Author Note: I had a reviewer suggest that Luke, Leia, and Mara interact with the Luke and Leia of the last three Star Wars movies (TFA, TLJ, and ROS). I haven't seen Rise of Skywalker because I loathed The Last Jedi with such a deep and abiding hatred that I decided not to irritate myself with the last of the trilogy. To be clear, I believe that since Disney purchased the SW franchise, they have the right to do what they want. The actors did a fine job with what they were given. But the plot of The Last Jedi can make me rant for a full hour, as my long suffering children can attest to. If you liked the last trilogy, I am truly happy for you. I know some people really enjoyed it.
So no, there will be no interaction with Kylo Ren or Rey or (shudder) The Last Jedi Luke.
For more of my opinion on The Last Jedi, feel free to check out my story, "A Peculiar Nightmare".
/
Darth Vader's Palace
Imperial City
Imperial Center
3 years after the birth of the Empire
Darth Vader knew, with a mixture of agonizing dread and excited anticipation, that it was going to be one of those nights.
In the first few months after she left, he had dreamt of her every single night.
He knew that he ought to purge her from his mind. She was gone, forever, gone along with the child, and he was alone save for the increasingly heavy hand of his Master.
He ought not to think of her any more. During the day, he was busy - so very busy - that he was able to keep his thoughts away from her but at night, during those few painful snatched hours of sleep, she always came to him.
But after a full year passed, well, he no longer dreamt of her every night. Often a full week would go by and then she would appear again in his dreams, her dark eyes alight first with love, then with terror and pain, then her silent form on the bier was pulled through the streets of Theed on Naboo.
Now, three years after she …
Now he rarely dreamt of her. But tonight was one of those nights. He knew, as he saw her approaching in his mindscape, with her hair streaming out behind her, her petite feet dancing amongst the flowers of the meadows near Varykino, that the dream would end in a nightmare of lava and fire and death, death, death.
And yet, he had not the power to turn away from her, even though he knew that he would awaken full of hatred at himself and the galaxy, full of sorrow and grinding pain, even though he knew his master would chastise him for his distress over the woman who had betrayed him.
(As he had betrayed her. She had begged him to come away with her, to come away and raise their child and he had reached out his hand and … and...)
"Anakin! Anakin!"
Within the hellscape that was the mind of Darth Vader, the woman he loved more than anyone or anything was screaming in the pain of labor and there was the cry of a baby, his baby, who would have been born if the child's father had not murdered her mother…
He woke up with the familiar sensation of suffocation. His lungs were a mass of scars, and he could only survive without his helmet within a small, claustrophobic chamber where pressurized oxygen provided him enough of the life giving gas to survive.
He often wished he had not survived. Life was worth nothing, less than nothing, without Padme at his side, without the child he had loved and lost.
Lost and murdered by his own hand, when he choked the life out of his Angel.
He raised his bald, scarred head and stared blankly at the flashing lights of the chamber. The dream had been so real, so very real, and once again, his heart nearly stopped with the agony of her loss. He had never imagined he could live without her. But perhaps he was not really alive anymore. He was more machine now than man, the Right Hand of Palpatine, hardly a person anymore at all.
(I am a person and my name is Anakin.)
A baby was still crying. But that was quite impossible. He was awake now. Unless he was hallucinating?
Vader sat up and gestured sharply; a moment later, the helmet was replaced on his head and the hyperbaric chamber parted and he was on his feet, all two meters of him and…
Now the crying baby was joined with the shrieks of young children and Darth Vader shuddered. No, it could not be – the Jedi Temple! The screams of the children as he cut them down...
(Master Skywalker, there are too many of them. What are we going to do?)
He was awake, and yet he could not be awake. He was going insane, of course. It was, Darth Vader decided wearily, entirely appropriate.
He stomped over to the door which led into his main...living area, was the right word, no doubt, but it was hardly a conventional space. The section in the middle was open so that he could practice lightsaber combat with droids, and several tables against the walls were filled with mechanical parts. He still liked tinkering, though. In any case, it would be empty, and this distressing experience would end.
The door slid open obediently and Vader stalked into the room and halted, his hidden mouth hanging open.
