Not a Halloween Themed update exactly, but I didn't want to hold it any longer. Also, I added a new note to chapter 1 that breaks this piece up into three parts, basically Luke and Leia's childhood, Teen years, and Adulthood. Though if you've been reading it up till now, this probably won't effect you.

Chapter 70 - Alive in a Memory

The experience of being in one location one minute, and a completely different location the next was dizzying. Anakin nearly fell over the first time the computer did it. As the Hangar and the slavers ship disappeared in front of him, it was replaced by the interior of a cargo ship. There he saw the boy from earlier, the one who stood next to the captain. The boy quickly skipped through a door and down a hall, and Anakin followed him.

"Where are we going?" Anakin tried, but the boy didn't respond.

He came to a stop suddenly when a Tauntaun crossed their path in front of them. "One Tauntaun on the way to the hold," the boy said out loud, as if the sight was a landmark. He then continued on.

As they walked, they passed a room with only a thin crack of a window in the door. On the other side a man was screaming. "Help," he yelled. "I can see you. Come back for me."

Anakin could hear the sound of a whip being used to hit someone. Call it selfish, but Anakin didn't want to see what was going on behind that door. It took him many years to get over his own experiences. He did not need the reminder.

The boy must have been desensitized to the harsh treatment of slaves. He didn't react or even blink to the man's cries. Anakin guiltily turned away and followed the boy.

Anakin followed him into a cargo bay. He could see chains and collars meant to hold men, and the sight brought him back to some of his mother's own stories about how their ancestors spent numerous days in a cramped cabin, living chained to the dead. How they were given barely enough food and water to survive, and when they were first brought out to see the twin suns of Tatooine, many fainted, believing they had seen heaven.

It was just like that here, only in place of sentient cargo, there were several Loth-cats attached to the collars. 'Huh, what's going on here? What are slavers doing, smuggling Loth-cats?'

The boy looked down like the sight was completely normal and he muttered, "Four hundred Loth-cats in the slave's shackles." He turned around and skipped out.

Anakin wondered how he could have counted them already, then realized they were in rows of ten.

They ran in a different direction and entered an engine room. There was no one else here. No crew to maintain the equipment, or to shoo the boy away.

"Three Hyperdrive exhausts." And indeed there were three exhausts on the hyperdrive in front of him.

Anakin scratched his head. Who would ever design a hyperdrive with more than one exhaust pipe. They obviously didn't know much about the technology.

The boy didn't stand there for much longer. He turned around and left the space again.

Anakin followed the boy as he reached his last stop. It was an office, and the captain was sitting behind a desk typing on two computers. The sight of a single man typing on two computers at the same time made Anakin blink to be sure he was seeing it right. The boy casually announced, "Daddy and his two computers. One, Four Hundred, Three, Two."

"Daddy huh?" Anakin walked around to get a look at the computer screens, but what he saw made no sense whatsoever. The Captain seemed to be hitting keys at random. Several places on the first screen had the numbers the boy just said: One, Four hundred, Three, and Two. Always in that order.

Anakin was just looking over to analyze the second computer more closely when his surroundings changed once more.


When the world evened out again Anakin was no longer in the slavers ship, but there was still Poodoo around him. Imperial Poodoo. Shiny black replaced the dirty greys and rusty browns. Almost everyone present wore white armor. It was almost the same Armor his clone troopers once wore, but he knew these were imperial stormtroopers because none of them had any distinguishing marks. Not even a scarf tied around one's arm.

An officer without any armor blew a whistle. Everyone stopped what they were doing and stood at attention. He turned to eye a group of five men who stood on a dais without their helmets on. One of the men looked familiar to Anakin, though he couldn't place him. He had Jet black hair and pale skin, and he kept his eyes down, barely looking at the crowd that stared at him.

"These men are declared guilty of Desertion. In our last combat none of them fired at the enemy troops. By code nine nine seventeen I declare them traitors. Shoot," he ordered.

Standing in a row across from these men were other troopers. They had similar marks on their shoulder pads to the men just sentenced. Each of them pulled out a blaster. In a few seconds, all but one of the marked men had fallen dead, the one Anakin thought he recognized.

The commander drew his attention to the one man who still hadn't fired. "Are you deaf? I said shoot!" Just then a tone from the comlink on his belt interrupted him and swayed the commander's attention. He reached down to answer the comm.

Anakin could tell the stormtrooper's arms were shaking. He understood it, being expected to shoot one of your own brothers in arms.

"Alright. Looks like you've gotten a new chance to serve the empire. Our AJ unit just expired from his wounds. Take him to the surgery suite."


One minute Anakin was watching the man flinch as troopers grabbed him, the next he was on the ground, in a military encampment. Stormtroopers all around him were rushing this way and that to follow orders.

