Chapter Text
“My Lord Amidala, please – your father explicitly ordered us to keep you inside until his return.” The servant hurried after Luke, trying to keep up with the irate youngster.
“Did he now? Why am I not surprised?!” The blonde crown-prince of the Galactic Empire hollered, turning to face the nameless servant with fire in his young blue eyes.
“Well, you can tell my father I am not a Yavian song-bird, to be kept in a gilded cage!” Luke turned back around, kicking open the door.
Watching the young prince run out into the vast gardens, the servant swallowed thickly before turning to contact his liege. “Oh force, Lord Vader won't be pleased. And I was so close to my retirement too.”
Luke ran and ran, the wind catching his hair as he whirled through the fragrant gardens. He'd been cooped up inside for almost two months and he just had to see the open skies again. He knew why his father did what he did – his mother's death was never forgotten in the Imperial Summer Palace in Naboo's lake country, or anywhere else for that matter. Her death at the hands of Jedi rebels was a yearly remembrance, and though Luke could not remember her at all, the celebration of her life always filled him with sorrow.
Laughing, he let himself fall upon a bed of Tassel Roses, enjoying their fragrant scent as it billowed around him. Sometimes, the garden held smells that almost made him remember his mother and today was no different. When he focussed enough, calling upon the tides of the Force that connected everything, he could almost see her face before his mind's eye.
But today, she remained distant from him. Luke wasn't sure why – she sometimes did that. For example, she never made her presence known when his father around. And when he told Vader, he had been uncharacteristically stoic. Usually, he'd be rather livid with anything displeasing, but that time had been the first time he had seen his father almost cry. And Luke had ever afterwards wondered why...
Letting his thoughts drift, Luke heard a servant nearby. Undoubtedly one of the many caretakers of the garden. His father had told him it had been designed by his mother, and its upkeep was an almost religious duty, enforced upon a small army of gardeners.
Always curious, Luke raised his head above the waist-high blooms about him, looking for the nearby servant. When he saw him, his breath almost hitched. The boy – he had to be a boy, he was a bit younger than Luke's sixteen summers undoubtedly – was busy pruning a rather wild looking Deshen bush, but the way he was pruning it attracted Luke's attention.
The brown-haired kid was waving his free left hand about the bush, eyes closed in deep thought sometimes, before choosing a branch to prune. Luke instantly perked up – he recognized the use of the Force when he saw it. And he couldn't believe it was a servant doing it! Father normally was very strict in allowing force-sensitives inside the Palace – something about possible Jedi-sentiments and rebels.
Lowering himself, using the army-training he had been thought on command of the Emperor, Luke kept himself hidden while slowly crawling towards the servant boy. He'd probably be chewed out by another servant later for dirtying his clothes and stuff, but Luke couldn't care less. This was a mystery! A real mystery! Finally, something to chase away the boring doldrums of his monotonous days.
Slowly crawling closer and closer, Luke watched the servant go about his business. After a while, he had to admit the boy knew exactly what he was doing. The bush was looking beautiful and it even began radiating a sense of gratefulness towards the tender care of the servant.
Finally, when it looked like the boy was about to move on towards the next chore, Luke sprang up, making himself known. The servant, totally unaware, shrieked and jumped almost out of his skin. When he realized who it was standing before him, he instantly bowed.
“My lord Amidala, I'm so sorry! I didn't know you were in the gardens! I wouldn't have been here if I had known!” The kid stammered, eyes closed tightly. Luke was taken aback, unsure where this fear came from. Holding up his hands, he tried to calm down the boy.
“Oh, don't worry – you're not in trouble. I just had to get out.” Lowering his hands as he saw the servant calm down a little bit, Luke looked back to the bush. “I was watching you. You have a real way with plants, don't you?” The boy didn't look up, but Luke could sense the feeling of gratitude at the praise.
“What is your name?” Luke asked, sticking out a hand to help the boy up from the ground. Hesitantly, the boy looked up and accepted the outstretched hand. “I am Ezra, my lord.” Luke looked him up and down.
“No family name?” The boy shook his head, eyes cast down.