The room was not empty. Three adults – a young blond man, a dark haired woman, and a redheaded woman, were scurrying around chasing one, two, three, four, five, six small children.
Six children, in his quarters. No, seven, because the brunette was carrying an infant child in her arms.
Very well, he was obviously deranged.
/
Luke Skywalker had, during his storied career, been partially dismembered, slobbered on by a rancor, blasted with Force Lightning, shot at, captured, nearly eaten by a Wampa, and thrown up on by his children.
He had never been quite this flustered, however.
He was used to the Force throwing him back in time with Leia, or Mara, or both. Not with his children and Leia's children. That was insane. That was ridiculous. What was the Force thinking?
His children and nieces and nephews were, of course, entirely delighted. One moment they were playing in one of Varykino's glorious gardens, the next they were in an austere room filled with various tables covered with enticing mechanical parts. There were also four training droids, mercifully powered down, in one alcove of the room.
"This is a nightmare!" Leia snarled, pulling her infant daughter closer to her. "What is the Force thinking?"
Luke grimaced sympathetically. It was bad enough that his children were here but at least they were potty trained. Leia would need diapers...
"Look, your bag!" Mara exclaimed as she charged forward to snatch a coiled wire from three year old Beru.
"Well, I suppose I should be thankful for small favors," Leia grumbled, gesturing at the diaper bag, which floated obediently toward her. "Still, this is ridiculous! Any idea where we are and what the timeline is?"
"Imperial Center," Mara said with a glance outside the large windows. A moment later, she charged over to herd her six year old son, Biggs, away from the droids. "But I can't tell whether this is before or after the Fall of the Republic..."
A door slid open and the giant form of Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, stalked into the room. Luke sighed and exchanged an unhappy glance with his wife.
"After," they said together, and all three adults moved their hands toward their lightsabers. It was tricky for Leia, who was carrying Padme in one arm, but she could, at least, protect herself a little if Vader came out swinging.
"Who dat?" Breha Organa Solo asked curiously, pointing at the two meter cyborg.
"That is sort of your grandfather, my dear," Leia responded to her daughter, and gestured firmly. "Stay behind me, children, that is an order."
Cassian, age two, was too curious to be impressed by his mother's tone, but the Organa Solo twins and the Skywalker children obediently retreated.
Mara grabbed her small nephew as Luke took a cautious stride toward his Alter Father and said carefully, "I know this seems very odd, but I can explain."
To his relief and surprise, the Sith did not make any aggressive moves, nor did he seem particularly upset. Indeed, Vader's posture was more sad than angry.
"Who are you?" the deep voice inquired.
"Well, I am Luke Skywalker, your son, but not from this timeline. I'm from the future. This is my sister Leia, and my wife Mara, and these are our miscellaneous children."
The three time traveling adults waited confidently for the usual statement that time travel was impossible, only to be surprised when Vader said instead, "Because neither of us were certain of the gender of our child."
Luke blinked and moved a little closer, "What do you mean?"
"I am imagining twins because Padme thought the child was a boy, and I a girl."
Luke blinked again and cast an anguished glance at his wife, who said, as she tightened her grip on a wiggling Cassian, "I think he thinks he is hallucinating."
"Of course I am hallucinating," Vader declared, taking a few agitated steps around the room. "I killed her, my angel, and the child with her. It is not enough that I suffer in my dreams; now I imagine my child when I am awake."
Luke stared at his Alter Father and moaned softly. This was a mess. How was he supposed to deal with a cyborg Sith Lord who believed he was in the grip of a fantastic vision?
"You are not hallucinating," he declared firmly. "We really are here."
Darth Vader regarded his male visitor with fascination and said, "You are short."
"I take after Padme," Luke said patiently.
"And I always imagined that if we had a son, he would have Padme's coloring."
"Well, Leia does," Luke declared with a gesture toward his sister, "but I take after Anakin. Except we are both short because of our mother."
"Ah," the Sith responded gravely.
Luke's shoulders slumped. "You still think you are in the midst of some kind of waking dream, don't you?"
"Yes, of course," Vader responded with a slight uptick in agitation. Was it not enough that he was caught in the throes of a guilt induced vision? Must his imaginary son insist that he was real?
