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Everything changed - everything descended into pain and restless, fevered confusion. Luke woke briefly from time to time, driven more by sudden peaks in agony than by any real awareness. The drugs which had given relief had numbed mind and body alike, but now, in their absence, he was left with pain which lanced through him and twisted about him so intensely that all hope of concentrating around or through it had been burned away.
There had been no time, it seemed; no moment's grace to gather the Force about his hazy, paralysed thoughts as the effects of the powerful narcotics left his body, the grating pain already bone-deep before he tried to bring his drug-numbed mind to focus, leaving him too distracted, too injured to reach out as Master Yoda had taught him. He needed only a moment, a fleeting respite from the all-encompassing pain to gather his thoughts and try to understand what blocked his path, but it dug and grated and twisted like knives with every barbed intake of breath, the exhaustion of simply withstanding it crushing any hope of concentration. Too much- too much to process, to even react to.
Time broke into short, shattered clips of awareness punctuated by long periods of pain so intense that all he could do was lie still and breathe. Just that. To simply breathe against it was a triumph, every inpull of air lancing through cramped chest muscles and aching bones, requiring concentration so complete that all else paled and fell away, senses muted to insignificance by the need to deal with the intense agony carving through him.
He was occasionally aware of the presence of others in the room - Mara, Nathan, or just as often his father - but the idea of speaking, of even opening his eyes to acknowledge them, was so completely beyond him as to be inconceivable.
Time passed like this - how long he had no idea, but every moment burned through him like an eternity - so that when it finally began to subside even slightly, just enough for him to become aware of his father's presence in the room, he reached out for him like a lifeline.
"Help me..." it was all he could manage to utter past his injured throat, through dry mouth and split lips, but the man he had rejected so completely stepped forward without hesitation.
Vader moved to the head of the bed, his black-gloved hands reaching out to gently take the weight of his son's head, thumbs to his temples, "Calm, now." he uttered in deep, bass tones, the words so composed and pacific, reaching out to Luke's enervated awareness, soothing and settling, benignly guiding. "You need to find your focus... fall back into the Force - it is all around you. Just breathe- relax. Stop struggling. Let it guide you - let it heal you. You know how to do this. Reach within yourself - remember that path, calm your mind and listen. Everything that you need is here, waiting. Sense it. Call it to you. Let it heal you." His tone was even and hypnotic, leading the Luke on, soothing and centering...
Vader had no idea if his son could still do this - the ability to heal was not of the Dark Side. It could sustain, could enable an individual to operate far beyond his injuries, but it could not heal. That ability was long lost to Vader. Yes, he had maintained his son's condition on the fraught journey back to Coruscant, but it had been just that; the ability to sustain, to slow any further decline. Any capacity to restore or revive was beyond his reach, then as now. All that he could do was try to lead his son through the motions and hope that Luke was still capable of reaching out in this way, channelling the Force even to a small degree to gain some limited relief, though in truth he knew this was in vain - the boy was no longer a Jedi.
It hadn't failed to come to Vader's attention that the aspect of the Force which he always berated and dismissed for its weakness had the power to help his son when the Darkness Vader had so resolutely wrapped about himself for so long, so sure if its invulnerability, was of no value whatsoever.
Still, he sensed the boy calming now at his words, the bewildered twist of pain and turmoil which had gathered to a knot within him beginning to unravel just slightly. His shoulders slumped in response as he finally regained some contact, his breath slowing and regulating, head falling heavy against Vader's hands. Vader felt his own tight chest relax in response, aware that he had remained tense as a wire in the face of his son's pain, unable to help.
Unable to help... he reached out now and sensed that mental link with his son re-established and with it... that particular mindset, the willingness to merge without loss of self, to accept with grace, to surrender without submission into the Force.
Darkness never surrendered... so it was not this that the boy touched now.
He knew Luke had built his barriers, walls within walls within walls. Knew how much he was able to hide, even from the Emperor...
Vader reached out again to touch that sense and it slipped away like a half-imagined haze, diffuse and oblique, hidden completely from him now. But the memory of that momentary contact remained and he studied it again, searching to categorise it. It was not Light... nor was it Darkness- it was neither and both, defying any classification, giving Vader cause for deeper thought.
Palpatine believed him converted completely, as did Vader, even now... so then what was this?
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Something... some distant awareness of voices and senses and disparate minds swirled about Luke, obscure and indistinct in his twisted perceptions. Voices murmured words he couldn't hear as shadow-senses closed in about him, though he remained in the void, neither truly aware nor completely unconscious, the scarlet haze of pain wrapped about him, cutting him off from reality.
A hand reached out to rest lightly against his chest, cold as the grave, and the finely-honed shock which burst through him lit old memories, dragging them to the fore in his fevered thoughts with absolute focus and staggering intensity...
...Of that room - that cell - cold as the tomb, dark as pitch. And his Master, always pushing and provoking and punishing, of force-pikes and broken bones and lightening arcing through the gloom to sear skin and burn through flesh. So much that his bones felt hot within his skin and his muscles would cramp for hours afterwards, dragging him awake through drifting unconsciousness, blood and adrenaline in the back of his throat....
Luke jolted awake, gasping a breath in, anticipating the sharp stab of the Force-lightening and bringing his arms up to protect himself. The motion sending a shock of pain searing up through his arm and across his chest, making him cry out.
Someone grabbed at his arms, holding them down, the agony lancing up through his left arm and across his shoulders, their voice alarmed and stern and worried and demanding all at once. For long seconds he was so stunned, so shaken by the intensity of the pain that he didn't recognise it, couldn't work out the words, struggling against their hold... then Mara Jade called out his name again, telling him to stop, that it was okay, that he was safe...
Slowly, reality filtered in and he collapsed back in dazed silence, Mara releasing his arms, the pain from the sudden burst of movement rolling over him in waves, leaving him nauseous and weak, breath ragged, the blood draining from his head in a disorienting blur.
Silence hung heavy and expectant, the fog of personas within the Force settling slowly out into Palpatine, Vader, Mara and Hallin, and though he knew all eyes were on him he felt too weak, too drained to even pull words into a thought, let alone speak them out loud.