Chapter 10: What Happened.

The day the world began to turn upside down, a great battle was unfolding. The Empire, which was in the process of re-building the Death Star, altered its construction process so the actual weapon could be made operational as soon as possible. Their manpower and resources were sucked away from other projects and injected into the second Death Star to the point of negligence; while half-completed star destroyers and other Imperial warships sat in nearly abandoned shipyards, the steel and crew originally meant for them were turned to the construction of the new super-laser. The objective of this was to lay a trap for the Rebellion: knowledge of the weapon's construction and its location would be leaked, but the order of construction would be kept secret. When the Rebel armada came to destroy the new Death Star, they would be unaware that the weapon was operational, and would attack blindly. The Rebels received the information they were meant to, and no more than that. They began amassing their forces, preparing to strike. With them were the main characters of the Star Wars films-- Han Solo, Chewbacca, Leia Organa, and Luke Skywalker. In concordance with the films, Luke Skywalker was fully aware of Darth Vader's true identity, and was also missing a hand as a result of the encounter in question. Although not mentioned in the films, Vader was also able to retrieve the lightsaber that fell from Luke's hand when it was cut off. He now kept it aboard the second Death Star, where he overlooked the weapon's construction. Meanwhile, the Emperor came aboard the Death Star as well, both to overlook the construction progress, and to act as bait for the Rebels. As they amassed their forces, they thought in destroying the superweapon that they would also kill the Emperor-- two birds with one stone, as it were.

The Death Star orbited Endor, a moon covered in forests with huge trees and occasional lakes. On Endor's surface was a shield generator that created a protective force field around the Death Star, while a legion of Imperial troops lay hidden in the brush, waiting for the Rebel strike force that would attempt to disable the shield. The Rebels did come, helped along by small endemic creatures called ewoks, and a battle began on the surface for control of the shield generator. This fight was led by Chewbacca, Han, and Leia. Meanwhile, the Rebel armada had arrived, and were engaged with the Imperial fleet guarding the Death Star. Luke Skywalker, in an attempt to meet Vader and turn him from the dark side, had turned himself in to the Imperials, and had been conveyed to the base on the forest moon, where Vader was already waiting for him. Up to this point, all events proceeded in accordance with those in the films. This is where they cease to do so.

In the film Return of the Jedi, Luke speaks briefly with Vader while on the surface of the moon, but is unable to turn him there. Vader brings Luke aboard the Death Star, before the Emperor, who tries to turn Luke to the Dark side. In the end, Luke throws his lightsaber away, and facing failure, the Emperor begins electrocuting him by shooting lightning from his hands. Vader, overcome with sudden compassion for his dying son, throws the Emperor down a reactor shaft, saving Luke, but dooming himself in the process, as stray lightning from the Emperor strikes Vader as the former falls. Vader dies shortly after, and Luke flees in an Imperial shuttle with Vader's body to the surface of Endor as the Death Star explodes, where he burns the corpse. He later sees a vision of Anakin standing with Yoda and Obi-Wan, smiling at him. None of this happened.

Something affected Vader before Luke turned himself in. At the point I read these news feeds, no one except Vader and possibly his immediate relations knew what it was, so I'll save an explanation of what exactly was going through the minds of those involved until I can describe the circumstances of the explanation I was given. However, this was known: when Luke finally met Vader, a change was already in progress. Luke was able to convince Vader to confront the Emperor with relative ease, and Vader's conversion from the dark side was swift. When they went to the Death Star to face the Emperor, they made no attempt to attack the Emperor. Rather, Vader made a simple yet effective gesture: he removed the mask which, it was rumored, he would die without, instantly dispelling such rumors. The Emperor tried to kill Vader with lightning, but the latter simply directed the blow to the blade of his lightsaber. Seeing that his attacks were futile, and likely knowing that trying to fight both Vader and Luke at once would be pointless, the Emperor shouted, "very well, Jedi-- but you'll never have the honor of destroying me!" With that, he killed himself with his own lightsaber.

Vader, to his shock, realized that as the Emperor's old apprentice and former second-in-command, he was the new Emperor. He called an immediate cease-fire between Rebel and Imperial forces. Then, for three standard days, the galaxy sat immobile, in quiet shock and anticipation.

What I've heard, although I've never tried to confirm it, is that Vader, or Anakin as he should now be called, spent these three days of stasis weeping. The media went nuts during this time, but everything else shut down-- businesses closed their doors for several days, military production stopped, spaceports were locked down and all travel and business effectively stopped. The Rebel and Imperial forces circled each other nervously, and everyone held their breaths.

Finally, the new Emperor went into action. He called the recently disbanded Imperial Senate to Coruscant, warning them that their authority was about to be fully returned. The Death Star was gradually dismantled, the Rebellion was released from all charges of treason, and life gradually began returning to normal. When this was done, and the Senate was restored, he released his authority to them, leaving them only with a stern warning not to allow such tyranny again. In a matter of weeks, the Republic had been re-established. Since the Republic's infrastructure and personnel relied on what was left of the Empire and the Rebellion, the decision was made not to press civil charges on members of either. They even decided to acquit potential charges against Anakin Skywalker, because at the time he and Luke Skywalker were the only known remaining members of the Jedi Order, and executing one of them would not help rebuild the Jedi, who were the traditional guardians of the galaxy and had been for thousands of years. Anakin and Luke were given effective control over the old Jedi Temple on Coruscant, which desperately needed renovations. They went to Coruscant and stayed to oversee this process, and Han, Leia, and Chewbacca followed them, probably to watch out for Luke, seeing as he was spending a lot of his time around the most dangerous person in the galaxy.

The final announcement I read on my datapad, several days after the first few, was a declaration put out by the three remaining Jedi (Leia had been welcomed into the Order, and Luke had started trying to train her a little): if any Jedi of any rank still lived in the galaxy, they were called to return to the Temple and begin reconstruction of the Order. Their safe transit was assured, and they would be provided with quarters upon arrival. The Jedi purge was over, and was going to stay that way.