Star Wars - The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader Read online

  Palpatine suspects the Council is up to something, and the Council wants me to spy on Palpatine! Who should I trust? Anakin tried talking with Padmé, but when she expressed her concern that democracy no longer existed in the Republic, he accused her of sounding like a Separatist. Is she turning against me too?!

  Later that night, Palpatine summoned Anakin to meet him in the Chancellor's private box at the Galaxies Opera House. There, while watching a troupe of Mon Calamari perform a zero-gravity ballet within immense spheres of shimmering water, Palpatine informed Anakin that Clone Intelligence Units had discovered that General Grievous was hiding in the Utapau system. After dismissing his aides from the box, Palpatine further confided that he had come to suspect that the Jedi Council wanted to control the Republic, and was plotting to betray him.

  Palpatine said, "They asked you to spy on me, didn't they?"

  Squirming in his seat beside the Chancellor, Anakin replied, "I don't, uh... I don't know what to say."

  "Remember back to your early teachings," Palpatine continued. "All those who gain power are afraid to lose it. Even the Jedi."

  No, that's not true, Anakin thought. "The Jedi use their power for good," he insisted.

  "Good is a point of view, Anakin," Palpatine said calmly. "The Sith and the Jedi are similar in almost every way, including their quest for greater power." That's not true, either.

  "The Sith rely on their passion for their strength," Anakin said. "They think inwards, only about themselves."

  "And the Jedi don't?" Palpatine asked, lifting his eyebrows high to convey his belief that the answer was as plain as his face.

  "The Jedi are selfless," Anakin countered. "They only care about others."

  There was applause from the audience, and Anakin and Palpatine directed their attention to the performers. Palpatine said, "Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise?"

  "No," Anakin admitted.

  "I thought not," Palpatine said smugly. "It's not a story the Jedi would tell you. It's a Sith legend. Darth Plagueis was a Dark Lord of the Sith, so powerful and so wise he could use the Force to influence the midi-chlorians to create... life." He slowly turned his gaze to Anakin before he continued. "He had such a knowledge of the dark side that he could even keep the ones he cared about from dying."

  Anakin thought immediately of Padmé, and of his most recent nightmares, and felt a tingling sensation along his spine. He said, "He could actually... save people from death?"

  "The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural."

  Anakin thought about Darth Plagueis, wondering just how much of the legend might be true. He said, "Wh - What happened to him?"

  Looking away from Anakin, Palpatine answered slowly, "He became so powerful, the only thing he was afraid of was losing his power, which eventually, of course, he did. Unfortunately, he taught his apprentice everything he knew. Then his apprentice killed him in his sleep. It's ironic. He could save others from death, but not himself."

  Because the Chancellor was such a learned man and had discussed the ongoing hunt for Darth Sidious with members of the Jedi Council, Anakin wasn't curious about how he might have learned such a bizarre story about the Sith. Anakin only wanted to know one thing.

  "Is it possible to learn this power?" he asked.

  Raising his eyebrows, Palpatine turned to once again lock his gaze on Anakin and said, "Not from a Jedi."

  INTERLUDE

  Twenty-three years after the end of the Clone Wars, Darth Vader had no difficulty recalling Anakin Skywalker's meeting with Supreme Chancellor Palpatine at the Opera House. Although he had not yet realized that Palpatine was really the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, it was at that particular moment that Anakin Skywalker decided he must learn the secrets of the Sith.

  At the time, Anakin had convinced himself that he only wanted to gain the powers that would help him save his wife. He hadn't wanted to take the path to the dark side. In fact, he had continued to behave nobly after that meeting at the opera. When the Jedi Council insulted him yet again by selecting Obi-Wan to hunt down General Grievous on Utapau, Anakin apologized for his arrogance. And after he learned that Palpatine was the Sith Lord who had slain Darth Plagueis, and realized that the Chancellor had no intention of stepping down from his position of power after the death of General Grievous, Anakin reported his discovery to Mace Windu, who led a team of Jedi Masters to apprehend Palpatine. Anakin had done the right thing.

  But because Anakin believed that the only way he could save Padmé was by gaining Palpatine's arcane knowledge, he had been unable to let Mace Windu kill the Sith Lord. And so he had allowed Palpatine to unleash Sith Lightning on Mace Windu, and chose to betray all the Jedi on Coruscant, and pledged himself to Palpatine. As the Sith Lord's new apprentice, he had taken the name Darth Vader before he set out to kill every Jedi who remained at the Jedi Temple. Now, so many years later, Vader reflected on all the Jedi he killed that day. Remembering the stunned expressions of Mace Windu as he fell from Palpatine's office window and the screams of the Jedi younglings and their teachers, he felt no remorse. Just as he believed he had done his best to be a dutiful Jedi, he believed his actions as Palpatine's apprentice were even more righteous.

  Smoke had been still billowing from the Jedi Temple when Vader traveled to the volcanic world ofMustafar to kill the Separatist leaders in their hideout. Meanwhile, Palpatine initiated an order for all off-world clone troops to kill their Jedi generals, and then informed the Senate that the Separatists had been defeated and the Jedi rebellion had been foiled. Joyous cheers had accompanied Palpatine's declaration that the Republic would be reorganized into the first Galactic Empire.

