Star Wars - Altered Path 4
Aaaand here's the next bit.
Chapter 4
The Lost is Found
He was so very, very tired. The blue smoky presence had helped and was still helping. But the fight against the Darkness had gone on for so long that he simply couldn’t last much longer. His shredded and frayed ethereal self was starting to fade…
Yes, Lord Vader, let go. Fade away. Leave your body behind for me!
Don’t give in yet, Anakin. I’m still with you. Hold on just a little while longer.
He wanted to do as the kinder presence asked. He didn’t want to fall to the Darkness and be consumed. But the Darkness was relentless and crafty. Periodically it would pull back a bit on its assault before lashing out with a single powerful and narrowly focused attack. It would briefly pierce the shield of the blue smoke and dig deep into him, tearing at old scars on his spirit and making them bleed afresh.
There is no point in your struggle. There is no hope for you. You started down the Dark Path long ago. It is your destiny.
There is always hope, Ani. You’ve come a long way since we last met. There is only a little further for you to go. Your future is yours to make.
He struggled to rally his strength and keep on fighting…but it was so hard.
He was so tired…so very, very tired.
…He didn’t know how much longer he could last.
***
Sabé sat at the side of the medical cot on Bail Organa’s private vessel where her friend and employer lay and worried. She really didn’t know how they’d managed to spirit Padmé out of the Senate building without being accosted by any other Senators or lurking reporters. It had probably helped that the whole Senate was still in an uproar over the Supreme Chancellor’s death, and Jar Jar had started blubbering incoherently and made a big scene to draw all nearby attention on himself. And it was supremely lucky that Senator Organa had been there, and that his ship was parked very close by.
Padmé was deathly pale and still, but it was an improvement over the ashen-hued hyperventilating mess that she’d been in the Senate. Senator Organa’s private doctor had given her a mild sedative to help her rest comfortably and run a few tests to insure that she and her unborn child hadn’t been harmed by her episode. No damage had been done, so now it was just a matter of waiting for Padmé to wake up.
Why? Sabé chewed at her lower lip and clutched at the intricate hair ornament that she’d removed from Padmé’s head so that the Nabooan Senator could rest easier. Things had been going so well. Vader learned of the pregnancy and Padmé was finally going to return home to Naboo. And now this…
Tears of frustration and grief burned at the back of her eyes, but Sabé let them go no further. Right now her friend needed her and she would hold it together for her sake. She would weep later in private when there was nothing that needed doing.
It’s not fair, she raged internally. It’s just not fair! And what the doctor said makes it even worse!
A flickering of Padmé’s eyelids caught Sabé’s attention. A few minutes later, the pregnant Senator slowly cracked open her eyes and looked around. Eventually her gaze landed on Sabé and she blinked twice.
“Sabé?” she croaked hoarsely. “Where am I?”
“The medical bay of Senator Organa’s ship, the Tantive IV,” Sabé replied quietly. “How are you feeling, Milady?”
Padmé didn’t immediately reply. Instead, her right hand drifted up to grasp the cursed wooden pendant that Vader had gifted her, and her left hand moved to rest upon her pregnant belly. Her eyes fluttered closed and Sabé wondered if it was the sedative still lingering in her system.
“Padmé?”
“Did…did Master Windu really say that…that Vader…”
“Yes,” Sabé confirmed very reluctantly. “Yes, Master Windu said…that.”
Padmé’s face twisted in pain and the hand resting on her belly trembled. “I…I had hoped that I’d just-just dreamed it. But he really…he really…”
“Please, try to stay calm,” Sabé murmured, grasping her friend’s left hand as her breathing grew ragged. “It’s not good for you to get so stressed.”
“The baby,” Padmé rasped, her eyes growing wide. “Nothing-nothing happened to the baby, did it?”
“No,” Sabé hurriedly reassured her. “Senator Organa’s doctor didn’t find any problems. But…Padmé, there’s something that you need to know.”
The Senator’s brow furrowed in confusion at her tone. “What?”
“You’re not just carrying one child,” Sabé informed her. “There are two.”
“Two?” Padmé repeated blankly.
“Twins,” Sabé said with a nod.
The Senator stared at her in incomprehension and Sabé wondered if she was in a clear enough state of mind to grasp what she’d been told. Then, very slowly, understanding washed over her face. And then the tears came.
Her own heart clenching in sympathy, Sabé set the hair ornament aside and moved to sit on the side of the cot and hold Padmé’s head in her lap.
It won’t be one fatherless child, but two. Poor Padmé. It’s just not fair!
***
It was late afternoon when Obi-Wan finally dropped out of hyperspace into the crowded space lanes of Coruscant. The bustling space ways choked with traffic showed him that whatever he’d sensed back on Utapau wasn’t terrible enough to disrupt the capital as a whole. He should’ve felt some reassurance that there wasn’t a battle raging over the city-planet like there had been the last time that he’d returned.
