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| The Destination by Jedi Gepper |
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The Imperial shuttle was rapidly approaching the Executor. It was approaching far too quickly for Captain Lorth Needa's liking. He knew, truly knew that he had no choice but to apologize to Lord Vader and receive his punishment, most likely a death-inducing sort of one. He had come to the realization that this was his only alternative. Or was it really?
The shuttle pilot, a lowly and oblivious young ensign, was on the approach vector to the Super Star Destroyer where Needa expected destiny to meet him harshly. They would arrive within the next few minutes. Needa's heart beat in an unnaturally loud manner, at least in his own mind. If the ensign were to hear it, the captain would be most embarrassed.
The ensign. He was the only one who stood in the way of Needa possibly saving himself. Captain Needa had already mulled over in his mind the possibility of killing this young man, but it had seemed distasteful and, worse yet, probably futile. Vader would still find him. He always found whatever he wanted, especially if what he wanted was to punish or exact revenge.
Still, there had to be another option, a way to save himself without murder. The answer struck Needa so violently that he nearly uttered a comment on it. Instead, he took in his breath sharply, rose from his seat, and headed to the cockpit of the shuttle.
As he entered the cockpit, the ensign spoke.
"ETA of five minutes, sir. We will be there in no time."
"Yes, of course, thank you ensign." Needa fumbled his way into the seat next to the pilot who looked at him quizzically but without concern. The captain of a Star Destroyer, after all, was free to sit wherever he liked.
Without warning, Needa reached towards the ensign and unholstered the pilot's small sidearm blaster. He aimed it at the ensign with both hands. He need not have held the blaster so tightly since the ensign was in too much of a shock to do more than stare blankly at him.
"Listen to me, ensign," Needa began, hardly believing himself to be doing this, "I do not want to hurt you, but I cannot go aboard that ship. It would be in the best interest of both of us for you to turn this shuttle around quickly and take us to the nearest star system."
The ensign recovered enough to respond. "But sir," he said, "Isn't that Lord Vader's ship? If we do not dock as planned, he will come after us, won't he?"
"He may," Needa consented, more aware than the ensign of how serious that implication really was, "but that is not your concern now. We must turn around and leave as quickly as possible. Once we're in another system, you are free to return to the Empire and take your chances with it. I must leave it."
The pilot shook his head slightly and muttered, "I don't know…"
"What you know does not matter! What you think or want does not matter!" Needa exploded hysterically, the blaster shaking in his grip. "What matters is that you reverse the course of this shuttle and get us out of here now!"
The pilot finally realized that this was not the time to ruminate on his dilemma but rather to act before the seemingly unbalanced captain did something regrettable to him. He did indeed reverse the course of the shuttle.
"Where did you want us to go, Captain?"
"I don't know," Needa admitted, brooding to himself. "Just find a habitable system and take us to it. You're the pilot here, after all."
"Aye, sir. Setting a course."
The shuttle made another slight turn, and soon the starlines melted into one as the entered hyperspace. Needa had escaped Vader, but somehow he could still feel his pull. The captain assumed that with distance and the Rebellion, Vader could find far more interesting targets for his wrath. Time would tell. In the meantime, Needa was just happy to be moving farther away from what he now saw clearly as his own execution.
Captain Needa woke up to another peaceful day in Cloud City. The floating fortress on Bespin had become his haven, and Needa had absolutely no reason to complain. When the ensign had brought them here quite some time ago, Needa suspected he would find himself very unhappy. He was used to the sterile cold of star ships, not the bright and open nature of a city like this. It did not take long, however, to develop a fondness for the place. The ensign had long since gone his own way. Whether he had Rejoined the Empire or been captured trying to escape it mattered little to Needa. The captain had survived, and that emboldened him.
Needa had found work on the floating city as a manager of sorts for tibanna gas mining. His natural leadership abilities and command skills leant themselves well to his new profession. True, the worst he could do to anyone now was fire them, but he found that he actually preferred that to making threats of death or incarceration. His employees actually seemed to like him, and he liked them. It was almost more than he could have hoped to have. To be sure, he had been the captain of one of the most imposing ships in the Imperial Navy, but this actually suited him better. He still had authority, but he did not have the fear of reprisal, the ever-present sense that any mistake could cost him his life. This was truly the way to live!