Anakin saw what looked like a command tent, and went for its doorway. He figured it would be a good place to go to get answers. The door was locked. Remembering this was all a holo recording of some kind, he tried doing the ghost thing, and walking through the wall, but he found that the wall in front of him was very much real. Beside the door was a key pad.

"I heard the enemy are just fighting to free their people from the spice mines." Said one passing stormtrooper to another two.

"So, they are still bearing arms against the empire. That makes them guilty." One of the others said proudly.

"They are miserably armed with a few blasters. Most of their men only carry torches and pitchforks," said the first.

"All the better for us then." The second man shook his head and turned to walk away. Before he took a step he turned back and said, "Go ahead and pity the enemy if you want, just don't go pitying them too loudly, or the general will hear."

After the second was out of sight, the first turned to the third and said, "What about you? Are you going to dismiss what I've heard as well?"

"No, but then Mic has a point. We have to follow orders," said the third.

"Alright, but... Just imagine life under lock-down. Those times where command doesn't even let you leave your tent to go to the bathroom. Where your every move is monitored and strictly ordered. That is the life of the slaves in that mine. Yes, they are slaves. That's what our empire is supporting here…"

The first man went on, as the third stared off into space.


The world around Anakin transformed again. He was back in the slavers ship, and it was the boy, the captain's son, in front of him. He was playing with another little boy. They were laughing gleefully as they ran around tagging each other.

"Balu, Balu." A woman called. Anakin looked towards her and he noticed she was wearing a slave collar. Her arms were full as she carried laundry that looked like it belonged to the slavers.

The boy's stopped playing. That was when Anakin noticed, Balu was wearing a slave collar as well. He looked up and asked, "What mom?"

The Captain and another man walked in. "Sorry to interrupt your game son. The buyer's here."

"Balu is my friend. I want him to stay," said the boy.

The Captain rolled his eyes. "You can't keep every slave, boy. We're going to pick up another bunch at the next port. You can play with one of them." He turned to the buyer. "The pair are exactly as I described. Do they meet your expectations?"

The buyer pulled a hand up to his whiskered face. "Hmm, the boy is a fine strapping lad, but the woman is too skinny. Not worth the price. I'll pay just 30 for the boy."

"Very well then," said the Captain disappointedly.

The buyer grabbed the collar of the boy he was purchasing. Balu reached out to the woman and cried, "MOM!"

Even the captain's son had tears in his eyes. "Daddy, please," he begged.

Anakin's attention shifted to the edge of the room, where there was a closed door, with a panel beside it. It looked like the panel in the last Holo-recording he experienced. Curious, Anakin walked over to it and then he remembered the numbers the captain's son kept saying in the other past holo-recording.

"One Tauntaun, Four hundred Loth-Cats, Three hyperdrive exhausts, and Two computers." Anakin said out loud as he tried the combination of numbers on the panel. The door opened and Anakin stepped through.


Anakin noticed right away he was no longer on the slavers ship. He was back onboard the imperial dreadnought. On a computer in the room there was the face of the man with dark hair from earlier. The one dragged off to a surgery suite.

Behind him the commander from earlier walked in. A man wearing a white apron and thick goggles walked up. His voice was especially slick as he said, "General, the surgery is complete. We had to do three treatments on his scalp to stop the hair growth. His hair follicles have proven to be especially stubborn, but it is finished now and the implants are operational."

"Good, let's test them," The general ordered.

The doctor pushed a button on a device and a surface turned around. On the other side, Anakin recognized Lobot. His arms and legs were strapped down. The wounds from the implant placement on the back of his head were still raw and red. He looked directly at Anakin, though by now he ceased expecting any of these holos to react to him.

"I told you I could see you," Lobot said.


Hello,

Surprise! It's Lobot's memories he's been seeing. I know I had one guess to just that, so I suppose it's not too much of a surprise.

With Lobot's past I did some work combining the Legends and Canon backstories, which were very different. In the Legend's timeline his Dad was a slaver until he was a teenager, and something happened with pirates taking over and turning them into slaves instead. Well, I couldn't resist the story of Anakin trying to help a Slaver's son.

Later in Legends he ends up committing a minor crime on Bespin and as a penalty they decide to install the implants. This part I got rid of. Instead, in the Canon timeline, it was the Empire that put them in his head. Lando was quoted as saying it was because Lobot didn't want to fight. I decided to keep this, but alter it slightly, with it not being 100% voluntary. I feel it is very characteristic for the Empire to do this, and it fits my story well.

And the first scene here is based on a memory trick I was taught once. You use a familiar location, like a place where you spent your childhood, and you imagine finding a list of items in the location.

In the next chapter we'll get to see what else he's got to say, and what happens next. I don't know exactly how many more chapters this story arc is going to take, but good news is I have a general idea what will happen next. I will publish soon.