But his sense of urgency and dread only intensified.
Leaving the navigating to Geenine, Obi-Wan focused on stretching out through the Force. Now that he was in the same star system as Anakin he should be able to get a better read on his condition. As the astromech locked onto the Grand Jedi Temple’s beacon and dropped the space fighter towards the atmosphere, Obi-Wan searched for his young companion.
The bond was no longer thinned by distance, but it was still strangely transparent and empty-feeling. Troubled, he flowed down the connection to the other end where the border of Anakin’s mind lay-
Roiling Darkness, cold and malicious, festering and deep, and utterly foreign-
Obi-Wan jerked out of his focused trance with a strangled gasp. When he’d first met Anakin as Dar’ti Vader to boy had exuded darkness due to his previous training under Count Dooku. He was intimately familiar with Anakin’s shadowed taint and it left him certain that what he’d sensed was someone else’s darkness. But how could he be sensing someone else through the bond that tied him to Anakin?
Geenine chirped a warning at him and Obi-Wan set about recovering his composure as his Eta-2 swooped into the opening maw of the Temple’s hanger bay. By the time that the brass-colored droid had landed the green-trimmed fighter on an open landing platform his breathing was back under control and he had re-centered himself. Leaving the astromech to handle the ship’s shut-down and maintenance procedures, Obi-Wan climbed out of the fighter and strode off at almost his usual pace to find one of his colleagues on the High Council.
He aimed to find Mace first if possible. With himself and Master Yoda both off-planet, the Haruun Kal Master was next in line to look after Anakin. But if he stumbled over one of the other Masters, like Kit Fisto or Shaak Ti, he’d gladly seek their aid instead.
The sooner that he found out what was going on with his former apprentice, the better.
Obi-Wan exited the hanger complex and started to work his way to the residence halls, only to nearly collide with a body rushing the other way from a side corridor.
“What the-Obi-Wan?”
“Siri?” he sputtered, belatedly recognizing his fellow Jedi Master and former childhood friend. “What’s the rush?”
“I was asked to pick up Knight Bhaat and Knight Abrub from their search for security footage from buildings around the Senate Rotunda,” she answered, tucking a loose lock of blonde hair behind her ear. “I thought that you were on Utapau.”
“I was,” he replied. “What happened at the Senate?”
Siri hesitated for a moment before stepping closer to him and answering.
“The Council discovered that the other Sith Lord was the Supreme Chancellor, and they moved to arrest him in his office. He fought back and wounded Master Windu and killed the others. The Chancellor was about to kill Master Windu when Vader showed up and plowed him out the window, and then there was some kind of massive explosion. I was part of the search effort afterwards, but there wasn’t a whole lot left to find. Master Windu and Master Ti just informed the Senate a few hours ago, although I’m sure that they had to do some creative reporting to keep the Senators from descending into chaos.”
Obi-Wan rocked back on his heels and struggled to process what he’d just been told.
“Palpatine was a Sith Lord?!”
It was a shocking idea and one that he found difficult to swallow. He’d been in the Supreme Chancellor’s presence several times before and during the war and neither saw nor sensed anything that showed the man to be anything other than a mildly corrupt politician. He hadn’t even felt a hint of the other man’s Force sensitivity. But there had been a pall of Dark Side energy hanging around the Senate Building for years, faint and diffuse yet always present.
“That’s what I said,” Siri confirmed. “It’s hard to believe that he was under our noses for decades and not a single Jedi picked up on his true nature.”
“So where is Vader now?” he asked. “The Halls of Healing?”
“Obi-Wan,” she said slowly. “You heard me when I said that there was an explosion? And there wasn’t much left to find afterwards?”
“You think that he’s dead,” he stated flatly.
“He went out of an office building window and was at the heart of a huge blast,” she responded. “Master Windu and Master Ti gave up looking for him.” Her face softened. “Master Windu has his lightsaber, if you want to hang onto it for a while.”
Obi-Wan almost argued with her. He knew that Anakin was still alive. The bond between them was still intact, which meant that he was still breathing at the other end. But instead he simply shook his head and walked away.
Siri was stubborn and he didn’t have to time to convince her that he wasn’t simply suffering from denial. The foreign darkness that he’d sensed where Anakin should be and what he’d learned from Siri only underlined the vital importance of finding the young man as quickly as possible. And now he knew where on Coruscant to start looking.
“Where are you going?” she called after him.
“To the Senate Building,” he replied as he continued back to the hanger.
He didn’t bother to see if she had anything else to say to him or if she would try to follow him. Obi-Wan simply retraced his steps to the hanger and then diverted to the motor pool. Quickly selecting an open-topped airspeeder, he rushed through the vehicle check-out process and lifted off for the Senate.