“My family died before I could remember them, my lord. I was taken to an Empire orphanage and given an education there.” Luke nodded his head, remembering hearing about those programs.
“Ah, yeah, didn't the Emperor found them after the Clone Wars ended? I'm afraid I didn't really pay much attention to my history lessons.” Luke chuckled, shaking his head as he fondly remembered the many dull afternoons that he spent ignoring his teachers.
“Yes, he did, my lord. Growing up and being educated, my educators discovered my talent for botany and garden-care. Eventually, I was personally selected by the Emperor to work here.” Ezra confirmed, eyes still down but visibly more relaxed.
“Bit young, aren't you?” Luke asked, eyes curious now. Ezra tensed a bit.
“I am fourteen seasons old, my lord, or at least, that was the assessment of the orphanage's doctors when I was brought in. And I graduated when I was thirteen. I spent a year with my master, the Imperial Horticulturalist, until last winter, my lord.” Luke nodded, quietly impressed with those credentials.
Smirking, he threw a mischievous smile to Ezra. “So you're like me – I graduated when I was fourteen.”
Startled, Ezra looked up in shock. “My lord, we are nothing alike. You are the Imperial Crown Prince and I am just a humble servant.”
“But you're not – not really. You're the caretaker of these gardens, personally selected by my grandfather the Emperor, and thus had to be approved by my father as well.” Cocking a roguish smile, Luke then spilled his secret observation. “And you're Force-sensitive.”
Ezra looked like a Naboo Shaak caught by a predator, immediately denying the allegation. “N-No, I'm not, my lord. I am just a humble servant, I know nothing of the Force, my lord!”
Luke encroached the boy's personal space, placing his hands on the shaking shoulders. “Relax, Ezra. I just have never met someone else who was Force-sensitive but wasn't a tutor. And maybe you don't know about the Force, but you can still use it. Maybe you didn't even realize.”
Ezra, looking not quite convinced, tried to refute it again, but Luke shut him up with a hand over the mouth. “Shush.” Ezra, looking up at the smile on Luke's face, fell instantly silent. “Now, come. I'll excuse you of your chores for today – let's do something fun!” Ezra, too stunned by this whole situation, merely nodded and followed after the crown prince.
Anakin watched the interaction between the two boys play out from high above, looking down from the observation platform connected to his personal quarters. The servant who had warned him stood somewhere behind, his nerves plain to sense via the Force.
He took a few deep breaths through the mask that covered his lower face, finding that sense of calm he only ever had when he could see his son nearby him – the last palpable reminder of his love for Luke’s late mother. But it wasn’t just the selfish love for Padmé, no. It was also a selfless love for the son that Luke was to him. Luke loved him, a person that Annakin had thought could not be loved, for his crimes and for his appearance.
Yet, Luke still did. He had never hidden his crimes for his son, explained the gravity of why he had done what he’d done, why the Jedi were so dangerous as the cult they were. If anything, he only ever felt shame for being so easily swayed by the Jedi lies and propaganda that had led him to believe their seemingly innocuous cultish beliefs and behaviour. Now, however, he know better – and he would hunt down those last Jedi that still lived, root out the cult once and for all.
The Emperor, in his grand wisdom and mercy, had allowed Anakin to raise Luke, to teach the boy how to wield the Force in a way that did not ignore the role of emotions, or their power. That it made Luke a public figure showcasing the effectiveness of Imperial teachings was secondary, at least to Anakin. Taught all about military training, social etiquette, how to wield the Force, … Luke became the official crown-prince at age fourteen, when he graduated first of his class at the Imperial Academy for Youth. Anakin had no interest in ruling as the new Emperor should Palpatine come to die – he had his son, that was enough for Anakin.
Yet, publically, as Lord Vader, he was expected to follow up Emperor Palpatine as Regent, until Luke was of age. Personally, Anakin knew that Palpatine was unlikely to ever die – unless it suited one of his many plans. Anakin knew all about Project Necromancer after all – he wasn’t surprised that Palpatine would continue his research into functional immortality via Force-sensitive clones. The experiments on Kamino, after all, had bourne fruit already in that regard, even if it happened merely in one of the Jango fett clone batches. What was her name again – Omega? Something like that, he didn’t really care about that, to be fair.
