Note: various alternate pairings; references to genocide and murder; while the story occasionally draws on material from the scripts, ROTJ, the PT, and even (gasp!) the EU, it isn't compliant with the canon of anything except the film versions of A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back.

Prologue

Darth Vader had not, from any point of view, killed Anakin Skywalker.

He often wished that he had. Instead, as he knew perfectly well, that part of himself had been defeated, never destroyed.

At first, it seemed to be constantly shrieking at him - what am I doing oh Force what am I doing what I am doing? It had taken him years to silence the voice of his weaker self, and even now, it would sometimes cost him a moment's hesitation as he went about his duties. But Anakin Skywalker meant nothing to him - he was a weak, mewling prisoner who occasionally rattled the bars of his cage and shouted at his captor. Nothing more.

Yes, Vader claimed pieces of Anakin's life as his own, but that, he felt obscurely, was part of his victory. Everything that had been Anakin's was now Vader's by right: his faith, his past, his powers.

Time passed, and the name Skywalker lost all meaning for him. His triumph was complete.

Then he saw the plans for the Emperor's newest toy.

"The Death Star isn't merely a battle station," Tarkin told him. "It will be the size of a moon, and have sufficient firepower to destroy planets."
He was Darth Vader. His capacity for horror had long since shrunk to nothing; he had not thought that anything could even dismay him. But this -

Billions of Imperial subjects. Loyal Imperial subjects, most of them, innocent of any wrongdoing. Meaningless slaughter, loss of life, waste of resources. Clumsy and random too, a blaster aimed at planets. Their own planets. Not the way of the Force. Foolish. Anathema.

Vader may have been obliged to purify the Order of the treasonous and unworthy, but he remained a Jedi, a servant of the Force. For the first time in fifteen years, he was in undivided agreement with himself.

This thing is an abomination.

"Lord Vader?"

"I was not aware that the Rebellion controlled any entire system," said Vader.

He had not thought he would ever be grateful for the mask, either.

No, he did not approve of the Death Star. But in the end, it made little difference. He knew his duty - not to the Emperor, who he had despised for years and hated for years before that, nor to the simpering sycophants who filled the court and the higher ranks of the military. Vader's loyalty was to the Empire, as it had always been. He did what was necessary - whatever was necessary.

So he stepped on board the station, and did not execute any of the heretical fools who willingly served there. Admiral Motti didn't count. Vader had no intentions of killing him, on that occasion. Motti presumed to question the will of the Force, to doubt its power. He had to be punished.
Vader permitted Motti to live. He deferred to Tarkin, as much as he was capable of deferring to anyone. He interrogated Princess Leia. He listened to her lie. While he elected not to enlighten Tarkin on that point, his silence served no purpose. Alderaan burned.

Tarkin was a Force-blind fool, whose allegiance to the Empire sprang out of nothing more than a desire to wreak havoc across the galaxy. Naturally, he felt nothing. Palpatine must have sensed it, but if he had ever concerned himself with the good of the Empire, that time was long past. He, too, would have felt nothing.

Darth Vader had killed more men than he had bothered to count, but always for a purpose. Not like this. The anguish of billions screamed through his mind and his lungs struggled for the next breath. In that moment, Anakin thought the respirator had failed, and he was finally (free) dying. His mechanical fingers dug into Princess Leia's shoulder.

Then the screams died away and he heard nothing but his own breath, once more steady and controlled. The respirator had recovered from its momentary lapse, and he was himself again.

Vader stared down at the remnants of Alderaan and supposed that the Emperor considered this a reasonable way to keep order. It was certainly true that Palpatine had never concerned himself with anything other than acquiring as much power as possible, but once, he had at least been shrewd and pragmatic with it - a competent despot if never a benevolent one. In recent years, however, he had grown careless, foolish. Now, it had reached the point where he thought to strengthen the Empire by turning valuable systems to rubble.

Vader did not believe that Palpatine had turned senile in the usual manner. But apathy and complacency had taken their toll on his once-impressive will. That much would be contemptible in anyone, but it was deplorable in those who thought to harness the power of the Force. The Emperor, of all people, could ill-afford it; sunk as he was in the Dark Side, any weakness left him vulnerable to its ravages. Whatever shreds of reason he retained would soon be gone.

Vader had always meant to overthrow him, when the time was right. That time, he decided, was rapidly approaching. He had only to find a way. Unfortunately, Palpatine's powers had not vanished with his competence, and even Vader's were not quite sufficient to overcome him.

The right opportunity would present itself, he knew with all the clairvoyance at his command. Not in the distant future. Soon. He need not bide his time much longer. But at present, the Force told him to watch, and wait.