Sliding into the complex aerial traffic patterns, Obi-Wan battled his sense of dread and guilt. His duty to Anakin had been not only to teach him to be a Jedi, but to protect him from the Sith Lords that he had fled from as a young teenager. On Geonosis he’d failed and dragged Anakin into a confrontation with Count Dooku that had resulted in the young man losing his right arm. And now he’d been elsewhere when Anakin had faced down Dooku’s Sith Master and the consequences could turn out to be far direr than a simple maiming.
I’m on my way, Anakin.
His hands squeezed the steering yoke with a white-knuckle grip.
Please don’t let me be too late.
***
Siri chewed at the inside of her cheek as she piloted an airspeeder to the plaza in the locked down district by the Senate Building where her Jedi comrades were waiting for her. She’d considered chasing after Obi-Wan, but it was only a brief thought. He clearly wouldn’t be receptive to anything that she might say and he definitely wouldn’t take her doubts about Vader well if she were to let any hint of them slip.
It’s going to be like losing Master Jinn for him all over again, she thought grimly. He bonded too close again. Losing his Master drove him to Corellia…what will losing his student do to him?
Shaking her head, Siri signaled to the clone troopers that were keeping up a patrol over the closed streets and steered the airspeeder down to a landing pad. As the airspeeder’s engine spooled down to a low idle the two Jedi who had been awaiting her arrival strode over to the vehicle. She exchanged polite greetings with the Devaronian and Chadra-Fan Knights before asking about their assignment.
“Did you find anything?”
“No,” the Devaronian, Beelz Abrub, muttered with a grimace. “Nothing of any real use, anyway. The closest cameras were completely slagged by the blast, the mid-range views were corrupted by some kind of EMP, and the cameras furthest out only show partial low-resolution views of the explosion.”
“It didn’t help that there weren’t a lot of security recorders that were facing the right way and at the right level to catch the explosion in the first place,” the Chadra-Fan, Tirit Bhaat, said with a shrug of his tiny shoulders. “There’s not much reason to have a lot of cameras looking outward mid-way up skyscrapers where there aren’t many entrance or exit points to watch. But we did collect what little there was anyway.”
“I’m sure that the High Council will find some way to make use of what you’ve found,” Siri replied and started to lift the airspeeder up from the landing pad. “Perhaps it’ll be used in that formal report that they’ll be distributing to the Senate.”
Siri brought the airspeeder through a lazy turn through the rough semi-circle of closed-off city blocks bordering the wounded Senate Building, but paused before heading back to the Temple when something caught her eye.
“Who is that?” Knight Abrub wondered as he squinted at the dull green airspeeder that was hovering just off to the side of the black scorch marks two thirds down the damage path. “What are they doing?”
“That is Master Kenobi,” Siri answered with a sigh. “He wanted to see the scene for himself.”
“Wasn’t Master Kenobi dispatched to Utapau?” Knight Bhaat chirped in his high-pitched voice.
“He came back,” she shrugged, frowning as she watched Obi-Wan’s airspeeder drift along the border of the damage very, very slowly.
“Do you think he’s going to find anything?” Knight Abrub asked, scratched at the base of one of his brow horns with his index finger. “He’s a Master on the Council, so maybe-”
Obi-Wan’s airspeeder stopped its slow, drifting descent and abruptly cut to the side, away from the Senate Building wall and towards the nearest neighboring skyscraper, which made him disappear from their view.
“Ooh, it looks like he’s found something!” the Chadra-Fan Jedi squeaked. “Let’s go join him! Maybe we can help.”
“May we, Master Tachi?” Knight Abrub asked, his dark eyes glittering with interest. “It’s not like we found anything of vital importance that needs to be brought back to the Temple right away.”
“Fine,” Siri agreed, only half-reluctantly, and turned the vehicle back towards the Senate and stepped on the accelerator. “Though I can’t imagine that it’ll be anything exciting with all the searching we’ve already done here.”
As they rounded the corner of the smaller skyscraper, Obi-Wan’s vehicle came back into view hovering near an enormous utility pipe with a diameter that was more than twice as tall as an average Human. There was some slight cosmetic damage to the outer clamshell covering and an abandoned bit of scaffolding was still attached to it, but otherwise it looked just like any other of a million pipes that snaked along the outsides of buildings all over the planet. A light scan of the area through the Force didn’t seem to indicate anything special about the spot and Siri was left deeply puzzled as she watched Obi-Wan abandon the controls of his vehicle to stand, balancing a boot on the driver’s side door so that he could touch the metal pipe.
“What the hell is he doing?” she muttered under her breath as she cautiously edged her own airspeeder to hover parallel and just above his.
“Could something be inside the pipe?” Knight Bhaat wondered, flaring all four of his nostril slits with an interrogative sniff.
