Hand of Fate Read online

  Palpatine now regretted having chosen such a weak man as the Death Star Commander. He needed help, and he knew he would have to mind control the fool to get it. In a moment, Jerjerrod's face went blank, and he stooped to help the Emperor to a standing position. Together, they stumbled into the corridor. With the Moff's help, Palpatine reached a comm panel. He swiftly keyed a sequence that would send a coded message to his Grand Vizier. Sate Pestage would know what to do to prepare for the future. Now he had to ensure that there would be a future.

  Despite his precautions, he was very far from Byss now. To reach another clone, his essence would have to travel vast distances through the nether-realm while fighting the dissolution of the dark side's chaos.

  Such a journey might take too long to survive. But his studies with the Holocron had taught him about spirit anchors, how a consciousness could retain its individuality while entirely within the Force, provided there was a living mind to cling to. He planned to use one himself, to make sure he survived until he could reach Byss. It was no sure thing, but it was his only chance. He knew just the person. There was an operative named Mara Jade, code named the Emperor's Hand. She had the power to hear his call from anywhere in the galaxy, and he needed that ability now. He reached out with the Force and found her. The link was established in a moment, and just in time.

  Deep inside the station, the main reactor was exploding. Emperor Palpatine's last thoughts were of hatred for Vader and Skywalker, and of the vengeance he would one day have. Then the Death Star erupted with cleansing fire, bringing Palpatine's Empire to an end.

  * * *

  It was over. Palpatine, Luke, and Vader had gone through their personal crucibles and emerged forged into new shapes. Vader had lost his life, but won back his soul. Luke had lost his father and his innocence, but gained maturity and become a Jedi at last. The Emperor had lost everything, but somewhere within the dark side of the Force, he lived on as a hatred that would not die. He knew he would try to live again in one of his clones, and return to menace the children of Anakin Skywalker once again. But for the present, the light side had triumphed.

  The newborn New Republic was removing its forces from Endor. The threat of the Ssi-Ruuk had been countered, and now the weary freedom fighters could begin to return to their homes and undertake the monumental task of creating a new government. Mon Mothma wanted to leave Endor the way it had been before the Empire had moved in, pristine and unspoiled. A few Ewoks had decided to go adventuring in space with the former Rebels, but most of them bid farewell to their new tribe members and went back to their primitive lives among the lofty tree villages.

  The lights of departing starships dotted the night sky of Endor as one particular Rebel said his last good-byes to a place he might never see again. Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight, gazed sorrowfully at the burned out funeral pyre of his father. The starlight of the clearing dimly showed him that there wasn't much left of Darth Vader's body, only blackened, melted armor. A far greater absence was felt in Luke's soul.

  He had regained his father for such a brief time, then lost him forever.

  That made it much more painful, somehow. It was time to say farewell.

  Slightly embarrassed, Luke spoke into the night softly. "Father.

  Anakin. I know you're at peace in the Force now. I think I saw you with Ben and Master Yoda, that night after I burned your body. I hope that was the right thing to do. You were turned before the end, but I felt your body should be freed from the machine that kept it a prisoner." Luke looked up at the stars. "I know you came to see Leia. She told me you wanted her forgiveness. It's a hard thing for her to forgive or forget.

  But she told me a while ago that she had made her peace with you, and that you would know it. I wonder if you can hear me? I wondered why you appeared to Leia and not to me. I'm sure you had your reasons, but there was more I wanted to say to you." Luke's voice trailed off. He stood there for several minutes, letting his silence convey the rest of what he felt. He turned to leave, his face full of disappointment. Luke was startled to find himself face to face with the glowing apparition of his father, standing at the entrance to the clearing. Anakin was dressed in plain gray robes, and as before, he appeared as a gentle faced late middle aged man. He was smiling at Luke.

  "Have you--how long have you been standing there?" Luke demanded.

  "I've been watching you, my son. I'm very proud of you, and of your sister. I meant to see both of you, Luke, and here I am. It was given to me to see and speak with each of you once only. I asked forgiveness of your sister. As for you, my son, I want to tell you about the Emperor."

  Luke was pleased and saddened at the same time. "If that's all the time we can have, we should make the best of it. The Emperor is dead, what more is there to say about him?"

  Anakin's face was troubled. "You can't be sure of that, Luke. I was very close to the Emperor. He was strong in the dark side, but it made him weak in the flesh. I don't think this was the only time he died."