  After killing all the Separatist leaders, Palpatine's new apprentice had stepped outside the mountain fortress on Mustafar to gaze at the blazing lava rivers below. He would not mourn for the lives he had taken. But for the loss of his former self, the boy who had dreamed of becoming a Jedi, he was unable to hold back the tears that streamed down his cheeks.

  Anakin Skywalker was gone. Or was he? After all, Padmé had fallen in love with Anakin, not Darth Vader. He had not anticipated that Padmé, traveling with C-3PO, would follow him to Mustafar and refute the righteousness of his actions. Nor had he foreseen that Obi-Wan would survive the Jedi purge, and that the deceitful Padmé would bring him with her. Despite his powers and years of attunement to Obi-Wan, his rage had blocked his ability to sense his former Master's presence on Mustafar until he saw the Jedi standing in the hatch of Padmé's star ship.

  He also never imagined that Obi-Wan possessed the strength to bring him down so brutally.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  "You were the Chosen One!" Obi-Wan shouted down at what was left of Anakin Skywalker, who writhed at the bottom of a slope of black sand at the edge of a lava river on Mustafar. Their exhausting duel had carried them far from the landing pad where Padmé's ship had arrived, and where Anakin had used the Force to choke his seemingly treacherous wife.

  But now the duel was over. With a single sweep of his lightsaber, Obi-Wan had severed his former Padawan's legs at the knees and also his left arm.

  As Anakin straggled to raise his head from the smoldering sand, his eyes blazed with fury as he glared at Obi-Wan. I won't die like this! I'm still stronger than you!

  "It was said you would destroy the Sith, not join them!" Obi-Wan continued. "Bring balance to the Force, not leave it in darkness!"

  Feeling the intense heat permeating his torn tunic, Anakin sighted his fallen lightsaber lying a short distance away. Too stunned and dazed to focus his powers, he watched with rage as Obi-Wan bent down to pick up the lightsaber, then took it with him as he began walking up the slope.

  "I hate you!" Anakin roared, keeping his eyes focused on the departing figure.

  Obi-Wan stopped in his tracks and turned one final time to face the ruined, seething monster. "You were my brother, Anakin," Obi-Wan said. "I loved you."

  Anakin's cloth
es caught fire, and he was suddenly engulfed in flames. His screams were filled with anger as well as pain, not unlike that of any entirely helpless creature. His instinct was to roll and put out the flames, but because of his wounds and the red-hot stones beneath his ravaged head and torso, all he could do was burn and burn.

  Obi-Wan walked off, leaving Anakin to die. Somehow, through his agony, Anakin felt one last flicker of Obi-Wan's presence before the Jedi receded from view.

  Anakin kept screaming.

  * * *

  The flames finally burned out. Anakin's mechanical right arm dug into the sand. He pulled, and slid a few millimeters up the slope.

  Again!

  With each movement, hot volcanic shards scraped and tore at his roasted flesh. It took all of his concentration to shift his scorched remains up the slope and away from the lava river.

  He moaned. Only his powers kept him from blacking out.

  Again!

  Only his hatred for Obi-Wan made him want to live another day.

  * * *

  Anakin - he still thought of himself as Anakin - heard the engine of an arriving starship travel over his position. He had no idea how much time had passed before he heard a clone trooper's voice call out, "Your majesty, this way."

  Then he heard Palpatine's voice, "There he is. He's still alive."

  Anakin's blackened torso went completely limp as he finally allowed darkness to sweep over him.

  * * *

  Anakin awoke on an operating table, surrounded by droids. The recently appointed Emperor Palpatine had brought him to a surgical reconstruction center on Coruscant, and the droids were busily attaching robotic limbs to his quivering torso, which was strapped to the table by strong metal belts. The droids were working fast to maintain the precious midi-chlorians that existed in Anakin's blood and tissue. To prevent the midi-chlorians from becoming thinned by intrusive chemicals, the droids were working without anesthetics.

  Anakin felt everything.

  He felt each cold metal blade that sliced into his hideously scarred flesh to allow more tools to probe and stabilize his damaged internal organs. He squirmed as shattered bones were replaced by plastoid, and cringed as lasers grafted the new limbs into place. At some point, he overheard a surgical droid explaining to Palpatine that he would require a special helmet and backpack to cycle air in and out of his damaged lungs.

  Despite this damage, throughout the entire procedure, he never stopped screaming.

  Finally stabilized, Anakin lay quietly on the table to which he was still secured. He was clad in a gleaming black life-support suit with a lighted control function panel set across his chest. He watched as a robot mechanism above his head slowly lowered a black mask with oval vision receptors and a triangular respiratory vent over his face, while another mechanism placed a helmet over his skull. The helmet and mask locked onto each other as they simultaneously bolted to the armored ring that wrapped around his neck. Fully encased within the pressurized suit, he heard a labored, mechanical rasp, then realized it was the sound of his own breathing.

