Chapter Text
Smithers was sure that he was dreaming.
There was no other possible explanation for the trance-like state he had experienced, only to find himself in a completely different building, filled with windows that overlooked entire galaxies, but surrounded by the same people from his workplace.
Smithers was leaning against a wall in a gray, industrial-looking hallway lined with mechanical doors and shiny, metal flooring. Lights came from inside plastic patterning that decorated the halls. Everything felt strange. Not just strange; wrong.
But there he was.
Smithers took a few more moments to contemplate to himself what exactly had happened.
Eugene Fisk from Sector 7-G walked quickly past him, being sure to look away.
Maybe Smithers was in Sector 7-G, but he was definitely in some kind of alternate world.
Slowly stepping away from the wall, Smithers hesitated to move any more. But he started walking down the hallway. As he approached the first door, he peered through it.
There was the idiot Simpson alone in his office, pink donut frosting smeared all over his face as he dozed off, snoring loudly, and spinning in his chair. Instead of casual attire, Simpson was dressed in a greenish uniform that reminded Smithers of one from the army. He was stationed over a control panel, as usual, however there was some sort of different mechanism attached to it. Smithers squinted, struggling to read the tiny print of the screens in front of the imbecile.
Ship reactor neutral, Smithers read to himself.
A ship. They were on a ship!
He needed to find someone even slightly competent who he could get information out of.
Smithers turned away from the cracked-open door, spinning on his heel, and moved to the next office.
There was Lenny, at a different desk.
“Lenny-,” Smithers started.
“Hey there, Smithers! How’s the old man been treatin’ you? We never see you much around here anymore.” Lenny chuckled to himself, scratching the stubble around his mouth.
“Hello there, Lenny. Fine, I suppose.” Smithers gulped. He wasn’t sure what to do.
“No choking you to death or anything?” Smithers was beyond confused at the statement. His boss, and best friend, Mr. Burns, couldn’t choke a baby even if he tried.
Smithers was almost certain that he had tried at some point.
“Say, aren’t you supposed to be attending to Lord Vader right now or whatnot?” Lenny asked, looking towards his desktop computer and typing rapidly.
“Lord Vader?” Smithers asked, confused. Perhaps he had heard wrong.
“Sure! You know, your boss! The old Darth V!”
“Right. Of course. Darth… Vader.” Smithers was more confused than ever now. “Good talk, Lenny. Best for me to, uh, get going now.” Smithers swallowed and walked out the door, and back into the hall again.
Though the conversation with Lenny hadn’t been extremely productive, Smithers had learned something important during their chat. Instead of Mr. Burns, he now worked for a mysterious man named Lord Vader, who apparently had a reputation for choking people to death.
Smithers was unsure about what exactly he had gotten himself into.
**********
It was midday on the ship, and everyone seemed to be rushing somewhere. Men dressed in army uniforms or shiny, full-body armor flooded the halls. Smithers decided to follow the crowd of people shoving their way through the corridor.
After walking for a couple minutes, he reached a large room, seemingly a cafeteria serving chunks of a sort of mystery meat. As Smithers was about to enter a lunch line, an armed figure dressed in full white armor with black accents approached him.
“Sir.” The trooper bowed his head. “Lord Vader has requested your presence at once.”
Smithers began to sweat. He wasn’t sure what to do. “Of… course. Would you mind, uh, escorting me? I-...” Smithers prayed that the man would take that as a viable excuse.
“Yes, sir. Follow me.” The trooper began walking briskly toward a door. Smithers followed him through countless halls, trying his best to remember where to go, for his own sake. He wondered what exactly this ‘Darth Vader’ character was like. Perhaps he was as fierce and humble as his old boss, Mr. Burns. Maybe he was young and kind. Given the man’s apparent reputation, Smithers was unsure of that being the case.
Finally, he and the soldier reached a door. The trooper nodded, and began walking away.
Smithers took a breath, attempting to calm himself.
He opened the door.
**********
A large, hexagonal mechanism spun open, and inside, there was a robot.
There was a robot in front of Smithers, and it was staring right at him.
The robot had black armor, and a panel at the front with multicolored flashing buttons. It was breathing loudly.
Smithers quickly remembered that robots didn’t breathe.
“You are late, Smithers,” the robot spoke in a deep, modulated voice.
Smithers realized that the robot was Darth Vader.
“You, uh, summoned me, sir?” Smithers asked quickly, panicking.
“Yes, Smithers. Recently, with I have sensed an… unusual presence aboard my ship.” Vader hissed. “Perhaps there is something you have to inform me of?” Vader asked slowly, an ominous silence hanging between his words.
