New Age Dawning

In case this looks familiar, I originally published the first chapter of this story in April. Due to site difficulties, I was not able to update it in its current form, so I've had to repost here. Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoy.

To eliminate confusion, phrases in brackets are thought communications. Any observations outside of brackets are a character's private observations alone. Now that that's cleared up, on to the story!


New Age Dawning, Chapter 1.


“Where am I?” Mya cried. “What are you doing with me?”

Her rage scattered the remaining technicians, who were afraid of this petite woman with golden eyes.

[Stop,] a voice in her head commanded.

Mya whirled and froze as she took in the heavily armored, masked figure blocking the exit with a gargantuan frame. Her face paled.

“Darth Vader!” she gasped. “What…how…this can’t be real.”

“Who are you?” Vader rasped, clenching his fist. Mya’s hands fluttered at her throat as her air supply was cut off.

“Mya…” she wheezed. “Hermione Gallagher…my name is Mya…”

Her legs crumpled beneath her as Vader released her. She sat down hard on the cold floor and looked up at Vader’s intimidating figure.

“Where are you from?” he asked.

“The planet Earth, my lord,” Mya gasped, greedily inhaling air into her oxygen-deprived lungs.

“ What system?”

“The Milky Way, my lord.”

“I have never heard of such a system.” He made to cut off her air again.

“If you are truly Sith, you can feel that I am not lying,” Mya said desperately.

“And how did you know I am Sith?” he said dangerously.

Mya’s eyes widened. Shit, she thought. Why oh why can’t I learn to think before I speak?

“Because, my lord, I come from a different dimension,” she said, resolved to tell the truth even if he killed her. “Stories of this universe are common there. That is how I knew your name.”

“Impossible,” Vader said.

“Respectfully, my lord, it’s the truth,” she replied.

Vader was silent for a moment, measuring the girl with his eyes.

The woman/girl was trembling now, but had clasped her hands around her khaki-clad knees. A blood-red shirt covered her from neck to wrists, setting off olive skin and dark brown hair. Her chin was raised in defiance and her startling golden eyes shone with determination and fear. Her short hair was a riot of curls, showcasing high cheekbones and a strong nose. She was beautiful.

Vader shook the thought off.

“I believe you, Hermione of Earth,” he said.

Mya stood shakily. The top of her head was even with Vader’s shoulder.

“Call me Mya, my lord,” she offered. “Everyone else does.”

Vader inclined his head in acceptance. Well, he hasn’t killed me yet, Mya thought, so here goes.

“Lord Vader,” she asked, “how did I get here?”

“The Death Star’s primary weapons systems inadvertently caused a vortex in space that closed after your vehicle appeared.”

“So I have no way of getting home?” she asked, her voice rising.

“Even if another vortex could be opened, there is very little chance it would return you to your world,” Vader said evenly.

Mya closed her eyes. Tears threatened but did not fall.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said with a derogatory laugh. “I have nothing to go back to.”

“I sense the truth in your words, young one, but I cannot read your thoughts,” Vader said.

“Truly? Why not?” Mya asked. She suddenly felt a presence in her mind, a heavy weight sliding like black velvet across her consciousness.

[Lord Vader?] she thought deliberately, attempting to reach out to him with her mind.

[You can hear me, little one?] His voice reverberated in her head.

[Yes,] she thought back. [This is wicked cool. I’ve never done this before.]

“Interesting,” Vader said aloud. “You seem to be Force-sensitive.”

“What?” Mya blurted. “But…I can’t. It’s not possible.”

“Why not?” Vader probed.

“Because I’m ordinary!” she snapped. “Plain, ordinary, average Mya Gallagher from New Orleans, Louisiana on the planet Earth. There is no way that I have access to the most powerful force in the galaxy. It’s got to be a mistake.”

“It is no mistake, youngling,” Vader said. “The fact that you can unconsciously shield your mind from me but can still reply to my voice with your mind is proof. Some Force-sensitives take years to do what you have done in the past fifteen minutes.”

Mya looked straight into Vader’s mask.

“What are you going to do with me?” she asked.

