Little Lord Vader
Main Theme- Fly Like An Eagle by Jeff Russo & Noah Hawley
Kylo Ren returns to the Finalizer three weeks after failing to resurrect Darth Vader. Hunting down and murdering pirates working for the Resistance has given him some satisfaction, but he still feels bitter about his failure.
I did exactly as grandfather instructed and all it did was turn his helmet to ash. Now, I have just one less voice in my head and I'm returning home to ash all over the floor! I know the General ordered that none of the droids were allowed on my floor because I kept breaking them; it was only like five mouse droids! I'm tired I'll just clean it all tom–
The moment he docks his ship he feels someone strong with the Force, stronger than him, aboard the Finalizer. He ignores the modest fanfare of troopers and the mousy lieutenant. He speeds through the ship and finds himself outside the durasteel-reinforced door of General Hux. As his co-commander, Kylo is privy to Hux's access codes, so he simply punches in the code and the door slides open.
He has actually never been inside Hux's quarters. Usually, he made Hux come to him into his own quarters where he hoped to intimidate the Force-null into submission. Hux never showed fear nor even felt it in his slippery mind.
He steps through the threshold and keeps a hand resting on his lightsaber handle. It wouldn't surprise him if the General had an assassin droid as a fail-safe security measure.
He stalks forward and, in a blink, finds himself in the living room. He expected the room to be lined with the General's awards, or even trophies of his enemies, but finds himself blinking several times to make sure what he's seeing is real.
There's a credenza, worn and blue as the couch with a thousand gold buttons. Rugs shaped like eggs, stars, and triangles cover the metal floor like faux grass. A giant cobweb covers most of the ice-blue couch, and it takes him a second to realize that the cobweb is in fact a quilt. A poorly designed quilt.
He sees several shelves devoted to flimsiplast books and a few ancient datapads, the same shape and color of bricks. Under one of the shelves, he sees a child's toy chest; he uses the Force to lift the lid and finds plasticine figures of clone troopers and Super Star Destroyers. He closes it gently and finally heads to the disturbance in the Force.
The kitchen is smaller than his own, but it's red and black just like his. The stove has a pot of cream-colored liquid that smells like imitation vanilla. Half a loaf of wheat bread sits on the wooden cutting board. A jar of instant caf lays beside an electric red kettle.
Tin clinks against delicate porcelain.
He turns around to see a child swirling his tiny spoon in the black liquid of his teacup. The child has a mop of yellow hair and a snub nose. His eyes burn gold like the Sith.
"Grand–" The barrel of a blaster nudges right into the back of his ribs. At this range, there's no way he can deflect it.
"You and I are going to have a talk." Hux's hot breath against his cold neck sends shivers down his spine. They walk backwards together until those golden eyes could no longer follow them.
Hux finally lowers his blaster and steps away from him.
Kylo spins on his booted heel, fully intending to strangle the insolent ginger. Instead, he blinks and wonders if this is reality again.
Hux wears a midriff with the face of another ginger wearing far too much eyeshadow. He wears loose, olive-colored pants that would be perfect for an exercise class, but the black fuzzy slippers suggest that he's ready for bed.
"You have a burn?" Hux's entire left arm is reddish, almost wine-colored from age.
"What of it?" Hux raises a ginger brow in a haughty gesture. "I just wanted to let you know that I have formally adopted Vader."
"W-What?"
"You left a child all by himself while you were doing Force knows what on the other side of the galaxy. FN-2187 found him wandering the halls, covered in ash, probably trying to find you!"
"Hux, he's–"
"Not your child, I know. Vader told me that he and his mother were slaves, and then you came along and promised her that he'll no longer be a slave." Hux balls up his mismatched fists.
"I–"
"Don't know how to raise a child. Let alone one clearly traumatized by slavery. He has to sleep in my bed every night because he has such awful nightmares…" Hux looks so sad like he may cry. "But you could've at least left him some clothes before you left!"