“You see, uh, sir, I just-,“
“I do not have time for your nonsensical blabbering, Smithers. Either you will speak the truth, or I can make you.” Vader growled.
He hesitated. “Sir, with all due respect, don’t think I’m supposed to be on this ship,” Smithers said slowly. “I’m where I am, and all of the people here are the same, except for you.”
Vader sat, silent. Smithers picked at his fingernails, panicked, wondering if Vader was to choke him.
“Interesting,” Darth Vader mused. “You see, Waylon, it appears you have been… switched with the Smithers from this galaxy. However, there is no other here at the moment that can take your place, despite your utter lack of experience at this job. You are one of the more… competent beings on this ship, after all. You will still be required to perform all the duties that your… other once completed. If you do not know how, you must learn.”
Smithers nodded, slowly, trying to process all of the information that had just been thrown at him.
“Sir, may I ask what exactly my role is aboard this ship?”
“You, Smithers, are my right-hand man.”
**********
After walking out of the ro- Darth Vader’s quarters, Smithers was unsure of what to think.
It seemed that his job was to assist Darth Vader in his endeavors, and Smithers had absolutely zero idea of what those could be.
The raspy, robotic breathing of the man was the only perceivable weakness about him. Otherwise, he was perfectly polished and extremely intimidating, with both the vocabulary and air of a feared diplomat.
Smithers wondered what he looked like underneath the mask. Could he take it off? Was it purely for show?
The man was much more powerful and menacing than his old boss. God, he missed Mr. Burns, getting to be in his company during Smithers’s every waking hour, regardless of his somewhat irritable demeanor. He missed the smell of the old man’s cologne, the way his dry, throaty voice spoke his name. “Smithers,” Mr. Burns would say demeaningly, “Smithers, who is that man sleeping at his desk? Release the hounds, Smithers. Help me take a bath, Smithers. Make sure he gets fired, Smithers.” Oh, the dreamy voice of a one hundred and ten year old man, how lovely it was to work for the power plant.
But now he had Vader, and he would have to live with that. Without Mr. Burns.
*********
Later in the day, Smithers was summoned into Vader’s quarters. Again.
“Listen carefully, Smithers. You are expected to attend briefings and supervise officers by my side. Twice a day, you will inject me in the shoulder with medication. You will then prepare my bacta tank for my usage, and assist me in removing my helmet and limbs.” Smithers gaped.
“Limbs, sir?” He asked quickly, his brow furrowing.
“Mechanical, Smithers. My person is well-equipped with cybernetics.”
He nodded slowly.
“Now, you fool.” Smithers nodded again, quickly, and got to work helping his boss. He took off the shiny armor that covered Vader’s right shoulder. The area of skin exposed was purplish and heavily scarred, coated with small scabs seemingly from past injections. Smithers uncapped the needle and stuck it into the man’s shoulder, slowly releasing the medication into his arm. He next took off the remained of the armor on Vader’s arms, only to reveal silver, robotic hands beneath, with crude wiring and various tubes attached. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was expecting to find as he removed his Vader’s helmet. Click. One piece of the mask unlatched. He grasped firmly, and began to pull it off gently, careful not to break any of the mechanisms inside of it. Air started hissing, leaking from the partially exposed interior of the helmet. He worked nimbly to remove the rest, and soon saw Vader’s face for the first time.
God, what had happened to the man?
Smithers’s stomach twisted. Rather than a warm-toned, human face, Smithers was met with a genuinely sickening sight.
Vader’s face was a pale grayish color, with pulsating veins visible through his near-translucent skin. He was completely hairless, with furious golden eyes and a large, scarred-over gash running vertically across his forehead. His skin was sallow and discolored, and reddish, raw burn marks were evident on some areas of his face. His undereyes housed large patches of skin that were either thin or had formed thick streaks of flesh.
By choosing to stay alive, this man endured a fate worse than death.
“You are dismissed, Smithers,” the disfigured man rasped. “My medical droid can assist with the rest of the standard procedure.”
**********
Smithers paced around outside of the room of Darth Vader. Each interaction he had with the man left him more frazzled than the last.
What in God’s name could possibly have happened to the man to leave him that scarred and burnt? The man could barely survive without a constant supply of oxygen. Yet somehow, he was apparently feared and revered among many.
Smithers began to wonder if Vader was truly powerful at all, or only attempted to make himself seem menacing without having any real strength. He seemed to be considered a dangerous man, but it was not exactly clear to Smithers how true that was.