“How would anything get in there?” Knight Abrub muttered. “Utility pipes are sealed systems.”
Siri almost shouted at Obi-Wan over the ten meter gap to find out just what he thought he was doing, when she sensed him draw on the Force. The top half of the pipe cover rattled, creaked, and lifted a few inches from the bottom cover before sticking. He worked at it for a minute before releasing the metal cover with a clang and then drew his lightsaber.
He’s not going to-
Obi-Wan lit the blue blade and dug the tip into the pipe covering, then slowly and carefully started to cut. Siri blinked in shock seeing careful and cautious Obi-Wan use his lightsaber on a utility pipe without knowing exactly what was in it. Those kinds of pipes could contain anything from water mains and power cables to sewer lines and pipelines of hazardous chemical waste.
“What does he think is in there?” the Devaronian Jedi asked.
“No idea,” Siri muttered to the pair of younger Jedi as she edged her airspeeder closer so that they could assist Obi-Wan if it became necessary.
As she watched her old friend trace out a glowing rectangle in the pipe, Siri again called upon the Force to see if she could figure out what was so special about this spot. Again nothing really stood out to her senses, even when she closed her eyes to deepen her focus. The Force was murky here, like a flooded river filled with silt and debris, and it brought her no guidance or insight. It was like looking into a dark room without a lamp and trying to determine what were solid objects and what were just shadows.
A metallic groan snapped her eyes open in time to watch the cut-out section of pipe tumble loose and down to the streets fifty stories below. Siri clutched at the steering yoke in anticipation as the interior was revealed. There looked to be bundles of power and communication cables running through it, but tangled amongst them…was…
Vader?!
Siri’s jaw dropped as she made out a Human form twisted within the rat’s nest of disturbed cables and wires. Its clothing was shredded and scorched and an entire boot appeared to be missing. And its skin was chalk white like a corpse’s and splotched with what looked like blotches of severe sunburn and smears of grime.
“Stars above, there was someone in there!” Tirit Bhaat squeaked, his high-pitched voice reaching a shrill level.
“Is he still alive?” Knight Abrub wondered, half-leaning out of the airspeeder to get a better look.
They were close enough now for Obi-Wan to be able to hear them over the wind, but he seemed utterly oblivious to their presence as he put away his weapon and stepped into the hole he’d cut, mindful of the glowing-hot edges. Siri watched with bated breath as Obi-Wan crouched down and examined the young man with a shaking hand. And then she saw Obi-Wan’s back stiffen, tasted his hope on her tongue, and she knew.
“Head back to the Temple without me and have the Healers standing by,” she instructed the Knights before vaulting from her airspeeder to Obi-Wan’s, and then to the pipe, without waiting for their confirmation.
The Force connected them as if they were fighting a battle together-Obi-Wan’s purpose became hers, and her emotional distance from Vader balanced out his frantic urgency. Without wasting any words, Siri aided her old friend in disentangling Vader from the wires and cables, careful to avoid jostling him and disturbing any injuries that they couldn’t see. And once the young Jedi had been freed, he was loaded into the airspeeder’s backseat with his former Master while Siri took the wheel and floored it back to the Temple.
The journey back to the Grand Temple was something of a blur. Siri’s focus was on her piloting as the airspeeder blazed around the choked traffic patterns between the locked-down zone and their destination. The vague doubts that she’d harbored concerning Vader and the Supreme Chancellor were all but erased. She couldn’t imagine that Vader would help the Chancellor in any way if it led to him being hurt so badly, or killed. It just wasn’t in what she knew of his character. Distantly she was aware of Obi-Wan speaking to Vader, but the roaring sound of the wind in the open-top speeder made it impossible to hear whether he was trying to wake the injured man up or comfort him.
After what felt like an eternity they arrived back in the Temple Hanger. Siri almost cursed upon landing when she saw that there were no Healers waiting. But then she realized that her crazy piloting would have left the other Knights little time to carry out her orders. If they drove as conservatively as Obi-Wan usually did, it was possible that she’d even beaten them back to the Temple.
Shaking off the lingering adrenalin buzz from the frantic rescue, Siri turned around the in the driver’s seat to check on her passengers.
Obi-Wan was wedged in the corner of the backseat with Vader awkwardly draped across his lap and the rest of the back of the speeder. The Jedi Master hadn’t bothered to use the seat restraints and had held himself and his former pupil inside the vehicle by clinging to the door with one arm. And, now that she took the time to really look at him, Vader looked even worse than he had when he’d been wedged in the pipe. The front of his tunics were almost completely burned away and shredded, his black leather glove was totally gone, and the metal hand underneath was scorched and clearly damaged.
And then her visual examination halted as her ears finally registered what Obi-Wan was saying to his unconscious former student, and she frowned in confusion.
