Strike the Past

Chapter 1 - Vader

Author's Note: This is a gift for Superstary56 on ao3. :)

To Superstary56: I know Padme and Rex were supposed to be around, but they didn't really fit into the plot I came up with. Hopefully, you'll still enjoy it as much as I did. :D 

PS. We'll be updating weekly. ^-^

~ Tirana Sorki

The feeling of wrongness in the Force permeates the air everywhere here, but what strikes Darth Vader most is how familiar it is. He felt this feeling once, only years ago.

A lifetime ago. It hadn't truly been him who felt this. It was Anakin.

He knows what this disturbance in the Force is, and he knows what it means. But it doesn't make any sense. They killed Abeloth during the Clone Wars. It had been shortly after Mortis when she broke out of wherever she was, freed after the death of the Ones. But they had stopped her.

So, why does he sense her now somewhere close?

The planet houses an Imperial facility, and people have been dying everywhere at random, until almost the entire base was obliterated. Vader was in the area, and Sidious sent him to investigate the cause.

The Dark Side burns through him, eagerly lapping up his constant pain and anger and hatred – he no longer thinks he's capable of feeling anything else. He doesn't need to feel anything else, to be a Sith. (So why does he still want to?) He crosses the ground swiftly, towards where he can feel it strongest, drawing the Force to him. He always has to move fast – or he'll never want to keep moving again. If he stops, or starts walking too fast, there's a very high risk he'll offset his balance and snap his leg off.

It's only been two years since... everything happened, and he's still adjusting to being like this – this thing. If that's even possible.

(He doesn't actually know what he looks like. Doesn't want to. But he knows he looks like the monster he is.)

The Force suddenly surges, and a creature starts rising out of the ground in front of him. She's squid-like and creamed colored, with long tentacles extending from her body instead of limbs and hair.

Her presence screams with wrongness in the Force, the same way it did a lifetime ago. It feels as though he's in a time loop, reliving something that's bringing back his past when he least wants it.

(Especially when this time, he's here to face it alone. Last time –) But before, he never had the Dark Side as his ally.

"You," Abeloth hisses, swinging a tentacle for him, and he activates his lightsaber in a flash, slashing at it. Drawing the Force to him, he hurls her back. She skids across the ground... at least a short distance.

The Force whips around her violently, crashing into him, throwing him back before he can stop it. He hits the ground painfully, instantly trying to clammer back to his feet, but it's nearly painful enough to make him stop breathing entirely – not that that would be his choice, but it's taking a moment too long.

"You were gone," Vader intones, as he drags himself back to his feet, sensing more than seeing her advance. (His eyes don't work the way they used to, anymore.)

"I was," she agrees, voice coming out more as a hiss, "And now I am not. The galaxy will burn for what they have done to me, and this time, you will not stop me."

Vader draws the Force to him again, ready to lunge forwards, except she tries to throw him again. He instantly delves into the Force to block it, deeper than he's done in a long time – and now, he doesn't have to worry about his heart stopping from the strain of it, not that he would care if it did. He can feel her fighting back against it, and for all that he may be more powerful in the Force, she's still unquestionably more skilled. She's had millennia to learn, after all.