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“Luke.” Vader gently shook his shoulder. Luke's eyes blinked open and he looked at his father blearily.
“Father?”
“The press is gone. Your relief mission is over. It is time for us to go home.”
“Good,” Luke said, nodding. his neck was stiff. In fact, his whole body was aching. He pressed a hand to his forehead, where a headache was starting to bloom. It must have been the way he slept in the chair, or the long hours he spent here. “I just need to wrap up something with the Princess.” He hadn’t seen Leia in hours. The room spun for a moment.
He knew something was wrong when he tried to stand up. Waves of dizziness washed over him, and his legs gave out. Pain shot through his head, along with a terrible realization.
“Luke?” His father's voice came out fast as he reached for him.
“I think I'm sick,” Luke said, right before he collapsed.
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Hands padded his hair and touched his face. He felt both hot and cold at once. He tried to open his eyes, but they were glued shut. He heard someone groaning and realized it was him.
“Hush, Luke,” a voice said. “You need to preserve your strength.”
“Uncle Owen?”
The hands withdrew slightly.
Luke snaked his hands out of the blankets and pawed at the air until his questing fingers met fabric. He clutched it tight. “Don't go, uncle,” he whispered. “I'm sorry.”
“You have.. nothing to be sorry for,” The voice said. “You are strong, and good. You will make it through this.”
“So tired,” Luke said.
“I know. Sleep now.”
Someone pulled the blanket around his shoulders, and he fell into a fitful sleep. In his dreams, he ran through the dunes, hunted by Stormtroopers on speeder bikes, and black cloaked figures with red lightsabers. Other times he opened his eyes and his room became the nightmare. The walls moved, and once the ceiling turned into collapsing sand before jerking back into place.
Sometimes he coughed. Pain shot through his chest. He looked down and saw spatters of bright red blood on a white towel. He realized someone was holding him partially upright.
“Uncle?” he asked, fingering the thick, heavy fabric near his hand.
“Get some rest, Luke,” the voice said, laying him back on the pillow.
When he opened his eyes, it was dark. But then he blinked and suddenly it was light. Everything hurt. His throat felt like sandpaper.
“Water,” he whispered.
A glass appeared at his mouth. When he tried to swallow, half the water ran down his front, cold. Someone pressed a towel to his neck as he shivered, stirring a memory. He had wiped somebody's face when they spilled water. He couldn't remember why or where, just that at his side was…
“Leia,” he moaned. “Leia, I'm coming.”
“Hush,” a voice said. It wasn't Leia. The force was dark, but the darkness was brushed away as a hand brushed Luke's hair off his sweaty forehead.
He wanted to ask for Leia, but the words got stuck in his throat. He drifted to sleep again, waking when it was light, but then suddenly it was dark again. His legs felt like someone had tied stones around them and thrown him into the lake on Naboo. He tried to swim to the surface, but the deep water kept pulling him down.
“How is he?” someone asked. He realized it was his father.
“Not out of the worst of it yet,” another voice replied. It was his medic, Kix. Luke twisted on the mattress, fever burning his skin.
I need you to pull me out of the lake, he thought, but his father wasn't talking to him.
“It's almost time for his next dose of fever reducers,” Kix said. “And he’ll need more linens within the hour.”
“I will have them sent up.”
“Thank you, sir. And you're not showing any signs of sickness yourself?”
“No.”
“Thank the stars. I’m not sure your lungs would be able to take this infection. Regardless, you need a break. Get some rest yourself. I don't want to see you back until you've had it.”
The door hissed shut. Luke tried to stay awake. The next time his father came through the door, he would push himself out of the lake.
But the next time he opened his eyes, evening light was spilling across the floor. Coruscanti evening light. Luke took a breath. his chest hurt, but it didn't feel like he was going to cough. He still had a headache, but it no longer felt like his head was going to split in two. Luke stared at the ceiling, wondering if it would start moving again. When it stayed still, he lifted his head.
His father sat in a chair near his bed. With the mask on, it was impossible to tell, but the tilt of his helmet suggested his eyes were closed. Luke had a sudden memory of his early days on Coruscant, when his father stayed by him constantly in equal measure to comfort and contain him. Wipe his tears away when he cried for home, for Tatooine, and keep Luke from getting too far when he tried to go back.
