by Karen Miller
“Anakin,” Obi-Wan said again. “Listen.”
Anakin leaned even closer. “No, you listen. Yoda’s coming, with healers. You have to stay quiet, you have to—”
“Anakin,” said Obi-Wan, his voice so weak. “It’s important.”
He looked down at Obi-Wan, fighting outraged disbelief. How could this be happening? How could he be on this rooftop, surrounded by debris, by the wailing of sirens, choking on bitter smoke, bitter tears, staring at his dreadfully injured friend? When only moments ago he’d been in Padmé’s arms… and laughing… loving?
This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.
“Anakin,” said Obi-Wan. His voice was almost too faint to hear. “Tell Yoda that Dex’s message was about Grievous. He’s after Bothawui.”
That shocked him. “Bothawui? No. If Grievous gets Bothawui—”
“I know,” said Obi-Wan painfully. “Anakin, tell Yoda.”
“You can tell him yourself, as soon as he gets here.”
Obi-Wan looked at him, almost puzzled. “I don’t—I’m not sure—” His eyes drifted closed, and fresh red froth bubbled onto his lips.
Anakin slewed about, searching the crowded, smoky sky for Yoda. Ten years of rigorous Jedi training were all that stood now between him and screaming.
Come on! Come on! Where are you? Come on!
And just when he was on the brink of risking everything, risking Obi-Wan’s life by putting him in the airspeeder and heading to the Temple himself, Yoda and a team of three healers arrived. One of them was Master Vokara Che, who’d worked so hard on him after Geonosis.
“Stand back, young Skywalker,” Yoda commanded as the healers set about saving Obi-Wan’s life. “Done well you have. Die he will not.”
There were tears on Anakin’s cheeks, he could feel them. He wasn’t ashamed. He wasn’t going to apologize to anyone, not even Yoda, for caring enough about Obi-Wan to weep for him.
But it seemed Yoda was in a forgiving mood. “Die he will not,” he repeated, and to emphasize the assertion rapped his gimer stick on the rooftop.
“How do you know?”
“It is not his time,” said Yoda, softly. “Despite the dark side see that much I can.”
Shivering now, the shock setting in, Anakin felt his legs give way. He dropped to the rooftop, dazed. “He gave me a message for you, Master Yoda. Grievous is after Bothawui.”
“Bothawui?” said Yoda. And then he said something else, in a strange tongue, not Republic Basic. He sounded… perturbed. “Certain you are? No mistake there can be?”
He shook his head. “None.”
The healers were clustered about Obi-Wan, everything about them urgent. Vokara Che murmured something, the other two nodded, and then in one swift, coordinated move they turned Obi-Wan fully onto his back. He cried out as they shifted him, a shout of terrible pain.
“Master Vokara Che!” Yoda said loudly.
The healer turned, her twin head-tails writhing with her agitation. “Master Yoda, I’m sorry, but can you give me a—”
“Return to the Temple at once I must,” said Yoda. “Leave you here to help Obi-Wan I will. When returned to the Temple you are, and news of him you have, find me.”
Vokara Che nodded. “Of course.”
Anakin flinched as Yoda poked him with the gimer stick. “Your airspeeder that is, young Skywalker?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Then back to the Temple you will take me. And attention to the speed laws you will not pay!”
He didn’t want to go. He wanted to stay here, with Obi-Wan. He scrambled to his feet. “Yes, Master,” he said… but he was staring at his friend.
Yoda poked him again. “Trust me do you, youngling?”
Startled, Anakin looked down. “What? Yes.”
“Then safe it is to leave Obi-Wan! Not safe is Bothawui!”
Obi-Wan would tell him to go. Obi-Wan would be furious if he lingered, endangering lives. He and Yoda returned to the Temple.
Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, previously plain Senator Palpatine, for the better part of his life Darth Sidious, Dark Lord of the Sith, stood pensively in his luxurious office, benevolently smiling at the mayhem he had wrought.
Well, not personally. He wasn’t the one who personally found the willing dupes, stirred up their real and imagined grievances against the Republic, supplied them with the explosives and the codes required to evade security, and left them to get on with things. No. That was the tedious footwork of some minion or other. Some other willing dupe cozened by his useful—if elderly—apprentice, Darth Tyranus. The one keeping a seat warm for Anakin, who was ripening so nicely. Really coming along.
