Work Text:
“In here,” Luke hissed and shoved the new kid - Dev - towards a cramped opening between two oversized tree roots.
“What?” Dev looked at him like he was crazy (and maybe he was), but there was no mistaking the chill that was beginning to wrap around his spine.
“Just trust me, alright?” Luke glanced behind him. The chill was deepening, but it wasn’t on top of him yet. “Please?”
“Ok,” Dev said skeptically as he began to shove himself between the roots. “But when I told you I wanted to do something more exciting than flying patrols, this wasn’t what I meant.”
“It never is,” Luke muttered and shimmied in after him. Under the tree, hidden amongst the roots, was a hollow in the earth where they could hide. It would keep them out of sight of the stormtroopers that Luke could sense patrolling the foothills near their drop ship, which would hopefully buy them enough time to make a run for it. If not, he was going to have to come up with a plan for dealing with the darkness that was wrapping around his presence like wings around a bird.
“Hey,” Dev whispered from next to him. Fortunately for both of them, he was almost as slight as Luke was - the hollow they were crouching in wasn’t really big enough for two people. “What’s going on?”
“There are troop patrols heading our way,” Luke whispered back. “Vader's with them.”
All of the blood ran out of Dev’s face. “Vader?” he echoed. “Are you sure?”
Luke nodded tightly. “I can sense when he’s near. He can do the same for me.”
“That sounds bad!” Dev exclaimed. He was young - younger than Luke had been when he joined up. Luke was the older one here, the squad commander, the almost-Jedi, and the one Vader was searching for. Dev was his responsibility, and his first priority needed to be keeping him calm and safe.
“It’s not great, but sensing each other doesn’t work like a homing beacon. He won’t be able to find us, as long as we stay out of sight.”
To be honest, Luke wasn’t sure if maybe Vader could pinpoint his location like a homing beacon. But best not to tell Dev that if he didn’t have to.
“What about the drop ship? How do we get back?”
“We’re between them and the ship right now. I’m going to cause a distraction, and when I give the word you start running for the ship and don’t look back. If you get there and I’m not behind you, take off without me. Understood?”
“But--”
“Dev, that’s an order,” Luke said calmly.
Dev shut his mouth, his cheeks flushed. “Understood, sir.”
They crouched under the tree in silence, Luke shielding as tightly as he could without wholly cutting himself off from the Force. He didn’t want to lead Vader right to them, but still needed a fairly accurate sense of where the stormtroopers were. He didn’t think he had the control he needed to pull this off if they weren’t relatively close.
“Almost,” he said distantly.
Dev looked at him, fear coloring his gaze.
Luke closed his eyes, reached out with the Force, and did several things at once. A trooper in the middle of the patrol found his feet out from under him, crashing to the ground as his blaster flew away into the trees. Nearby, a dry tree cracked and tumbled to the floor. A pack of rodents sleeping in the rocks amongst the troopers’ feet woke suddenly and swarmed around them.
Luke opened his eyes, gasped, “now,” and then--
“Skywalker.”
Vader’s voice thundered inside and outside of him and Luke bit down on his lip to keep from crying out. Dev was nearly through the tree roots; Luke grabbed his shirt and hauled him back down.
“He’s closer than I thought,” Luke exclaimed breathlessly. “I’m sorry, I messed up.”
“You messed up?!”
“He must have been shielding too, I didn’t realize, kriff, I’m so--”
Stay calm, Luke. Keep Dev calm.
“It’s ok,” he said and took a deep breath, trying to ignore his heart pounding in his ears. “It’s going to be ok.”
“That’s what you said before!” Dev looked fully panicked now. “I’ve seen what Vader can do and I don’t want--” He took a deep shaking breath. “Luke, I don’t--”
“Hey,” Luke said softly and took Dev’s arm. “I’ve seen what he can do too. I know. Believe me, I know. But don’t let your fear control you. It won’t help. All it can do is hold you back.”
Dev nodded, still trembling. “Ok,” he whispered. “Ok. So what--”
“Luke. I know you are near and I know you are not alone.”
Dev jerked his arm out of Luke’s grip and stared at him, something accusatory beginning to color his gaze.
“Surrender now and your companions will be allowed to leave. If I am forced to find you, I will kill each of them in front of you.”
