Beware the Power of the Dark Side!

by Tom Angleberger

  Leia’s first thought is the success of their mission. If Vader is here, it will be far more difficult. But why would Vader be here?

  “How do you know?” she asks.

  “I felt his presence. He’s come for me. He can feel when I’m near. That’s why I have to go.”

  “Go?”

  “Yes…as long as I stay, I’m endangering the group and our mission here,” he replies quietly. “I have to face him.”

  “Face him? Why?”

  Luke has dreaded this moment, but now he finds relief as he finally lets loose his secret.

  “He’s my father.”

  “Your father?”

  “There’s more. It won’t be easy for you to hear it, but you must. If I don’t make it back, you’re the only hope for the Alliance.”

  “Luke, don’t talk that way. You have a power I…I don’t understand and could never have.”

  Now he turns away from the forest at last. Turns to look at her. Through the light of smoking torches, he sees her clearly. He sees and senses her strength. Yes, he decides, she is strong enough to bear this. She, too, is a Skywalker after all.

  “You’re wrong, Leia. You have that power, too. In time, you’ll learn to use it as I have. The Force is strong in my family. My father has it…I have it…and my sister has it.”

  And now a lot of things begin to make sense to Leia. Things that have never made sense before.

  “Yes. It’s you, Leia. You are my sister.”

  Yes, just like Luke, she feels the truth of this immediately. But what a truth to finally acknowledge! Finding out that Luke is her brother should bring her joy…but to learn that the dreaded Darth Vader—who captured her, imprisoned her, even tortured her—is her father? Alas, the joy of gaining a brother is lost for now in the shadow of their dark father.

  “I know,” she tells Luke. “Somehow…I’ve always known.”

  “Then you know why I have to face him.”

  “No!” she insists. “Luke, run away, far away. If he can feel your presence, then leave this place. I wish I could go with you.”

  “No, you don’t. You’ve always been strong.”

  “But why must you confront him?”

  This is the hardest question yet. He has long known he must, but is only beginning to understand why.

  “Because…there is good in him. I’ve felt it. He won’t turn me over to the Emperor. I can save him. I can turn him back to the good side.”

  Even as he says this, his belief in it falters. Yoda told him he was wrong. Obi-Wan told him he was wrong.

  “I have to try,” he says.

  And then he goes.

  BACK IN THE HUT, C-3PO has finished his story.

  Chief Chirpa and his two best hunters, Teebo and Asha, are deep in discussion. Logray, the village shaman, tries to interrupt, which makes Asha growl and bare her teeth. But Chirpa stops her and lets Logray speak his mind. There’s no need for us to get into a lot of Ewok politics now, but it’s really a delicate business.

  C-3PO’s story has inspired Chief Chirpa to aid the rebels. But Logray has a different response: as a shaman, his first concern is the safety of the tribe. He thinks the Ewoks should stay out of matters that are obviously much bigger than themselves. Only with Teebo’s and Asha’s support is Chirpa able to overrule Logray. The shaman doesn’t take it well and shakes his holy sticks and stones in frustration.

  But when Chirpa makes his announcement and the whole village cheers, even Logray is caught up in the excitement. The Ewoks are ready to free their forest and help free the galaxy, too, even if they have only a vague idea what a galaxy is.

  “Neesh Chee Hidalg!” Chirpa decrees.

  “Ooooo!” the Ewoks respond, and then begin waving spears, banging drums, and attempting to embrace Chewbacca and Han.

  “Wonderful!” exclaims C-3PO. “We are now a part of the tribe!”

  “Just what I always wanted,” says Han as Wicket clings to his leg.

  “Muurrug!” groans Chewie as he tries to disentangle himself from all the little furry hugs.

  “Well, short help is better than no help at all, Chewie.”

  With C-3PO translating, Han and the Ewoks agree to set out for the shield generator first thing in the morning. Hopefully the rest of the strike team will be waiting for them there and then it’ll be all over but the shooting, thinks Han as he stretches out on the floor of Teebo’s hut. Best to get some sleep first.