What did Vader even do? What were all the officers onboard working for, anyways?
Smithers decided that he would have to find out himself.
*********
After finding his way back into the busier areas of the ship, Smithers decided that he would strike up a conversation with an employee, and try his best to learn about the company they were working for.
Smithers spotted a tall, quiet-looking man with pale brown hair. His head was held high, similar to the other workers, and he was well-kempt.
“Hello there,” Smithers started awkwardly, biting the inside of his cheek in embarrassment. The officer gave a slight nod. “How would you say that the company has been treating you?” Smithers asked.
“The Empire has treated me well, thank you, sir. Though I wouldn’t quite call it a ‘company’. We rule half the galaxy, after all.” The officer stifled a laugh before returning to his stoic position. Smithers shifted uncomfortably, nodding out of politeness. He then headed away from the man.
Empire? Ruling a galaxy? Smithers thought to himself, stunned. If Vader was a higher-up in this Empire of sorts, did that mean that he had power over this galaxy as well?
How powerful could one man be, really?
Smithers paced around vigorously, spending hours pondering to himself.
**********
Smithers was suddenly conscious of what had happened. The shiny, cold floor pressed against his stomach, and he struggled to get onto his feet.
He had passed out. In the corner of an Imperial hallway, he had fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion.
How long had he been asleep? Where was he?
Pushing off of the ground and dusting himself off, Smithers looked around, scanning the hall. There were few in sight, and he quickly recognized that he was standing next to the door to Lord Vader’s private quarters.
Making his way back into some of the larger corridors, Smithers noticed officers coming out of their own personal quarters and beginning to start their work around the ship. Smithers was relieved; he must’ve slept through most of the night and into the early morning time.
He wasn’t exactly hungry, and needed to know when to go to a meeting with his boss. Nothing was ever clearly explained to him, after all.
He turned toward the door, and tried to enter Vader’s quarters.
*********
The bacta tank surrounding Vader’s feeble flesh stung.
It tended to catch, somewhat, on the more scarred areas of his own debilitated body. The greenish liquid bore into his wounds, the familiar burning sensation a constant reminder of his foolish mistakes as the weak-minded Anakin Skywalker.
Vader once despised the feeling of intense pain. Perhaps it was the Jedi within him that had not been completely snuffed out.
He had learned to embrace the anguish, the pain; torment only fueled his ever-rising anger.
Though he was weak as man, with machine he was a terrifying beast; his very presence as Lord Vader caused even the fiercest of men to panic.
It brought him an immense amount of satisfaction to know that his being perpetuated a sense of terror through his galaxy.
If not from demeanor alone, his reputation as a cold-blooded killer terrified most. Rightfully so.
It was not inaccurate.
Droids inside of the bacta tank assembled Vader, slowly clicking his cybernetic limbs into place, onto the mangled stubs that were once his arms and legs, removed only by well-placed lightsaber strikes.
Vader heard the metallic sound of a door sliding open behind him.
“Sir?”
It was Smithers. Though Vader despised being so exposed and weak-looking in front of those inferior to him, Waylon Smithers was a different story. The man was almost endearingly clingy, like a Loth-cat. He was decent at his work, for what it was worth, geeky and on the verge of being handsome.
“I was wondering if I had any meetings today to attend. I can come ba-“
“Stay,” Vader commanded.
**********
“Stay,” Lord Vader instructed Smithers, his voice more metallic and threatening from inside the clear, greenish tank.
Smithers nodded, trying not to show his panic. “Yes, sir.” He watched as robotic arms inside of the chamber nimbly put Vader’s armor onto him. His legs and arms were cybernetic, and only his torso, head, and neck were the only parts of his body still somewhat intact. He was attached to a breathing device, which hissed as Vader breathed in and out. Finally, his helmet was placed onto him, and he rose from the tank, modulated breathing seemingly louder than ever.
“You will accompany me in meetings daily, and accompany me in my personal ventures. I will assign another officer to you in order to assist you in finding your way around the Executor.”
The Executor. That was the name of the ship they were aboard. Seemed about right for a galaxy-controlling Empire.
“If that’s too difficult to arrange, sir, surely I can-,“ Smithers started.
“I am the highest-ranking man aboard this ship,” Vader interrupted. “Within the Empire, I am second-in-command only to the Emperor. You will be assigned an officer.”
Smithers nodded. Despite becoming aware of Vader’s high rank, he was still unsure about the power the man possessed.
“You are required to be at the bridge at around noon. There, you will supervise the activity of officers much like yourself alongside me.”
**********