When the moment arrived, Vader would be ready. For now, he bowed to the dictates of lesser men, and left to defend the Death Star from the Rebels' assault.

He might have disapproved of the Death Star and the nonsensical slaughter of billions of citizens, but it was still an Imperial station. He knew his duty. So he planned for a future without war, chaos, or needless destruction - or Palpatine - and shot down every Rebel pilot he saw.

Only one provided any significant challenge - one who shone like a small star as he hurtled through the trench. Vader was somewhat less than surprised, and almost regretted his obligation to bring the pilot down. Naturally, the Force sought the Death Star's destruction, and would inevitably achieve it - but not, if Vader had anything to say about it, today.

In the event, he didn't, if only because another Rebel darted in out of nowhere and sent Vader's TIE fighter spinning into space. A few seconds later, the Death Star exploded and another million deaths reverberated through the remains of Vader's body. He collapsed.

It took him some time to return to Imperial Center and a month more to wholly recover. Afterwards, he pursued the Force-sensitive pilot with single-minded purpose. His efforts did not go unrewarded. Within a year, he had acquired the pilot's name in the course of conversation with a captured Rebel.

At first, Vader felt only surprise - a surprise so great that he accidentally broke his prisoner's neck. It was a pity, he thought distantly; the creature might have had more information. Then he realized exactly what had just shocked him.

Skywalker.

It was his name. His former name, that was - but the name of those who shared his blood. They had always been strong in the Force; it was unlikely, but not beyond the realm of coincidence, that the young Rebel pilot might be some sort of distant cousin. It had to be that. He'd only ever had two nearer connections amongst his kin, his mother and his son. The former had died near her home, the latter with his Jedi abductor.

He'd buried Shmi's body behind the homestead, carved her name in Basic and then in the Alsaraic characters she'd laboured to teach him, and added the dates that marked the beginning and end of her life. Shmi Skywalker Lars; Marashmi Adanai. Forty-nine years old. It was a long life for a slave.

Luke, though, had left no body. If Vader had been Force-blind - perish the thought - he might even have held out hope. But he'd felt it happen. He'd felt Luke fade into the distance, and then a sudden, sharp weakening, followed by silence.

There hadn't even been a skeleton to bury. There was no grave for Vader's son, dead before his third birthday. If he'd lived, he would be almost a man by now, as their people had measured such things.

The pilot, his captive had mentioned, was now barely nineteen. Just as Luke would have been. But Luke was dead. It must be someone else.
It wasn't. With a birthdate and surname to guide them, his agents had little further difficulty in unearthing the pilot's identity, and every shred of information that could be found about him. Since they valued their lives, they sent the data to him immediately and discreetly.

The pilot was a boy named Luke Skywalker, born on his son's birthday, on the planet where his wife had given birth, raised by Vader's brother and sister-in-law. If any doubts had remained, the accompanying holo would have eliminated them. From the untidy blond hair, to the wide blue eyes and cleft in the chin, the boy's resemblance was unmistakable, both to Vader himself and to the child he remembered.

Luke Skywalker was a Rebel, a traitor, and little more than half-trained, yet the first thing Vader felt was pride. Everyone from Tarkin to the lowest officer onboard had gloried in their blasphemous creation, had blasphemed still further when they declared it invulnerable. Yet their precious Death Star had been brought low by an eighteen-year-old boy with no more knowledge of the Force than the merest novice. By his son. It seemed appropriate.

It was also distinctly satisfying. Luke could know little of their faith and clearly lacked any proper understanding of the Empire, yet he, too, upheld the will of the Force, after his fashion. Vader approved.

After his fashion.

All his plans were now possible; this was the opportunity he had been waiting for. But he would have to gain Luke's allegiance - which, he acknowledged to himself, would not be an easy task. Rebels were notoriously resistant to persuasion of any kind, and he considered it highly unlikely that Luke would be less so. He was, after all, a Skywalker.

More holos came his way, all of exceptionally poor quality, and mostly of the Rebellion's increased recruitment efforts. Luke appeared in a number of them - he had apparently acquired what passed for high rank in the Rebellion - though he generally remained silent and watchful at Princess Leia's side.

Princess Leia. She had been an ally, of sorts, once. She was nothing of the kind any more. Still, when he made out her grainy figure stride alongside his son's, the two of them apparently connected at the hip, he thought of P - he thought she might be of even greater use to him now than she had been as an Imperial Senator.

Luke could not yet sense anything that happened to her; his powers were still too undeveloped. But Vader had no doubt that his foresight would manifest in his son, or that he would know when it did. And he was accustomed to waiting.