Why is Obi-Wan calling him “Anakin”?
Chapter 4
The Lost is Found
He was so very, very tired. The blue smoky presence had helped and was still helping. But the fight against the Darkness had gone on for so long that he simply couldn’t last much longer. His shredded and frayed ethereal self was starting to fade…
Yes, Lord Vader, let go. Fade away. Leave your body behind for me!
Don’t give in yet, Anakin. I’m still with you. Hold on just a little while longer.
He wanted to do as the kinder presence asked. He didn’t want to fall to the Darkness and be consumed. But the Darkness was relentless and crafty. Periodically it would pull back a bit on its assault before lashing out with a single powerful and narrowly focused attack. It would briefly pierce the shield of the blue smoke and dig deep into him, tearing at old scars on his spirit and making them bleed afresh.
There is no point in your struggle. There is no hope for you. You started down the Dark Path long ago. It is your destiny.
There is always hope, Ani. You’ve come a long way since we last met. There is only a little further for you to go. Your future is yours to make.
He struggled to rally his strength and keep on fighting…but it was so hard.
He was so tired…so very, very tired.
…He didn’t know how much longer he could last.
***
Sabé sat at the side of the medical cot on Bail Organa’s private vessel where her friend and employer lay and worried. She really didn’t know how they’d managed to spirit Padmé out of the Senate building without being accosted by any other Senators or lurking reporters. It had probably helped that the whole Senate was still in an uproar over the Supreme Chancellor’s death, and Jar Jar had started blubbering incoherently and made a big scene to draw all nearby attention on himself. And it was supremely lucky that Senator Organa had been there, and that his ship was parked very close by.
Padmé was deathly pale and still, but it was an improvement over the ashen-hued hyperventilating mess that she’d been in the Senate. Senator Organa’s private doctor had given her a mild sedative to help her rest comfortably and run a few tests to insure that she and her unborn child hadn’t been harmed by her episode. No damage had been done, so now it was just a matter of waiting for Padmé to wake up.
Why? Sabé chewed at her lower lip and clutched at the intricate hair ornament that she’d removed from Padmé’s head so that the Nabooan Senator could rest easier. Things had been going so well. Vader learned of the pregnancy and Padmé was finally going to return home to Naboo. And now this…
Tears of frustration and grief burned at the back of her eyes, but Sabé let them go no further. Right now her friend needed her and she would hold it together for her sake. She would weep later in private when there was nothing that needed doing.
It’s not fair, she raged internally. It’s just not fair! And what the doctor said makes it even worse!
A flickering of Padmé’s eyelids caught Sabé’s attention. A few minutes later, the pregnant Senator slowly cracked open her eyes and looked around. Eventually her gaze landed on Sabé and she blinked twice.
“Sabé?” she croaked hoarsely. “Where am I?”
“The medical bay of Senator Organa’s ship, the Tantive IV,” Sabé replied quietly. “How are you feeling, Milady?”
Padmé didn’t immediately reply. Instead, her right hand drifted up to grasp the cursed wooden pendant that Vader had gifted her, and her left hand moved to rest upon her pregnant belly. Her eyes fluttered closed and Sabé wondered if it was the sedative still lingering in her system.
“Padmé?”
“Did…did Master Windu really say that…that Vader…”
“Yes,” Sabé confirmed very reluctantly. “Yes, Master Windu said…that.”
Padmé’s face twisted in pain and the hand resting on her belly trembled. “I…I had hoped that I’d just-just dreamed it. But he really…he really…”
“Please, try to stay calm,” Sabé murmured, grasping her friend’s left hand as her breathing grew ragged. “It’s not good for you to get so stressed.”
“The baby,” Padmé rasped, her eyes growing wide. “Nothing-nothing happened to the baby, did it?”
“No,” Sabé hurriedly reassured her. “Senator Organa’s doctor didn’t find any problems. But…Padmé, there’s something that you need to know.”
The Senator’s brow furrowed in confusion at her tone. “What?”
“You’re not just carrying one child,” Sabé informed her. “There are two.”
“Two?” Padmé repeated blankly.
“Twins,” Sabé said with a nod.
The Senator stared at her in incomprehension and Sabé wondered if she was in a clear enough state of mind to grasp what she’d been told. Then, very slowly, understanding washed over her face. And then the tears came.
Her own heart clenching in sympathy, Sabé set the hair ornament aside and moved to sit on the side of the cot and hold Padmé’s head in her lap.
It won’t be one fatherless child, but two. Poor Padmé. It’s just not fair!
***
It was late afternoon when Obi-Wan finally dropped out of hyperspace into the crowded space lanes of Coruscant. The bustling space ways choked with traffic showed him that whatever he’d sensed back on Utapau wasn’t terrible enough to disrupt the capital as a whole. He should’ve felt some reassurance that there wasn’t a battle raging over the city-planet like there had been the last time that he’d returned.
