The Empire Strikes Back Part 16

But this time Luke was cautious and more controlled. If he could subdue his anger, as he had finally controlled his fear, he would not be swayed.

Remember the training, Luke cautioned himself. Remember what Yoda taught! Cast out all hatred and anger and receive the Force!

Gaining control over his negative feelings, Luke began to advance, ignoring Vader's goading. He lunged at Vader and, after a quick exchange, began to force him back.

'Your hatred can give you the power to destroy me,' Vader tempted. 'Use it.'

Luke began to realize just how awesomely powerful his dark enemy was, and softly told himself, 'I will not become a slave to the dark side of the Force,' and moved cautiously toward Vader.

As Luke approached, Vader slowly moved backward in retreat. Luke lunged at him with a powerful swing. But when Vader blocked it, he lost his balance and fell into the outer rim of steaming pipes.

Luke's knees nearly buckled with the exhaustion of battling his fearsome opponent. He gathered his strength and cautiously moved to the edge and looked down. But he saw no sign of Vader. Switching off his lightsaber and hooking it into his belt, Luke lowered himself into the pit.

He dropped to the floor of the pit and found himself in a large control and maintenance room that overlooked the reactor powering the entire city. Looking around the chamber, he noticed a large window; standing silhouetted in front of it was the unmoving figure of Darth Vader.

Luke slowly moved closer to the window and reignited his lightsaber.

But Vader did not light his own sword, nor did he make any effort to defend himself as Luke drew nearer. The Dark Lord's only weapon, in fact, was his tempting voice. 'Attack,' he goaded the young Jedi. 'Destroy me.'

Confused by Vader's ploy, Luke hesitated.

'Only by taking your revenge can you save yourself..."

Luke stood locked in place. Should he act on Vader's words and thus use the Force as a tool of revenge? Or should he step away from this battle now, hoping for another chance to fight Vader when he had gained better control?

No, how could he delay the opportunity to destroy this evil being? Here was his chance, now, and he must not delay ...

There might never again be such an opportunity!

Luke grasped his deadly lightsaber in both hands, tightly gripping the smooth handle like an ancient broadsword and raising the weapon to deliver the blow that would slay this masked horror.

But before he could swing, a large piece of machinery detached itself from the wall behind him and came hurtling at his back. Turning instantly, Luke flashed his lightsaber and cut the thing in half, and the two ma.s.sive pieces crashed to the floor.

A second piece of machinery sped toward the youth, and again he used the Force to deflect it. The weighty object bounced away as if it had struck an unseen s.h.i.+eld. Then a large pipe came tumbling toward him through the air. But even as Luke repelled that enormous object, tools and pieces of machinery came flying at him from all directions. Then wires, that pulled themselves out of the walls, came twisting and sparking and whipping at him.

Bombarded on all sides, Luke did what he could to deflect the a.s.sault; but he was beginning to get bloodied and bruised in the attempt.

Another large piece of machinery glanced off Luke's body and crashed out the large window, letting in the screaming wind. Suddenly everything in the room was blown about, and the fierce wind lashed Luke's body and filled the room with a bansheelike howl.

And in the very center of the room, standing still and triumphant, was Darth Vader.

'You are beaten,' the Dark Lord of the Sith gloated. 'It is useless to resist. You will join me or you will join Obi-Wan in death!'

As Vader spoke those words, a final piece of heavy machinery soared through the air, striking the young Jedi and knocking him through the broken window. Everything became a great blur as the wind carried him, tossing and rolling, until he managed to grab hold of a beam with one hand.

When the wind subsided a bit and his vision cleared, Luke realized that he was hanging from the gantry of the reactor shaft outside the control room. When he gazed down he saw what appeared to be an endless abyss. A wave of dizziness swept over him and he squeezed his eyes closed in an effort to keep from panicking.

Compared to the podlike reactor from which he hung, Luke was no more than a speck of squirming matter, while the pod itself - just one of many jutting from the circular, light-dotted inner wall - was no more than a speck itself in comparison with the rest of the immense chamber.