  The table tilted, raising Anakin's restrained body to a standing position. From the shadows of the operating room, the hooded Emperor stepped forward and said, "Lord Vader. Can you hear me?"

  Vader? That's right... I'm Darth Vader. Anakin is gone.

  Vader exhaled, then said, "Yes, Master." The mask's vocabulator had transformed his voice into a commanding baritone. He still felt weak, so it was with some difficulty that he slowly turned his head, adjusting his vision through the helmet to better see the Emperor. The Emperor's face was gnarled and twisted, deformed by the Sith lightning that had been briefly deflected by Mace Windu during their battle.

  "Where is Padmé?" Vader said in his new voice. After everything that had happened, he was still concerned for her, still loved her, still wanted to save her life. "Is she safe? Is she all right?"

  In his most sympathetic tone, Palpatine said, "It seems, in your anger, you killed her."

  "I? I couldn't have," Vader said with disbelief. I loved her! I did everything I could to save - his mind's voice sounded strange to him, weaker than the synthesized roll of thunder that emitted from his mask. He recalled choking Padmé on Mustafar, watching her body crumple and fall on the landing pad.

  I didn 't mean to...

  Vader snarled, "She was alive. I felt it!"

  Palpatine took a cautious step backward as Vader moaned with grief and rage. Around the laboratory, equipment and droids began to rapture and burst as Vader lashed out in all directions with his Force powers. There was a loud snap of metal as he tore his left arm free from the table, then his right. He lurched forward on alloy legs that were fitted into cumbersome boots until he stood at the edge of the surgical floor. And somehow, through all his anger, he suddenly sensed at least one truth: Padmé was dead, along with their unborn child.

  "No!" he bellowed so loud and long that his cry echoed off the walls. Behind his mask, he squeezed his eyes shut in an effort to hold back the tears that he was physically unable to wipe away.

  But no tears came. He didn't know whether the surgical droids had altered or removed his tear ducts, and he was beyond caring. All he knew for certain was that Padmé was gone from him forever... and that there were more than a few Jedi still waiting to be killed.

  Devoid of love for anyone, and unable to feel the touch of anything through his gloved, cybernetic fingers, Darth Vader was finally ready to fully embrace the dark side.

  And so he did.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Darth Vader's earliest missions involved tracking down the Jedi who had survived the purge. He investigated every reported sighting, traveled to many remote worlds to hunt his quarry, and killed every Jedi he found. No reports led to Obi-Wan or Yoda, but Vader remained ever vigilant.

  With every passing day, Vader distanced himself from the Jedi he had been. Where Anakin Skywalker had been influenced by traumatic circumstances, Vader shaped himself by inflicting pain on others. Unfortunately, because of his artificial arms, he was unable to conjure Sith Lightning or be invulnerable to it. He would always be weaker than the Emperor.

  Few people were aware of what had become of Anakin Skywalker, but it was not long before nearly everyone in the Galactic Empire had heard some rumor or stray fact about Palpatine's new servant. One month after Palpatine became Emperor, a story circulated that Vader had tracked down a nest of fifty Jedi traitors and killed every one of them by himself. Eyewitnesses described him as a wraithlike being who seemed to possess Jedi powers and wielded a lightsaber, but he was definitely not a Jedi. After all, the Jedi may have attempted to overthrow the Republic, but they had never been known to strangle their opponents.

  Some suspected Darth Vader was a droid engineered to carry out the Emperor's will. Others suggested that he might have once been a professional gladiator or bounty hunter. There was even speculation that he might be a well-known public figure who had assumed the name "Darth Vader" and wore his face-concealing helmet to hide his true identity.

  Vader himself did nothing to reveal his personal history. As far as he was concerned, the only thing people had to know about him was that he answered only to the Emperor.

  As the Emperor's lieutenant, Vader carried out his Master's directives with lethal precision. Besides hunting Jedi, he supervised the expansion of the Imperial Navy and enforced every new law - many of which promoted the hatred of nonhumans - to bring greater power to the Empire. Those who opposed or disappointed Vader wound up dead or enslaved, and even Palpatine' s most ardent supporters regarded the masked, shadowy cyborg with dread. In a short time, his very name became synonymous with terror.

  The Emperor reorganized the Galactic Senate as the Imperial Senate, so he could continue to monitor and manipulate the representatives of the worlds he now controlled. Vader accompanied the Emperor to the more important Senate functions, which were often attended by Senator Bail Organa of Alderaan, among others. During the Clone Wars, Anakin Skywalker
had, for a time, shared Senator Amidala's regard for Organa as a rare, honorable politician, but to Darth Vader, the man was as insignificant as a common insect. Like most people, Organa directed his gaze elsewhere when Vader was present.

  After allocating the more mundane responsibilities of government to paranoid administrators, the Emperor made fewer public appearances, which allowed him to devote more of his time to studying the dark side of the Force in his palace on Coruscant. In time, Vader's looming form became the ultimate icon of Imperial authority. But the Emperor never let Vader forget who was in charge. Over time, they had many variations of the same conversation, which usually began with the Emperor's taunting question: "Are you afraid of death, Lord Vader?"