There was something so satisfying about a plan brought to fruition.
In the cocooned hush of his office it wasn’t possible to hear the sirens, the screaming, the shouting, the horror. But he didn’t need to hear it. He could see it, and feel it in the Force.
The dark side was a wonderful thing.
He glanced away from the fruits of his daydreaming to the chrono on his desk. Ah. Nearly time. Turning from the vast transparisteel window, from the panorama of death he’d painted with such skill, he retrieved his dark hooded cloak from his private wardrobe, slid into it, and activated the narrow-band holotransceiver he kept for these… special occasions.
“Master,” said Dooku’s hologram, bowing. Really the man should be kneeling, but age did have its compensations. At least for a little while. “You are aware of our most recent success?”
“Yes, Darth Tyranus,” Sidious replied. “I’ve been watching events unfold with some interest. Well done.”
Praise from a Sith Lord was rare, and Dooku let his surprise show. “My lord, you humble me.”
And you bore me, but let us not go into that. Not yet. “How stand matters with General Grievous?”
“He assembles his renewed droid army now, my lord. He is anxious to engage the Jedi in battle once again.”
“The point of this mission is that he not engage the Jedi, Tyranus. Not until Bothawui lies firmly in his grasp. Once Bothawui has fallen to us, they will expend themselves thoughtlessly in the attempt to reclaim it. We seek the deaths of many Jedi, my apprentice. Remind Grievous of that. Remind him he is hardly indispensable.”
Dooku bowed again. “My lord, I will.”
Darth Sidious disconnected the hololink, returned the transceiver to his cloak’s pocket and the cloak to its hanger in the wardrobe. He liked to keep his possessions neat and tidy. A place for everything, and everything in its place.
His desk holopad beeped, and he toggled its switch. “What is it?”
Mas Amedda’s hologram bowed. “My lord, word has reached me that Obi-Wan Kenobi was injured in one of the terrorist attacks.”
Obi-Wan? Really? “Don’t say terrorists, Mas Amedda. It’s such a partisan, emotional word. Leave words like that to our redoubtable friends in the HoloNet news service.”
Mas Amedda nodded. “My lord.”
Darth Sidious looked down, his thoughts seething. The gesture was a dismissal, and Mas Amedda knew it. The hololink disconnected. Unobserved once more, he looked up, knowing a red light gleamed in his eyes. Obi-Wan injured? That upright, sanctimonious, inconvenient Jedi injured?
Good.
He slid himself beneath the surface of the everyday, submerging his mind in the peerless currents of the dark side. Where was Anakin? What was he feeling?
Grief… fear… anger… guilt.
Excellent.
Would Kenobi die? No… no, which was sad. But this turn of events was certainly serendipitous… something could be made of it, surely… something useful. Something… permanent. For it was time, and more than time, that Anakin was weaned from Kenobi and his milkish light-side pap.
Time he truly began to sup upon the dark.
Sitting back, fingers steepled, Darth Sidious began to explore the possibilities.
Anakin wanted to go straight to the Temple’s Halls of Healing and wa
it there for Obi-Wan to arrive. He’d given Yoda Obi-Wan’s message. What further use could the Council have for Anakin Skywalker? None. But Obi-Wan needed him. Even unconscious he’d know his former Padawan was with him. Just as he’d known, stupefied after his disastrous duel with Dooku, that Obi-Wan and Padmé had him safe between them.
But Yoda wouldn’t hear of it.
“A healer you are not, young Skywalker. Report to the Council you must,” he decreed in that overbearing, irritating, pompous way of his. Making pronouncements that everyone was supposed to accept without question, just because he’d lived a long time.
A full Council session was convened, every Master in attendance—although three-quarters of their complement appeared as holograms. Ki-Adi-Mundi was so far away, almost to the very edge of the civilized galaxy near Barab I, investigating some rumor of trouble, that his hologram was little more than a shadow, his voice a whisper.
“Tell the Council, Anakin, what Master Kenobi told you,” said Yoda, eyes half lidded and deceptively mild.
