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The roar of the crowd is nearly deafening. The stands are packed, civilians and Imperials alike filling every seat - some of them are sitting down while leaning over the rails to take a good look at the racers, but most are on their feet, cheering, hollering, whistling as loud as they can.
Luke can't believe she's here.
It took a lot to make it to this race and her guardians would be so cross with her if they knew she'd decided to participate in a dangerous podrace instead of being laid up in her dorm, battling the fake illness she told them about. She would've preferred to not lie at all, if she's being honest, but this was a visitation weekend for the students at the Imperial Academy and lying was the only way she managed to get uncle Owen and aunt Beru to stay on Tatooine and not make the journey to Coruscant.
Luke felt bad, lying to them like that, especially since she knows how much aunt Beru has been looking forward to seeing her after more than a year away from home, but Luke has worked too hard to get her name on the racers' list to bail out at the last second. If all goes well - and she'll be damned if it doesn't - she'll use her prize money to go back to Tatooine in a month when school lets out for the summer.
She's one of the first to arrive on the track but she pays close attention to her competition. Podraces are dangerous no matter where they're held - whether it be Tatooine or Coruscant - and after years of sneaking away to races behind her guardians' backs, Luke has learned to always size up the competition. She made the mistake of underestimating someone once and she nearly became one with Beggar's Canyon.
She's busy surreptitiously scrutinising a particularly vicious looking Trandoshan while pretending to fiddle with a strap on her jumpsuit when the crowd goes absolutely still for a long moment before bursting into such pandemonium that Luke is almost certain someone caught fire when she wasn't looking. She whips around to see what all the commotion is about at the same time the commentator's booming voice spills out of the speakers.
"We have an unexpected racer today, people! The Emperor's Second in Command himself, Lord Darth Vader, has just entered the arena!"
Luke nearly drops her helmet when she takes in the hulking, black figure standing in the spot next to her. He's so tall he nearly blocks out the sunlight falling on her and his podracer looks impossibly tiny when he's looming over it. He doesn't spare anyone a glance, seemingly unbothered with the uproar he's caused by being here and Luke has to forcibly remove her eyes from him before he notices and decides to take offence at her ogling him.
Darth Vader.
Kriff.
Of all the karking people she could've been in a racing competition with, it had to be him.
Everyone knows how good of a pilot he is. The promotional pamphlets for the Flight section of the Academy - of which she is a student - are filled with short clips of Vader expertly manoeuvring his TIE Advanced x1 in the fights against the Rebels, flashy text boasting that 'you, too, can learn to fly like this at the best Flight Academy in the galaxy' . Nevermind that this is the galaxy's only Flight Academy.
Her chances of winning this thing have just significantly lowered compared to a few moments ago.
No matter. Luke is a damn good pilot, everyone says so - her undeniable skills are the only reason she managed to secure a spot in Coruscant, after all - and she will not cower before anyone, not even the Emperor's Fist. She will give it her best shot, even if she won't win first place. The second place prize isn't too shabby, either, and this will just serve to make her work harder in anticipation of next year's race.
Once everyone is by their podracers, Luke waits for the signal from the commentator and mounts, securing her helmet on her head and waiting for the start of the race. Vader is on her left, a Togruta on her right, but she keeps her eyes in front of her, focused on the race ahead. After another moment in which everyone settles in their place, the commentator starts the countdown then a cannon booms, signalling the start of the race.
Luke is off like a shot, dodging the Togruta expertly, who swerves to the right too widely and crashes into another competitor, taking both of them out of the race. On the left side, she spies other racers being taken out of commission out of the corner of her eye but she tightens her hands on the controls and races ahead, forcing herself to ignore the commotion. For now, she's in the lead, but she knows that won't last if she doesn't focus, especially with Vader close on her heels, so she sinks into that meditative state which always appears when she's piloting and lets her instincts take over.
On and on she goes, weaving between obstacles, swerving at the last second to avoid crashing, putting little bursts of speed between her and Vader every time he looks close to overtaking her.
Before she knows it, Luke is almost close to the finish line - she can barely believe it. A quick tune in back to the commentator tells her the only racers left are the two of them and a Rhodian who's so far behind that he has no hope of catching up with them. Luke almost lets herself believe she has this in the bag, already imagining what she'll do with the prize money, when her engine starts spluttering. Alarm bells go off in her head and she frantically starts pressing buttons, trying to find what the problem is, but that momentary loss of focus is all it takes for her to miss the last obstacle that stands between her and her win. Her podracer bumps into the obstacle, sending her flying in the air, spinning out of control, and Vader speeds past her with ease, crossing the finish line. Luke skids to a halt moments later, somehow finishing the race despite her accident, but it doesn't make her feel any better.
"Lord Vader wins the race! Skywalker places second, somehow still in one piece after that nasty tumble."
Luke ignores the cheers - and boos - from the crowd as she extricates herself from her destroyed podracer. Scowling, she gives it a hard kick.
"Piece of bantha poodoo," she curses, frustrated that she lost because of an engine malfunction.
The sting of such a pathetic loss makes her wrench the helmet off her head harshly and drop it angrily in the pilot's seat and she doesn't stick around for the award ceremony. She has no interest in hearing Vader gloat about his win. They can mail her prize later.
