A/N: Only one more chapter after this! I can hardly believe this saga is nearly finished.
I'd like to wish a merry Christmas, happy New Year, happy Hannukah, and a happy whatever to everyone who is still reading this. I appreciate every one of you.
Calm had returned to Lucia by the time they exited the shuttle on the Death Star. She was a prisoner, on her way to face the Emperor on the battlestation her friends were trying to destroy, but the Force wrapped around her and she had no fear. Beside her, Vader's presence in the Force seethed with anger and fear, but the light persisted beneath the darkness, stubbornly refusing to die.
Jaydra led them across the large shadowed space to a throne on which was seated a dark figure from which the all the darkness in the room seemed to emanate. On either side, red-cloaked guards stood watch. The black-robed figure—the Emperoro—shifted, deep hood lifting just enough to reveal a ravaged visage. Sickly yellow eyes turned toward Lucia, and she felt her skin crawl. "Welcome, young Skywalker," he said in a voice that creaked and broke. "I have been expecting you." Dread rose in waves from Vader and the Emperor turned that bilious gaze on her. "And you, my apprentice. I am very disappointed in you."
Vader shrank away, but Lucia raised her chin and squared her shoulders, meeting the Emperor's gaze without flinching and she felt Vader draw strength from her defiance, straightening to stand firm beside Lucia.
Slowly, as if his joints creaked as did his voice, the Emperor rose and walked down the stairs to stand before Lucia. Without looking at Vader, he said dismissively, "I will deal with you later, Darth Vader." Lifting one finger, he manipulated a tendril of Force energy and Lucia's cuffs fell away to clatter on the floor, leaving her unbound. "You will no longer need those."
Keeping her hands crossed before her, Lucia held his gaze, unmoving, refusing to give him the satisfaction of a response.
Thin lips flickered into a parody of a smile. "Guards, leave us." Jaydra and the red-cloaked guards silently left the room. "I'm looking forward to completing your training. In time you will call me Master."
Lucia shook her head slightly, still holding his gaze. "You are mistaken. My Master is Obi Wan Kenobi."
Amusement flickered in the shadows of the Emperor's Force signature. "Oh no, my young Jedi. You will find that it is you who are mistaken… about a great many things." He hefted a lightsaber in one hand, Lucia's lightsaber. "A Jedi's weapon," he mused. "Much like your mother's. By now you must know your mother can never be turned from the dark side. So will it be with you."
"You're wrong. About everything." Lucia smiled despite the roiling confusion she could yet sense in Vader. "Besides, soon we will all be dead."
A sharp cracked laugh escaped the Emperor's ruined form. "Do you refer to the imminent attack of your Rebel fleet? I assure you: we are quite safe from your friends here."
How did he know? A spark of fear washed through Lucia, and she let it fall away, released into the Force. It didn't matter. "Your overconfidence is your weakness."
"Your faith in your friends is yours," he rejoined. "Everything that has transpired has done so according to my design." His voice deepened, becoming stronger. "Your friends up there on the Sanctuary Moon are walking into a trap. It was I who allowed the Alliance to know the location of the shield generator. It is quite safe from your pitiful little band. An entire legion of my best troops awaits them."
Fear crawled down Lucia's spine, setting its claws into her soul. Her gaze darted to Vader, back to the Emperor, then to the saber hilt in his hand. Was there anything she could do?
The Emperor's smile widened, splitting his ghastly face. "I'm afraid the deflector shield will be quite operational when your friends arrive."
Anger rose up within her. He was so casually cruel, glorying in it.
Hanna burst through the door into the main control room, Alaric and Chewie right behind her with several other Rebels. "Move! Move!" she shouted as they took the Imperial personnel prisoner.
Alaric bent over a screen on one panel. "Hurry! The fleet will be here any moment!"
"Charges! Come on, come on!" Hanna and Chewie placed explosive charges as quickly as they safely could.
"Freeze, Rebel scum."
Hanna's head snapped up to see an Imperial commander stride into the room, followed by a crowd of disciplined troopers who quickly filled the room and disarmed the Rebels. Shit. Frack it all anyway. Hanna raised her hands, but watched for an opportunity. She wasn't about to give up that easily.
"Come, child." The Emperor stood by a floor-to-ceiling window in one wall and beckoned to her with a clawed hand. "See for yourself."
The fear and pain of those fighting and dying pulled Lucia to the window. Outside, the battle was chaos, the Millenium Falcon and hundreds of Rebel fighters fighting fiercely against thousands of TIE fighters around the giant Rebel cruisers. Weapons flashed silently against the blackness of space as both sides fought desperately for their lives. Lucia's fingers curled into her palms and she turned away, her gaze falling on her saber, still held loosely in the Emperor's gnarled grip.
