Palpatine believed that Vader had already tried unsuccessfully to turn his son to his own cause, Mara knew. Failing that, he seemed to have a new goal--to attain through his son all the ambitions that he could not himself fulfill. It was hardly a new concept--Mara had seen many times the outrageous extremes which over-zealous parents pushed their children to, in an effort to gain them eminence in her master's Court. But this was contemptible even by their standards.
How far is too far? He must feel something for his son in order to want this for him. If he saw him...A momentary spark of hope flared in her chest.
"You should see him," she murmured quietly.
Again the Dark Lord hesitated for a long time, then, "That is not necessary."
Coward.She was frustrated as much by her own spineless, impotent inability to act as she was by Vader's.
"I hope you realize how high that price is--for your son and yourself. Or do you seriously think you'll stay in favor now?" Vader turned at that, and Mara felt a cruel smile form unbidden on her lips. "You're the old model, Lord Vader. Yesterday's vogue. Dispensable. Your son may well come to the throne, but you'll never see it."
The high double doors of Palpatine's private quarters swung open to a long row of scarlet Royal Guard who lined the main hallway beyond as Cordo, the Emperor's aide, gestured expectantly.
Mara bowed with mock courtesy. "The Emperor will see you...for now."
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She wasn't surprised to hear that Lord Vader left within the hour for his fleet in the Rim Worlds, immediately on taking his leave of the Emperor...
He didn't try to see his son.
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Han sat on the poky little light freighter heading back to the Rebel fleet, mourning his loss of the Falcon, wondering where she was now and how he could get her back.
She was his first true love--well, maybe not his first, but she'd stayed with him the longest...and he sure as hell had spent the most credits on her.
And all his gear was on her.... He sighed, rolling his eyes. Chewie's bowcasters were onboard--both of them. The Wook was gonna kill him. He pulled another face, realizing that his range rifle was onboard too--and his holdout.
"Man..." he moaned aloud in frustration.
The Iridonian pilot in the seat next to him glanced over, her eyebrows raised in question.
"Ah, I just realized that all my stuff's on the Falcon--my ship. The Empire've impounded it."
The woman dropped her head to one side, shaking it in consolation. "Say goodbye to that, friend."
She was young, maybe the same age as Luke or Leia, Han figured, with olive skin and big, dark eyes, her hair pulled back into a bound tail at the nape of her neck, the multiple short, blunt horns on her head still little more than bumps.
Han glanced out to the starfield before him, feeling strange not to be the one calculating the next jump--not to be in the Falcon. "No, not that old girl--she's a homing bird, I'll get her back. Besides, I've got to--my partner'll kill me."
"I'm sure you can take care of yourself," the girl said, amused.
"He's a Wookiee," Han said pointedly.
"Oh, well, maybe not." She grinned then, as if this confirmed her suspicion, added, "So I guess you are Han Solo then?"
Han had introduced himself just by his first name when they'd met in the docking bay, and the woman had done the same--Astrig.
She'd patched him through on a secure holo-channel to Home Onealmost as soon as they'd cleared the atmosphere, telling him she'd been instructed to do so then leaving him alone in the cockpit.
He'd spoken to Leia--just for a minute and she'd seemed kinda...strained--but they'd spoken, and damn, it was good to see her again, even like this. She'd smiled and they'd gone through the pleasantries; 'you've lost weight,' 'yeah, prison food does that to you. You look good though,' 'Me? This old thing?' 'Chewie okay?' 'He's fine, he's been helping out the techs--or terrorizing them, depending on who you're listening to.'
Strangely, she'd not once mentioned Luke--not asked where he was or if Han had seen him; nothing. Then, at the end of the conversation, she'd asked him not to speak about Luke to anyone...nothing at all. Seemed pretty insistent. He'd wondered what the hell was going on, but let it pass, said okay. Maybe they had something lined up to get him out. Yeah, that was it; they already had something in mind, which would be why she hadn't mentioned the kid.
Han had wracked his head trying to think how not mentioning Luke could possibly help to get him out, but came up a blank. Didn't matter though, clearly something was in the offing, which was good to hear.
And since no-one had said he couldn't blow his own trumpet, he looked at Astrig now, grinning. "Yeah, I'm Solo," he said easily. "My reputation precedes me."
She snorted her amusement. "Yeah, something like that." Then her face fell serious. "Sorry about Skywalker."
Han glanced away, uncertain what to say having just been asked to say nothing.
Clearly everybody hadn't had the same order, because the pilot continued freely, "My brother flew with him a few times. Said he was a great pilot...great Flight Commander. A natural, he said--always kept his flight one step ahead, always looked for a different angle. Fast up here, you know?" She glanced up to Han as she said the last, grinning as she tapped her forehead. "Makes all the difference. My brother's in a B-Wing--Heavy Assault?"
She made it a question and Han nodded. "Yeah I know 'em. Good ships."
B-Wings were big, heavy fighters bristling with armaments and shields and designed to bring down prey ten times their size, even freighters and small frigates. When Han first joined the Imperial Fleet as a pilot, still optimistically looking to walk the straight and narrow, everyone flying everything from shuttles to bulk freighters and corvettes had been terrified of the Rebellion's new heavy-fighter, but the TIE's soon found their weakness; they were faster and more maneuverable than their intended prey, but way too slow to go up against a TIE or another snub-nose; the price you paid for carrying the kind of heavy armament that could pierce a corvette's hull. 'Target practice,' TIE pilots used to call them, if they didn't have faster support fighters running interference for them. Probably still did.
The young pilot nodded, obviously proud. "Been in it for three years now. Me, I'm waiting for a transfer to Gold Wing. Got my hours, got my wings, I just need a commission."
Han nodded easily. "A-4 or S-3?"
"S-3. I like company when I fly."
He nodded again, glad to be off the subject of Luke. "Yeah, I like a little bit more ship around me when I fly. Like to think they gotta shoot more bits off before they get to the pilot."
She shrugged easily, as sure of her own invulnerability as all fighter pilots were--you had to be, to be willing to get into a small metal box and launch into space on a regular basis, to let people take potshots at you.
"Thessy--my brother--said he went to the remembrance service after Hoth. Said a lot of people were pretty cut up about Commander Skywalker. Never met him myself, but...kinda wish I had, even once. Just to be able to say I met him, you know? The guy who took down the Death Star."
Han turned sharply to her, confused by how much her words sounded like a eulogy, but she didn't notice, and the nav computer chose that moment to pronounce its calculations complete.
"Jump's up," she announced, pulling the levers and launching the ship forward past the speed of light.
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By the time they arrived at Home One Han was burning to ask what the hell was going on. But when he stepped down the ramp onto the deck, Leia, Chewie and Lando were waiting, and everything else was forgotten, if only for a moment.