My Dearest Lauren,

Today I arrived on the Death Star to take command. It's incredible. It has everything you need to take over the universe. Reactor Cores. Trash Compactors. Prison Cells. Fighter Bays. Even a Day Care Center. I swear the hydraulics in the doors need to be let up on. They come down so quickly sometimes. But it's not anything like commanding a Superstar Destroyer. It takes forever to move this thing through space.

And all my old friends from the Acedemy are here, too. Admiral Tagge. Amiral Romodi. Bast. Ozzle. Motti. Even the old Colonel. My how I pine for the younger days. Vader arrives in two days. I miss him.

Love, Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Today Tagge showed me around the Reactor Core and other places. You know, I never realized how dangerous this place could be. Guard railings are virtually non-existant. And believe it or not, there are big open holes in the unlikeliest places. How the hell are you suppose to unload your ship's cargo in the bay if there's a big ass fucking hole in the floor? When no one was looking I kicked a Droid down the whole and I never heard it hit bottom.

And I got a peculiar complaint from one of the Stormtroopers today. He insists every time he enters a room, he bumps his head on the door. He doesn't appear to be an overly stout man, so I wonder how he is continuously able to do this? Odd I tell you. I told him that if he has a problem with doors, he should duck before entering.

Tarkin.

*

Dear Lauren,

Lord Vader arrived today. I swear every time I see him he gets bigger. And you'll never guess who he had with him. Remember old Senator Bail Organa? Well, Vader had his daughter in tow. He picked her up along the way after attacking her Consular Ship. Attacking a Conbsular Ship? What balls. He claims she stole technical plans for this battle station but they couldn't find them on the ship. It appears an escape pod was ejected just after the fight but there was no life signs onboard. He dispatched stormtroopers down to the planet to find it. I hope you don't get jealous Lauren, but I invited Princess Leia to dinner. I don't know if she will attend though, considering Vader's keeping her in the prison cell.

And believe it or not, three more stormtroopers stopped by to complain about the low doors. I think Tagge's behind this trying to pull on me one of his old practical jokes from the Academy Days. Remember that time he let loose all the Wookies from their Cells and took off running? I was laughing for days after watching them take out the old Battle Droids. Thank God the Empire replaced them with the stormtroopers. But I bet the Battle Droids would have never bumped their heads into the doors.

Love always, Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Remember that escape pod that they thought this station's stolen technical data plans were in? Well it now appears there were two droids inside. We did a quick search through our copies of the Consular Ship's manufest and believe it to be an Artoo Unit and a Protocol Droid. When I told Vader about this, I swear I could hear a sniffle through his helmet. Wonder what that was all about.

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

I swear Lauren, Vader's a nut about to crack. Just twenty minutes after I sent you the last letter, Admiral Ozzle informed Vader the escape pod and droids were on Tatooine and he started to lose it. He threw Ozzle across the room, bashed some stormtroopers together, and pulled out his Saber and started hacking away at the computer consoles. It will take days to repair the Tractor Beams in Sector 12. Now if we ever wanted to tractor a ship in, we have to turn the whole damn station around to do it. The troopers will be fine. But I honestly don't know what I'm going to do if Vader goes over the edge. The Saber we can handle with enough men. But how do you take someone down who can throw droids at you just by waving his hand?

I'm sorry Lauren. I didn't mean to scare you. I'll be fine here.

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

A quick note. Today the Emperor himself personally called me to ask me to inform the others that the Emperor has permenantly dissolved the Imperial Senate. He wants me to tell the others myself. Wow!

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Motti's an Ass! When I told everyone the Imperial Senate had been resolved, he actually stood there and questioned the possibility of the existing rebellion obtaining technical data of this battle station. Like I'm so sure that's going to happen... again. And when I tell the others that any attack the rebellion would make would be useless, Vader jumps in and insists that the power of the Death Star to destroy even an entire Star System is "insignificant" to the power of the Force. Then Motti attacked Vader's beliefs in the force and Vader tries to choke the guy from across the room. Jesus Christ, Lauren, what have I gotten myself into?

Luckily I was able to put a stop to it.

Love always, Tarkin.

*

My Dearest Lauren,

Remember that vacation trip you wanted to take to Alderaan? You're going to have to change your plans on that one. If you haven't heard about it yet, when you do, just remember it was your beloved who gave the order. I have the power baby!

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Gosh, I had a busy day today Lauren. First we took onboard an old Corellian Starship. My God I haven't seen one of those since the Clone Wars. I thought they were all gone. Turned out it was empty. I don't know what to do with it. It's a piece of junk and it's sitting in my hangar bay. But rules are rules and I had to personally install a tracking transmitter in that Corellian crap of a starship myself because trooper TK-341 never seems to be at his post.

Then General Darklighter finds out his son Biggs went missing and never made it to the Academy as planned. The other Generals tried their best to console him. He took off from Tatooine so we sent our sandy covered stormtroopers in to investigate the route he took since they manage to lose those droids they were suppose to find. And I'm not even going to tell you what I found out they did to some Jawas down there. Luckily the locals are blaming Tusken Raiders. I assured Darklighter that his son would turn up soon in the unlikeliest place like all kids do. Probably out racing Skyhoppers or something. Vader said himself he looks forward to meeting him some day. I sent Ensign Piett to head up the investigation. I shouldn't have put an Ensign in charge, but he's so gifted I believe he will move up in the ranks quite quickly.

Then to top the day off, Vader comes in out of no where and insists Obi-Wan Kenobi's onboard the station. He's losing it Lauren.

