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Vader never expected things to go so bad. First, he believed Leia Organa was the problem. What an awful creature to befriend, and his son accomplished befriending in a glimpse. Then a deserted smuggler Han Solo, whose brain went missing at least ten years ago or so. When Vader worried about Luke being alone... Now hw missed that time, badly, the whole situation driving him crazy.
Given: his only child disappeared, the princess was kidnapped and their illegal buddy sneaked away from the radar, these all at the same day with a gap of three hours each. Vader saw a clear pattern, ISB remained silent after his and Bail Organa's personal requests for investigation sent. He couldn't personally interfere until he wanted to draw some attention to the presently classified information of his aid's origin. What's worst, Han Solo was the first. And the only conclusion coming to mind...
Still, the first step to take was to rummage through Luke's personal computer...
Luke Lars - Skywalker at present - had some things to tell about friendship so far.
First, be always ready to jump into a shithole right after your comrade, that's why store at least something better than an office blaster and an jammed comm.
Second, never follow the initial plan if you started screwing up first step halfway.
And, third, the last, do not think about dying young, it makes things a hundred times worse.
So, here they were, Han stuck in carbonite, Leia dressed in vulgar metal swimsuit and chained to the worm, and he... belatedly realising he was the one to get rid of. He didn't leave a message, didn't take the ship, presumably stuffed with all kind of spying devices by his overprotective parent, so there was no backup. Die on Tatooine in Jabba the Hutt's ugly shack, smelling like a dump, was never Luke's dream.
For a while they stored him in a cell, hands cuffed behind his back. The crono attached to his belt was taken with the weapon he carried. Enemies outnumbered their tiny team of two, since Han could never take a fight being... where he eventually was. Gaimorrians stood on both sides of the prison bars, their pig-like faces and small stupid eyes following every breath of the captured prey. Luke tried to work out a solution, but the more effort he mad, the worse the headache turned. Previously, just a tingle somewhere from the nape of his neck to the top of the head, just a little itchy sense, it grew into something torturously painful, pulsing in his temples with a lazy thought crossing his mind about... He didn't even finish it, closing his eyes.
The darkness surrounded the body splayed on the stone floor, some scattered angles and pits here and there bruised his skin under the coarse fabric of his beige suit. Leia bought it in the port, as she did with the helmet and big round goggles for him to hide face. In the end it just cut his chin and top lip when both lenses shattered after throwing him across the room.
Jabba was clearly going to feed the intruder to the rancor, and Luke still didn't decide if he wanted to be a girl. At least cell supposed some privacy and clothes remaining, and the company of a stinky sloth distant and undisturbing. Physically undisturbing.
Luke offered to cover the debt at least a dozen of times, and Han argued about it like a stubborn petulant child, he, in particular, was, trapped in a body of a grown-up.
"I can work it out, you know, kid, I have a reputation." This belief was going to cost three lives, put at stake, forced into gambling. And the real lucky guy already lost, the turn coming to the other two. Vader planned operations and attacks for hours, ready to pull the reasonable amount resources into it to ensure he wins. Not as a rule, but in majority of cases. He had an ability to kill people with a twitch of his finger, so he could afford a plan with a single step - termination. Luke should've remembered he had no such ace in his sleeve, and he didn't have a pair of properly working hands at the moment. Humbness preserved whatever position Luke tried taking to ease the pressure in his upper limbs. His fingers might have a slight shade of blue at this point or he started hallucinating in an unhealthy atmosphere of capture without food, water and cheerful company.
For the first - apparently, the last, too - Luke prayed. It was a disastrously strong distress signal, messy and devastated. His father might destroy the whole Galaxy instead of a Tuesday lunch so far...
"Sir, I'm afraid we're unable to pick any message at this frequency," admiral Piett tiredly sighed.
"Keep monitoring. Permanently. I'll be out to speak to Isard. Comm me, when you catch anything."