"Um–"
"Considering the appalling conditions you left him in, I decided that he would be my responsibility. You don't have to worry about him; he'll want for nothing under my care. You may go." Hux dismisses him with a wave of his white hand and walks away from him.
And Kylo leaves because he didn't know what else to do.
Vader knows that his chief purpose in this second life is to protect the Palpatine lineage. Armitage Hux is the latest in the line and thus warranting his protection. He expected the cool regality that he saw in Emperor Palpatine during his brief time with him. However, Armitage lacked the Palpatine coolness and burned with love.
They've been sleeping together since the first day they met.
Armitage's body is sharp and tends to poke him while he sleeps, but Vader enjoys this. His warm embrace. It reminds him of his mother. And, in the last life, he failed to protect her.
But he won't fail again.
Author's Comments- No links this time.
One of the few things I liked from RoS is that it turns out that Palpatine was the voice behind Vader's charmed helm, even though the previous two movies implied that there was never a voice and even if there was, then it was probably Snoke. I decided to run with that for this story and I was also inspired by Wonder Woman's origins Pre-New 52. Hippolyta, Wonder Woman's mom, had a barren womb and wanted a child, so she decided to mold an image of an infant from clay. The Goddesses and Hermes give the clay life and thus Diana, aka Wonder Woman, was born. Sidious used the ashes to make his own nearly perfect version of Vader. He thought by removing the Anakin Skywalker element would make Vader less likely to make his life messy. He is wrong:
Nearly twenty years after gifting his grandson Vader, Darth Sidious is busy drinking wine and reading an ancient tome on wine cultivation when the doors to his throneroom are blown wide open. Vader appears and has grown as tall and beautiful as Anakin once was, but his hair is a short bob of golden curls instead of the familiar shaggy do or the shorn Academy cut a few years prior. Right by his side is Princess Eos Palpatine, his not-related-by-blood little sister and Sidious's great-granddaughter. The mixing of the Skywalker and Palpatine lines produced the most powerful Sith Lady in generations that happens to be just as well-constructed as her older brother. She has a sharper shape to her Padmé-like body with the blessedly small Hux nose and Rama's emerald eyes and pale skin. She's only a few centimeters taller than Armitage, currently known as Emperor Palpatine II of the Reborn Empire, and the only trace of the treacherous Kylo Ren (now Ben Solo for he saw the "light" after a heavily pregnant Armitage finally performed the coup to take out Snoke and nearly all the Knights of Ren, save Kylo at the time) can be found in her long, black hair. Sidious predicts that in a few years' time she'll be beating back suitors with her magick staff. Or Vader will be relieving many of their hands and eyes with his lightsaber.
He wonders what game Eos is playing at. Unlike his grandson, he can communicate perfectly fine with Eos considering her Ancient Sith-level power in the Force, but she can be quite fickle with him, sometimes affectionate and other times mocking him much like a cruel pittin.
They reach his throne and Vader goes on one knee just like his predecessor, but then, horrifyingly, pulls out a ring. It was then that Palpatine regretted not physically disfiguring the ash-simulacrum or removing his sexual organs.
Vader: Marry me, Sidious.
Sidious: Vader, I literally created you!
Eos: But you're not his biological father, so you're not related by blood. Therefore, it's not incest, great-grandfather.
Sidious: *sighs deeply*
Let's just say before Ben turned into Kylo, he had some of his sperm frozen in case he couldn't find the one but still wanted to have a child. Hux found out about this shortly after Vader giving his blessing for a younger sibling. What better way to stick it in Resistance General Leia's craw than by mixing her beloved (and he thought dead) son with his DNA and birthing their child? Needless to say when Palpatine found out about Skywalker and Palpatine lines finally mixing together, he drank his entire wine cellar and had to cultivate another vineyard. Hey, he's Chaos, the Emperor of the Seven Sith Hells, he can do whatever the hells he wants with the Netherworld!