Grasping the beam firmly with only one hand, Luke managed to hook his lightsaber on to his belt and then grab the beam with both hands. Hoisting himself up, he scrambled onto the gantry and stood on it, just in time to see Darth Vader walking toward him down the shaft.

As Vader approached Luke, the public address system began to blare, echoing through the cavernous rooms: 'Fugitives heading toward Platform 327. Secure all transports. All security forces on alert.'

Walking menacingly toward Luke, Vader predicted, 'Your friends will never escape and neither will you.'

Vader took another step, and Luke immediately raised his sword, ready to renew the battle.

'You are beaten,' Vader stated with horrifying certainty and finality. 'It is useless to resist.'

But Luke did resist. He lunged at the Dark Lord with a vicious blow, bringing his sizzling laser blade to crash onto Vader's armor and sear through to the flesh. Vader staggered from the blow, and it seemed to Luke that he was in pain. But only for a moment. Then, once again, Vader began to move toward him.

Taking another step, the Dark Lord warned, 'Don't let yourself be destroyed as Obi-Wan was.'

Luke was breathing hard, cold sweat dropping from his forehead. But the sound of Ben's name instilled a sudden resolve in him.

'Calm-' he reminded himself. 'Be calm.'

But the grimly cloaked specter stalked toward him along the narrow gantry, and it seemed he wanted the young Jedi's life.

Or worse, his fragile soul.

Lando, Leia, Chewbacca, and the droids hurried down a corridor. They turned a corner and saw the door to the landing platform standing open. Through it they glimpsed the Millennium Falcon waiting for their escape. But suddenly the door slammed shut. Ducking into an alcove, the group saw a squad of stormtroopers charging them, their laser guns blasting as they ran. Chunks of wall and floor shattered and flew into the air with the impact of the ricocheting energy beams.

Chewbacca growled, returning the stormtroopers' fire with savage Wookiee rage. He covered Leia, who punched desperately at the door's control panel. But the door failed to budge.

'Artoo!' Threepio called. 'The control panel. You can override the alert system.'

Threepio gestured at the panel, urging the little robot to hurry, and pointing out a computer socket on the control board.

Artoo Detoo scooted toward the control panel, beeping and whistling as he scurried to help.

Twisting his body to avoid the burning laser bolts, Lando feverishly worked to connect his corn-link to the panel's intercom.

'This is Calrissian,' he broadcast over the system. 'The Empire is taking control of the city. I advise you to leave before more Imperial troops arrive.'

He switched off the communicator. Lando knew that he had done what he could to warn his people; his job now was to get his friends safely off the planet.

Meanwhile, Artoo removed a connector cover and inserted an extended computer arm into the waiting socket. The droid issued a short beep that suddenly turned into a wild robot scream. He began to quiver, his circuits lighting up in a mad display of flas.h.i.+ng brilliance, and every orifice in his hull spewing smoke. Lando quickly pulled Artoo away from the power socket. As the droid began to cool off, he directed a few wilted beeps Threepio's way.

'Well, next time you pay more attention,' Threepio replied defensively. 'I'm not supposed to know power sockets from com puter feeds. I'm an interpreter-'Anybody else got any ideas?' Leia shouted as she stood firing at the attacking stormtroopers.

'Come on,' Lando answered over the din of the battle, 'we'll try another way.'

The wind that shrieked though the reactor shaft entirely absorbed the sounds of the clas.h.i.+ng lightsabers.

Luke moved agilely across the gantry and took refuge beneath a huge instrument panel to evade his pursuing foe. But Vader was there in an instant, his lightsaber thras.h.i.+ng down like a pulsating guillotine blade, cutting the instrument complex loose. The complex began to fall, but was abruptly caught by the wind and blown upward.

An instant of distraction was all Vader needed. As the instrument panel floated away, Luke involuntarily glanced at it. At that second, the Dark Lord's laser blade came slas.h.i.+ng down across Luke's hand, cutting it, and sending the youth's lightsaber flying.

