The Mellow Mooka Restaurant and Lounge

Ramsees Hed

Capitol of Cal-Seti

Core World

The redheaded woman, dressed in flowing green garments, spun around four times, her slender hands making sinuous movements in the air. At last, she came to a halt and bowed her beautiful head, which caused the patrons of the Mellow Mooka to clap their hands and a few enthusiastic souls even stomped their feet. The woman smiled professionally and glided off the stage, which was the focal point of the Mellow Mooka's Crystal Room. A moment later, another dancer strode in, this one a male Dug, who proceeded to enthrall the patrons with an accomplished and energetic jizz dance.

Mara Jade, now known as Silby, formerly the Emperor's Hand, presently a full time dancer, allowed her body to droop as soon as she went off stage. It was not the dancing that made her tired; she could dance for literally twenty four hours without collapsing. It was the sheer pointlessness of her life that she found exhausting. Six months ago, she had been servant to the most powerful, most wonderful man in the entire galaxy, Emperor Sheev Palpatine. He had called her by name. She had been important and useful. Then it had all fallen apart; Luke Skywalker had waltzed in and somehow managed to kill both Vader and Palpatine, and the Glorious Empire had fallen.

And she, Mara Jade, Emperor's Hand, found herself with nowhere to go. Her position in the Empire had been a secret one, and in any case, the Empire had crumbled with surprising speed. She had been here on Cal-Seti in the middle of an operation when the Emperor died, and she had been fortunate to slip away from the docking port of the planet before a local group of insurrectionists took over the former Imperial facility.

Now she was relegated to dancing for rent and food, though at least she was able to keep her clothing on. That wasn't a given in the dancing lounges on the planet, and she tried to be thankful, but mostly she was just mad. Her life sucked. The only reason to go on living, really, was to take revenge against Luke Skywalker, who had cruelly murdered her master. But she would have to find a way to get to him; given that Skywalker had survived while both Palpatine and Vader had fallen, the man must be quite strong and likely nearly impossible to find. She wouldn't be able to take him on hand to hand, but perhaps she could sneak in and kill him with a blow dart or something.

She breathed out slowly and wandered into the dancer's break room, a small but surprisingly cozy space where the men and women could eat and rest before going back onstage.

The room was more crowded than usual, and two of the more extroverted dancers were arguing loudly, which was annoying.

"He is Darth Vader's son!" the Togruta female, Jan, exclaimed. "You'd have to be crazy!"

"Nonsense," blonde haired, human Tanitha returned briskly. "He's good looking, he's practically the heir to the Empire..."

"The Empire is dead!" a male Twi'lek, Bolum, interrupted, "so how can he be the heir of a dead institution?"

Ordinarily, this would cause Mara's hackles to rise, but she was so flummoxed by the previous comment that she walked right up to Jan and said, "What makes you think Darth Vader has a son?"

"Oh, Silby!" Tanitha exclaimed, jumping up from her chair and giving her fellow dancer a hug. "You might try out for it too! I am guessing Skywalker's bride will be human, so..."

"Skywalker!?" Mara squealed, her face going pale. "Skywalker?"

"Yes, you just missed it!" Jan said excitedly. "Time traveling versions of Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa just went on Relinka Spetzv's show and said that they are twins, Skywalker and Organa, I mean, and that Darth Vader was their biological father."

Mara froze, stared, gulped and finally gasped, "What?!"

There was a babble of voices from the assembled dancers such that Mara, even with her sensitive hearing, couldn't understand a thing. Thankfully, Bolum, whose voice was deeper and louder, stood up and started waving his hands and yelling for everyone to hush. When he had done so, he grabbed the remote for the holoscreen in the corner, messed around for a few seconds, and ran a recording of Spetzv's show for Mara to watch.

When it was over, she was trembling. She also discovered that she had absentmindedly found a chair and was now sitting, which was a relief. She felt so weak from shock and anger and bewilderment that she probably would have fallen over if she had been upright.

"I still don't believe a word of it," said a hitherto silent Kassk female declared. "The whole thing is probably a publicity stunt to get the ratings up."

Bolum shook his head, frowning heavily. "I think even Relinka Spetzv would be nervous about poking the leadership of the Alliance this way. Naturally she cares about ratings, but she's not crazy. No, I think it is true enough. Makes sense, really – how could this Skywalker person have survived the war and going up against Vader and the Emperor without some help?"

"Well, he had help," the Kassk commented. "He's a trained Force sensitive. Doesn't mean he's Vader's son…"

"All of this is not remotely important!" Tanitha interrupted. "The vital point is that the future Luke Skywalker told the current Luke Skywalker to get married!"

"To a woman named 'Mara'," Jan said smugly. "Last time I checked, your name isn't Mara, Tanitha!"

"Doesn't matter," the human woman returned, shaking her blonde locks dramatically. "I could pretend that Mara was a childhood nickname. I am sure that he'd take one look at me and stand on his head!"

"Stand on his head?" Mara asked in spite of herself.

Tanitha looked down her nose at Mara and said loftily, "In my culture, it is considered romantic for a man to stand on his head when he proposes."

"It is certainly flexible," Jan mused.

"Anyway, I wouldn't bother trying," Bolum said, rising to his feet. "There are going to be thousands of females who have seen that broadcast and are going to have the same bright idea. It sounds odd to say this about a man who is the progeny of Darth Vader, but I almost feel sorry for him. He won't be able to step outside without women chasing him around."

"Maybe he'll like it," Tanitha suggested with a coy smile.

"I need to go home," Mara said, lurching out of her seat. "I'm tired."

"See you tomorrow, Silby!" Jan exclaimed.

