Rescue the Farmboy: Liberation Teaser 01

[klcthebookworm]

The other project I'm working on is the first novel up in the Rescue the Farmboy series. It has reached editing status and I'm almost ready to send it off to my beta reader. I was inspired by a comment on one of Tor.com's Star Wars articles that wanted a fanfic in which Luke actually made it to the Imperial Academy and what kind of hell broke loose then. Then I found the title in the observation that Luke is always getting rescued. And the idea kept going until I have to rewrite the original trilogy.

Now I had shared this scene before on Tumblr but as I pulled it out for Dreamwidth, I realized that my edits had changed things. So you're getting the first glimpse of the new material. To set the scene, Luke has already seen the Academy plans end with detainment and a death sentence, but is going with his hunch that Darth Vader won't kill him and offers to give himself up so Biggs can take Princess Leia down to Tatooine to meet old Ben when the Devastator catches up with Tantive IV.

Darth Vader waited with the stormtroopers troop in the Devastator’s main hangar bay. The Corellian Corvette Tantive IV settled onto the bay floor. He had the Princess of Alderaan and proof of her treachery within his grasp. He had expected more of a fight from her, but the smaller ship had announced their passenger agreed to surrender as soon as the Star Destroyer rounded the planet. She must think her hiding place for the plans was impenetrable.

Padmé was quiet now in his mind. She had raged when the order had been given that it was a distraction from the alarm at the Academy. That alarm had been set up years ago to discover what Palpatine was waiting for and he agreed with her that it needed investigating, especially since the name attached to the alarm had been a portion of his once, but who did they have on Coruscant to investigate? No one that they trusted capable of evading Palpatine. Then she had switched to how they should align their forces with her old Senate colleague Bail Organa and his family. He had finally ended that argument with how the Organas shouldn’t have been so obvious in their rebellion to draw this much attention. But the Princess of Alderaan in his custody gave them greater leverage, and Padmé would eventually stop sulking and find a way to use that.

The entry ramp lowered and Vader strode up into the Corvette flanked by stormtroopers. The crew of nearly fifty men lined the corridor. Their captain Raymus Antilles and a boy dressed in the desert garb of Tatooine waited in front of the turbolift. Princess Leia Organa was no where in sight.

Vader stopped in front of the captain. “Where is the Senator?”

“Princess Leia is not aboard for this voyage. This is our passenger, Luke Skywalker of Tatooine.” The captain gestured at the young man standing next to him.

Skywalker! Vader’s head jerked back. He had thought the boy was the Emperor’s prisoner or dead by now after he had seen Palpatine’s orders on the Academy record. But here Luke Skywalker was, having evaded capture until now.

Ani? Padmé’s voice awoke in his mind. What is it? What’s wrong?

He studied the boy best he could through the lenses of his mask that tinted the universe red. Luke’s hair was fair, probably blond like his had been before the fires of Mustafar. The roundness of Luke’s face suggested Padmé’s, but the cleft in the boy’s chin matched his. And the Force radiated from Luke like he was another sun in the sky.

But it couldn’t be true!

“Skywalker,” Vader said because he had to say something in front of these witnesses.

Padmé gave a soft gasp. He looks like you, Ani. But different enough to not be a clone. He escaped Palpatine?

The boy straightened his shoulders. “How did you gain passage on the Senator of Alderaan’s personal counselor vessel?” Vader asked.

Luke blinked. “She offered it to me, sir. So I could go home while she discovered why I was treated like a criminal for enlisting.”

“Like a criminal?”

“The Academy locked me up and then stormtroopers came after me.” Luke snapped his mouth shut. His indignation over the treatment blazed in the Force.

“And you turned to the Senator of Alderaan for assistance.”

“She wasn’t appointed by the Hutts.”

Vader blinked behind his mask. That… that was a Padmé response: factually accurate and delivered without a trace of sarcasm so the cut was all the sharper.

She laughed in his mind. Oh, I like him. How did he end up with that name?

You’re objecting to his name?

No, I’m curious. I had picked Luke if we had a boy, but I don’t remember telling anyone.

Because her body died, her life force combined with his in this ruined body, and they had watched the HoloNet footage of her funeral and that of their unspoken of but obvious child. “Who raised you, Luke Skywalker?” Vader asked.

The young man’s forehead furrowed, not expecting that question. “Owen and Beru Lars, my uncle and aunt. They died last year in a sandpeople attack, sir. Those are Tusken Raiders-—”

“I know what Tusken Raiders are and what they can do,” Vader interjected. “What did they tell you of your parents before they died?”

Again the boy frowned in confusion. “My father’s name was Anakin Skywalker and he was a navigator on a freighter, died in space. My mother was Padmé Skywalker and she died having me.”

Vader closed his eyes at the names spoken aloud after so long, eighteen long years. The Force sang that it was true as well.

Padmé’s ghostly arms felt like they were wrapped around his body. Our child lives? How is that possible? Oh Ani, I didn’t know. I would not have hidden this from you for eighteen years. We should have tried harder to get my memories from between the explosion and awakening with you.

I hurt you once and I swore to never do it again.

But we lost him. Luke deserved better than a hard scrabbled life on Tatooine.

No one deserved a life on Tatooine, except probably Jabba inside the Great Pit of Carkoon, especially not the son of his angel. Someone had saved his son and sent him to the only family they knew Vader and Palpatine would ignore. He had his suspicions of who that someone was and briefly wondered why his former master had been foolish enough to let the boy enlist. But it didn’t matter right now. Padmé’s son lived. He had a son.

And the Emperor of the galaxy wanted his son dead.

“Your uncle was creative with the truth,” Vader said to the boy. He turned to the stormtroopers hovering behind him. “Skywalker is in my custody. Restrain him in a cabin next to my quarters.”

“Yes, Lord Vader,” the stormtrooper answered. Two stormtroopers stepped up to Luke and secured his wrists in front of him with binders. Then they escorted the boy down the entry ramp.

Vader gestured at the Tantive IV’s crew. “Take these men to the brig. Then tear this ship apart. I want the plans found.” The rest of the stormtroopers marched forward.

Is he arrested too, Anakin? The scowl that he couldn’t see again was present in her voice.

No, love, for his protection only. Palpatine must not have him.

Well, on that we are agreed. But you have to tell him the truth. He thinks we’re dead.

When there is time, I will tell him everything. Vader turned and left the ship with his black cape billowing behind him.