Luke groaned aloud. If he had more time, he would use the gentle approach but the kids were going to go nuts soon and he needed to figure out what to do before someone turned on a battle droid and ...
With a gesture of one hand, he focused on Darth Vader's bald head, hidden behind the helmet, and gave it a hard slap with the Force.
The cyborg lurched back in astonishment, and his left mechanical hand went to his helmet while the other dropped to his lightsaber.
"I am sorry about that," Luke said boldly, "but we don't have all the time in the world. Obviously an apparition couldn't do that."
Vader's ears were still ringing from the blow but he was an intelligent person, and he was forced to admit that the apparition was quite right. He couldn't be an apparition.
That did not make much sense.
"Who are you?" Vader demanded again, this time more harshly, and Cassian Organa Solo cried out in fear.
Luke sighed and explained patiently. "I am your son, though from another timeline, Luke Skywalker. This is my twin sister Leia, and my wife Mara. These are our..."
"The child is dead. She died with her mother."
"Padme didn't die on Mustafar," Leia said firmly, rocking her baby daughter soothingly. "I know you think you killed her when you choked her, but Kenobi rushed her to Polis Massa and she gave birth to us, then died a few minutes later. You have living children in this timeline, though I am not sure how old they are. How long has it been since Mustafar?"
Vader stared at his Alter daughter for a full, incredulous minute.
"You are saying that...the child lived?" he finally stuttered. The vocoder was behaving very oddly, but then so was his voice.
"Your children lived, yes," Luke insisted, using Force suggestion to convince the bemused Sith.
Another minute passed in silence and then Vader took a step forward. "Where are they? Where are my children?"
"How long has it been since Mustafar?" Mara demanded, lowering Cassian to the floor and scurrying over to Leia's twins, who had scaled a table and were rooting around it for sharp tools with which to impale themselves.
"Three years," Vader responded in agitation, and looked down in wonder as Cassian toddled over to grasp his cloak in his hands. A moment later, the little boy tugged hard on the cape and tried to pull it down, which did not work, of course, since the cyborg weighed about 100 times that of his Alter grandson.
"Well, that doesn't work," Mara declared as Luke rushed forward to remove his nephew from the entangling folds of Darth Vader's cloak.
"Why not?" Leia demanded in confusion, and added, "Cassian, leave your grandfather alone."
"Grandfather..." Vader repeated in wonder. "Grandfather..."
"Why doesn't it work?" Luke asked his wife.
Mara, looking harassed, used the Force to pull Biggs away from a panel full of buttons which the boy was pushing vigorously and said, "The Luke and Leia of this timeline are three years old. If Vader finds them now, he will kill them."
This broke through Darth Vader's bemusement and he took an outraged step toward the redhead. "How dare you say such a thing? These are my children and they should be with me! I will not harm a hair on their heads!"
Luke groaned aloud and gestured toward his three year old twins, who were now engaged in climbing a fortunately deactivated battle droid. "Mara is right, Father. You are a psychotic Dark Sider now, and you have no idea how incredibly exasperating Skywalker twins are. I know Leia and I were absolute terrors at age 3. You wouldn't mean to hurt them, but you would."
"I would not," the Sith declared.
"You strangled your own wife," Leia pointed out as baby Padme began to cry, "and she was just trying to pound some sense into your idiotic head. Luke and Mara are right; the Luke and Leia of this timeline would drive you insane. I think it is written in the Sith rules somewhere that Sith Lords shouldn't try to raise obnoxious three year olds."
"What obnoxis?" Shmi Skywalker asked curiously, staring up into her mother's face.
Mara scooped up her twins in both arms and said fondly, "You are obnoxious sometimes, my darlings, but we adore you both."
"Padme is hungry," Leia murmured, glancing around helplessly. She usually nursed her infant on a comfy chair in the corner of her living room. This stunk.
Luke gestured with one hand and a large chair next to a tall table floated into a corner. A moment later, Leia's diaper bag opened and a blanket floated out and into Leia's hand.
"Go ahead and feed her," he directed. "Mara and I will take care of the rest of the kids, and ... and Vader...and..."
"I wish Han was here," moaned Leia, moving toward the chair.
There was a flash of light and suddenly Han Solo was standing among them, his cheeky grin firmly in place. "Hello, everyone!"