Safely protected in the ultimate power of the Universe, Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Good God Lauren, Kenobi was onboard the station after all. That bearded bastard cut off the Tractor Beam before Vader had it out with him in the hangar bay. Princess Organa escaped and took off in that piece of junk Corellian crap with a Wookie and who knows who, but not before having it out with some stormtroopers. Sure enough, every trooper that got hit fell into that big hole in the floor. I ordered the holes filled in but Tagge says it will take time because they're bottomless. God Damn the person who built this thing. Those Stormtroopers had families! Ozzle's trying to suck up to Vader to get Kenobi's Lightsaber. It's a good thing I placed a tracking transmitter onboard that crap of a starship. We're on the move now to the source to blast the hell out of it.

I'll let you know what other planets you can cross off your vacation list once we're done.

Love, Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

We're still on the move today, Lauren. Damn this thing's slow. We don't have the ability to jump to lightspeed. Me and Tagge had it out with some designers over the communications today. When Tagge asked them why they didn't install Lightspeed into this thing, those smart-asses insisted we were a bunch of blowhards just trying to overthrow the Empire with our mobile light-speed-jumping ultimate-power-in-the-universe planet-destroying metal moon. Then they suggested me and Tagge design our own Death Star and give this one back if we didn't like it so much. Those bastards. Tagge suggested we put them on our list with Alderaan after we're done with this one we're headed for now. He told them that he believed he could justify to the Empire that in fact we very well should take out the creators of this station to prevent the rebellion from building one themselves. And considering the plans already got out once, the Emperor might back us on it. Then those bastards told us to go ahead and try because they had the proto-types and know how to shut down our shields by remote. Those bastards.

I asked Vader if he could choke them or throw some debris at them or something but Vader said they were too far away.

I sent General Darklighter to look into the matter to see if they really could shut down our shields by remote. Plus I thought it was good to get him back to work.

After talking with Tagge about it, we believe maybe we could design a better one after all. He's off to the local shop to buy some pencils and posterboard. We still never found out what those big holes in the floor of the hangar bay are for.

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Me and Tagge are still working on the new Death Star idea. Others found out what we were doing and joined in with tons of ideas. Everyone agrees that the new one should use natural gravity by spinning in space instead of wasting so much energy creating artificial gravity. But soon we realized that reality will strike us down if we don't cut back on some features. We decided the Guard Railings must stay because we're losing too many troopers, but we're willing to give up several hangars and gun turrets for a short while, leaving those areas empty until a later time when we can afford to fill them in. Vader wants his own command center right at the top of the station so he can take command himself on occassion and personally drive the station around like a Tie Fighter. Sometimes he acts just like a child. Ozzle started laughing before we all realized what Vader had planned. He literally wanted to sit on top of the world. Vader got upset with Ozzel and to prevent another choking incident, I sent Ozzle on patrol to scout out the nearby systems. We'll pick him up on the way back once we're done.

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

My God Lauren. I can't believe what has happened. We were so caught up in the new design, that Tagge and the others started talking and we believe that we could actually do it. I must be insane Lauren for thinking such thoughts. And if the Emperor found out we would all surely die. But we discussed this in detail. With Vader out of the way we could return to Coruscant and take out the Emporer ourselves. I know it's crazy Lauren but we can do it. We were up all night talking about it and we believe that within three days the Empire could be in our hands, not Palpatine's. We only hope Vader doesn't find out. Romodi suggested that Ozzle might not go along with this, but that we could order him away on a secret mission, and tell Vader that Ozzle went missing. Then when Vader goes to check the area himself we take him out with the Death Star. With Vader gone and Ozzle under orders to maintain radio silence, we could tell the Emporer whatever we wanted until we were within firing range of Coruscant three days from now.

It could work Lauren. And nothing could stop us. I have to go now, my beloved. We're almost within range of the new planet to blast the hell out of it.

Tarkin.

*

Lauren,

Wouldn't you know it, the rebellion are sending ships after us. We're twenty minutes away from blasting them to hell, and they send little itty bitty X-Wings after us. If you look close you can see little rusted Artoo Units in them. I bet a dollar to a doughnut that one of those little cylindrical bastards is the one carrying our technical data plans. Plus I got some moron breathing down my shoulder telling me they analyzed the attack and that there is a danger to us. I told him to piss off. Then this spud comes up to me and suggests that I have my personal escape craft ready. Hell, I didn't even know this station had personal escape crafts until he said something. Later on I'll have to look over my new ship.

Just to screw with the rebellion, I decided to send two Tie Fighters out to play with them. Just two. Tagge's rolling around on the floor laughing. Vader's so upset with me because I won't send any more than two that he himself is going out to personally stop them. For a guy who insists this station is insignificant compared to throwing furniture around with your mind, he sure is in a hurry to get out there and save it. With luck, Vader will be taken out by the rebellion just before the rebellion is taken out by us. Then we give the order to Ozzle to go away and three days later - Boom! - Coruscant no more! Emperor Tarkin sounds kinda good. What do you think about being a Queen, Lauren?

See you after the battle.

Love always. Tarkin.

The next entery:



My Dearest Lauren,

I know it's only been a half an hour since I last wrote you, but this is just frickin' funny.  Those X-wings are buzzing around us like flies.  We're taking them out quickly with our turbo lasers and a few rookie pilots.  One X-wing shot some proton torpedos at us.  It had about the same effect as shooting a BB at an elephant.  There's only two X wings left.  These guys are a riot.

Darth Vader always brags about how good a pilot he is, but he's really having trouble with one of the X-wings.  He even shot at the guy twice and missed.  He'll never hear the end of that, let me tell you.  Now the moron has crashed into his wingman, and he's flying off into space.  This is great.

Those X wing pilots just don't get it.  That ship that was giving Vader all the trouble just fired some more proton torpedoes.

Ah, it looks like they took the hint.  They're buggering off.  Well, that's all the news for now.

Love, Tarkin

bumped for the day crew.  I thought it was funny.