Chapter 13 - Dreams
Vader stalked across a barren landscape, unsure how he arrived. His most recent memories being the inside of a bacta tank and the maintenance and modifications to his suit and prosthetic limbs. He looked down at at his right hand, opening and closing the fingers slowly.
They were neither the mechanical replacement for the original taken by Dooku all those years back, nor flesh and blood. His entire body was not the one he knew so well, and yet he felt it was undeniably his own true self. Truer than any body his spirit could ever inhabit. He knew, in some indescribable way, that this form would never succumb to injury or exhaustion.
Giving up on understanding this strange body, Vader looked around at the rocky world he now found himself on. Tendrils of mist, some white and airy, some black and smoky, clung to him as he walked onward. He could discern no particular direction that would be better than any other, and yet…
"No matter where I walk, it feels as though I progress towards some distant goal," he said, speaking aloud. It was the voice of both Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader all in one. A strange sensation, but much like his body, it felt correct. And sure enough, despite turning this way and that, his path surely brought him closer to some unknown goal. As he walked, he became aware of something at the very edge of hearing. Wind, he assumed at first, but no. There were voices, somewhere, speaking. At once both near and far, he strained to hear them.
"If you seek me, come forward."
Despite lacking any apparent lightsaber, Vader's hand grasped at the mist and a burst of power coalesced around his fingers, extending into a red beam of energy. It extended from nothing, but as sure as he was that this was his own body, Vader knew this was his weapon as well.
So, this is the one.
Hearing the distinct sentence, Vader turned in a circle, looking for its owner.
As I said, the Force chose him. The Child of Prophecy.
A second voice, and this one was familiar, although Vader couldn't place it. Somewhere deep in the past, but long lost to time and tide.
Many prophecies, but I see why you think I can teach him. Ah, it appears he noticed us. Very talented indeed.
"Who are you," he asked.
Things are more complicated than you know, Anakin. But you'll understand soon enough.
Vader tilted his head slightly, trying to place the voice. "Jinn?"
###
A pair of yellow eyes opened and Vader was back in the tank. His suit, the work completed, was on the table in front of him. A communicator buzzed in his ear.
"Speak," he commanded.
"We expect to arrive within less than six hours, Lord Vader," Tarkin said.
Whatever he experienced, dream or vision, Vader pushed it aside and used the Force to activate the bacta tank's harness system. It slowly pulled him out and held him, suspended in the air. "I will be on the bridge shortly."
His prosthetic limbs lifted off the table and drifted across the room until they hovered just past the ends of what remained from his battles with Count Dooku and Obi-Wan.
Closing his eyes, he pulled them in and felt the flash of pain as his nerves reconnected to his arms and legs. The harness lowered and he stepped out of it, onto the floor of his personal quarters. Looking down, he opened and closed his mechanical fingers, then his mind drifted back to the dream and those two voices.
His eyes narrowed. "Nothing, not visions, not ghosts of the past, will stand in my way."
He quickly pulled on his suit and cast aside the respirator. For the half-minute it took to pull on and activate the life systems, he did not and could not breath, but it was hardly a new sensation. One more minor bit of pain in a fog of suffering.
A source of further rage to draw on and fuel his power.
At last, Vader set the face plate over his eyes and activated the heads up display. The helmet locked into place, and his black armored suit activated.
Kshhhhhh
With a hiss, his helmet sealed and Vader was once more locked within. Oddly enough, Vader felt… different. Better, in fact, than he'd felt in a long time. The readout projected onto his black lenses gave a physiological scan. And if what it said was accurate, the Sith spent a good twelve hours unconscious.
Asleep.
Something he hadn't done since before Palpatine put him inside this prison.
Anger welled up inside him. Far below, the Dark Trooper pilots of Black Squadron felt a sense of discomfort, although none of them would be able to say why. Any who were truly Force sensitive would feel Vader's presence thrum within the Dark Side.
"Prepare," he ordered Ceezee, and marched towards the bridge.
###
Vader's eyes scanned the tactical display. Coming out of hyper space at the far edge of the Geonosian gravity well, they'd place the planet between themselves and the Death Star shipyard. Given what the battle station was meant to do, Vader had no intention of letting it get a clear shot.
"I agree with the approach, Lord Vader, but given the time table it seems dubious that any weapons are operational, let alone the main beam," Tarkin said from the Sith's right.
Kshhhhhh
"Do not underestimate Palpatine, Grand Moff. He spent decades orchestrating the downfall of the Jedi and the Republic itself. Even if they would have both collapsed eventually, it was Darth Sidious who set it all in motion. No amount of caution is unwarranted where my master is concerned," Vader said. He looked around the gathered officers. "No, not even now that he is dead," he answered the unasked question. "The Sith plan on a timescale of centuries. I have no doubt he created contingencies."
With the exception of Tarkin and the Inquisitorius, Palpatine's death was still thought to be the action of Jedi assassins.
"Could we not reason with them, Lord Vader?" Major Gaunt, one of the younger men, asked. "Perhaps its all a misunderstanding? They think they're acting against the Jedi?" It gave voice to a hope Vader sensed all the officers gathered shared. It was one matter to war against enemies, but these were, at one time, loyal members of the Empire.
"Even the Senate has been brought to heel," Tarkin said. "If the Death Star shipyard will not do the same, we are left with no choice."
A grim atmosphere hung over the war room.
Kshhhhhh
"Steel yourselves," Vader ordered. "The Republic failed to make hard decisions. Politicians hoped for the easy way. The comfortable way." He had the attention of the entire war room now, even the comms officers and functionaries. "You will not fail as they did. I will not permit it."