To his own shock, Needa even found that women found him attractive. He had seen so few women as an Imperial Captain, and he certainly had no skills in talking with them. There was one lady who worked near his main office selling exotic drinks to visiting business travelers. She was always quick to smile at him and offered him more than one drink free of charge. Had Needa been more experienced with women, he may have seen the signs of her attraction to him. Hopelessly clueless as he was, however, it took him days upon days to figure it out. The two talked about meeting up outside of work hours some time, but as of yet nothing had come of it.
Had he been clever he would have thought to ask the city's administrator Lando Calrissian. That man seemed to have no trouble gathering ladies around him, and he enjoyed every minute of it from appearances. In quiet moments, Needa realized that he envied him.
For all intents and purposes, life could not have been better for Lorth Needa. He had a good job with potential, he was making friends, and he was respected more out of accomplishment than intimidation. Best of all, the shadow of Imperial authority no longer fell on him here. He had escaped, and life was good.
While meandering the many hallways of Cloud City one day, the now very civilian Lorth Needa noted that Lando Calrissian did not seem his usual laid back self. He paced the city now, looking around him cautiously and not exuding the cool that men respected and woman gossiped about. Needa, being as carefree as he was now, noticed it but did not let it concern him.
The next day brought Needa more reason to pay attention. He was approaching his office for work in the morning when he heard the steady clicking of boots behind him. Such sounds were not new to him and he tried to brush it off. It nettled him, though; that it sounded like several sets of boots all clicking in unison…marching in unison, actually.
Despite his sense that what he was about to do would provide him with no pleasure, he turned around to glance at the noise. Sure enough, confirming his worst suspicion, he saw a group of six stormtroopers marching down the hall behind him, blasters in hand.
A strong urge to panic and run came over poor Needa, but he held it in check. With as much composure as he could muster, he punched in the access code to the door of his office, and entered casually as if he saw stormtroopers strolling the hallways every morning.
The next couple of days were a constant source of terror to Lorth Needa. The rumors were running quietly but rampantly throughout the city about the possible presence of stormtroopers there, but very few people had actually seen them. The administrator, Calrissian, was tied up with some visitors apparently and had made no comment on the possible Imperial presence. Soon, the new rumor ran that Darth Vader himself was in the city and that he had arrived there to capture some Rebels.
Needa refused to leave his apartment in the city. He sat nervously staring into the wall for large portions of the day. The rest of his time he spent in watching the skies for Imperial shuttles or TIE fighters. It was a mistake. He was going to be caught. The story about there being any Rebels there was nonsense. Needa knew they were after him. It did not occur to him that, had they really been searching for him, his apartment would have been one of the first places they checked. He was too flustered with theories on his inevitable capture to think through anything else.
At one point as Needa stared out of his window, he saw a lone X-wing fighter soar through the city. How strange, he thought, for it to be there, especially with an Imperial presence in the city. That pilot must be suicidal, Needa decided.
As he sat quietly nursing his nerves some time later, Needa jumped at the public address system outside blaring. It was Lando Calrissian announcing that, yes; perhaps it was a good idea for everyone to leave the city before more Imperial troops arrived. The agony of it all was driving Needa crazy. Why had they not found him yet?
It was then, finally, that Needa decided that Lord Vader and his minions were not after him at all. Surely he would be in custody, or more probably dead, had the troops been in the city this long in search of him. He watched more contentedly out of his window at the mad scramble of people. Being aware of Imperial procedure, he knew that it was unlikely that Vader would leave that many troops around. Since no one was really looking for the wayward captain, Needa was sure he could get out of the system fairly easily if he just gave things a few days to calm down. Everything would be fine, just fine.
When the streets appeared empty again, an insanely unwarranted sense of calm came over Needa. He felt invincible. Once again he had managed to avoid Darth Vader's grip. How many men had lived to say that? He decided that after his long held seclusion in his apartment, it was time to take a walk. He had no particular reason. No shops or other establishments would probably be open right now by Imperial decree. Still, he needed to get out and breathe again.