Anakin was able to control his anger, just. This was pointless. A waste of his time. “Yes, Master Yoda.” He swept the Council with an impatient look. “Obi-Wan told me that Grievous plans to attack Bothawui.”
“Grievous?” said Adi Gallia, as beautiful in a hologram as she was in the flesh. “You’re certain?”
“What, you think I’m making this up?” he demanded. “Yes. Grievous. That’s what he said.” Again, he swept the Council with a look, harsher this time. “And I don’t care how crazy it sounds, you have to believe him. He was in agony, and all he cared about was making sure Master Yoda got the message. The message came from Dex. That means it’s the truth. Grievous is planning to invade Bothawui.”
“It means,” said Eeth Koth, his hologram wavering, “that Obi-Wan thinks it is the truth, young Skywalker. Your former Master could be mistaken… or misled.”
Anakin could never look at the Zabrak Master without a shiver of distaste. Without seeing superimposed over him the menacing red-and-black Sith who’d murdered Qui-Gon. Even though he’d only glimpsed that dreadful face once, in the hangar on Naboo, he’d never forgotten it.
“Mistaken?” he echoed, not caring anymore if his anger showed. “I don’t think so. As for Dex, he’d never lie to Obi-Wan.”
A glum silence told him he’d scored a point. At last.
“Thank you, Anakin,” said Master Windu heavily. “The Council will deliberate in private now. You’re excused.”
Anakin looked at Yoda. “I have your permission to—”
“Yes,” said Yoda. “Returned to the Temple Obi-Wan should now be. Tell Master Vokara Che that to see her I will come, when I am able.”
Anakin nodded. “Yes, Master Yoda.” Added, grudgingly, “Thank you.”
As he reached the Council chamber door, Mace Windu’s voice made him pause. “The Force is with him, Anakin. You are wrong to be afraid.”
Yeah, yeah. Wrong to be afraid, wrong to be worried, wrong to care two bantha pats what happened to Obi-Wan.
Everything I do is wrong. But you still expect me to save you, don’t you?
“Yes, Master Windu,” he said over his shoulder, and kept on walking.
“Skyguy! Skyguy, hold up! Wait for me!”
He spun on his heel to see Ahsoka racing across the meditation-level concourse toward him. “Don’t call me that!” he snapped when she was only a handful of paces distant. “I’m Master Skywalker to you, or just plain Master.”
As though he’d physically slapped her, she skidded to a halt. Slight, wiry, such a little thing, she stared up at him in shocked silence.
“I’m sorry,” she said at last, in a small wounded voice. “I only meant—” She dropped her gaze. “I’m sorry.”
Unfortunately they weren’t alone on the concourse. The Jedi and Padawans entering and exiting the nearby swift-tubes did not stop or stare, but Anakin could feel their curiosity. Ten years in this place, and still he was an object of interest. Of speculation. All their hopes and dreams hanging on him like decorations on a bantha skeleton at Boonta Eve.
He hated it.
“What do you want, Ahsoka?” he said roughly. “I don’t have time to look at yesterday’s training session.”
“I heard Master Obi-Wan was hurt in one of the explosions,” she whispered. “I thought—I felt—”
“What?”
She was trembling. “You’re frightened for him. And I wanted to—I thought you might like—” She turned away, defeated. “It doesn’t matter.”
Her pain knifed through him. He felt stupid, and cruel. “Ahsoka, wait.”
Reluctantly, she turned back.
“You’re right,” he said. “I am frightened for Obi-Wan. I shouldn’t be, but I am. And I would like some company while I wait to see him.”
Not her company; he was desperate for Padmé. But that was impossible. Ahsoka would do, in a pinch.
“Yes?” Ahsoka’s face lit up with joy. “You mean it?”
He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, having so much easy power over one young girl. Why did she care so much? Why should what he said matter?
Qui-Gon mattered to me. I suppose it’s the same.
He jerked his head toward the swift-tubes. “Come on. We can work through your training session while we wait. Don’t suppose you thought to bring that droidcam?”