“He’s bluffing,” Luke whispered immediately, even though he knew that to be a lie. “He won’t find us. Don’t panic, we can still figure this out.”
But Dev was panicking. Luke could see it in his eyes, in the shake of his hands, in the pulse of the veins in his neck. Before he could decide how to calm him down, Dev’s head and shoulders were through the tree roots and he was shouting.
Here, he’s in here! Don’t shoot, he’s in here!
Luke fell back into the dirt, stunned. However he had expected this to end, it hadn’t been like this - sold out by a squadmate who was too afraid for his own life to trust him. And Luke knew Dev was young and scared, but kriff, he was young and scared too!
He wasn’t ready for this. Not yet.
Dev’s dangling legs disappeared abruptly. Before Luke could gather the courage to climb out after him (for what choice did he have now, cornered, with Dev in custody), the tree above him was ripped from the ground and flew away. Luke held back a yelp, but his eyes went wide at the sheer power it took for Vader to do that - and how utterly unnecessary it was, too.
With the tree gone, Luke straightened to his full height (such as it was). Vader stood at the edge of the hollow, towering over him.
“Come out. Now.”
Luke grimaced and climbed up the side of the hollow, now mostly loose dirt and torn tree roots. Without any of the larger roots left to support him, he ended up with dirt all over him - which was humiliating, and probably served Vader’s interests just fine.
He was barely back on solid ground, hadn’t even straightened to brush the dirt off his hands and knees, when Vader grabbed his arm in a durasteel grip. Luke gasped, his fear momentarily taking control, and tried to pull his arm free. Vader twisted him around by the shoulder, pinning his arm against his back until his wrists were bound behind him.
Even then, Vader did not let go of his arm. The dark wings of his presence folded around Luke’s, choking him with cold and fear, and he began to shiver uncontrollably. Vader’s grip on his arm tightened and he set off, dragging Luke behind him on legs that would barely move.
“Wait!” Dev cried. “You said you would let me go!”
It brought Luke back to himself, even as a part of him hated that Dev had done this to him. All he’d needed was a little patience; he would have eventually surrendered, had it been clear that there was no other choice. To be betrayed by an ally instead of making that choice for himself stung, but all he could do now was make sure that whatever happened to him was worth it.
Dev had to go free.
“You did say that,” Luke said, jerking on his arm to stop Vader and hoping that whatever miniscule consideration Vader might be willing to show him would extend to Dev as well. “Please, let him go.”
Vader looked from him to Dev and back. Luke took a chance and said, softly, “Father, please.”
Not softly enough, though, because Dev heard him. Neither Luke nor Vader missed his sharp gasp and the horror and betrayal that emanated from him. Vader turned to him deliberately and a knife-edge of terror sliced into Luke.
“I said his companions would go free if he surrendered,” Vader said, “which, thanks to you, he did not.”
“I would have!” Luke cried. “I just didn’t have enough time!”
“Because he betrayed you,” Vader said. His voice was calm, cold, and Luke’s terror increased tenfold.
“Please, no,” he begged and started for Dev. But Vader squeezed his upper arm until he saw stars and fell back, gasping, against Vader’s side. At the same time, Vader’s left hand came up and closed into a fist, and Dev began to gasp silently, uselessly for breath.
In one last-ditch effort, Luke reached out desperately into the Force, trying to insert his will between Vader and Dev, pull Vader away from Dev, anything. For a moment he felt Vader’s grip falter and tried to push forward with even more power, but Vader’s presence slammed into him like a fist and he landed face-first in the dirt.
Dev’s body landed beside him a moment later.
Luke turned away so he didn’t have to see the look of betrayal fading from Dev’s unseeing eyes and didn’t bother to hold back the tears running hot through the dirt on his face.
Vader grabbed his arm and waist and pulled him up to his feet. Luke didn’t bother to hide his grief. It wasn’t like Vader hadn’t seen him at his lowest, thoroughly shattered point already.
“I told him not to worry,” Luke finally managed. “I told him everything would be fine.”
Vader reached up and wiped the tears from Luke’s cheek with a soft swipe of his thumb, warm leather against overheated skin, and Luke gasped.
“Do not make promises you cannot keep, my son,” he said, then took him by the shoulder and led him away.