Star Wars One-Shots

Smoke and Ash

He can't lose Luke, too.

(Why did you leave me here, Master? He doesn't even know which of his two masters he's talking to anymore, the images blurring over one another in his mind... and in his heart.)

Vader hauls his body across the black ground with a furious determination, never straying from his ultimate destination of the ruins of the Techno Union facility where he went so many years ago after the newly elected Emperor sent him here to kill the remaining Separatist leaders.

He makes it inside, respirator still cycling rhythmically as he twists himself upright, silently seething at his Master's rule that he not use the Force. It's unfair. The Force is an integral part of him, and he hates that he's unable to use it. But... it's only a small setback, he assures himself. He's used to repairing things without using the Force, even if those times are from a past that's no longer his own. The skills are still there, which is what matters. He won't be able to feel all the little things through the Force, the way the pieces fit together, the way they work in sync, but it doesn't (shouldn't) matter, because he's not keeping these limb replacements permanently. It's just for now, until he can prove himself again.

And then, once this is all over, he'll make his own plans. He can't – Luke. He can't let anything happen to his son. He has to protect him. He will protect him. He'll destroy his Master for threatening his son. (For abandoning him here.) Luke is good. He's light. He has to be protected and kept safe. That will never happen so long as the Emperor lives and reigns. Vader will kill him, and he'll put Luke on the throne. Luke will know what to do. He will. He's his mother's son; he'll be a good Emperor, and Vader will gladly enforce Luke's will on the galaxy.

Luke is good, but Vader is not. He's – he's a butcher, a monster. He knows what he is, what he's done. Nothing he does will ever change it, and he doesn't know if he would change it even if he could. He's obeyed his Master, done what was necessary to bring peace and order. If that means war, so be it.

And Vader will do the same for Luke. He'll kill for his son. He'll – he'll do anything for him. It's what he's done for his Master, and his son deserves an even greater devotion, because he's family. And Vader is – he'll continue his path, continue to be a weapon wielded by Luke's hand. He deserves no less. That's all he'll ever be.

("There is good in him...")

No, there's not. It's foolishness, a foolish wish, a dying hope. Nothing more.

Vader is made of hatred now, lost so deep to its clutches that he can feel the Dark Side gnawing at him, demanding more. More bloodshed. More death. He wants to see Sidious dead. He wants to rip him to pieces, burn him to ash and scatter them across the galaxy. He wants his Master to suffer. He wants – he wants to make him bleed. He wants to tear him apart with his bare hands, destroy him with the very... "gifts" that Sidious bestowed upon him.

He never asked for this. Never. He never asked to be remade; he never wanted it. He didn't want to die, but he didn't want to live either, not like this. Never like this. He isn't – he isn't even human anymore. He lives because of machines and because of his Master's graces. Oh, he knows that he could probably try to kill Sidious, but he doesn't think he would ever succeed, and more than that, he doesn't know if he even has the strength to try, for all that he wishes and wills it.

A mouse droid rolls across the floor nearby, and Vader reaches out, snatching it before it can leave, tearing open the side one-handed, and rewiring it so that it will listen to him and bring him what he needs. He rages inwardly at having been reduced to this, to repairing himself like he's a droid, and without being able to use the Force, no less.