She wasn’t pretty- not in the usual way. Not in her usual way either- she was too young, yet others’ choices (she told me so, once) had made her look older. And, of course, there was in her a painful tinge, something shadowed behind the dirty outline of her mouth, thinned yet not contorted, as she tried to look as normal as she could. As if she was too sore inside and outside, too tired to keep on a perfect mask but too strong-willed to be completely beaten by the Dark Lord’s successes- trying to look like a chess player who had occasionally found a worth opponent and lost a match rather than like a prisoner riskily held on balance between death and carried on torment.

She was-

”Admiral Piett, as you must know my daughter is now on board. Not as a prisoner, but as an apprentice of mine.” The girl shuddered. Daughter? I knew she was but the daughter of a traitor, a honourable opponent herself this far, but still one of those rebels still menacing from inside the security of our country. She held her eyes firmly on her father’s face, the unintentional nervous baring of her teeth on the now full bottom lip fast enough to be barely registered by my eyes. “However, I want you to know that she’s still not allowed in some part of this ship, such as hangars or service room, let’s say, trash compactors.” She blushed. I nodded. Somehow, I think he looked at me for quite some time through that mask of his. My men were silent behind me, and in this silence the couple swiftly left the room.

”Of course, Lord Vader’s words were meant to be heard by you all. No transgression to his orders. You know the penalty.” I smiled nervously- we still remembered Ozzel’s outcome. “I suppose it’s clear enough…”

She was pretty- pretty in a girlish way, with some moves of the woman that she could be in years far in her life. She turned to look at the camera- she was what- eighteen, something around that strange age when human beings lose the shine of childhood to touch more firmly the security of a grown man or woman. She spoke once in the silence of the registration, her lips moving soundlessly. A fragment, a pretty little thing to remember her- probably forever, surely without any chance of seeing her again. But I did remember her voice, during that night on Coruscant- the first time I ever had set foot on the capital, shocking enough for a son of the Outer Rim plain looking life. She has been fascinating (she was striking) for me then. And of course I was in awe at her casual chatting me through politics to anything of her fancy those days, so offensively in awe that I didn’t even noticed the slight propositions for something more, maybe just some kind of closer touch between the two of us, until the day after, when I thought a second, sober time about everything that happened that single night- nothing, if you want, but she has been mine for the first time then, without anybody knowing, not even the two of us. Because that night I fell in love with a woman, set my soul on her target and never, in any way that I know, really changed what I wanted.

Her.

disclaimer: I don’t own Leia, Piett or Lord Vader. Or Coruscant- or Ozzel (as somebody said. yippee!). George Lucas’ property- no money out of this.