  AT LAST!

  Vader gets the call: a patrol has picked up a rebel spy in the woods.

  It’s his son. His destiny.

  They’re bringing the prisoner in on an AT-AT.1

  Does Lord Vader want to wait here or…

  Of course he doesn’t want to wait! Out of his way, you fool!

  He stomps off toward the AT-AT loading dock, two stormtroopers scurrying after him. He snarls his metallic snarl at various Imperial imbeciles who snap to attention as he storms past.

  Then, as he thunders across a walkway, an elevator door opens at the other end and he sees Luke.

  There he is! Defenseless. No visible weapon. Dressed in black cloth, no armor. Ah, yes, the boy has two hands again. But the hands are bound.

  Vader could end all this right now. He could strike Luke down and be done—if not for his master’s orders. He certainly feels enough hate to do it. Of course, we know, reader, that Vader’s hate is not really hatred of Luke, but of his own past. But Vader has a fear of Luke, too. And fear and hate have long ruled this powerful Sith Lord.

  “Lord Vader,” says a smug Imperial officer who Vader hadn’t noticed until this moment. There are two stormtroopers there as well presumably to guard the prisoner. How foolish they are.

  “This is the rebel that surrendered to us,” says the officer.

  Vader sees the defiant look on Luke’s face. He knows this is no surrender. This will be a great struggle.

  Vader says nothing so the officer continues:

  “Although he denies it, I believe there may be more of them, and I request permission to conduct a further search of the area.”

  Again Vader says nothing, so the officer is forced to give up his last piece of information.

  “He was armed only with this,” he tells Vader, holding out Luke’s lightsaber.

  “Good work, Commander,” says Vader, taking the weapon. “Leave us. Conduct your search and bring his companions to me.”

  “Yes, my lord,” says the officer, less smug than he was. He and the troopers step back into the elevator and now at last Vader and Luke meet again.

  But Vader turns from Luke. His mission is not to engage in a battle—either of weapons or words—but only to bring Luke back to his master.

  “The Emperor has been expecting you.”

  “I know, Father,” says Luke, eager to turn this meeting to his own purpose.

  “So, you have accepted the truth.”

  “I’ve accepted the truth that you were once Anakin Skywalker, my father.”

  Now Vader does face him.

  “That name no longer has any meaning for me,” he booms, looming over Luke.

  But Luke answers with compassion, not fear.

  “It is the name of your true self. You’ve only forgotten. I know there is good in you. The Emperor hasn’t driven it from you fully. That was why you couldn’t destroy me. That’s why you won’t bring me to your Emperor now.”

  The struggle is already greater than Vader expected. He turns away again, this time looking at the lightsaber in his hand. This is not his old lightsaber, he realizes. Where has this come from?

  He ignites it. Admires the focused green light. A flick of his wrist would kill Luke now, but that doesn’t even occur to him.

  “I see you have constructed a new lightsaber. Your skills are complete. Indeed, you are powerful, as the Emperor has foreseen.”

  But Luke isn’t going to be distracted.

  “Come with me,” he says.

  Now Vader truly understands why he has f
eared his son so much. Not because of his mastery of the Force or skill with a lightsaber. But because Luke can make him question the dark truths that have long ruled him.

  Defensively, he recites these truths now…even as he begins to wonder if they really are true.

  “Obi-Wan once thought as you do. You don’t know the power of the dark side. I must obey my master.”

  “I will not turn…and you’ll be forced to kill me.”

  “If that is your destiny…”

  It is a cold answer. Especially from a father to a son. But it is also a weak one. And Luke knows it. He presses his attack.

  “Search your feelings, Father. You can’t do this. I feel the conflict within you. Let go of your hate.”

  Luke’s attack has at last reached into the great, dark, troubled mind of Anakin Skywalker. And to Vader it is far more painful than the lightsaber slash Luke scored in Cloud City.

  But even this is not enough, Luke. Ah, they all tried to warn you: the dark side is strong. Vader uses it to close off the questions, the memories, the hopes. The dark truths are true again.

