Within Firing Range – A Vader/Leia/Tarkin Vignette

This is just something I cooked up quickly as I wanted to explore it and I have exams now. Look forward the Jedi Alliance Series next Feburary by me.

Through the sterile corridors of the Death Star walked Darth Vader, his commanding presence causing fearful looks among those who noticed him as they struggled to look busy so to avoid any attention from the Sith Lord. With him, and trying with some effort to keep her head held high and her face expressionless, was Princess Leia. She wore a long white dress and her hair that was secured either side of her head in buns; she looked almost child-like in comparison in Vader's foreboding presence.

They stopped before a door, a code was given and the door slid open. The stormtroopers flanking them forced Leia to enter, but she ignored this as her mind was on something else. Someone else. The man stood before her, smiling in a self-important way. His large-cheeks bones made his face resemble a skull, a sneering skull. He stepped towards her; great purpose and assurance in his stride and poised to say something. But it was Leia who spoke first.

"Governor Tarkin," she said with an icy smile. "I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash. I recognized your foul stench when I was brought on board."

She put all her confidence and conviction in those words and smiled defiantly at him, convincing herself as much as Tarkin that she was not perturbed by her imprisonment. Even suggesting the interrogation was something she could handle. And she had managed to survive the interrogation without betraying the Alliance, what could they throw at her now?

"Charming to the last," Tarkin said with an amused smile. "You don't know how hard I found it signing the order to terminate your life!"

Two can play at that game, Leia thought.

"I'm surprised you had the courage to take the responsibility yourself!" She spat back.

"Princess Leia," Tarkin said, the amused smile still on his lips "Before your execution I would like you to be my guest at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational. No star system will dare oppose the Emperor now."

Leia almost shouted at him in frustration. When could they learn, these Imperials? This was the one of the main reasons behind the formation of the Alliance. No one should have that much power over other beings, yet that was what was happening and she hoped that Artoo had managed to get her message to Ben Kenobi. Even if she died here she would have helped their cause.

"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin," Leia warned. "The more star systems will slip through your fingers."

She knew this to be true, that was the atmosphere when she was last on Imperial Centre. The meetings with Garm Bel Iblis and Mon Mothma in secret rooms at night, the long conversations she had with her father, the reports she received from Winter...they all knew what would happen if the Empire continued with this doctrine of fear.

"Not after we demonstrate the power of this station," Tarkin said, eyeing Leia as a carnivore might eye his prey. "In a way, you have determined the choice of the planet that'll be destroyed first. Since you are reluctant to provide us with the location of the Rebel base, I have chosen to test this station's destructive power...on your home planet of Alderaan."

For a moment Leia collapsed inside, Tarkin's threats were not empty as she knew as well as he did the damage the station could do: total. She would have told him anything, even betray the Alliance, to save her planet. She couldn't be responsible for the death of so many by this tainted star.

"No!" She screamed frantically. "Alderaan is peaceful. We have no weapons. You can't possibly..."

"You would prefer another target?" Tarkin interrupted. "A military target? Then name the system!"

Leia could feel her heart thumping painfully in her chest; she could see the planet where she was standing. So innocent, so unaware of the great threat looming over them. Could she do it? Could she betray her homeworld? No, it was unthinkable...

"I grow tired of asking this. So it'll be the last time," Tarkin's voice cut into her thoughts like a vibroblade. "Where is the Rebel base?"

She was ready to give in, tell them the location of the base and then hope that the plans had found their way to her father. But how could she be sure? There wasn't any way she had of warning either planet.

Then she remembered when she was briefing some intelligence agents a few months back, reminding them of the pressures that would be put on them by the Empire. And telling those intent faces that absorbed her every word that it was vital if they were in a situation that require them revealing vital information to stall as long as possible.

A standard day, she remembered saying to them, an hour, take as much time as possible by however means you can. Then it was all too obvious.

"Dantooine," she said, closing her eyes and lowering her head in false submission. "They're on Dantooine."

There was a pause and Leia thought Tarkin had called her bluff. But he didn't look at her; he merely smiled at Vader who was standing like a shadow behind her.

"There," he said with a triumphant grin. "You see Lord Vader, she can be reasonable."

Leia almost smiled but remembered in time. But time was what she had given her homeworld; they would have noticed the Death Star and its departure would give them time to react while it was on the other side of the galaxy.

But then...

"Continue with the operation," Tarkin said with cool indifference. "You may fire when ready."

"What?" The words were out of Leia's mouth before she realized it.

Tarkin was quite amused by her outburst and that added to her fury. How could he? Her hands itched to strike him despite the binders she wore and she started to move forward in anger until Vader forcefully held her back. His large hands like manacles on her shoulders.

"You're far too trusting. Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration," Tarkin said with another smile, addressing the matter as if there were no more than a few flies that he could brush off without much effort. "But don't worry. We will deal with your Rebel friends soon enough."

"NO!"

She fought Vader's iron grip as he dragged her to a window to watch the destruction. So intent on her thoughts she didn't notice that the Dark Lord had left, that the two stormtroopers held their blasters ready in case she tried to escape. Tarkin stood behind her, his hands behind his back as her surveyed her torment with a superior disdain.

This couldn't be happening; it had to be a bad dream, her worst fears amplified and made real. Perhaps she was still in her cell on the cold bunk and the torture droid hovering over her, Darth Vader standing in the distance like a living monument to darkness.

But that pain, the pain that reverberated when the superlaser went home – to her home – made it real. Then there was the awful cry as the planet exploded into dust. A great cry that almost felled her, almost made her turn to Tarkin and tell him the real location of the base.

But she stood there, watching the scene and trying to keep indifference in her expression. She didn't know what was worse, watching Alderaan be destroyed before her eyes and know it was her fault. Or to have to stand there, as if she could still see the blue-green glow that heralded her arrival home as she neared the planet after being away, and look as though she could feel nothing.