He can feel time slipping away. Each heartbeat brings him closer to his possible end. Time is rushing like water and the lift is excruciatingly slow, taking its sweet time with no regard for anything or anyone. It is still moving up, he reassures himself – but why does he feel like he is sinking, sinking through the floor, falling down the shaft, lying broken and dying in fire…
He shudders. No time for this. He must think clearly if he wants to get out of this hellhole. If fate's twisted sense of humor had chosen this very inconvenient moment to make an appearance, the lift would surely have malfunctioned. But it has not. Perhaps the Force has finally decided to lay off.
The lift stops and the doors slowly, languorously slide open, and he is off, sprinting, the liquid fear burning inside him, driving him forward. Three floors, and he will be on the ground floor; all he will have to do is get out. One floor down. Up. Up, down, what does it matter?
Two floors. His breath is rattling in his throat and the grey tones of the walls are blurring together. Last one; his limbs are leaden and the floor is tilting...It jerks and hits him in the face, sparking against his skin. The world rights itself. The blood in his head is roaring like an angry sea and he seems to have misplaced his body…He forces himself to crawl to his feet and resume his mad dash.
And it is madness. Blind and death, he runs, he doesn't care; all he sees are the grey tiles of the floor sweeping beneath his feet. He sees nothing as he collides with a spindly, rusted flight of stairs. The frenzy dissipates for a moment, and he can hear the boom of distant explosions; the chain reaction floors below, the fire gaining on him…
He blinks, shakes the vision from his head and clambers up the rickety flight. It opens up into a large, dank room, dimly lit by flickering glowpanels. It looks like a warehouse – shabby, lined with crates and boxes, and these seem to extend forever.
There should have been an exit – some sort of doorway; there always is. Escapes don't fail because people can't find the way out! Yet there he is, enclosed and doomed to die alone. He smirks bitterly. What an irony. Fate has outdone herself. Best get comfortable. Hold on and wait until the ground shakes and your spine breaks.
The ground does shake; he is thrown and sent sprawling on the floor. A strange silence has fallen over everything. There is the rhythm of still-distant explosions, like a drumroll announcing impending oblivion…He lies and stares at the dirty ceiling, the snarl of pipes…Pipe dream, he thinks.
He thinks of Leia, cold, dark, hateful Leia who loves him still, and Han, the cynical bastard, and of the irritating, persistent woman who will miss him when he is gone…The dark specter who was never his father – I wish you were… Lovely Jade, so strong, so delicate, lost forever – I'm coming for you…
The ground shakes again, and something snaps - cold, gritty agony…Wait for the bright, killing light...Darkness falls.
Painless quiet and a soft, regular sound, soothingly predictable. Like waves…It hurts to move his eyelids.
He swallows; it feels like a hot shard of glass, scraping its way down.
Someone is breathing…In and out, like waves. Just you, all alone…
Fire on his skin; in his eyes…
He's alive. Why couldn't you just die?
Still breathing, whoever it is. Just you; wretched little you…
Just the water…Pipe dreams…
No more pain; he is blissfully numb; light and empty. He has no body.
He is there, hanging freely in the air, like a little speck of dust…
Opens his eyes…too bright; a sun is glaring in the sky, angry, scorching…Why do you hate me?
A dark figure, blurred and vaporous, stares down at him…breathing.
Too early…I'm not dead…
He opens his eyes again. The sky is a clear and endless. If he tried hard enough, he could drown in it.
Still breathing…Why should this old ghost linger?
He runs his tongue over cracked, bleeding lips. There is blood in his eye, too.
Still breathing, in absurd monotony.
Something soft and black touches his cheek.
Just fade…Don't want you here.
He's somewhere else, now. There is no water. Only jagged stones, grey as ashes from the wrathful blaze of the sun.
Still breathing; he can't hear anything else.
"Still there?"
His throat feels like sandpaper.
"Yes."
Funny how visions can sound amused when one asks an innocent question.
"Not real…"
"More than you know."
He opens his eyes, and looks up - steel death mask with a hollow black gaze…He can see himself in those eyes, pale, frail and drenched in blood.
"Vader?"
Sounds like ground glass.
"Yes."
Sounds like melted glass.
"Will you stay?"
"Always, my son."
"I'll try to stay."
And there he lies, shattered and numb, enveloped in warm folds of darkness. It's where he belongs.
White. Stark, brilliant white, sharp as ice. The light burns his eyes, worse than the sun…Sun? There's no sun here. White, he's wearing white again. He looks down; there are fresh scars on his arms, still red and raw. And burns, not seeping fluid anymore. There's an ache in his bones, and he does not know where it came from.
He is back in the cell. Back? He never left. Then why were there wounds..? Nothing here could have done this to him. Not the walls, not the voices, not the ghosts.
Where has he been? It feels like he's been gone…
Beautiful brown eyes, like melted wood…Leia? Black is not your colour…
All his friends are dead. Dead, what a lovely, dreadful word.
I want to forgive you.
…Afraid you're wasting your time.
Liquid copper hair, spilt like blood…
Dark water, fire and water, fire behind him, world collapsing…
Always.
Welcome to our collective suicide.
He takes a breath and opens his eyes, truly opens them.
Splinters and ashes inside. The mighty walls tremble but do not fall. The unnamed prisoner weeps.
He's sprawled on the floor again; he's forgotten how he got there. He wonders for a moment, then gives up as the doors hiss and open. In she walks.
She bends over and strips him with her gaze.
"So, how are we today?"
Blank, blissfully numb. Peaceful, so easy to let go…
"He almost loved me, you know."
She smiles stiffly.
"He just doesn't know it. Someday he will, and maybe he'll come back for me…someday."
"You're a lost little thing, aren't you? Forgotten. Left behind by all those who might have cared."
Yes. She's so spiteful, she's beautiful. Exquisite poison.
"But I can love you. I will never leave you. I can fix you."
I can devour you.
Always.
Never.
And he wants the poison.
She strokes his hair, gently, possessively. Because this is home.
Finis