PART 5: JEDI

CHAPTER 19: Meeting

"Military power wins battles, but spiritual power wins wars." —General George Catlett Marshall

****

Luke brought the droids with him to Coruscant. It would have been better had he left them behind on Dagobah, but he had decided he didn't want to be without company—for he was fearful of being alone with his thoughts. He tried to ask questions and listen to the chatty Threepio's long-winded answers and to the occasional quiet chiming in of Opakwa or Artoo, but his head was being invaded by dark thoughts despite his attempts to distract himself. They remained a determined army he was unable to hold at bay.

Images from his Force vision and from the tree cave blurred together in his mind. Pain and death seemed to intermingle in a maelstrom of despair, the likes of which he'd never truly experienced. He saw the dying face of that apparition of his mother—Leia Organa's features contorted in pain—Darsst's severed head lying on the floor—Han Solo shouting to stop, to stop—his blade piercing his father's black armor. His vision started to swim, and he fought against the blackness, wrestling to regain full control of his consciousness and focus on the outside world and finally succeeding.

"—seems rather interesting to me," Threepio was saying. He tilted his head, noting his new master's unusual bio signs. "Master Luke, are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Threepio," the young man heard himself saying distantly. He waved his hand in front of his face—the motion was blurry, and he was starting to see black spots in front of his eyes. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against his seat. Stars, how could he face his father again? Especially after—after the cave...

He had told his mentors that he wouldn't turn to the Dark Side—but he feared the promise had been a lie. The fear, anger, and aggression Yoda had warned him against were hovering around him. He feared that there was nothing he could do to stop his slip into darkness—and he was angry that he felt so helpless. In that cave, the Dark Side had briefly sunk its claws into him, and now it was prowling like a predator around a dying campfire, waiting for his light to go out so that it could pounce one final time. If it did, there would likely be no escape for him.

Artoo whistled something that sounded worried, not believing in the human's assertion of the "fine" nature of his state of being.

"Don't worry, Artoo," Luke said softly. But he didn't say that there was nothing to worry about.

****

Luke left the droids inside the ship. Artoo, strangely faithful, tried to follow him, but he ordered the droid to please, please stay behind. If Luke didn't return, Artoo would need to pilot the ship to Alderaan.

"You need to save them, Artoo," he told the little droid. "They won't survive without you."

The astromech gave a sad whistle and watched him leave. He had been wrong to bring the droids—he knew that now. That which was before him was something he had to face alone.

With the Force pulsating around him, waiting for him to call it to him, he found it easy to navigate through the Imperial Palace despite its heavy security. Stormtroopers made particularly weak-minded guards and were easily persuaded by a fledgling Jedi such as him, and he began to see how it had been easy for Obi-Wan and Han to help him escape the Palace.

As he walked down the palace's corridors, he waved his hand occasionally in the air, drawing attention away from himself. With his whole body swathed in black and the hood of his cloak pulled down over his face, he was often the focus of curiosity, but the Force ensured that an undesirable scene was never made.

The Force also guided him to his intended destination. By reaching into their minds, Luke was able to render the guards posted outside the room unconscious. He winced as their bodies slumped to the floor. It felt wrong to use the Force in such a way, but at least they would be unharmed. At least he had not killed them.

He closed his eyes, concentrating on the inner workings of the door. The door was passcoded, and he didn't know the number, but with a little luck and a judicious use of the Force...

The door slid open.

Luke stepped forward into the room. Han and Leia were both slumped over onto cots, unconscious. They looked spent—their faces were haggard, and even in sleep they seemed to be in pain.

The young man's eyebrows turned downward and inward, and his lips pressed together in anger.

Behind him, he heard someone's soft footsteps approaching. Without turning around, he asked in a low voice, "Where is he?"

"I'll take you to him," Mara Jade said, also quiet.

There was a coldness between them now, as if distance had done something to them. He'd changed, he knew, and perhaps she had, too. After all, she had a new master now—during the time he was gone, she must have realized that.

After one last look at his friends—no, he'd never really let himself get close enough to anybody to truly call them 'friend,' had he?—Luke turned and followed Mara Jade out of the room.

She took him back through the Palace corridors to the private throne room. Luke's father was waiting in the room, though he wasn't sitting at the throne. Palpatine had always relished the feeling of sitting on that giant chair, but Emperor Vader—for he had finally declared himself to be such—was standing in front of the seat of power, gazing slightly upward at a hologram map of the galaxy. Holographic stars and planets rotated slowly around him. His gaze was focused on one in particular, but then he pressed a button, and the map disappeared. His helmet lowered as he moved his gaze to rest on the two newcomers.

