The Republic has fallen.
In the final days of the Clone Wars, Chancellor Palpatine died under mysterious circumstances. With the Senate struggling to retain a sense of unity, it was the perfect time for the Separatists to strike. And strike they did...
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Stars, but it felt good to ditch that Force-forsaken suit.
The Emperor would be displeased when he heard of this, no doubt, but Vader wouldn't preoccupy himself with that now. In the streamlined life support module he'd left back on Coruscant, he might've managed it, but Vader was not a small man. The armor on his fortified suit made his shoulders even broader than they already were; waring that, there was no way he'd be able to squeeze into this crawlspace.
He paused halfway through unscrewing the dull grey access panel before him, stuffing the tiny screwdriver he'd been using between his teeth to rake his hair off his face. Those damned med droids had cropped it too close after his last head injury a few months ago, and now it was too short to tie back in a pinch when he needed his vision clear for detail work.
He growled through his teeth and took a few hasty breaths, frustration getting the better of him. A sudden, jarring stutter in his diaphragm reminded him of the inescapable truth that had dominated his life for the last year: going without the suit or the module had consequences.
The inevitable first flash of panic hit him harder than usual, this time, and as Vader spat out the screwdriver he found himself scrambling for the dark side like a lifeline. Liquid courage filled his veins like magma in an instant, and he managed to force his breathing into a slower rhythm with only one more hiccup.
Full, deep breaths, and a steady heartbeat. That was the key.
Retrieving his screwdriver, Vader removed the panel and set it aside. Eight slender data chips gleamed up at him from their ports, but Vader only had eyes for the third one from the left. Sliding the screwdriver between his teeth again, he pulled a code cylinder from his breast pocket and touched it to the chip.
It buzzed after a moment, informing him the data transfer he'd been hoping to make since early this morning was complete. As quickly as he dared with the threat of another flareup looming over him, Vader replaced the panel and began shuffling backwards out of the crawlspace. His borrowed engineer's coveralls had to be hopelessly creased by now, but who would look for the Emperor's second-in-command in the bowels of the least-used comm tower on the entire Death Star?
Vader pulled himself the last of the way out of the crawlspace and dropped to the floor, wincing when his heartbeat lurched. At least this time the flareup passed like a blip on the radar, long before it could really impact Vader's mood. He was left to transfer the information he'd copied to his code cylinder onto his datapad in peace, an eager smirk touching the corners of his mouth.
Summoning the breath for anything more than a low grumble without his oxygen tank and electrical stimulators risked taxing his diaphragm, but he allowed himself the luxury of whispering, "Surely the infiltrator didn't think of this," as if it would somehow make it true.
And it would be, he expected. No slicer worth paying would leave any kind of trail back to their location unless they were in a hurry, with a very reliable escape route only a few steps away. Vader himself had honed his skills until he could slice at phenomenal speeds solely to give himself enough time to cover his tracks. But the exact date and time of the infiltration... those weren't something an average slicer or even a good one typically bothered hiding. And right now, even the smallest, most often disregarded details could tell Vader something about his opponent.