Now, like then, it was at once confining and comforting.
Luke shifted on the bed, and his father straightened.
How are you feeling?” his father asked.
“Better,” Luke said truthfully.
His father brushed hair out of Luke's face. “Kix says the worst is over. You are going to recover.”
“What day is it?” Luke asked.
“Tsaungsday.”
“Oh,” he said, and fell asleep again. When Luke woke up, it was morning. His father was still at his side. The Force glowed a little when his father saw that he was awake. Luke felt much better.
“You took me from my home,” Luke whispered, even though it hurt to talk. “What happened to my aunt and uncle?”
His father was silent for a long moment.
“I do not know.” The Force rang with truth . “When I learned that you lived, that they had kept you from me, I was…angry. But I did not…” Vader paused. “I do not know,” he said again. Then, “When you are better, perhaps you and I could find out, if you wish. Why do you ask?”
Luke coughed a little. His father produced a glass of water and helped him drink.
“You should get some rest now, Luke,” his father said.
There was something else Luke should have been asking, but he couldn't think of what it was. Just that it was connected to family. “You haven't really tried to get to know me,” he said instead. He supposed the flu made him feel like telling old truths, long buried. But no, that wasn’t right. Wasn’t what he wanted to say. What was it?
“I was.. not sure how to raise a child,” his father admitted. “and there were not any siblings or other children for me to compare you to.”
Siblings. That was it. Leia was missing.
“How is L— Princess Organa?” Luke caught himself at the last second.
“That Rebel scum has been exposed for the terrorist she is.” Luke blinked at the sudden vitriol in his father's voice.
“Rebel scum?” It took too long for him to connect the dots. Luke schooled his face, prevented his eyes from widening in shock. or, wait; would that be a more realistic reaction?
There was no time to overanalyze it. his father was already moving on. “Yes. She was put on trial, and is set to be executed tomorrow.”
Luke fought his father's hands as he lugged himself out of bed and stumbled down the hall.
“Tomorrow?! Leia? Leia!” he cried. He had to get to his sister. He had to explain, before…
The hall spun, and his legs buckled. His father caught him before he hit the floor.
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Luke couldn't go to the execution. Kix said he was too weak to get out of bed. Afterward, his father sat by his bed and stroked his hair as he told him about the trial.
The Princess Organa, his father told him, had ensured that Luke caught the disease. Vader had had an inkling that she’d been a Rebel before, but was unable to prove it—until now. There had been too many…incidents surrounding her and Luke’s joint relief missions. Too many Imperial bases that fell, attacks that failed, after such missions. Clearly Princess Organa had been using the image of Imperial cooperation that she and Luke touted at every relief effort as a ploy to distract from her anti-Imperial sentiments. And clearly, she had deceived Luke, who was a victim in this; he couldn’t have known she was a rebel, or he would never have worked with her willingly, never named her friend. Right?
At that, Luke nodded, lightheaded and on autopilot, then reconsidered. Luke opened his mouth to protest, but his father blazed on, heedless.
“I am glad to be rid of her at last, although it inflames me that as that vile princess revealed her true political leanings, you were the one hurt, my son.” Vader cupped Luke’s cheek and surrounded him in the Force like a blanket, his equivalent of a soft look. “At least, you will be her last victim.”
Luke inhaled sharply, sitting up. “Last victim?”
“Yes.” Vader returned to stroking Luke’s hair. Luke needed the comfort so badly he couldn’t bring himself to push him off. “Princess Organa has been scheduled for execution. Did I not already say that?”
“You did.”
Luke grasped desperately for the Force. His father’s black form enveloped him before he could find Leia, cradled Luke against himself, crooning comfort into his ear. Luke reached out again—was his sister still alive? Was there still time to save her? He had to know!
The crooning turned to something more resonant, which dragged Luke’s eyelids down against his will. He sagged in his father’s arms, wrapped in his father’s Force presence, blinded to anything outside their too-small family unit.
“It will be alright, my son. You’re safe now,” Vader said. “She won’t hurt you again. Rest.”
You’re the one hurting us, Luke thought, but he was already gone.