writing practice #3 (leia + vader)
“Leia,” he said.
He sounded almost plaintive.
She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see the mask, silvery at the edges in the light and too much like an expression. It would be so easy, she thought, easy to shoot him and take her revenge.
Instead she found herself stepping back, giving him enough room to stand. The respirator emitted its cool exhale, and she listened to its rise, its otherworldly ping.
Then the harsh, consistently ragged inhale. Leia heard the creak of leather, the rustle of polyester, the sound of aluminized coating folding and unfolding.
When she opened her eyes again, he towered over her. The mask was angled only partly down, like he wanted to say something but couldn’t quite bring himself to do it.
She lifted her chin, looking as straight into the eyes as she could. Shadow tinted them black, hiding the true sockets she had sometimes glimpsed as dark crescents beneath.
“Come on then,” she said.
He inclined his head to the side. She told herself he wasn’t bemused - as she most certainly wasn’t - by the lack of snap to her tone.
The mask lowered fully; she recognized the approximation of a nod. “Very well.”
Leia was glad for the return of feeling, of anger. “Don’t sound so pleased,” she said.
The blaster made its weight felt as she hoisted it with the barrel casually pointed towards his chest. She turned a grimace into a shield. “We’re behind schedule.”
He straightened - she hadn’t realized he was stooping for her benefit, someone needed to remove a good foot or so of his inches - and lifted the mask, removing all but edges and neck from her sight. A finger rose and pointed.
“There is no schedule.”
That wasn’t the point. Feeling her eyes narrow, she jerked her head in the direction of the blast doors. “Maybe we would’ve had more time if you hadn’t gotten us locked in here!”
“A minor inconvenience,” he said. The final syllable had coincided with an inhale. No amount of exposure would make that sound any less uncanny, especially when he shook a finger at her when it happened. “One that has served you well. It is only because of my distraction that you were able to throw me into a wall with the Force.”
Great.
(could’ve pulled the trigger why didn’t you)
“I thought there was a bomb,” she said, wishing she could see his mask. The key to a convincing lie was to make eye contact, and it threw her off to not have the opportunity. “Clearly I was mistaken. The important thing now is to get us out of here!”
She saw him stiffen at the same moment she realized her misstep. Her voice had come out just an edge too hysterical.
Suddenly he seemed even taller and more immovable, the air in the room thinner, the mask darkly incomprehensible.
“Your anger makes you strong,” he said.
If there was expression in his voice, Leia couldn’t hear it.
She didn’t have to. Obviously he was satisfied - his voice boomed with conviction. “Already your powers have increased.”
He stepped forward while raising his head even higher, forcing her to drop hers - there was no point in craning her neck back that far, and she needed to see how many steps he’d take into her space.
Several, apparently.
She found herself backtracking. Vader had always been mercurial, and the shift in his mood should not have been unexpected, but she’d thought they were past the intimidation tactics.
Worse, they still worked. She almost longed for those seconds before, when the atmosphere had been staticky with cautious hope. Next time she’d - just let him have it, she thought.
“This isn’t convincing me.”
The respirator seemed to respond, its mechanism silent. Then came the horrible, broken inhale, and he stepped forward once again - far too close, close enough she could smell the faint reek of decay. She looked at boots the size of her torso and down at herself and realized she was close to dropping her blaster, that her hands had broken out in a sweat. That they were shaking.
The pang of fear was what did it.
“Stop!”
Vader halted before her with ease, as though this was precisely what he’d always intended. She couldn’t help but wonder if saying the word earlier would have been effective. Curiosity warred with outrage, and she found herself looking to the mask.
Though they stood but inches apart, he couldn’t seem more distant. The mask had yet to fall from its lofty angle, leaving her with nothing she could read.
(she knew he - felt things. toppling him expecting rage, she’d found him motionless and resigned.
a little pathetic, honestly.)
“Look,” she said without thinking, only to realize she’d followed a gut instinct to be truthful. “I thought about killing you. I didn’t. Okay? I could have and I didn’t. Now that’s all I’m going to say about it, and we have things to do here, so how about we just move along and focus on our plan. All right?”
That cool exhale, soft until it snapped like air trapped in her ears.
He was too still. It made her afraid.
“All right?”
How she hated that inhale.
Then she felt it - a kind of lessening of tension in her center. The mask fell at the same time, its surface slipping through light like some thin, writhing creature.
She met the eyes, now bright with the glare of reflection. Impossible as it was to tell, he seemed to gaze back.
“As you wish.”
Leia flinched; he’d laid a hand on her shoulder. The weight wasn’t what surprised her; on the contrary, it appeared she hadn’t expected corporeality. A being composed purely of shadows and spite should dissipate when touched.
“Daughter,” he added.
He said it like a threat and a promise. She took in a sharp breath and ground her back teeth. Rejecting him now was surely out of the question, certainly until he forgot about the - near attempt at murder. He was very good at forgetting, she told herself.
Still, it took effort not to duck away and stick her blaster to his controls. “You know how I feel about that word, Anakin.”
That had been inspired, she thought.
Even as the air between them soured, Leia could enjoy the giddy rush of scoring a hit. The mask seemed to retreat under the cover of the helmet, driving all but the protruding segments into darkness, and she felt her eyes narrow with satisfaction, her lips become rippled and hard.
His hand fell off her shoulder. Then he was sweeping past her to the door.
“Truly you are my child,” he said.
His voice reminded her of deathstick ash, of that exceptionally bitter smell. She turned and saw his lightsaber ignite. Against his hunched and massive form, the red of the plasma looked monstrous. But for once, she couldn’t fault his plan - it would get them out of here.
(not your daughter)
She watched him plunge the blade into the doors and begin cutting out a circle. There was something mesmerizing about seeing impenetrable durasteel start to glow and melt, and she found herself moving closer.
Vader appeared to have been waiting for her. She felt it in the air between them, even as his mask remained still, facing forward like acknowledging her involved more pain than it was worth -
“You know how to go for the throat.”