Star Wars: Dark Angel, Scarlet Dragon Ch. 02

She clawed at the vice of his hand around her throat, her mouth frothing. "Plyease..."

"WHO IS THE PILOT IN THAT HOLOGRAM?" Vader roared in fury. "WHAT IS HIS NAME?"

Another seizure, another excruciating wrench back into this hell. "Please... kill me..."

"LUKE WHAT? WHO IS THAT PILOT?" He raised his hand again. "HIS NA-"

"Sk..Skywalker," she choked. Her eyes rolled back into her head. "Luke... Skywalker..."

The Dark Lord held the girl off the floor by her neck, motionless, silent, his breathing and her last breaths the only sounds in the cell. But in Lylla's mind, a cacophony blared. Still linked to him through the Force, Lylla shrieked when her consciousness was suddenly dragged through the miasma of Vader's memories-

***It was morning, at breakfast. She laughed at the joke he just made. "Anakin Skywalker, you're terrible." She looked out the windows at the rising Coruscant sun that streamed into the dining room. He couldn't believe how the sun could ignite the mahogany in her curls like that. Her face lit up, she placed her hand on her belly, and smiled at him. "What do you think of 'Luke'? It's Naboon for 'the morning light'. Do you like it?"

He returned her smile. "It's a fine name."

She slumped a little. "Fine? You don't like it."

"No, I do, I really do. It's beautiful."

"You're letting me pick the name, Ani. I want to be sure you like it."

He reached over the table and took her hand. "I'll love anything you pick, Padme." He let go of her hand to tap the table. "It's settled. His name will be Luke."

"Really?"

"Absolutely. I'll name the next baby." He winked. "Deal?"

She giggled. "Deal." ***

Vader crushed his fingers around Tiri Akiro's throat, severing sinew and muscle until he found the spinal cord, and snapped her neck. The durasteel restraining table, machined to hold a metric ton, erupted out of its bolts in the floor and split with a deafening crack down the center, cables sparking all over the cell.

Lylla scrambled to the farthest corner of the cell and pressed herself into it, sliding down to the floor. She clutched and ripped at her suit because her skin felt like it was on fire. Electricity surged through her bones like they were made of metal... and she realized she was experiencing him in his armor. She felt his rage boiling into insanity as the frenzy of a thousand memories lacerated his traumatized mind without order or reason: thousands of bodies floating in space; slaughtering sandpeople; dozens of children lying around him, all dead by his hand; his dying mother in his arms; standing in a river of the blood of hundreds while their village burned around him, all because they harbored one Jedi...

Strangling his pregnant wife.

And the Emperor's laughter, the croaking, cackling, diseased laughter of that living corpse, echoing all through it, from all directions, never-ending, deafening-

Lylla slapped the sides of her head, trying to make it all stop, and screamed in terror and agony.

Vader slowly turned around, lowered his arm. Still clutching the dead girl by her broken neck, The Dark Lord stalked toward Lylla. From her view on the floor, he engulfed the entire room, the death stare of his mask bore into her skull. For the very first time, Lylla was afraid of him.

"Vader...?" she choked in terrified breaths, trying to shrink even more into the corner. "Vader, it's me, it's Lylla." He still came murderously toward her in heavy, measured steps. She started to cry. "Vader, please, please, stop...it's ME. IT'S LYLLA!!"

*It's Lylla It's Lylla It's Lylla It's Lylla It's Lylla Lylla Lylla Lylla Lylla*

Lylla's cries echoed through his madness, calling him back into the cell, into reality. Vader stopped. His reason ebbed back like black waves on a lightless beach. It was only then he was aware of the corpse he was dragging with him, and dropped her to the floor. He looked down at Lylla, his woman, huddled into the corner, shaking, her white eyes bloodshot, tears and terror staining her beautiful face.

He straightened up, turned his mask away from her. He flexed his hands, open, closed, open... Finally, he spoke. "Save the brain. We'll need it to crack the Rebel's counter-interrogation code." The cell door shrieked open. He swept out.