The pain was excruciating. Luke smelled the terrible odor of his own seared flesh and squeezed his forearm beneath his armpit to try to stop the agony. He stepped backward along the gantry until he reached its extreme end, stalked all the while by the black-garbed apparition.

Abruptly, ominously, the wind subsided. And Luke realized he had nowhere else to go.

'There is no escape,' the Dark Lord of the Sith warned, looming over Luke like a black angel of death. 'Don't make me destroy you. You are strong with the Force. Now you must learn to use the dark side. Join me and together we will be more powerful than the Emperor. Come, I will complete your training and we will rule the galaxy together.'

Luke refused to give in to Vader's taunts. 'I will never join you!'

'If you only knew the power of the dark side,' Vader continued. 'Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father, did he?'

Mention of his father aroused Luke's anger. 'He told me enough!' he yelled. 'He told me you killed him.'

'No,' Vader replied calmly. 'I am your father.'

Stunned, Luke stared with disbelief at the black-clad warrior and then pulled away at this revelation. The two warriors stood staring at one another, father and son.

'No, no! That's not true ...' Luke said, refusing to believe what he had just heard. 'That's impossible.'

'Search your feelings,' Vader said, sounding like an evil version of Yoda, 'you know it to be true.'

Then Vader turned off the blade of his lightsaber and extended a steady and inviting hand.

Bewildered and horror-stricken at Vader's words, Luke shouted, 'No! No!'

Vader continued persuasively. 'Luke, you can destroy the Emperor. He has foreseen this. It is your destiny. Join me and together we can rule the galaxy as father and son. Come with me. It is the only way.'

Luke's mind whirled with those words. Everything was finally beginning to coalesce in his brain. Or was it? He wondered if Vader were telling him the truth - if the training of Yoda, the teaching of saintly old Ben, his own strivings for good and his abhorrence of evil, if everything he had fought for were no more than a lie.

He didn't want to believe Vader, tried convincing himself that it was Vader who lied to him - but somehow he could feel the truth in the Dark Lord's words. But, if Darth Vader did speak the truth, why, he wondered, had Ben Ken.o.bi lied to him? Why? His mind screamed louder than any wind the Dark Lord could ever summon against him.

The answers no longer seemed to matter.

His Father. .

With the calmness that Ben himself and Yoda, the Jedi Master, had taught him, Luke Skywalker made, perhaps, what might be his final decision of all. 'Never,' Luke shouted as he stepped out into the empty abyss beneath him. For all its unperceived depth, Luke might have been falling to another galaxy.

Darth Vader moved to the end of the gantry to, watch as Luke tumbled away. A strong wind began to blow, billowing Vader's black cloak out behind him as he stood looking over the edge.

Skywalker's body quickly plunged downward. Toppling head over foot, the wounded Jedi desperately reached out to grab at something to stop his fall.

The Dark Lord watched until he saw the youth's body sucked into a large exhaust pipe in the side of the reactor shaft. When Luke vanished, Vader quickly turned and hurried off the platform.

Luke sped through the exhaust shaft trying to grab the sides to slow his fall. But the smooth, s.h.i.+ny sides of the pipe had no hand-holes or ridges for Luke to grasp.

At last he came to the end of the tunnellike pipe, his feet striking hard against a circular grill. The grill, which opened over an apparently bottomless drop, was knocked out by the impact of Luke's momentum, and he felt his body start to slide out through the opening. Frantically clawing at the smooth interior of the pipe, Luke began to call out for a.s.sistance.

'Ben ... Ben, help me,' he pleaded desperately.

Even at he called out, he felt his fingers slip along the inside of the pipe, while his body inched ever closer to the yawning opening.

Cloud City was in chaos.

As soon as Lando Calrissian's broadcast was heard throughout the city, its residents began to panic. Some of them packed a few belongings, others just rushed out into the streets seeking escape. Soon the streets were filled with running humans and aliens, rus.h.i.+ng chaotically through the city. Imperial stormtroopers charged after the fleeing inhabitants, exchanging laser fire with them in a raging, clamorous battle.