He looked down and smiled. "You want this, don't you? I can feel your your hatred for me." He lifted the weapon, holding it out upon his open palm. "Take it. Use it. I am unarmed. Strike me down. Give in to your anger."
With a sharp shake of her head, Lucia turned away. "No!" Certainly he deserved such an end, but she couldn't give in to the darkness. She wouldn't.
"It is unavoidable." His voice curled around her, fingers of darkness reaching out to clutch at her soul. "You cannot resist. You are mine."
As the Imperials led Alaric, Hanna, and Chewie from the bunker, a horn sounded somewhere nearby among the trees. Before Hanna could do more than wonder at the sound, hundreds of Ewoks exploded from the undergrowth, swarming over the stormtroopers and their AT-ST walkers. In seconds, all was chaos as the Imperials desperately tried to fight back against the determined little fuzzballs.
In the confusion, Alaric dove for cover next to the bunker door. Hanna followed him, scrambling for the control panel for the door. "The code's changed," Alaric shouted over the commotion around them.
"Don't worry!" Hanna shouted back, putting more confidence into her voice than she felt. "I can hotwire this thing!"
"I'll cover you." Alaric spun and raised his blaster while Hanna worked furiously on the control panel.
A few seconds that felt like hours later, Hanna whooped, "I got it!" Sparks flew, and a blast door slid down with whoosh in front of the closed door, trapping them further. "Frack."
Behind her, Alaric let out a cry of pain, and Hanna spun to fall on her knees before him. Smoke curled gently from a burn mark on his shoulder and Hanna's heart fell into her stomach.
A voice behind Hanna, filtered through a stormtrooper helmet, demanded, "Freeze."
Ignoring the trooper, Hanna fumbled at Alaric's shoulder, her hands shaking. "Let me see."
"I'm all right." It was an obvious lie.
"Don't move," the stormtrooper demanded.
Alaric caught Hanna's eyes and hefted his blaster, hidden by Hanna's body. He smiled.
Hanna's heart was so full she couldn't hold back the words. "I love you."
Alaric's smile was fierce. "I know."
"Hands up!" A blaster muzzle nudged at Hanna's back. "On your feet!"
Slowly raising her hands, Hanna stood and stepped aside, out of Alaric's line of fire. A shot rang out, and the stormtrooper fell to lie unmoving on the ground. Frack, she loved this man!
"Your fleet has lost," the Emperor hissed. "There is no escape, my young apprentice. The Alliance will die here… as will your friends."
Anger and despair clutched at Lucia, drowning her in hatred for this evil creature. She struggled to remember why she shouldn't kill him.
"Good." He came closer, until she could feel his fetid breath on her face. "Let the hate flow through you."
The Force around Vader exploded, and Lucia's saber leapt from the Emperor's hand, igniting in mid air and landing in Anneke's gloved fist. "You are unwise to lower your defenses," she said calmly, green blade glowing brightly in her raised hand.
"You would not dare," the Emperor spat, backing away from them. Rage crackled around him, and he raised his hands, sparks dancing on his fingers. "If you will not stand with me, you will be destroyed." His face twisted in fury, he flung the sparks at Lucia, and they grew into long shafts of lightning, leaping from his fingers to strike her.
Agony ripped through Lucia's body, sending her to her knees. She reached for the Force, trying to ward off the assault, but it slipped through her fingers, lost under the overwhelming pain. Her vision whited out.
"Your feeble skills are no match for the power of the dark side." The Emperor's voice reached her ears only faintly through the roaring of the lightning.
Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.
Reaching into the Force deeper than she ever had before, Anneke grabbed the threads of power that made up the Emperor's lightning and yanked. Claws of fire ripped free from Lucia and snapped around to bury themselves in Anneke's flesh. Welcoming the pain, Anneke embraced the lightning, lifted her daughter's lightsaber, and sliced through her former Master's withered form.
A silent scream contorted the Emperor's face as he fell. Lightning continued to pour from his broken body for a few seconds, diverting from Lucia into Anneke. Then his eyes went flat and he collapsed like a sack of dirty rags.
Anneke found herself on her knees, muscles quivering with fatigue and pain. But her soul was bright and clean and, for the first time in years, she could see clearly without the shadows that had wrapped themselves around her for so long. She was free.
Lucia pushed herself to her hands and knees and crawled to Anneke's side. Tears streaked Lucia's face and the Force shone with love.