I watch as the bounty hunters drag Obi-Wan upright. "What do we do with Kenobi?" Sing sneers as Obi-Wan sways in their grasp, blood painting his cream colored tunics like a canvas of pain.
Cad Bane gives Obi-Wan a satisfied look, pleased with his handiwork. "The boss gave us orders to kill him if Skywalker didn't cooperate."
Sing laughed, a high pitched mocking sound. I cringe from the floor, wondering how I'm going to get Obi-Wan out of here alive when he can barely stand. "Were there any specific details on this death warrant?" She asks coldly.
"Yes." Bane drawls, "One. That we kill him-" he shakes Obi-Wan, sending him staggering, "With Skywalker watching."
"No!" I gasp as a reflex. This can't be happening. How did it even get this far? All I remember is bits and pieces…
"Now really Anakin, it couldn't have been that bad." Obi-Wan laughs as I glare at him.
"That's what you think." I growl, punching in the code for our diplomatic suite, "You weren't the one that had hands crawling down your pants." Another burst of cheerful laughter that I can't help relishing. .
"I'm truly sorry Anakin, but I was a bit busy negotiating and you were just the distraction the opposition needed to be counted out of the final vote."
"Sure, Master." I grumble as I throw my diplomatic cloak onto the couch. "You were busy negotiating." He smiles widely, the laughter still lingering in his blue-green eyes as he hands me a cup of the fresh brewed tea that the planet is known for.
"To the successful negotiation and mission." He says, holding his cup to my own, "And let there be many more."
We both drink deeply without bothering to check for tampering. Why bother when you've already swayed the opposition to your side? First mistake. It hits me first, like a punch to my stomach. "Anakin?" Obi-Wan asks, all teacherly concern.
Then it throbs back, even stronger. "Anakin, are you all righ-" His normally crisp tone is cut off as he doubles over as well, placing a hand on the wall behind him and grimacing as he tries to ride the pain. "We've been poisoned." He forces out through a groan.
My hands scrabble for the toxic suppressors on my belt, only to still as I realize that we're both wearing our decorative negotiation sashes to show our intentions of goodwill. They hadn't trusted us with all of the gear in anyway, and we'd been forced to empty out almost everything except protein pellets and water cubes when we first arrived on planet.
"Obi-Wan." I breathe what seems like years later, looking up from my view of the floor.
"I'm sorry, your Master isn't available at the moment Skywalker." A familiar voice hisses as blue fingers tug my face up roughly. "He's sleeping right now, do you want to leave a message on his com and hope he calls back?"
I stiffen and struggle to open my eyes against the pain, dreading that another one of my adopted family will be hurt because I've made a mistake. The picture that greets me is like a scene from my worst nightmares. Obi-Wan is a limp form on the floor, and next to him are the vicious bounty hunters Aurra Sing and Shahan Alana.
"You'll pay for this Bane." I hiss through my teeth, dragging my gaze up as a rough hand twists my head to the side and bares my neck.
"I don't think so Jedi. I think someone is going to be paying me." And the last thing that I see before being pulled into the blackness is a needle pressing into my skin.
I'd woken up feeling like I'd been run over by a bantha in an inescapable cell. My first reaction was to grab for the Force's soothing warmth, but there was nothing there. The cell was dead. No light. No sound. No Obi-Wan.
Hours passed. I waited, chained and trapped, for someone to make the first move.
It had been over twelve hours since my capture when I was roughly dragged into a smaller room by two of Bane's droids and pushed into a large chair. I looked at the bounty hunters, trying to keep my mind off of what was on the table behind them, shooting daggers at them and daring them to try and drag information out of me.
"Alright, Jedi." Sing oozed, dripping with sarcasm and charm. "This is how it works. If you cooperate with us, your precious Jedi friend stays alive. If you don't, he is beaten for each refusal and eventually killed. Do you understand?"
I spat in her face.
When the pain started, it was almost a relief to not think about the muffled cries that I heard after each denial for information. It was too brutal and painful for thinking to be possible, and just as I felt myself starting to slip into the darkness once more a harsh voice called for a stop. "The boss wants this one alive." It snarled as the darkness faded to a semi-conscious gray. I was barely aware of being dragged back into my cell and chained to a wall before everything went black.
I wake up, feeling like every single moving and nonmoving joint was going to scream with the slightest flinch. I was alive though, which came as a surprise. I open my eyes to take stock of my current condition, and then I see him. Obi-Wan. Sprawled face down on the cold cement floor and unmoving. Blood covers his cream tunics and oozes out of the puncture wound in his shoulder. It makes me want to retch as the coppery tang of his blood permeated the air.
I shuffle over to him, heedless of my own hurts. "Obi-Wan!" I croak, my voice hoarse from the interrogation session. I place a hand on his unhurt shoulder and roll him onto his side, covering his cheek with my palm and leaving a red smear against his pale skin. "Obi-Wan!"
Eyelids crack open, and a low moan escapes him. It is the singularly most beautiful sound that I have ever heard. "Ana…kin?" He mumbles, sounding dazed.
"Yeah, I'm here."
"What… happened?"
I grimace as I look at his wounds more closely. He would need a Medic for some of them, but they weren't life threatening. "We were captured by Bounty Hunters Master." I whisper, trying to ease him into a more comfortable position. I'm rewarded with a sharp grunt of pain as the flayed skin of his back chafes against my tunics.