Kshhhhhh
Around the room, more than a few men pulled at their collars
"Command is yours, Tarkin." Vader stormed out of the room, heading for the lift to the hangar.
"As you will, my lord," Tarkin said with a slight bow. He waited until the doors closed to turn back to the other officers. "Gentlemen, this may be your first occasion to work directly with Lord Vader. Let me tell you, in no uncertain terms, we intend to make the Empire the sole and undisputed power in the galaxy. If that requires culling the herd, so be it. Make no mistake, Darth Vader killed politicians in cold blood, right in front of me, without flinching. Do you expect him to treat you any differently?"
With the men suitably cowed, Tarkin continued. "As the Emperor said, steel yourselves. Bringing an entire galaxy to heel means getting your hands dirty, at least on occasion."
###
Ordering his own wing to launch as soon as they dropped out of Hyper Space, Vader was already in his Actis Interceptor, checking the systems one last time. It wouldn't be long now. A part of him anticipated the combat. It felt like years since he last flew a fighter into battle. The plan was set, although the Sith knew how often plans fell apart at first contact with the enemy.
Drifting almost into meditation, Vader thought he heard a voice over the comms.
A Sith who meditates like a Jedi? Curiouser and curiouser, though I suppose you gave your Master little time to teach you.
Vader's eyes snapped open. This time, a voice did call to him from the communicator. "Lord Vader, we expect to drop into normal space in less than five minutes," Captain Mithel of the Dark Trooper pilots said. "All members of Black Squadron are prepped and accounted for."
Vader quickly keyed in his personal code, routing all battle data from the bridge to his fighter and helmet readouts. "Link your launch to my ship, Captain," he ordered. "Tarkin," he continued, "send firing solutions to all allied vessels."
"Understood, Lord Vader."
Satisfied, the Sith Lord reached out with the Force, trying to find the owner of the voice he heard. If they were on this Star Destroyer, he would know it. "Reveal yourself. You cannot hide from me."
We will meet and soon, but you have other matters.
Furious, Vader nearly crushed the docking clamp holding his fighter with nothing but the Force, but he kept a lid on the rage. "Arrival in ten…" came the announcement over the comms.
"Ceezee, scan every ship in the fleet," Vader demanded. A part of him already knew this was someone working through the Force, but he wanted the confirmation all the same.
"All members accounted for, no unknown life forms discovered."
"So be it." This meant whoever or whatever intruded on his meditations, it was through the Force, and so distance was meaningless. The Power of the Force was beyond such paltry concerns
"… Three, two, one!"
With a thunderclap, the fleet reappeared in normal space. Beneath them, the wasteland of planet Geonosis turned like a lethargic animal. Within the Imperious Star Destroyer, Vader hit the thrusters and sent his fighter barreling straight out the hangar and through the force-field. The eight other Interceptors making up his wing followed after, streaking into space and out, ahead of the fleet.
"Defensive platform, twelve 0' clock low, my lord!" Captain Mithel called.
Kshhhhhh
"Maintain attack formation, we're going in."
Vader led the Interceptors into a steep dive straight for the platform. Most likely several more would be spread all around the planet. An early warning system for the very sort of attack Vader just initiated. The heavy cannons turned to lock onto the small fighters, but it was far to late. "Break on my mark," he said, noting the gun's angle.
Kshhhhhh
"Break."
The Dark Trooper pilots of Black Squadron, some of the first the Inquisitorius scouted, were all talented behind the controls of their ships. It was that minimal connection to the Force which allowed them to excel as pilots in the days of the Republic and now in the Galactic Empire. At Vader's command, they proved it, the streaking light of their engines bursting outward like flower blooming in the darkness of space. Forced to track nine targets all spreading out in different directions, the cannons were slow. Only by a fraction of a second, but that was more than enough for a Sith.
Vader's lasers peppered the platform, followed by Captain Mithel right behind. Black Squadron pulled away as the installation violently ruptured. Being lightly armored, Vader surmised it was meant to slow them down and send an advanced warning to the orbital shipyard on the far side of Geonosis, not seriously hamper them.
"Advance First Fleet and launch all squadrons."
Darth Vader's command came through over the comm system and the bridge of the Imperious burst into activity. "At once, Lord Vader," Tarkin replied. Engines thrummed with power and the destroyers and assault ships moved around the edge of Geonosis, drawing closer to their primary target.
###
Aboard the Death Star, in one of the few currently habitable sections of the initial framework built as housing for the early construction, a human male looked over the currently available data.
"So they did come," he said.
"Yes, Master Sheyvan," one of his clones answered. The one called Sheyvan, a student of the Dark Side, was otherwise known as The Hand of the Emperor. The true emperor, as he thought of it. Whoever this 'Vader' was, Sheyvan never heard Palpatine mention him, and he certainly didn't recognize this upstart as the heir of Sidious.
Sheyvan carried out whatever task his master required, often wet work, but ever since the initiation of a Sith experiment in cloning Force sensitive soldiers, he'd been training his duplicates and acting as the guard and overseer of the Death Star site.
"Prep the fighters and activate all weapons. I want this false emperor, Darth Vader, to be little more than a crater on the planet below."
"At once, Master Sheyvan," his clone said and left to carry out the command.
When he was alone, Sheyvan looked to the statue of Sidious, almost an alter at the center of the room. "Whatever plans you've made, my master, I will ensure they come to fruition."