Aggravated, Luke pushes through the crowd that has descended on the ground to congratulate the winner and makes her way to the hangar, hoping to haggle with someone for a ride back to the Academy.
***
Vader's heart stills when that name falls from the commentator's lips. He almost wants to choke the man and demand to know where he heard that name and what business he has bringing it up in front of this crowd of insipid vermin, but the words uttered replay in his head and he realises with a start that it wasn't him who the commentator referred to. It was the small human girl who nearly won the race if it hadn't been for her engine failing.
He waves off the people clamouring to talk to him, ignoring the call from the organiser to come on the podium and receive his prize, and stalks out of the arena in the direction he saw the girl - Skywalker - storming off in.
When he enters the hangar, he takes a moment to survey his surroundings before he spots his prey a few metres away. She's sitting on a curb, her chin in her hands, staring straight ahead with a mutinous expression on her face. Vader approaches her slowly but with determination.
The sound of his respirator must alert her to his presence for she raises her head right before he stops in front of her.
"I left early so I didn't have to hear you gloat, you know?" she says testily, eyes lit up with irritation. She's entirely unafraid of him, something he might have endeavoured to correct were it anyone else, but he finds that he doesn't mind. He's not entirely certain she is who he thinks she is, but even if she is not, he doesn't plan on letting her go anywhere. She is Force-sensitive, even if she clearly isn't aware of her own powers, and she will make a perfect apprentice regardless.
"I would not debase myself so much as to gloat, young one," he retorts. She opens her mouth to say something else but he continues before she can. "You flew well out there. You would've won if it hadn't been for your engine."
She scoffs, petulant anger shining in her eyes and the Force, and removes her chin from her palms as she straightens herself up.
"Not all of us have military money to build reliable vehicles." Her tone is scathing and just a little envious.
Vader hooks his thumbs in his belt and looks down at her.
"Indeed. How did you enter, then? There is an entry fee that doesn't seem within your budget, judging by the state of that racer you flew."
At that, her cheeks flush and she averts her eyes, opting to fiddle with a strap on her jumpsuit to avoid his gaze. The sight amuses him greatly.
"I managed," she mumbles. That isn't an answer and they both know it, but Vader lets it slide - it isn't what's important here, after all.
"How old are you, pilot? Do your parents know you're competing in semi-illegal podraces?"
The girl's face twists, her nose scrunching in a way that is so painfully familiar, it sends a dagger-like jolt through his heart. He looks at her, really looks , and he can't help but note the similarities between this girl and his precious Padmé - the shape of her lips and chin, the slender fingers still fiddling with that strap, her diminutive build, the shape of her eyes. Judging by the variations in the red tint his mask paints the world in, the girl's eyes and hair are a light colour, and he would bet one of his mechanical limbs that those colours are blue and blonde.
"I'm 19, I don't need anyone's permission to do anything," she answers hotly, before she becomes subdued with her next sentence. "Besides, I don't have parents to care what I do, anyway. Just an aunt and uncle too far away to intervene."
This isn't quite the confirmation he needs, but the Force is trembling with the anticipation of a major truth revealed and Vader knows, before he even opens his mouth to interrogate her further, that he's right.
"Is that so? What's your name, pilot?"
"Skywalker. Lukka Skywalker, but everyone calls me Luke."
Luke. Lukka.
Vader hears the name and suddenly he's transported nearly 20 years in the past, to a breezy summer evening nestled in bed with his angel, five months pregnant, discussing baby names. He'd been convinced they were going to have a daughter but Padmé swore up and down her child would be a boy.
"His name will be Luke. Like the person from that legend you told me about, Ani. Lukka sounds too feminine and kids might pick on him if we name him that, you know how narrow-minded Coruscanti people are."
"I love you, angel, but no. She will be a girl and we'll name her Leia."
Well, they were both wrong, it seems. Lukka, Luke , is definitely not a boy but she isn't a Leia either. She is perfect, though, as beautiful as her mother and so spirited, so strong in the Force even without any training, and so talented behind a wheel. This is his daughter, of that he has no doubt, and the Force chimes softly in his ear, confirming it.
"Tell me, Luke, how would you like piloting something better than a beat up podracer made from scraps?" Vader asks, a plan already forming in his head, and Luke's head shoots up to gaze at him in shock, eyes wide and lips stretched into a surprised 'o'.
Later, Vader will thank his lucky stars that he decided to kill off his boredom while planetside by entering himself last minute into a podrace. Later, he will wonder if it hadn't been the will of the Force guiding him towards this particular race. Later, he will think about how Luke survived childbirth after all, how Padmé must've lived long enough to name their child, and how his Master blatantly lied to and manipulated him in order to keep him shackled to the Dark Side, grovelling at his feet like a lap dog for nearly two decades. Later, Darth Vader will decide that the Emperor has ruled the galaxy for long enough and that it is time for someone else to take his place. Someone better, purer, more competent. Someone like his daughter.
But that will be later. Right now, his focus is entirely on convincing his daughter to drop everything and join him on the Devastator without revealing their relationship. The time for revelations will come, but the hangar of a podrace stadium is hardly the place for personal conversations such as this. Besides, it isn't everyday that one finds out her dead father is not only alive, but the Emperor's Second in Command to boot. He has to be delicate in his approach. After all, he doesn't want to overwhelm his daughter by dropping a bombshell like this without proper preparation.