Piett stepped forward as the Dark Lord emerged from the cell. "My Lord-" He never finished the sentence. Vader's cape, blown by force and speed, filled the corridor as he stormed away. Knitting his brow, he looked into the cell, and was horrified by the mangled corpse on the floor, the ruptured restraining table, and Lylla sobbing in the corner. "Baroness!" he exclaimed, rushing around the table to her side. "Are you alright?"

Fighting to control her crying, she gripped Piett's sleeve. "Get a medical team down here, harvest the brain, keep it alive. Evacuate all personnel off every level in Lord Vader's sector." She looked up at him, her eyes pleading and terrified. "Now, Piett, do it NOW."

He had never seen the Baroness frightened before. For the first time, Piett was alarmed for her. "Yes, Baroness, right away. Rhys!"

Lieutenant Rhys stepped in, and immediately stopped in horror. "Gods and hells, what happened here?"

"Never mind, Rhys. Order all levels of Sector 9 evacuated immediately. And get a medical team down here for that Rebel's brain." Rhys nodded and sped out of the cell. Piett helped her up. "Baroness, you should let them look at you-"

"No," she insisted, wiping her face, "I have to go after him-"

"Madame, I don't think that's wise."

"No, it's not wise. At all." She started out of the cell. "Baroness," Piett said, stopping her. He looked at the dead girl, then back at her. "By the Force, what did that girl tell him?"

She looked back at him. "The truth." She ran out.

Lylla raced through the Executor's black corridors, often falling due to the high heels of her boots. But every time, she scrambled back to her feet and kept running. She knew Vader was heading back to his sector- all she had to do was follow the trail of utter chaos. Smashed droids, shattered lights, three upturned transports, crew members howling in pain and grasping broken limbs and cracked heads from having been thrown into the walls and ceilings. Medical teams rushed past her to tend the injured but, unfortunately, some medics were unable to avoid running into her. She dealt with it by grabbing them by their uniforms and throwing them out of her way.

She finally came to the lift that would take her to Sector 9. She threw herself inside and slapped the controls. Pressing against the wall, she grabbed the eyepiece off her head and battled to calm her frantic breathing.

The lift arrived. The doors slid open. Lylla launched herself out into the empty black corridor, fell again, struggled to her feet, and ran to the room that housed Vader's hyperbaric chamber. She pounded the door with her palm. "Vader," she cried, "Vader, please, open the door. It's Lylla, please open the door!"

The doors shrieked open, revealing Vader standing in the center. He clenched his massive fists and leaned over her. "Why are you here?" he rumbled like a Mustafar volcano.

"Vader-"

He came at her, a black tank of machine and fury that didn't stop, forcing Lylla to back away. "If I wanted you here," he growled with the intensity of a thermal detonator about to ignite, "I would have summoned you here. I will not tolerate your insolence any further, Sa'thraxxx!"

"Beloved, please, let me help you!"

He exploded. "I DO NOT WANT YOUR PITY!"

The floor under her feet began to shake. Lylla stumbled on her heel as she backed up and fell. Her thin tether of control snapped, and she bawled, "Vader, please, DON'T SEND ME AWAY!"

He lunged down, grabbed her by the front of her suit, and heaved her off the floor above his head. "GET OUT!" he roared. Lylla screamed, hysterically flailing in his grip and clutching at his hand. The corridor filled with the sickening pops, groans, and shrieks of metal twisting and breaking. Meter-long dents ruptured the floor and ceiling. The lights strobed and burst. Vader stormed to the open lift and threw her inside. Lylla hit the wall and fell to the floor. "DO NOT COME BACK!!" He slammed the controls with his fist. As the door slid closed, Lylla saw the corridor behind him rip itself apart.

The lift launched. Lylla lay on the floor, her body wracked with sobbing. Then she threw back her head and screamed like she never had before.