He strolled through the deserted city, marveling at the ability of an Imperial presence to shut everything down. He congratulated himself at so successfully getting out of the Empire. Who knows? Needa thought he might even decide to stay in Cloud City after the Empire got out in a bit. After all, his job was going well, and there was that girl who gave him the drinks…
As Needa ran through these idle musings, he turned a corner in the grand hallway. As he did so, his eyes widened to the point where they strained his face. Walking straight towards him at the head of several troopers was Lord Vader. He heard Vader say, "Bring my shuttle." He knew the Dark Lord was getting closer and closer to him. Needa did not even think for several moments to just step aside. His mind raced over the possibilities. Begging on his knees was out of the question, but the idea did not pass without some consideration on his part. Turning and running was another option, but Needa saw the futility of that. Finally, he just stepped aside as casually as he could. Darth Vader strode by him without even a turn of his head towards the man now quaking against the wall.
Moments passed in which Lorth Needa was not sure he was still conscious or in reality. The flowing black cape billowed as it continued down the hall. Needa stared uncomprehendingly. Finally, he released the breath that was screaming to leave his lungs. He slid down the wall and held his head in his hands. He had done it. He had once again escaped Darth Vader. Fortune, or the Force or whatever, was smiling on him.
He laughed lightly to himself. Needa rose back to his feet, physically shook himself to relieve what was left of his stress, and proceeded to continue his walk heading in the opposite direction of the receding steps of Lord Vader.
Five steps into it; Needa was seized by a feeling of dread unlike any he had ever known. The steps of Vader as he had strode down the hall had stopped. Instead, Needa heard them approaching. Now he wanted to consider that running option, but he could do nothing but hold firmly in place. The steps reached to within a few paces behind him. The steady mechanical breathing was as ominously obvious as anything Needa could imagine. He forced himself, or was somehow forced, to turn around and face the Dark Lord. The two stood silently for several moments. Vader finally spoke.
"You are fortunate, Captain Needa, that I have little time to deal with you now."
The former captain, who would not correct Vader on that particular point, could only stare in terror at the black mask. The regulated breathing continued in his ears, but Needa felt only the throbbing of his own heart.
"An apology was in order, captain, and I have not received it."
"I…I…I am sorry, my Lord."
"You should be sorry for so many reasons, captain."
The pause seemed endless, but it lasted only seconds. Needa, seeing very little in the way of options now, chose to take his chances with speaking again.
"My Lord, I thought I could…"
"Do not compound your stupidity by attempting a lie or a rationalization with me, captain."
Needa stopped dead. There was nothing he could say, he realized now. He could only wait.
"Yours were mistakes of cowardice, captain, and there is little I despise more than that. There is no time now, however, to punish you as you truly deserve." With that, Vader whirled on Needa and continued the way he had been going, his black cape again billowing as Needa had seen earlier.
The blank stare returned to Needa's face. He let his breath go. He had lived. More accurately, he had survived again. As Vader approached his group, Needa watched him go with a vision in his head of a long life ahead of him. The vision, however, did not jibe with the strange scratchiness he was suddenly feeling in his throat.
Suddenly, Lorth Needa realized that he could not breathe. He really could not. He reached for his throat, looking down towards it as if he could see the problem. As he looks back up, he saw Vader at the end of the hallway standing completely still, watching the stricken captain. The Dark Lord spoke loudly and firmly.
"Apology accepted, Captain Needa." With that, he turned and disappeared from sight down another hallway.
Lorth Needa collapsed to his knees and then fell to his back. His sight was blacking out on him now and stars were appearing. They were not like the stars he had once seen on the bridge of the Avenger. No, he would never see those stars again. He would never see his tidy office in the city or the nice girl giving him free beverages and an occasional toss of her hair. Needa realized now that his mistake was in ever thinking for even one insane moment that he could escape Darth Vader or, in a larger sense, escape Fate. He had been born to fail. He could have stayed in his apartment and never run into another Imperial in his whole life had he been smart. Instead, he had to take that walk. He had to revel in his own brilliance. He sickened himself at the thought. It was a horrible thing to die so disappointed in one's self, but so it would be for Lorth Needa. As his last breaths tried to escape and no new ones would enter, the Captain stared wide-eyed into the bright white ceiling. The twinkling stars in his eyes went completely to black, and Needa's last thought was how terribly, terribly sad it was that he had not just let himself die on the Executor as he was meant to do. He could have saved himself some stress.
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