reached up and found Vader's armoured shoulder, pushing at it feebly. "Everything hurts, and I'm stuck here with you!"

"Lucky," Vader hissed, and then heard another rumbling. He glanced at the X-wing, the flames consuming it, and before he could think to warn Luke, seized the boy in his arms and sprinted away from it.

This explosion was smaller, shards peppering the dusty orange desert with metal and holes. But it would still not have done Luke any favours, despite the curses he was flinging at him. The gases emitting from the burning metal and fuel were toxic as well, Vader's life support systems were informing him. He started moving again, farther and farther away from the wreckage, towards the top of the nearest slope he could see.

Luke squirmed in his grip, and Vader tightened his hold unconsciously as he looked down the hill at the land around him. Glass crunched in his hands, Luke shouted, and more blood seeped over Vader's long-stained gloves.

It wasn't until then that it really hit Vader, looking at the son in his arms, the burns and the blood and the blinking eyes, all coated in a sickening orange dust, exactly how injured his son was. All the emergency medkits had exploded with their ships. And a medkit would likely not cut this, anyway.

Vader had come to Vrogas Vas alone, seeking Luke based on Aphra's information. There were no Imperial ships in close proximity—only the Rebels.

"Darth Vader!" an electrically augmented voice boomed out. Vader snapped his gaze up and swung it around. Rebels from the base had gathered here, loaded with grenades, blasters, and a reckless hope for the impossible. They formed a ring around this hill and were all advancing forwards. All with their blasters trained on him.

All with their blasters trained on Luke.

"Drop your weapons and surrender!" the leader called out again, his megaphone making Luke wince from the noise. He bucked again in Vader's grip, groaning when Vader tightened it again, and screamed when something gave. "Release Skywalker and come quietly!"

Vader made no move.

"You will let me through," he said instead. "You will lead me to your base." He needed to get Luke to a medbay. He needed to save his son's life. If he admitted that to them, would they yield?

No, he thought. No.

Rebels were brutal.

Rebels were terrorists.

Rebels would see his son dead before they released him to his hands, and that ideology had corrupted Luke until he had almost destroyed himself for the mere hope of destroying Vader.

Scoffs all around.

"You will let me through," he repeated. Luke was still struggling, and he was still bleeding profusely. Any moment an infection could set in. He did not know how much time Luke had left, but marching across a barren desert for miles, battling ridiculous Rebels, as Luke grew sick and died in his arms, was not how he would allow this to end.

But he would never admit that he needed the Rebels to cooperate.

The leader rallied his confidence. "Release Skywalker and drop your weapons! You are surrounded!"

And for a moment, he considered it.

He could not get to the Rebel base in time. He would not. Luke might well die if he did not cooperate and surrender him.

He looked down at his son, the rictus of pain in his face, the blank stare. He opened his mouth.

And that was when the first few warning shots fired.

They skittered off his cloak, his helmet. But a few embedded in Luke's limbs, and the sound of his son's screams changed his heart.

No Rebels would ever take his child from him again. Not in life, and not in death.

He lowered Luke to the ground. He lit his lightsaber.

"All I am surrounded by," he growled, "are fools and dead men."

He left Luke bleeding into the sand, stock still and staring at the sky, as he began his slaughter.