  “It is too late for me, son. The Emperor will show you the true nature of the Force. He is your master now.”

  Vader turns abruptly and signals two of his two stormtroopers to come take the prisoner.

  The battle is over and Luke has lost.

  “Then my father is truly dead,” he says as he is prodded toward the landing pad.

  Yes, Luke did lose this battle, but once he has gone, we can see that Vader has lost something, too. He stares out at the trees, no longer so impatient for action.

  SOON THE SHUTTLE carries Luke to the Death Star, leaving behind his friends—who are, of course, not going to be found by that smug Imperial officer who has no idea at all that they are hiding in a treetop Ewok village.

  This forest moon turns rather slowly and the night is a long one. Especially for Leia, who has far too much to think about to sleep.

  Han is restless, too. He feels the heavy responsibility of leading the strike team tomorrow. If the strike team is even out there, that is. For all he knows they’ve been captured or killed or…Things were so much more fun when it was just him and Chewie and no worries.

  Chewbacca isn’t particularly worried, but he certainly isn’t comfortable, either. Forget about squeezing into an Ewok bed, he can barely even fit in an Ewok hut. He grumbles and mumbles all night.

  The Ewoks aren’t asleep, either.

  They are holding a council of war.

  Things are said that are not cute. The Ewoks are talking of battle, of weapons and traps and death.

  These are fierce creatures. Predators. The top of the food chain in a deadly forest. And they are ready to kill.

  For, you see, now that the Ewoks understand that our heroes are in fact heroes—and are there to destroy the cursed biker scouts and blow up the great metal mess in the sky—they are eager to help. They had known nothing of the great galactic struggle for freedom that the Rebellion had carried on for decades.

  But, Chirpa reminds them, they did know that a great evil had come to their forest. He recalls the tribe members killed by the Empire’s soldiers and metal monsters.

  Several of the Ewoks here are refugees whose villages were destroyed when the Empire arrived to build its sprawling generator and troop base. Chirpa calls on one of these, Romba, to tell of the night he returned from hunting to find his village burning and his whole tribe dead.

  The Ewoks have heard this story before with fear. But Chirpa tells them it must now give them something to fight for, not hide from.

  Now, he tells them, the tribe has a new hope. These strangers believe that the Empire can be beaten and he believes it, too. But…he warns that the strangers cannot win without the Ewoks’ help.

  “Then let us help them,” declares Asha. They have fought to protect their territory before, and now the whole forest is at stake.

  “This is bigger than one tribe of Ewoks,” agrees Romba. “Tomorrow’s battle will affect all Ewoks. So all Ewoks should have the chance to join in.”

  Logray mumbles something about some sacred refuge where they could hide, but no one else is interested.

  So in the end, Chirpa’s decision is really the village’s decision.

  He sends messengers off through the forest to explain it all to the leaders of other tribes…and ask for their help. The message, composed by Teebo, is beautifully worded in the Ewok language, but C-3PO translates it somewhat mechanically, like this: “Tomorrow we fight to save our forest and bring down the cold metal moon. Our new golden god has shown us how. Join us and we will be free again.”1

  What Han Solo, who is the commander of this mission after all, would have said about all this we’ll never know, because he and Chewie had finally fallen asleep.

  Leia sleeps at last, the chaos in her mind quieted by exhaustion.

  Even R2 and C-3PO have powered down, to save energy for the coming action.

  And perhaps we, too, should pause, reader…because when the sun rises tomorrow, things are going to get crazy. There will be no more plodding. The plodding is over.

  So…take a deep breath and when you’re ready we’ll make the jump to lightspeed.

  FAR AWAY, the rebel fleet is a swarming hive no more. It is lined up, every ship pointing across the galaxy toward the distant Death Star.

  “Admiral, we’re in position,” Lando says, leaning over the Millennium Falcon’s controls to speak into the comlink. “All fighters accounted for.”

  “Proceed with the countdown. All groups assume attack coordinates,” comes the crackling response from Admiral Ackbar on the bridge of the command ship, the Mon Calamari vessel known as Home One.