/

Fifteen minutes later, Mara trudged into the small apartment she called home. It was clean, at least, and the landlady, a Boosodian, was careful about security. Mara didn't think anyone was going after her, and if anyone was, they would probably be able to get past the building's security measures, but at least it kept the creeps away. Two idiots from the lounge had shown up at the front door of the complex, one with flowers, one with a scalefish in a bowl, hoping to wheedle her into going out on a date. Males could be such fools.

Usually, at the end of a long day of dancing, she lurched into her small bedroom, changed into comfortable clothing, and took a long nap. Today, however...

She threw herself onto her one and only chair in the main living area, turned on the holo, and watched the entire Relinka Spetzv interview with supposed weirdos from the past for the second time.

It was pretty weird that these unlikely time travelers had said "Mara." Naturally, she would cut her own throat before marrying the man who had taken her master's life. But maybe she could use this for her own purposes? Maybe she could somehow get close enough to Skywalker to kill him by pretending to be the current timeline counterpart of the time traveling Skywalker's wife?

"Of course," she said aloud, "the whole time traveling thing is ridiculous. Maybe this is a trap to flush me out..."

The door to her bedroom opened and a red haired woman who looked exactly like her, except a decade older, stepped into the room, grinned, and said, "Nope, it's not a trap."

/

Luke Skywalker's temporary quarters

Former Imperial Palace

Two days later

Luke was obsessively reading an article about landspeeders on his holopad when a welcome chime in the Force signaled the arrival of his precious sister.

He leaped to his feet and walked over to the window, peering out toward the wide boulevard which sat across from the palace. Numerous members of New Republic forces were standing along barriers, keeping back large crowds of women, mostly human, though some were Twi'lek and Togruta.

The door slid open and he spun around and rushed into the arms of his sister.

"Leia!" he cried out, "thank the Force you are finally here!"

"We had some trouble with the Falcon," Leia answered, returning the embrace with fervor. The twosome clung to one other, and Han Solo felt what might be a tear forming in his eye. It was quite affecting to see the twins so happy to see one another, especially because they were twins. He would have been far less cheery if Leia had been that happy to see a man who wasn't her brother. Actually, she was very attached to General Rieekan, though in a fatherly way. Anyway...

"Isn't it awful?" Luke said, stepping back to stare wild eyed at Solo.

"It is," Leia said, clenching her fists as she began stalking up and down the carpeted floor of the main living room. "I assume our time traveling counterparts are really gone?"

"Yes, they are," Luke said wearily, dropping into a random chair. "I felt them disappear into the Force."

"That's a pity," Leia responded grimly. "I was looking forward to punching them each in the nose!"

Luke raised his eyebrows. He was feeling thoroughly overwhelmed after the galactic broadcast, but even so...

"That seems very violent," he commented. "I mean, I know our alters probably had our best interests in mind and didn't know how much trouble it would cause."

"Not know how much trouble it would cause?" Leia repeated sarcastically. "Of course it caused trouble! How could it not cause trouble to tell the entire galaxy that you and I are the progeny of Darth Vader?"

Luke's mouth gaped open at this statement and he lurched to his feet.

"Wait, that's what you are upset about?" he asked in confusion.

Leia leaned forward and fixed her brother with a fearsome glare. "Yes, Luke, I am upset that my people, the diaspora of Lost Alderaan, is now collectively losing its mind because the heiress of Alderaan, me, that I am the daughter of a sadistic, warmongering, cruel..."

She trailed off and tilted her head, her expression now confused. "Wait, what are you upset about?"

Luke closed his eyes, moaned, and then put an arm around his sister and guided her to the window. "Do you see that crowd down there?"

"Yes?" Leia said in bewilderment. "We noticed them when we were landing the Falcon."

"Looks like a bunch of women. Who are they, Kid?" Han asked, stepping up next to them.

Luke moaned again and ran his hands, one real, one prosthetic, down his haggard face.

"They are women," he explained wearily. "Thousands of women. Maybe tens of thousands. Each claiming her name is Mara. All wanting to ... to..."

"Marry you?" Leia whispered in shock, her eyes flaring wide.

Han looked first at his wife, then at her brother, and then began laughing. When this provoked annoyed and anguished looks from his wife and her brother, respectively, he laughed harder, so hard, indeed, that he found himself collapsing on the couch in a puddle of hysteria.

"It is not funny! " Luke howled.

Leia compressed her lips and stared first at her husband, then at her twin, then back at her husband, and a reluctant smile formed on her lips.

"It is a little funny, Luke," she said.

"No, it is not!" Luke yelped, his hands clutching his hair and causing the dark blond locks to stand up straight. "Who are these women? Are they insane?"

"What's insane about marrying you?" Leia demanded, now looking irritable. "You are good looking, noble, brave, and the hero of the Rebellion. What's not to like?"

"As you just pointed out, I am Darth Vader's son!" he said, and groaned. "You would think any normal female would find that an unnerving concept."

"People are weird, Kid," Han said with a cynical lift of one eyebrow. "Leia's right; you have a lot going for you. For that matter, it could be argued that you and Leia are the natural heirs to the Empire, so maybe some of the ladies out there are thinking that they could marry you and start a dynasty..."

"Stop!" Luke interrupted. "Just stop. This is getting more horrible by the minute! I don't know what to do! If I try to leave the palace, I get chased. I'm going to have to go into hiding."

"According to our future selves," Leia said in a dry tone, "that is the worst thing that could happen. You are supposed to get married and have children."

"With 'Mara'," Luke agreed, rolling his eyes. "Though how I am going to find one woman in a galaxy of trillions of sentients, who is the right Mara, sounds pretty well impossible."

The door slid open and an auburn haired woman strode in with another red head trailing uneasily behind her.

"Thankfully for you," Mara Jade Skywalker said cheerily, "I brought your bride to you!"