He had not yet decided exactly how to manage the Emperor, when Palpatine himself appeared to demand a report of his progress. Vader grovelled to the best of his ability - which was not particularly great but seemed to suffice - and silenced his disgust at the indignity as he silenced all his weaknesses. Kneeling and mouthing pleasantries, after all, provided a few precious moments to collect his thoughts without visible hesitation, and he had never needed the time more.

Within those few seconds, he had made his decision. Luke's loyalties could be dealt with in the future; for now, he had to protect his life.

Vader regretted to say that he had not yet located the pilot, but he could sense that he was growing closer. He was following several promising leads; undoubtedly one of them would turn up the right man. As soon as he identified their enemy with absolute certainty, Vader said, carefully thinking of nothing except his loyalty to the Empire, he would, of course, inform his master.

He lied on that occasion and every occasion thereafter, until it became more prudent to leak the information. The Force assured him that the droid sent to Hoth had, indeed, discovered the Rebel base; Palpatine was now at some distance, and Luke's sympathies the more immediate . . . difficulty. The threat of the Emperor would likely be necessary.

He was, therefore, unsurprised when the Emperor demanded an audience, though the timing was, as always, less than convenient. Vader stopped chasing Rebel ships through the asteroid field and returned to his chambers, dropping to his knees.

Palpatine's twelve-foot hologram flickered to life.

"There is a great disturbance in the Force," Palpatine announced.

"I have felt it," Vader said, truthfully enough. He had felt it for well on two years by now, but the Emperor preferred not to be troubled with trivial details.

"We have a new enemy: the young Rebel who destroyed the Death Star. I have no doubt this boy is the offspring of Anakin Skywalker."

He didn't cherish many doubts about it, himself. However, while it might be amusing to enlighten Palpatine before his death, Vader had no intention of tipping his hand this early.

"How is this possible?" he said flatly. They both knew perfectly well how it was possible that he, a Jedi to this day, could have offspring. Nobody still living knew how that offspring could be alive and well and blowing up space stations.

"Search your feelings, Lord Vader," Palpatine told him. "You know it to be true."

Vader fell silent. He could say nothing that was not false in every way, and he knew from harsh experience that that was rarely a wise approach to take with Palpatine.

"He could destroy us," the Emperor said, and Vader knew, with the certainty that only came from the Force, that Palpatine had foreseen his own destruction. Only his own destruction.

"He's just a boy!" snapped Vader, then hastily added, "Obi-Wan can no longer help him."

Palpatine gave him a long look. "The Force is strong with him. The . . . son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi."

To Vader's horror, the weak, but somehow indestructible, part of himself that he kept shut up in the back of his mind, chose that moment to murmur, I'm right here. He instantly repressed the thought and focused on other, more productive ones.

Vader would find his son - his, whatever Palpatine thought - and finish his training. Luke would become a Jedi, though not any kind that the likes of Obi-Wan would recognize.

It would be simpler, he decided, if he could further his own objectives while cooperating with Palpatine. For the moment.

"If he could be turned," Vader said carefully, raising his mask to look directly at the hologram, "he would become a powerful ally."

"Ye-es," Palpatine intoned, "he would be a great . . . asset. Can it be done?"

It would have to be done.

"He will join us or die, Master," Vader assured him, and bowed deeply enough to hide his thoughts.

It was true enough. Luke would, inevitably, die if he remained with his Rebel friends. And Vader had known that Palpatine would never suffer an enemy Jedi to live, even before he said so. The Emperor would demand Luke's death if he did not turn. Yet the last time Vader had spoken to his son, Luke had been a toddling child barely able to lisp their - his - name. In all probability, he would not immediately see reason.

Vader could now pursue Luke with the Emperor's knowledge and blessing, but he needed more than that. He needed time.

The Force was murky, but it did, at least, assure him that this problem would resolve itself. He suppressed a flicker of doubt and continued with his plans.

Solo, irritatingly, managed to evade Vader's forces, but it was of no matter. He found their destination, and he reached it before they did. He was not acquainted with Cloud City's present baron-administrator, but they were all much the same, selfish and corrupt. Vader would have little difficulty in managing Lando Calrissian.

Bespin itself was little-known to him; there were rumours of slave-labour, but not yet well-substantiated enough for him to have bothered to crush the colony. Its only notable feature was the enormous carbon-freezing chamber -

Carbon-freeze. Used on animals, mostly, but sufficiently advanced facilities had been known to work on sentients, as well. He'd have to perform a test of some kind, of course, before he risked losing his only son to a freezer, but that shouldn't be any trouble. If it was efficacious on humans, then Luke could be as obdurate as he liked. Vader would simply put him in carbon-freeze and take him - not to the Emperor, though he would say so. To his own stronghold, where he could turn Luke at his leisure.