  Luke couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What do you mean, Father?"

  Anakin spread his spectral hands. "I saw him become very old several times while I knew him. Suddenly, he would be young again. He never told me how he did it, but I suspect he used a clone of himself to regain his youth. If he is able to do so again..." Anakin let his hands fall.

  Luke shuddered. Palpatine had been so evil, so powerful. Only his father's intervention had saved his life in the end. He doubted he could survive another encounter.

  "However," Anakin tried to reassure him, "the Emperor always went to a mysterious location in the core worlds in order to be rejuvenated.

  It may be that he could not save himself here at Endor. He may be dead forever. For now, at least, the galaxy is free of him."

  "You're free of him forever, Father," Luke smiled.

  "Thanks to you, my son," said Anakin. "Somehow you knew there was good in me when the Emperor didn't know, and I myself didn't know. How could you tell?"

  "I'm your son," Luke said simply. "I had to believe in the good in my father if I was to have any hope for the good in myself. Besides, once I accepted the truth that you were my father, I thought back to how on Cloud City, you could have killed me. But you didn't. There must still have been something of Anakin in you."

  "It was a near thing, my son. You took a terrible risk. I would have killed you, had the Emperor commanded me to. You came close to killing me, too. Such is the power of the dark side. Never underestimate it, my son."

  "I did come close. Too close." Luke remembered the moment all too well. The dark side had responded to him so quickly and powerfully once he had opened himself to it. "It was your threat to turn Leia to the dark side that pushed me over the edge. I'm not sure how to put this... I loved her, Father. I saw her image and followed it across the galaxy. I wanted her to be mine, to love me back. But she fell in love with Han, and then I learned she was my sister. I know she can never be mine, but I still love her, even now. I couldn't bear to think of her going through what I was going through. But in the end, when I had you at my mercy, when the Emperor was calling out for me to kill you, what held me back was this." Luke held up his prosthetic right hand. "I saw your severed hand, bionic like mine, and I realized that a vision I saw during my training was coming true. If I continued down the dark path, I would become Darth Vader. The hand that Vader cut off saved both of us."

  Luke couldn't help but recall the horrible attack of the Emperor that had nearly killed him. "You saved my life, too, Father. The Emperor would have killed me then and there."

  "The Emperor's hold on me was strong, Luke. I had to obey him, no matter what. Even when I realized he wanted me dead. When you and I fought, He didn't aid me with his powers. On the contrary, he clouded my mind as he once did to Obi-Wan. That, combined with the power given to you by the dark side, was enough to seal my fate as your victim. You withheld, but still I went back to my Master's side. I needed his presence to replace the emptiness of all that I had lost b
ecause of him.

  He knew that, and thought his hold on me was absolute. But then I saw you dying, and Anakin was reborn. I realized that what I felt for you was love, an emotion I had forgotten. Palpatine's hold on me was broken. I suddenly saw him, not as my dark Master, but as a small, twisted old man, full of spite and cruelty. And this foul creature was killing my son. I knew what I had to do. Though it killed me, I had to save you."

  "Father, how did the Emperor come so close to winning? He seemed to know me completely, before I even arrived. He knew exactly what would tempt me to the dark side."

  Anakin replied seriously, "The Emperor could foresee many things.

  Before our battle, he told me that you would turn to the dark side if all you held dear was threatened. Your friends, and the Rebel Alliance itself were to be in mortal danger, driving you to seek the power you couldn't find in the light side of the Force. He did know you, and so he would have won, except that he did not know me."

  Luke smiled grimly at the irony. Palpatine had kept the instrument of his own destruction by his side for twenty years. His overconfidence had been his weakness after all. A man who had been one of the Jedi had avenged his kind against their conqueror in the end.

  "Yoda tells me that your destiny is a great one, Luke. He says that restore the Jedi you will. Excuse me, that you will restore the Jedi. I believe in you, my son. One day, you will be a Jedi Master. Through you, the Jedi will return."

  Luke smiled at his father. Anakin had begun to fade away. "I must leave you now, Luke. Be strong, and believe that someday, you will find love. The Force will be with you, always."

  "Good-bye, Father," said Luke sadly. Luke's father shimmered and was gone, leaving Luke alone in the quiet starlit clearing. And you shall always be with the Force, Father, Luke thought. Deep in his heart, he knew the Jedi had already returned.

  © Text copyright 1997 Brendon J.Wahlberg.