In one of the city's central corridors, Lando, Leia, and Chewbacca held off a squad of stormtroopers by blasting heavy rounds of laser bolts at the Imperial warriors. It was urgent that Lando and the others hold their ground, for they had come upon another entrance that would lead them to the landing platform. If only Artoo succeeded in opening the door.

Artoo was trying to remove the plate from this door's control panel. But because of the noise and distraction of the laser fire blasting around him, it was difficult for the little droid to concentrate on his work. He beeped to himself as he worked, sounding a bit befuddled to Threepio.

'What are you talking about?' Threepio called to him. 'We're not interested in the hyperdrive on the Millennium Falcon. It's fixed. Just tell the computer to open the door.'

Then, as Lando, Leia, and the Wookiee edged toward the door, dodging heavy Imperial laser fire, Artoo beeped triumphantly and the door snapped open.

'Artoo, you did it!' Threepio exclaimed. The droid would have applauded had his other arm been attached. 'I never doubted you for a second.'

'Hurry,' Lando shouted, 'or we'll never make it.'

The helpful R2 unit came through once again. As the others dashed through the entrance, the stout robot sprayed out a thick fog - as dense as the clouds surrounding this world - that obscured his friends from the encroaching stormtroopers. Before the cloud had cleared, Lando and the others were racing toward Platform 327.

The stormtroopers followed, blasting at the small band of fugitives bolting toward the Millennium Falcon. Chewbacca and the robots boarded the freighter while Lando and Leia covered them with their blasters, cutting down still more of the Emperor's warriors.

When the low-pitched roar of the Falcon's engines started and then rose to an ear-battering whine, Lando and Leia discharged a few more bolts of brilliant energy. Then they sprinted up the ramp. They entered the pirate s.h.i.+p and the main hatchway closed behind them. And as the s.h.i.+p began to move, they heard a barrage of Imperial laser fire that sounded as if the entire planet were splitting apart at its foundations.

Luke could no longer slow his inexorable slide out the exhaust pipe.

He slid the final few centimeters and then dropped through the cloudy atmosphere, his body spinning and his arms flailing to grip on to something solid.

After what seemed like forever, he caught hold of an electronic weather vane that jutted out from the bowllike underside of Cloud City. Winds buffeted him and clouds swirled around him as he held on tightly to the weather vane. But his strength was beginning to fail; he didn't think he could hang like this - suspended above the gaseous surface - for very much longer.

All was very quiet in the Millennium Falcon c.o.c.kpit.

Leia, just catching her breath from their close escape, sat in Han Solo's chair. Thoughts of him rushed to her mind, but she tried not to worry about him, tried not to miss him.

Behind the princess, looking over her shoulder out the front windscreen, stood a silent and exhausted Lando Calrissian.

Slowly the s.h.i.+p began to move, picking up speed as it coursed along the landing platform.

The giant Wookiee, in his old copilot's chair, threw a series of switches that brought a dancing array of lights across the s.h.i.+p's main control panel. Pulling the throttle, Chewbacca began to guide the s.h.i.+p upward, to freedom.

Clouds rushed by the c.o.c.kpit windows and everyone finally breathed with relief as the Millennium Falcon soared into a red-orange twilight sky.

Luke managed to hook one of his legs over the electronic weather vane, which continued to support his weight. But air from the exhaust pipe rushed at him, making it difficult for him to keep from slipping off the vane.

'Ben ...' he moaned in agony.'... Ben.'

Darth Vader strode onto the empty landing platform and watched the speck that was the Millennium Falcon disappear in the far distance.

He turned to his two aides. 'Bring my s.h.i.+p in!' he commanded. And then he left, black robes flowing behind him, to prepare for his journey.

Somewhere near the supporting stalk of Cloud City, Luke spoke again. Concentrating his mind on one whom he thought cared for him and might somehow come to his aid, he called, 'Leia, hear me.' Pitifully he cried out once again. 'Leia.'