She smiled, a sharp flash of feral teeth. “Of course I did, Sky—Master. I know I’m thick sometimes, but—”
He sighed. “You’re not thick, Ahsoka. And I guess you can call me Skyguy. But only when we’re alone.”
Her face lit up again, so much unbridled joy. “Thank you!”
He didn’t want her gratitude. He didn’t want her as his Padawan, though he liked her well enough. He didn’t want any Padawan. But thanks to the Council they were stuck with each other. All they could do was make the most of the fact.
“Come on,” he said again, and walked away.
With a gasp and a skip, she hurried after him.
Chapter Seven
“Senator Amidala!”
Padmé turned at the sound of Bail Organa’s voice. He was pushing his way toward her through the crowded corridor, collecting stares and rude comments, which he ignored. They’d been called to an emergency session of the Security Committee. The terrorist attacks. The Senate complex was like a poked beehive, frantic with activity.
“Padmé,” he said as he reached her, then pulled her aside into a convenient alcove. His dark eyes were anxious. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Obi-Wan Kenobi is one of the bombings’ casualties.”
The lies came so easily now. “No! I didn’t—oh, that’s awful, Bail. How badly is he hurt?”
“He’s not dead. But I’m told it’s serious. I’m sorry. I know you’re friends.”
Well, she wouldn’t precisely call them that. Not since she’d ignored his plea and promptly married the man he’d begged her to renounce. “Friends. Yes. Bail, how did you find out? There’s been no announcement.”
“The Jedi shuttle taking him back to the Temple got caught at an emergency checkpoint. The sister of one my Senate staffers is a security officer. She flew escort for it once the problem was resolved.” He shrugged. “And sisters gossip.”
They certainly did. “I want to know everything you know, but it’ll have to wait till after the briefing. Which we should get to before we’re late.”
Bail nodded. “Of course.”
When they reached their allotted chamber, though, they found it empty… save for Supreme Chancellor Palpatine.
“Don’t be alarmed, my friends,” he said as they slowed uncertainly on the chamber’s threshold. “You’re in the right place. But I took the liberty of canceling your briefing.”
Padmé exchanged a cautious glance with Bail, who stepped forward. “Chancellor?”
“I wish to personally inspect the damage inflicted upon us by the Separatists,” said Palpatine. “And I’d like both of you to accompany
me. No fanfare, no elaborate escort. Just three concerned public servants united in a common cause.”
Padmé frowned. “I’ll come, of course, but—”
“Why you?” Palpatine smiled, gravely. “Because I value your advice, milady. Your experiences as a target of Trade Federation terrorism, first on Naboo and then more recently here and on Geonosis, afford you valuable insight. You’ve looked firsthand into that dreadful abyss, Padmé. It has tried to devour you and failed every time. I want to see these attacks through your eyes. You will see things I never would, or could. And if I’m to protect our great Republic, I must know what they are. No matter how alarming or upsetting that may be.”
Taken aback, she nodded. “Anything I can do to help.”
“And as for you, Senator Organa,” Palpatine continued. “If you’ll forgive my blunt speaking, I have felt of late that you’re coming to regret the unconditional support you’ve shown my office.”
“Regret?” Bail shook his head, vehement. “No, Supreme Chancellor. I support you without reservation, as always.”
“Do you?” said Palpatine, gently. “I must say that’s not the impression I’ve received.”
“With respect, sir, you’re mistaken. If I have regrets, it’s that we’ve been forced into this war. That in creating our Grand Army of the Republic we’ve turned our backs on a thousand years of peace. On all the Senators who came before us and preserved that peace by steadfastly refusing to give in to their fears.”
“Are you saying my negotiations for an equitable settlement with the Separatists were not genuine?”
“No, of course I’m not.” Bail ran a hand over his close-clipped goatee. “Nobody could’ve tried harder than you did to give Dooku and his cronies what they wanted while still preserving the integrity of the Republic. It’s just—”
“That now you’ve seen soldiers killing, and dying,” said Palpatine. “Clones, to be sure, but even so. Am I correct?”
Bail nodded. “Yes.”
“And you wonder if you did the right thing, agreeing to support a Republic army. Especially since your dear friend here, Senator Amidala, opposed the Military Creation Act at the risk of her own life.”