"Father," Luke greeted quietly.

"Son," the larger man returned.

Luke noticed that Mara did not even falter upon hearing their exchange. Apparently, she already knew of the blood that stood between them. Well, there was no reason to keep it secret from her, anyway.

"I feel your power," Vader commented. There was a smoothness to his voice, a certainty. "You have learned much, young one."

"And you have been busy as well," Luke said, fighting to keep a growl out of his voice. But his emotions were easily readable, and a muscle in his cheek was twitching. Han and Leia should have never been brought into this. He would have faced Vader eventually—he had just wanted some time.

"I knew they would bring us together one way or another," noted Vader with that self-assurance that had always been dripping off Palpatine. It seemed the transformation to emperor was complete.

"How could you torture them?" the young man snarled, unable to keep himself from expressing his anger. "They never did anything to—"

Vader cut him off, his own anger easily evident. "But they did, Son. Or did you think I didn't know about Leia Organa's involvement with the Rebel Alliance? She is a traitor and should be executed."

"I'm a traitor, too," Luke said, stepping forward, eyes flashing. "Why haven't you killed me? Or have you forgotten that I was the one who fired the shot that destroyed your precious Death Star?"

"That technological terror was a product of Palpatine's madness," Vader growled. "It was but a tool for me. It cannot compare with the power of the Force."

"Everything's a tool for you, isn't it?" Luke had stopped moving and was standing a few yards away from his father.

"Your anger betrays you," the Sith Lord said quietly. His own fury from moments ago had cooled. "Do you know how much your friends suffered because you hid yourself from me?"

Luke's right hand twitched. The handle of his saber dangled at his hip.

"You thought you could grow strong enough with the Light Side of the Force to defeat your father. But you didn't have the power to stop your friends from suffering...And you don't have the power to save your companions from dying." The dark helmet seemed even blacker in the dim light of the throne room. "I hold that power."

The young man closed his eyes for a moment, trying to push away his anger, trying to find peace...But peace was elusive, and images of Leia and Han in pain swam in front of his lowered eyelids.

"I can kill them, Son. And the only way to stop me is to strike me down or join me. In this room, anger and hatred are your only allies."

Calm...Peace...Luke tried to find them, to grasp at them—he needed them—stars, how he needed them—

"I will kill them, Luke. They have served their purpose, and I no longer need to keep them alive."

Luke struck. His blue lightsaber came arcing down toward Vader's head—

—only to be blocked by Mara's red blade.

Breathing hard with the rage-filled adrenaline thundering through his veins, Luke stared at Mara with blinding hatred flaring in his eyes as their sabers remained locked in the air above Darth Vader. "You shouldn't have done that," the young man growled before brutally attacking, pressing Mara backward and down the steps in front of the throne. She tripped and almost fell, but she managed to duck to the side and escape his fierce downward slash.

Their blue and red sabers flashed against each other as the battle was waged around the room. Mara was forced to stay on the defensive as Luke's fury was expressed in a series of power-filled slashes. He pressed her against a wall, but she managed to roll out of it, bringing her lightsaber up and biting her lip in concentration. Sweat was already beginning to cling to her face, while Luke seemed barely affected by their duel—his arms seemed tireless, and she could not match his strength. It was only her speed that was enabling her to survive this battle. And even that would soon fail her. Luke was too powerful. During the time he'd been away, she had become resigned to her place in life—but he had become committed.

Their weapons hummed angrily, and she whipped her saber up to block another one of his blows, jumping off to the side into a careful roll as he swung his most powerful attack yet. She came up to her feet from the roll with her lightsaber ready, swallowing as she saw the look of rage etched onto Luke's face. His was a face not meant for such intense anger, but it was covered in it.

"Good," Vader said simply, watching their fight with dark pleasure. His son was embracing the Dark Side—anger was swelling up around him like a storm—the Dark Side was reigning triumphant.

If the young man heard Vader's utterance, he didn't show it. His concentration was on the fiery blue-white blade clenched in his hands. He struck at his opponent from the side, then from above, and then he lunged, nearly impaling Mara, who brought her blade up just in time to push his weapon aside so that it only grazed her hip. She hissed in pain, and he used that moment of distraction to twirl their sabers around and disarm her, flinging her now-unlit saber aside and forcing her down to her knees.

He was pointing his lightsaber at her throat, panting with the dark exertion he'd been putting forth.

The young woman closed her eyes. She waited for Vader to tell Luke to kill her. And she waited for Luke to do it. It was what her master would have encouraged had he still been alive. It was the way of the Sith to destroy the weak.