But his sense of urgency and dread only intensified.
Leaving the navigating to Geenine, Obi-Wan focused on stretching out through the Force. Now that he was in the same star system as Anakin he should be able to get a better read on his condition. As the astromech locked onto the Grand Jedi Temple’s beacon and dropped the space fighter towards the atmosphere, Obi-Wan searched for his young companion.
The bond was no longer thinned by distance, but it was still strangely transparent and empty-feeling. Troubled, he flowed down the connection to the other end where the border of Anakin’s mind lay-
Roiling Darkness, cold and malicious, festering and deep, and utterly foreign-
Obi-Wan jerked out of his focused trance with a strangled gasp. When he’d first met Anakin as Dar’ti Vader to boy had exuded darkness due to his previous training under Count Dooku. He was intimately familiar with Anakin’s shadowed taint and it left him certain that what he’d sensed was someone else’s darkness. But how could he be sensing someone else through the bond that tied him to Anakin?
Geenine chirped a warning at him and Obi-Wan set about recovering his composure as his Eta-2 swooped into the opening maw of the Temple’s hanger bay. By the time that the brass-colored droid had landed the green-trimmed fighter on an open landing platform his breathing was back under control and he had re-centered himself. Leaving the astromech to handle the ship’s shut-down and maintenance procedures, Obi-Wan climbed out of the fighter and strode off at almost his usual pace to find one of his colleagues on the High Council.
He aimed to find Mace first if possible. With himself and Master Yoda both off-planet, the Haruun Kal Master was next in line to look after Anakin. But if he stumbled over one of the other Masters, like Kit Fisto or Shaak Ti, he’d gladly seek their aid instead.
The sooner that he found out what was going on with his former apprentice, the better.
Obi-Wan exited the hanger complex and started to work his way to the residence halls, only to nearly collide with a body rushing the other way from a side corridor.
“What the-Obi-Wan?”
“Siri?” he sputtered, belatedly recognizing his fellow Jedi Master and former childhood friend. “What’s the rush?”
“I was asked to pick up Knight Bhaat and Knight Abrub from their search for security footage from buildings around the Senate Rotunda,” she answered, tucking a loose lock of blonde hair behind her ear. “I thought that you were on Utapau.”
“I was,” he replied. “What happened at the Senate?”
Siri hesitated for a moment before stepping closer to him and answering.
“The Council discovered that the other Sith Lord was the Supreme Chancellor, and they moved to arrest him in his office. He fought back and wounded Master Windu and killed the others. The Chancellor was about to kill Master Windu when Vader showed up and plowed him out the window, and then there was some kind of massive explosion. I was part of the search effort afterwards, but there wasn’t a whole lot left to find. Master Windu and Master Ti just informed the Senate a few hours ago, although I’m sure that they had to do some creative reporting to keep the Senators from descending into chaos.”
Obi-Wan rocked back on his heels and struggled to process what he’d just been told.
“Palpatine was a Sith Lord?!”
It was a shocking idea and one that he found difficult to swallow. He’d been in the Supreme Chancellor’s presence several times before and during the war and neither saw nor sensed anything that showed the man to be anything other than a mildly corrupt politician. He hadn’t even felt a hint of the other man’s Force sensitivity. But there had been a pall of Dark Side energy hanging around the Senate Building for years, faint and diffuse yet always present.
“That’s what I said,” Siri confirmed. “It’s hard to believe that he was under our noses for decades and not a single Jedi picked up on his true nature.”
“So where is Vader now?” he asked. “The Halls of Healing?”
“Obi-Wan,” she said slowly. “You heard me when I said that there was an explosion? And there wasn’t much left to find afterwards?”
“You think that he’s dead,” he stated flatly.
“He went out of an office building window and was at the heart of a huge blast,” she responded. “Master Windu and Master Ti gave up looking for him.” Her face softened. “Master Windu has his lightsaber, if you want to hang onto it for a while.”
Obi-Wan almost argued with her. He knew that Anakin was still alive. The bond between them was still intact, which meant that he was still breathing at the other end. But instead he simply shook his head and walked away.
Siri was stubborn and he didn’t have to time to convince her that he wasn’t simply suffering from denial. The foreign darkness that he’d sensed where Anakin should be and what he’d learned from Siri only underlined the vital importance of finding the young man as quickly as possible. And now he knew where on Coruscant to start looking.
“Where are you going?” she called after him.
“To the Senate Building,” he replied as he continued back to the hanger.
He didn’t bother to see if she had anything else to say to him or if she would try to follow him. Obi-Wan simply retraced his steps to the hanger and then diverted to the motor pool. Quickly selecting an open-topped airspeeder, he rushed through the vehicle check-out process and lifted off for the Senate.