“I must inform my Master of your arrival. We are approaching Alderaan now, so you will remain on the cell block until then.”

“Your Master. The Emperor,” Mya said flatly. “Well. He’ll most likely want me dead. Palpatine doesn’t seem to care for Force adepts. You may as well kill me now.”

“Do you wish to die?” Vader inquired lightly.

The corner of her mouth quirked up in a half-smile. “Not particularly. I’m just realistic,” Mya replied softly.

“I am shielding your presence from my Master at the moment. While I will have to inform him of your presence here and that you are not in fact a figment of the Death Star administration’s imagination, I do not think it is necessary to inform him of your Force sensitivity. You were accurate in your estimation of his reaction. It would not be pleasant.”

“Lord Vader, why are you doing this? I don’t wish to sound ungrateful, but it is a risk. Why would I be important enough to take it?”

“That will need to be addressed at a later time,” Vader said. “All you need to know for now is that I find you a curiousity and you may prove useful to me.”

“Useful, my lord?” Mya asked dryly. “I like being useful. You said a moment ago that we were on a course to Alderaan. May I ask if the Princess Leia is on board?”

“How did you know that?” Vader demanded.

Mya stood calmly as his anger snaked across her skin like a whip.

“I told you that stories of this galaxy are common in my world,” she said. “Some of them talk about things that have happened in the past, like the Clone Wars, but some…I think I’m in the middle of one of those stories.”

“Meaning that you know what the future will hold,” Vader mused.

“Yes,” Mya confirmed. “The Death Star will be destroyed.”

Vader sucked in a breath audible even over the rasp of the respirator.

“Alderaan will be destroyed when Leia refuses to give up the Rebel station,” she continued. “Leia will be rescued. You will kill Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

“Obi-Wan?” Vader rasped, grasping Mya’s shoulders hard enough to bruise. “He’s coming here?”

Mya hissed as Vader’s hands squeezed her raw shoulders. He immediately let go as her pain broke over him.

“Why are you in such pain?” Vader demanded. “Let me see your injuries.”

Mya unbuttoned her shirt with hesitant fingers, revealing a black lace bra that cupped her swelling breasts. Her skin was stained with dried blood that still oozed sluggishly from welts carved into her shoulders.

The welts were layered on top of older scars. From the top of her shoulders to her waist, silvery scars glistened in the harsh med bay light. Mya slipped the shirt off completely, showing Vader her heavily scarred arms in silence. She turned around and allowed him to see the welts carved into the muscle and scar tissue of her back.

“Who did this to you.” Vader’s voice trembled with fury as he struggled to contain his rage at the thought of someone harming her. The wave of surprise at the possessiveness he felt toward her helped hi stem the tide of Dark Side power that filled him to the brim.

Mya looked at him fearless.

“I told you I had nothing to go back to, my lord,” she said quietly. “I was not exaggerating.”

Vader waited for an explanation, but one did not seem to be forthcoming. He brushed her mind, trying to prod a response. All he felt from her was pain and, underneath it, a coldness like smooth metal.

It was like a bucket of ice water. Vader knew that coldness. He had felt it many times, the iciness of despair. A decision was made in that instant. He would not press her about her past. After all, Vader knew all too well what it was to be a victim. Compassion bloomed within him for the first time in years. He let her feel its warmth and in turn, felt some of the cold melt away as tears filled Mya’s eyes.

Vader closed his own eyes against the sight. It had been years since anyone had laid bare their emotions in his presence voluntarily. I cannot heal her emotional wounds, Vader thought, but I can heal her physical ones.

“Let me clean your wounds,” Vader rasped. Mya nodded, turning her back to him. The acceptance she felt from him, the careful prodding, the compassion overwhelmed her.

He understands, Mya thought, and he won’t push me on it, at least, not unless I misbehave. I never thought Vader would be so willing to trust.

The leather of Vader’s gloves was cool on her skin as he applied a kolto pack. Mya could not hold back a sigh as blessed coolness seeped into her raw, reddened skin.