****

Luke stared down at his opponent, at the red flames that were her hair and the pale ice that was her skin. Fire and ice meant nothing to him. He could extinguish both. And as for the two green seeds planted beneath the flames in part of the ice—that was as nothing to him as well.

He brought his saber to the side, ready to separate the flames from the bulk of that ice, to cut off the connection which enabled both to dog his footsteps, but then the two seeds disappeared.

He paused, staring downward. He had not done anything—what had happened?

His rage was slowly replaced by confusion, and that confusion was slowly placed by understanding. The one before him was no amalgamation of matter or elements but a person. Not an opponent, not a rival even—just someone making her way in the world just as he had been.

Someone he had grown to care for.

And then he heard a whisper of a word—a word that was spoken in tones that were somehow both pleading and resigned—a word that meant "light"—a word that he called his name and that signified his identity.

****

It was Mara's heart that pushed Luke's name from her lips. She barely heard the word, though she spoke it in an expression of a wordless desire, of a hope, a wish that everything could be different. It was not her life that she was pleading for—but a life. A possibility of a life which he had shown to her—a life she hadn't known could exist.

But though her soul sought expression in the speaking of his name, her mind had hold of her body, and she drew in several deep breaths as she waited for his blade to fall. She was resigned to death—resigned to lose that possibility of a life. How fitting it was that he who had showed her the possibility would be the one to take it away from her.

And yet, as the seconds ticked away, she realized that somehow the possibility had not disappeared—somehow, her life was still intact. In confusion, she opened her eyes and looked up at Luke. He had shut down his saber and was turning to Vader. The mad look in his eyes was gone, replaced by a sort of resigned sadness. The Dark Side aura that had been surrounding him had vanished.

Suddenly, she felt a sense of relief—and of hope. She fixed her eyes on Luke's face, trying to read the light and the newfound sense of peace which were present in it.

****

"I won't kill her," the young man stated quietly as he advanced toward his father. He felt almost as if the ring Arelis had given him, which he had kept tucked in his pocket as a reminder of her sacrifice ever since it had been given to him, was beginning to throb. He was back on the right path—he couldn't believe how close he'd been to forsaking it forever. The fire he had faced and triumphed over had forged him anew. "Mother—your wife—would never have approved of all this, Father. I heard much about her—I was taught much. Though she could use a blaster, I know she hated war, battles, strife. She wouldn't want this from us...From either of us."

"Pad—she is dead," the Sith Lord growled. His voice was defensive yet dark.

"Do you know why she's dead, Father? Obi-Wan told me."

"Obi-Wan?" hissed Vader. "He is alive?" He had suspected as much, but the truth still surprised him.

Luke stared at the Sith Lord intently with his clear blue eyes. "He told me she died of a broken heart, Father."

"It—it was not my hand that killed her?" Vader asked softly. Palpatine had told him that in his rage he had killed her—could it be that was a lie? After learning of Luke's existence, he had simply assumed that she had died after childbirth due to injuries he had given her...

"She was perfectly healthy, but she couldn't live without you," the young man told him. "You shouldn't have done what you did, Father. You shouldn't have sold your soul to save your wife's body."

Vader turned his helmet away from Luke. Despite his greatest efforts, he had been unable to save his wife. Instead, he had been the one that caused her to die—but in a way that had been completely unnecessary and wholly tragic. And now, here he was, trying to make his son follow the path he had trodden. Could he really do that?

He brought his eyes back toward his son, who was pointing his lit blue saber at himself.

"I would rather kill myself than turn to the Dark Side, Father. All the Dark Side brings is suffering." But despite his words, the boy extinguished his saber and dropped to his knees, pointing his face toward the floor as he revealed the back of his neck. "If you are a true acolyte of the Dark Side," he said quietly, "you will kill me now...For I will never serve the Dark Side as you have. I will merely hamper your dark progress until I die. As the Dark Side's servant, you cannot afford to let me live."

Vader's legs somehow carried him over to the youth, and his arms somehow ignited his sword. The ruby blade hovered over Luke's neck as the Sith Lord stared down at the young man.

Nearby, Mara Jade was watching him. She had stood up, and her face was a blank mask. But with the Force, Vader could sense the myriad of emotions pouring off her.

Vader lifted his hand, the lightsaber rising into the air above Luke's head with a low hum. His hands trembled, and he extinguished the weapon and threw it away. And then words escaped him which did not belong to Emperor Vader: "I cannot kill my own son."

The boy stared up at him with an expression that was equal parts joy and relief. "Then my father lives again."

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Author's Note: Thanks again to Phantom Jedi for beta-reading this whole thing and for looking over this chapter (plus the epilogue) multiple times for me!