  Nien Nunb, in the Falcon’s copilot seat, chatters as he taps the coordinates into the computer.

  “Don’t worry, they’ll have that shield down,” says Lando, then murmurs, “or this will be the shortest attack of all time.”

  Nien Nunb responds with his own muttered comment, but finishes his task, flips a switch, and settles back into his seat.

  “All craft, prepare to jump into hyperspace on my mark,” Ackbar orders, his voice going out to the entire fleet now.

  “For the Rebellion…and for the Republic…now!”

  Nien Nunb pulls a lever and he and Lando watch the galaxy both stretch and shrink as the hyperdrive engines propel the Falcon and the rest of the fleet at such a speed that the stars streak past.

  But wait: it wasn’t the whole fleet. One ship is left behind: Mon Mothma’s ship. In a moment, she will order it to take her to a safe hiding place to await news. But for now she stares out at the vast emptiness and hopes.

  WHEN OUR HEROES AWAKE, they find the village nearly deserted. There were an abundance of very young and very old Ewoks, but all those able to join the fight had risen and followed Chirpa, Teebo, and Asha into the forest. There was much work to be done.

  Wicket tries to explain this to C-3PO, who tries to explain it to Solo, who doesn’t quite grasp the importance of the words. The important thing to him is that a few Ewoks—Romba, Wicket, and Paploo1—are still there to help them find the easiest way to the rendezvous point.

  Even with the Ewoks’ help, it is a frustrating journey with C-3PO seeming to fall over every root or clump of ferns and R2 needing to be lifted over dead logs. Leia has to remind Solo—who has, I fear, uttered some impolite language—how useful the droids have been already.

  And in any case, it is quite necessary to have R2, since he is best able to home in on the coordinates of the rendezvous site, which they eventually do…albeit with very little time to spare.

  The rebel strike team is indeed there. Solo feels a little foolish introducing them to the Ewoks, but these soldiers are all veterans and they know the importance of having someone on a mission who understands the lay of the land.

  And that’s exactly what Romba can offer them. He, unlike any of the other Ewoks, is a native of this part of the forest. His village once st
ood not far from here and he knows every tree and every path.

  First he leads the team to a bit of high ground. From here Solo gets his first look at the military base and shield generator that he has promised to destroy.

  It is an intimidating site: a complex of industrial buildings sprawling under an enormous landing pad and even more enormous shield-casters. An AT-AT stomps around near the only entrance gate, while several AT-STs bustle about importantly. Guard towers top the thick, high wall and biker scouts zip about in front of it.

  Chewie lets out a low growl and Solo and Leia exchange looks. There’s muttering among the troops, and that’s never a good sign.

  “The control bunker’s on the far side of that landing platform,” says Leia. “This isn’t going to be easy.”

  “Hey, don’t worry,” responds Solo, “Chewie and me have got into a lot of places more heavily guarded than this.”

  But Leia knows Solo’s bluster, by now. And she knows that he’s as worried as she is.

  Romba tugs at Leia’s sleeve, chattering away.

  “What’s he saying?” she asks C-3PO.

  And now, reader, we see how even a protocol droid can play a pivotal role in a galactic war. What a chain of chance that brought C-3PO here—built by young Anakin on Tatooine, hauled back and forth across the galaxy on missions he never quite understood, blasted to bits on Cloud City, picked at by Salacious Crumb, stumbling, tripping, plodding, and always complaining and almost always left behind—he has somehow made it here to the middle of this forest where he can save the lives of the whole strike team with the power of his six-million-language interpreting system.

  Chance? Or the Force? Or just the old Han Solo luck? We really don’t have time to get into it now, because C-3PO is listening to Romba and announcing: “He says there’s a secret entrance on the other side of the ridge.”

  Well, that changes everything!

  “A back door, eh? Good idea,” says Solo, greatly relieved.

  Half an hour later, the strike team has reassembled in another part of the forest and Solo and Leia survey the scene from behind a fallen log.