#i have many thoughts and theseones were demanding to be heard

[eldritch-and-tired]

@misskirby  Hi! Hello! Welcome to my crib! Here today we have a ramble about What If Sidious Couldn’t Quite Fuck EVERYTHING Up- thank you for coming to my Ted Talk, and I hope it makes sense, kinda?

Okayokay SO Vaders Hell Suit was like,,,,, a hell suit. It was awful. Terrible. Painful. Probably not very effective as a medical device. And I know Sidious, being the awful, wrinkly, prune that he is, probably was super creepy and invasive over it, putting shit in, taking shit out, standing over whatever unfortunate surgeon was signed up for the Government-Mandated-But-Medically-Fucked surgery this time and muttering about weird surgical implants he wanted installed in his shiny new apprentice. Remember the kill switch?? I remember the kill switch. 

But. 

I cannot imagine that Every Single Doctor Sidious ever found for his build-a-apprentice project was terminally evil. And I also cannot imagine he used droids for every single step- as much fun as it is torturing Anakin, Darth Raisin also needs a semi-functional murder weapon, so he’s got to have, like, an entire medical team dedicated to keeping this single trainwreck of a man running. But also somehow in the most awful and painful way possible. And look, that is a lot of people to sieve through if you are looking for both A) medical competency and B) evil, so I imagine that there has got to be at the very least one or two people in this group quietly going whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck in a quiet out-of-the-way corner whenever Sidious pops back in like HEY GUYS I JUST HAD THE BEST IDEA SERIOUSLY-

Like, come on. How many people become doctors just to torture people?

And I ALSO imagine that in the very early days of the Empire, when most Important People were probably running on stims, hopes, and prayers more than actual sleep or whatever it is that sustains politicians, Sidious must have been pretty fucking busy. Maybe busy enough for a few things to slip through the gaps. 

Maybe busy enough that a newly hired intern to his assembled team of ‘Doctors in charge of Lava Boy’ might have just completely and utterly missed the memo of Do Not Actually Fix This Man, and one fine morning will see this poor, poor intern trotting into Vader's recovery room and presenting him with a folder full of pain management options and asking him which he would like to try.

Have you ever been in serious, unending pain? The kind that never goes away, just kind of simmers and simmers at vaguely manageable levels, that chips away at your energy and your willpower to do anything but lay in a puddle and cry- that’s what Vader is probably experiencing at a very uncomfortable level right now, even drugged to the nines and in and out of surgery rooms as he is. Canon Vader probably wore that suit due to a combination of No Way Out, I Deserve This, and What Do You Mean Your Boss Isn’t Supposed To Torture You? 

But this Vader is tired, sad, and alone. His wife is dead. The temple has burned. He killed children. His legs are gone, his arms are gone, he hurts everywhere and everything sucks and he is teetering on the edge of a black hole and while Sidious is very good at playing the edge of it Vader hurts. So. Bad. 

He doesn’t want to hurt. Sidious hasn’t really had time to sink as many hooks into his brain as he wanted yet, and Vader is still semi-used to those years of ‘you’re free now Anakin’ and doesn’t think twice about sending off this Intern with orders to buy him a big fuckin bag of Space Weed or whatever so he can hurt a little less.  

And like. What is Sidious gonna do about it? By the time he realizes what happened, that his plans have been derailed, this intern is already on Vader's radar. He Knows. If this intern disappears now, Vader will look for him. He can’t get rid of him. Vader is busy horking down anti-inflammatories and appetite inducers and this intern is right there next to him reading off lists of new medications to try or absent mindedly flipping through a data pad and going ‘hey that’s weird you don’t need that surgery or that or that or that and hey wanna try this other brand of prosthetic? they work a lot better, we can schedule you in for some skin grafts, let’s call in this specialist i know i worked with him back over at-’

The rest of the medical team is. Well. Terror would be an understatement. Sidious is Not Happy, but he can’t do shit to this fucking intern as long as Vader is even somewhat aware of him because that would be tipping his cards too early and sharply, and Vader isn’t quite on board with the ‘letting my master torture me for funsies’ train yet.

So Sidious sits. And he seethes. And he moves on, eventually, to other plans to control Vader now that this one has gone so off-the-rails, and meanwhile Vader is getting healthier and healthier and his mind is getting clearer and clearer without so much chronic pain and fucking hell, and one day as he gets back from yet another battlefront, horking down another cupful of pills, he thinks to himself-

wow sidious kind of sucks

And thus begins the end of the Emperor. 

(it really is amazing how much Anakin is capable of when he isn’t hamstrung by a horrible, terrible death suit, even if he is going to be a medical disaster for the rest of his days)

And look, Vader is never gonna be a Nice Guy. He is a Sith. He kills people. He chokes his coworkers and beheads people he doesn’t like, terrifies his enemies and his allies and has so little patience for bootlickers and social climbers he once gutted a socialite right in the middle of a high-society function he was ostensibly playing bodyguard for. He is grumpy and impatient and stupidly powerful and irritatingly competent and makes few friends and a great many enemies. 

But he still beheads Sidious ten years into his new Empire and ascends to the throne as his old masters body cools on the durasteel behind him. 

And this new Empire is… well. Still terrible and facist and fond of genocide. Anakin still leads by bloody example, and despite how much he hates the throne and delegates as much of the actual politicking and paperwork and etcetera off to whomever he can find, he can and will find time to forcefully input some changes. 

There is no slavery in this new Empire. Nepotism is considered a death wish. Corruption and pointless cruelty are less easily dealt with, but the worst offenders are dragged off and made very delicious and bloody examples of- Vader is a flawed man/machine, but what he can or cannot tolerate amongst his personal command tends to trickle down and get absorbed by osmosis by anyone with a lick of sense in their head. 

So now, Vader doesn’t build any kind of paradise. It’s still a tyrannical government where aspiring young senators that get drunk on too much brandy at fancy functions can and will get thrown out of windows for vomiting on the wrong pair of boots, where people are oppressed and where rebellion stews quietly in the background, but-

But. 

Vader has always been the kind of general to be, if not liked, than respected by the men he leads. You could find worse people to head an Empire, even one so great and terrible as this.