Sliding into the complex aerial traffic patterns, Obi-Wan battled his sense of dread and guilt. His duty to Anakin had been not only to teach him to be a Jedi, but to protect him from the Sith Lords that he had fled from as a young teenager. On Geonosis he’d failed and dragged Anakin into a confrontation with Count Dooku that had resulted in the young man losing his right arm. And now he’d been elsewhere when Anakin had faced down Dooku’s Sith Master and the consequences could turn out to be far direr than a simple maiming.
I’m on my way, Anakin.
His hands squeezed the steering yoke with a white-knuckle grip.
Please don’t let me be too late.
***
Siri chewed at the inside of her cheek as she piloted an airspeeder to the plaza in the locked down district by the Senate Building where her Jedi comrades were waiting for her. She’d considered chasing after Obi-Wan, but it was only a brief thought. He clearly wouldn’t be receptive to anything that she might say and he definitely wouldn’t take her doubts about Vader well if she were to let any hint of them slip.
It’s going to be like losing Master Jinn for him all over again, she thought grimly. He bonded too close again. Losing his Master drove him to Corellia…what will losing his student do to him?
Shaking her head, Siri signaled to the clone troopers that were keeping up a patrol over the closed streets and steered the airspeeder down to a landing pad. As the airspeeder’s engine spooled down to a low idle the two Jedi who had been awaiting her arrival strode over to the vehicle. She exchanged polite greetings with the Devaronian and Chadra-Fan Knights before asking about their assignment.
“Did you find anything?”
“No,” the Devaronian, Beelz Abrub, muttered with a grimace. “Nothing of any real use, anyway. The closest cameras were completely slagged by the blast, the mid-range views were corrupted by some kind of EMP, and the cameras furthest out only show partial low-resolution views of the explosion.”
“It didn’t help that there weren’t a lot of security recorders that were facing the right way and at the right level to catch the explosion in the first place,” the Chadra-Fan, Tirit Bhaat, said with a shrug of his tiny shoulders. “There’s not much reason to have a lot of cameras looking outward mid-way up skyscrapers where there aren’t many entrance or exit points to watch. But we did collect what little there was anyway.”
“I’m sure that the High Council will find some way to make use of what you’ve found,” Siri replied and started to lift the airspeeder up from the landing pad. “Perhaps it’ll be used in that formal report that they’ll be distributing to the Senate.”
Siri brought the airspeeder through a lazy turn through the rough semi-circle of closed-off city blocks bordering the wounded Senate Building, but paused before heading back to the Temple when something caught her eye.
“Who is that?” Knight Abrub wondered as he squinted at the dull green airspeeder that was hovering just off to the side of the black scorch marks two thirds down the damage path. “What are they doing?”
“That is Master Kenobi,” Siri answered with a sigh. “He wanted to see the scene for himself.”
“Wasn’t Master Kenobi dispatched to Utapau?” Knight Bhaat chirped in his high-pitched voice.
“He came back,” she shrugged, frowning as she watched Obi-Wan’s airspeeder drift along the border of the damage very, very slowly.
“Do you think he’s going to find anything?” Knight Abrub asked, scratched at the base of one of his brow horns with his index finger. “He’s a Master on the Council, so maybe-”
Obi-Wan’s airspeeder stopped its slow, drifting descent and abruptly cut to the side, away from the Senate Building wall and towards the nearest neighboring skyscraper, which made him disappear from their view.
“Ooh, it looks like he’s found something!” the Chadra-Fan Jedi squeaked. “Let’s go join him! Maybe we can help.”
“May we, Master Tachi?” Knight Abrub asked, his dark eyes glittering with interest. “It’s not like we found anything of vital importance that needs to be brought back to the Temple right away.”
“Fine,” Siri agreed, only half-reluctantly, and turned the vehicle back towards the Senate and stepped on the accelerator. “Though I can’t imagine that it’ll be anything exciting with all the searching we’ve already done here.”
As they rounded the corner of the smaller skyscraper, Obi-Wan’s vehicle came back into view hovering near an enormous utility pipe with a diameter that was more than twice as tall as an average Human. There was some slight cosmetic damage to the outer clamshell covering and an abandoned bit of scaffolding was still attached to it, but otherwise it looked just like any other of a million pipes that snaked along the outsides of buildings all over the planet. A light scan of the area through the Force didn’t seem to indicate anything special about the spot and Siri was left deeply puzzled as she watched Obi-Wan abandon the controls of his vehicle to stand, balancing a boot on the driver’s side door so that he could touch the metal pipe.
“What the hell is he doing?” she muttered under her breath as she cautiously edged her own airspeeder to hover parallel and just above his.
“Could something be inside the pipe?” Knight Bhaat wondered, flaring all four of his nostril slits with an interrogative sniff.