Watching his son and the gardener boy run through the garden, the latter in the wake of the former, he shook his head in mock exasperation. “What else could I have expected?” He whispered to himself.
“My Lord?” Ah, yes, the servant. Anakin waved him away.
“You can go. I am relieving you of duty, Manaford. Enjoy your retirement after you select a replacement from the approved list of names.”
Manaford bowed deeply, hands clasped nervously together. “Oh, thank you, my Lord, you are far too gratious.”
Anakin almost snorted. “I am not and you know it. Goodbye, Manaford.” It was a pity the man was retiring – he had done a remarkable job these past eleven years. Manaford had been the only one who had managed to handle Luke at his most rebelious, succeeding where dozens upon dozens of other servants had failed in the five years before then.
“Goodbye, Lord Vader.”
Anakin heard the door close a few seconds later, then waved one of the Imperial Guard closer to him. “Bring me all the information we have on that boy – I want to know everything. Especially his heritage – the Force sticks to the boy, more so than usually to Force-sensitive servants we employ.”
“Yes, Lord Vader. Should we inform the Emperor of the child?”
He considered the words for a few minutes. If the boy was a nobody, and his heritage showed nothing of interest, that alone would make him interesting. Force-sensitivity always had a history in families, able to be traced down through the generations. As far as Anakin knew, he was the only exception, together with Palpatine. Neither of them had families with any prior history of such sensitivity before them. How small the odds would be if this turned out to also be the case for the gardener – and how interesting that they would seem to slowly flock towards one another in that case. It would seem almost preordained…
“No, I shall inform him after I review any and all information you deliver me. Leave out nothing, no matter how small or seemingly inconsequential.”
“Yes, Lord Vader.” The Guard replied, turning to leave the room.
Keeping his gaze on the two teens for a while longer, Anakin eventually retreated from the platform into the interior of his quarters. He had barely been back from Tatooine for an hour when the servant had found him at the Palace’s entrance. He hadn’t even gotten to unpack the gifts he had brought for Luke and his droids.
Looking at C3PO and R2D2, standing by near the entrance of his quarters, unmoving, Anakin motioned them to approach.
“Good to see you return, Master Anakin. Master Luke has missed you, sir.” C3PO began, giving Anakin the usual report he always delivered whenever he had been away from home a while. His role as Palpatine’s right-hand regularly saw him visit important and distant Imperial stations for inspections and… disciplinations.
“Yes, thank you, 3PO, R2. I have some upgrades for you both, courtecy of the Imperial droid development research station on Tatooine. They’ll replace some of your older parts that can’t be manufactured anymore and increase both of your functionalities and memory circuits. Don’t think I have forgiven you from forgetting Luke’s graduation day last year.” Anakin warned C3PO with a mock glare, causing the droid to almost bluster and blush somehow.
“Oh, I am dreadfully sorry, sir, you know I am. And thank you, sir, these parts will be a heaven sent, indeed. I shall notify the Palace Engineer immediately, sir, so that he can install them post-haste.”
Anakin raised a hand, motioning C3PO to slow down and be quiet. “No need, I shall install them myself. Though I trust Marshall implicitly with any other Palace droid, I don’t trust him with you two except for the regular clean-up and oil-bath.” R2D2 chirped out a series of beeps, almost in affirmation to his words. The little droid always was a bit paranoid about anyone approaching him with a tool unless it was Anakin himself.
“Of course, sir, my apologies. Oh, it’ll be a delight to have you perform my maintenance, sir, there is truly no one else I truly trust as much as I do you, sir.” C3PO went on, slowly falling into his usual ramblings. Anakin gave an unseen smile, grateful for the protocol droid’s ease around him. It was always a welcome change to the sniffling and simpering submissive behaviour of literally everyone else he usually met. Only Troopers and Imperial Guards usually didn’t behave as such due to their training, even if the fear or awe was equally as obvious via the Force when he felt it.