That sigh stirred emotions in Vader that he had thought long dead. His hands shook minutely as he finished tending her wounds. The silence was companionable, each lost in the contact. She, who had not been touched with gentleness for so long, and he, who had not touched without the intent to destroy in two decades.

A chime sounded, startling Vader from his reverie.

“My lord?” Mya asked.

Vader smoothed his palms over the wide bandage once more before withdrawing silently so that Mya could slip her shirt back on.

The chime sounded again.

“I am needed on the bridge,” Vader rasped.

A thought occurred to him.“Do you know where the Rebel base is located?”

Mya faced him calmly. “Yes, my lord,” she said, “but before you press me to tell you…I can only assume that you want to use me to seize the Empire for yourself. When the Death Star is destroyed, you and a handful of TIE fighters are the only survivors. Why prevent the Death Star’s destruction and leave such a powerful weapon in the hands of the Emperor?”

“Your thoughts are logical, little one,” Vader said, “but they are not sufficient. If what you say is true, I must see your memories.”

“Very well,” Mya said. She steeled herself for a moment, then opened her mind to him completely.

Vader saw the Death Star die, the TIE fighters spinning into space. He saw himself thrown from a fuel trench, retreating from the zone of destruction. Rage enveloped him as he watched the fruit of the Empire’s labor, his labor, explode into space dust because of a Rebel pilot’s lucky shot.

Everything I build is destroyed, he fumed. I can protect nothing I value. I always lose.

A need to lash out at anyone, anything, built in him to the point of pain. The dark side surged through him, putting him in control, making him the victor!

Suddenly, he registered another presence. He wasn’t just in Mya’s mind, Vader realized. She was in his mind, too.

Vader braced himself for the condemnation he was sure he would see in her mind Just like Padme… only to find acceptance and compassion. Shocked beyond belief, his rage, so overpowering just moments before, dwindled into embers at her matter-of-fact acknowledgement of it.

[I know your pain,] she thought, brushing her mind against his softly. [I share it. Living with it is the hardest thing I will ever do. Maybe everything will happen exactly as the stories say and I will change nothing. But I have to try.]

Vader abruptly turned from her memories to her emotions, unable to process the raw vulnerability in that thought and seeking to find the one insidious emotion that would prove her a liar.

In the real world, Mya gasped and swayed, not in pain, but in response to the onslaught that allowed Vader to see deep into the core of her being. Vader effortlessly caught her as he sorted through her intentions toward him with ruthless efficiency. There was fear, respect. There was compassion and understanding, and there was hope, pure and clear as the waters of Manaan. No subterfuge. No manipulation. She was telling the truth.
A smile curved Vader’s lips as he opened his eyes. Mya was in his arms, plastered to his chest with both arms wrapped around his waist. One of his arms rested gently at the small of her back and the other cradled her head, fingers slipping through her short curls.

Mya looked up at him with a face that had gone chalk-white, her eyes huge.

“Thank you,” he murmured. “That was most…enlightening.”

Mya relaxed against him for a moment, then pulled away.

“Thank you, Lord Vader,” she said, “for everything.” Even though I am afraid you will take more than I have to give.

His mind brushed hers, and she knew that he had heard.

[Never, little one,] Vader thought. [I have known you less than a standard day, but I will not destroy you. You burn brightly in the Force. I will not extinguish your gift. It is too…precious to me.]

Mya’s lips quirked as the chime sounded a third time, longer and if possible, shriller than before.

“You have to go,” Mya whispered.

“Yes,” Vader said. “You have made a point about the Rebel base. I will not ask for the location.”

Mya nodded. “May I accompany you to the bridge, my lord?” she asked. “I might prove useful.”

Her eyes glinted with mischief. Vader’s mouth twitched. “That you may, little one,” he said, letting her feel his amusement.

Vader extended his massive arm to her and Mya accepted it daintily. They swept out of the room, he in black and she in red.

The medics huddled in the hallway scattered to allow them passage. They stared in wonder at this petite woman with Vader, an angel on the arm of a demon. Awe and fear lingered in the pair’s wake, a harbinger of events to come.