“How would anything get in there?” Knight Abrub muttered. “Utility pipes are sealed systems.”
Siri almost shouted at Obi-Wan over the ten meter gap to find out just what he thought he was doing, when she sensed him draw on the Force. The top half of the pipe cover rattled, creaked, and lifted a few inches from the bottom cover before sticking. He worked at it for a minute before releasing the metal cover with a clang and then drew his lightsaber.
He’s not going to-
Obi-Wan lit the blue blade and dug the tip into the pipe covering, then slowly and carefully started to cut. Siri blinked in shock seeing careful and cautious Obi-Wan use his lightsaber on a utility pipe without knowing exactly what was in it. Those kinds of pipes could contain anything from water mains and power cables to sewer lines and pipelines of hazardous chemical waste.
“What does he think is in there?” the Devaronian Jedi asked.
“No idea,” Siri muttered to the pair of younger Jedi as she edged her airspeeder closer so that they could assist Obi-Wan if it became necessary.
As she watched her old friend trace out a glowing rectangle in the pipe, Siri again called upon the Force to see if she could figure out what was so special about this spot. Again nothing really stood out to her senses, even when she closed her eyes to deepen her focus. The Force was murky here, like a flooded river filled with silt and debris, and it brought her no guidance or insight. It was like looking into a dark room without a lamp and trying to determine what were solid objects and what were just shadows.
A metallic groan snapped her eyes open in time to watch the cut-out section of pipe tumble loose and down to the streets fifty stories below. Siri clutched at the steering yoke in anticipation as the interior was revealed. There looked to be bundles of power and communication cables running through it, but tangled amongst them…was…
Vader?!
Siri’s jaw dropped as she made out a Human form twisted within the rat’s nest of disturbed cables and wires. Its clothing was shredded and scorched and an entire boot appeared to be missing. And its skin was chalk white like a corpse’s and splotched with what looked like blotches of severe sunburn and smears of grime.
“Stars above, there was someone in there!” Tirit Bhaat squeaked, his high-pitched voice reaching a shrill level.
“Is he still alive?” Knight Abrub wondered, half-leaning out of the airspeeder to get a better look.
They were close enough now for Obi-Wan to be able to hear them over the wind, but he seemed utterly oblivious to their presence as he put away his weapon and stepped into the hole he’d cut, mindful of the glowing-hot edges. Siri watched with bated breath as Obi-Wan crouched down and examined the young man with a shaking hand. And then she saw Obi-Wan’s back stiffen, tasted his hope on her tongue, and she knew.
“Head back to the Temple without me and have the Healers standing by,” she instructed the Knights before vaulting from her airspeeder to Obi-Wan’s, and then to the pipe, without waiting for their confirmation.
The Force connected them as if they were fighting a battle together-Obi-Wan’s purpose became hers, and her emotional distance from Vader balanced out his frantic urgency. Without wasting any words, Siri aided her old friend in disentangling Vader from the wires and cables, careful to avoid jostling him and disturbing any injuries that they couldn’t see. And once the young Jedi had been freed, he was loaded into the airspeeder’s backseat with his former Master while Siri took the wheel and floored it back to the Temple.
The journey back to the Grand Temple was something of a blur. Siri’s focus was on her piloting as the airspeeder blazed around the choked traffic patterns between the locked-down zone and their destination. The vague doubts that she’d harbored concerning Vader and the Supreme Chancellor were all but erased. She couldn’t imagine that Vader would help the Chancellor in any way if it led to him being hurt so badly, or killed. It just wasn’t in what she knew of his character. Distantly she was aware of Obi-Wan speaking to Vader, but the roaring sound of the wind in the open-top speeder made it impossible to hear whether he was trying to wake the injured man up or comfort him.
After what felt like an eternity they arrived back in the Temple Hanger. Siri almost cursed upon landing when she saw that there were no Healers waiting. But then she realized that her crazy piloting would have left the other Knights little time to carry out her orders. If they drove as conservatively as Obi-Wan usually did, it was possible that she’d even beaten them back to the Temple.
Shaking off the lingering adrenalin buzz from the frantic rescue, Siri turned around the in the driver’s seat to check on her passengers.
Obi-Wan was wedged in the corner of the backseat with Vader awkwardly draped across his lap and the rest of the back of the speeder. The Jedi Master hadn’t bothered to use the seat restraints and had held himself and his former pupil inside the vehicle by clinging to the door with one arm. And, now that she took the time to really look at him, Vader looked even worse than he had when he’d been wedged in the pipe. The front of his tunics were almost completely burned away and shredded, his black leather glove was totally gone, and the metal hand underneath was scorched and clearly damaged.
And then her visual examination halted as her ears finally registered what Obi-Wan was saying to his unconscious former student, and she frowned in confusion.
Why is Obi-Wan calling him “Anakin”?