"Oh…" It sounds confused, disconnected, nothing like the man who can go into battle with cracked ribs and injuries that would make a normal person faint. It worries me that he's not coherent yet. He's had worse injuries than this and continued to fight. The revelation hits me like one of the bounty hunters fists. He's been drugged. Even more so than me. They know that I won't leave without him and they've pumped enough chemicals into him that he's deadweight. A deadweight that would be able to feel every movement as his former Padawan carried him over his back as he fled for safety.
I bow my head and search for options. There is always a way out. But after hour upon wearing hour of keeping a silent vigil over a once again unconscious Obi-Wan, I find myself drawing a blank. I am trapped.
Which leads me to here. I'm staring at Obi-Wan who can barely comprehend the situation he's in and a bloodthirsty Bounty Hunter that's holding a blaster leveled at his chest. I feel as twinge as Obi-Wan stares at the weapon, incredulous, as though it's all part of one of his own nightmares that he can't wake from. When I hear the safety click off, I can see in his pained grey eyes that I am his only hope.
"Wait!" I shout, pushing myself to my knees. "I'll tell you what you need to know."
"The Chancellors private residence codes." It's flat, no room for compromise.
"I don't have that kind of clearance."
"My sources tell me that you meet with the Chancellor regularly. Surely you must have some idea…" I shake my head in a caricature of desperate confusion. "I see," Bane drawls. "Maybe this will jog your memory?" Bane gives Obi-Wan a cruel jerk, sending him spinning into the hold of yet another bounty hunter.
All I can hear in my head is screaming. "I don't have access to that information."
"I'll give you five seconds." Bane rasps, making eye contact with Sing. She holds up her slender fingers in a silent countdown. I'm frozen. I can't speak. I can't move. The seconds tick by on Sing's hand, representing the seconds that my Master has to live… Palpatine and Obi-Wan, both counting on me to save them… What do I do? What do I do?
"Time's up Jedi!" Sing snarls, her face twisting into an evil smirk. "Say bye-bye to your Jedi friend." She turns to Obi-Wan, who's looking at the blaster with fear in his eyes, the drugs making his reaction almost comical as he tries to pull away. I watch in mute horror, mouthing silent protests as I pull at the chain that is holding me to the wall, only seeing his eyes, his frightened, terrified eyes as he starts to fight clumsily against the arms holding him. Nonononononono-
A flash. A sharp intake of breath. Obi-Wan stiffens and looks at the smoking hole in his chest, reality dawning on him that this is no nightmare. For some strange reason, that's what if feels like for me. I can only register the most basic of things, like the thud of his knees on the floor. The trickle of blood turning into a flood on his tunic. His eyes, locking onto mine as he falls slowly to the ground.
I yell his name and then the Force is suddenly howling all around me. I use it to break the chain and throw the bounty hunters into the walls around me, the numbness gone and all I can feel in it's place is red and fear and anger as I force fling them out of the room with enough power to snap their necks upon impact. I feel powerful and enraged that they could do such an injustice, and all I want to do is take my revenge on them when I realize that Obi-Wan is still breathing.
"Master?" I whisper, my anger bleeding out of me almost as fast as the blood spilling down his robes. He looks at me, dull eyes trying to make sense of the pain that is his chest. He coughs lightly, and more blood slips out of his mouth as he attempts to form a word.
"Anakin."
"Yes, Obi-Wan. I'm right here with you. I won't leave. Stay with me, Master!" His fading grey eyes look at me, and I can almost see the life slipping away.
"Anakin, don't let me die." He whispers brokenly, each word sounding like he's choking on it as it escapes him. "Please, don't let me die."
"Don't worry, Obi-Wan. I've got you. I won't let you go." My brave Master, afraid, scared and beaten so that my reassurances only make his eyes go wider with fear.
"Please, Anakin… I don't want to die." He gurgles, a clear track of water making its way down his pale, blood smudged face. It's just the drugs talking, I chant in my head. And yet these are the last words my Master is going to say to me. "I… don't want to die…" He whispers, growing fainter and grabbing my arm with a weak strength. This wasn't how it was supposed to end, I howl internally. We were supposed to die in battle, comrades, back to back in some heroic last stand. It wasn't supposed to be me holding his shivering body as the shock forced his body into a last push for life.
"I don't want to die …"
The hand squeezing my forearm goes limp as grey blue eyes roll back. I'm holding a corpse now. A dead body, a hollow shell of the man I knew. I hold it for hours.
When the Republic gunship arrived to retrieve me from whatever planet I was stranded on, I couldn't bring myself to part with his body. I carried him, cradled to my chest like a parent would carry their sleeping child, and I didn't let go until my Padawan pried him from my arms, tears running down her face. The war was over for me. If good men could be killed by a bounty hunter looking for easy money, could be killed without a chance to defend themselves, I no longer wanted to be a part of it. But the truth was, I just couldn't force myself to watch another hero die an inglorious death.
A.N. It's done! Wow, I had this idea in January while on a ski lift and it didn't get out onto paper in what, almost half a year? There has got to be something wrong with me! But this is it, the final product. Shortened to only four pages and hopefully packing a punch. At least it's not bugging me in my sleep anymore. Speaking of which, my bed calls…