Of course, first he had to lure him to Cloud City, but he could sense the sharp improvement in his son's abilities. If his friends were in pain, Luke would know it. And if he remotely favoured the people his parents had been, he could no more stay at a safe distance while they suffered than he could swim.

Those friends were headed straight towards Vader even as he planned. How . . . fortuitous.

In the event, however, their meeting was - less than fortuitous. His plan worked well enough, certainly. The Wookiee's and the smuggler's agony provided effective lures, and the carbon-freeze worked perfectly well on Solo. Vader's son sprang the trap as he had expected.

Luke didn't recognize him, of course, and attacked him on sight - also as Vader had expected. It seemed an excellent way to test Luke's ability, so he permitted the fight to continue for some time. Luke, he determined, was powerful, resourceful and talented, but still very young - in more than years - and half-trained, at best. At the same age, he had been a warrior for half a decade.

Vader could have ended the duel at any time. Instead, he gradually fought Luke onto the gantry, where retreat would soon send him tumbling into an abyss. If his son could not be convinced to join him, or forced into the carbon-freeze, then Vader would be obligated to end his life. It would be - most regrettable, but not nearly as regrettable as permitting him to leave Cloud City as a personal enemy of the Emperor rather than a potential apprentice. Palpatine would find him, and once he did, Luke's life would be short and his death long.

Vader very much hoped it would not come to that.

Luke glared at him with a hatred that, in other circumstances, would have been surprising. It was even hotter and deeper than the princess', strong enough to send the Dark Side flowing through him, and he would need it. Nevertheless, there was something inexplicably unpleasant about it, even before it gave Luke the power to break past Vader's defenses for a moment, and stab him in the shoulder.

It was the first time in their encounter that anything had happened that he neither expected nor planned, and the first time in years that Vader had suffered injury to anything but his mechanical limbs. He had almost forgotten that he had any flesh left to be injured.

Without a moment's hesitation or thought, his lightsaber lashed out, and Luke screamed.

It was only then that he registered the strange, agonizing sensation in his shoulder as pain, and realized that he had just sliced off his son's hand. This, too, was regrettable, and he suspected had just narrowed his options considerably.

He vaguely realized that the lightsaber he had just sent flying into the bowels of the chamber was, in fact, his own. He would have to retrieve it later. For now, Luke had been effectively rendered incapable of further resistance.

Vader explained the situation as much as was possible. He was Luke's father, he intended to rule the galaxy with him. Luke could join him willingly, or be taken to the carbon-freeze, or fall to his death.

Luke chose death - or rather, what he thought was death. As soon as he jumped, Vader knew the fall would not kill him.

The uttermost necessity that he had so dreaded had fallen upon him. He had to kill his own son. It would be quite simple, take only a small, brief effort to reach out and crush Luke's throat or heart as he fell. A kinder death, too, than the other that awaited him.

Yet he did nothing. It was as if the flaws that had crippled his old self, that he had kept safely locked up for years, each decided to stage a revolt at the same moment. They rose up in his throat, gripped his limbs, leaving him unable to act, almost unable to breathe.

No, he thought, not my son, and could not bring any part of himself to disagree.

Very well. He did not have the . . . wherewithal to murder his own child. There were undoubtedly more disastrous failings he might have possessed, that he had possessed; he would make the best of this one. Now, Luke had just been sucked into an exhaust pipe and - yes, he would be hanging from a weather vane in a few moments.

Vader left the chamber and strode towards the landing platform, where two aides were waiting.

"Bring me my shuttle," he said shortly, and spent the short journey with his mind fixed on his son. It seemed that Calrissian had double-crossed him, and helped the princess to escape on Solo's ship, only to return for Luke. No matter, the hyperdrive remained inactive; Piett had assured him of that, and he had reason to be both careful and honest.

They could still capture Luke. And the others, of course.

His ship drew close to the floundering Falcon, and Vader felt Luke's presence, muddled but strong.

His breath caught, even through the respirator. "Luke," he said, expecting his son to shut him out of his mind as soon as possible.

Luke's response was instantaneous.

"Father?"

Vader could sense his confusion and exhaustion; that only made it more satisfying, in a way, to hear the title - for the first time, too. Luke hadn't used it, before.

"Son," he said, unable to keep himself from lingering on the word - you are my son, my child, mine - "come with me."

Luke's mind recoiled from his, his bewilderment abating into horror and something reassuringly like fury.

"Luke, it is your destiny," Vader told him.

He felt a flicker of anguish, almost as if it were his own, and steeled himself against it. Luke, too, would do what was necessary to accomplish his fate - some way or another.

Then, impossibly, the Millennium Falcon disappeared into hyperspace, and there was only silence.