Vader didn't like how his previously firm "when" was about to turn to "when". He checked the computer, the datapad, the last notes Luke left - no trace. Case turned colder with hours running, and nothing were in the grasp and under control. World started falling apart, lacking its gravity centre. He didn't train the boy to wield the Force, even basics, though natural talent required attention and care. But as the Emperor didn't sense him, neither did Vader, his patience not just growing thin... A flicker of possibility to lose his son filled him with rage. After Padme's death he spent approximately five years hunting the remnants of Jedi down, he did it personally and killed with pleasure. There wouldn't be a brick of the Empire if Luke... He gripped the hilt of the lightsaber.
Luke is alive.
According to the temperature, it'd been a couple of days in the cell. Without water the incoming twenty-four hours of hopeless ride supposed to become quite a miserable final in the story of a boy who escaped from Tatooine to still pass away there. Headache was gone now, the sudden void in the skull. Luke didn't have spare energy to roll on the other side, so he just pushed his eyelids up with an effort too hard for such a simple motion. It hurt to watch the world, coloured with vague greyish colours and smelling so odd with... something burning. Dry eyes itched, numb arms behind his back unable to wipe the sand grains out.
Then the door lock clicked. It was so loud, a bomb blew up quieter, and Luke's ears perked up instinctively. Someone tugged him up, then shook him by the shoulders violently. Now the lack of sound turned into a ringing noise just inside his mind, forcing him to catch a shade of golden red.
"You're such a damsel-in-distress," what a well-known voice. Luke choked on water, some rolling down his chin, under the collar, cooling itchy and sticky with sweat skin. "You're no help with a broken wrist," Mara helped him to sit up against the wall, then slapped his cheeks slightly. "Stay tuned, golden boy, I'll take you out of here."
"I'm not going without Han and Leia."
"Very noble. You sound like a sarlacc shit," she pursed her lips, the attire of a dancer suiting her no less than the last one she wore in the ballroom.
"I should've known you're an agent."
"I don't work with diletants of ISB," Mara gritted, working on his handcuffs with a swing of her lightsaber.
"You're impressive. I- that's a very lucky coincidence." Luke spoke hoarsely, his throat sore with dehydration.
Mara frowned, her gaze sterning. She didn't say anything else, checked the blaster in the holster attached to her forearm and sighed. Luke knew he'd own her, and he'd own her blastedly a lot.
Fortunately, Vader didn't need to start the siege.
"So, you say, you felt him?" he asked Mara Jade, her unnaturally straight posture cutting through the air before his desk.
"Him. Or the Organa girl. Or both," she added sourly. "I don't believe a princess with her altruistic slogans could choke the Hutt just with her bare hands."
Vader, otherwise, didn't. Padme performed worse things, half of them being pregnant, so a girl stored just enough to take a life with no weapon provided. Ahsoka costed a whole garnison, and he didn't even finish her training. So, generally, women carried the menace men were unable to identify and then parry the attack coming from the most vulnerable asset. And Mara Jade, herself, presented a deadly case of a slayer, who just passed by to save the Galaxy from the inevitable end.
Vader wanted to crash something, but he... caused enough damage for today. It'll take Isard months to renovate the office and, probably, a couple of weeks for marks of his fingers to come off the neck.
"I must thank you-"
"Leave it, Organa, just take your child back to Alderaan," Vader growled, pushing Bail away with his shoulder. He wanted to see his son, now under the permanent watch of better doctors the Executioner stored abroad. It wasn't a long enough walk to put mind at rest, but quiet and deserted halls eased many things. He didn't kill anyone, at least, yet. He'd throw Han Solo later in the open space, after telling him never to talk to Luke again. Or he was going to ban Leia Organa to text to his subordinates and send messages directly to him. The trail of thought abruptly cut itself, when he caught the presence of Mara Jade leaving the medbay in a hurry.
He said Leia was bad? That was much worse.