Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars. I just eat, sleep, dream and play in that galaxy. This is for fun and not for profit. This galaxy legally belongs to George Lucas and Disney. But in our hearts, it belongs to us all.

This Story is sequel to Ahsoka's Quest and will make more sense if you read that one first.


Recap: This is set after the final episode of Season 5, The Clone Wars, after Ahsoka leaves the order. She went on a quest (see Ahsoka's Quest) to find out what made her friend Barriss Offee turn to the dark side. One thing she found on this quest was a clone of Barriss Offee.


Obi-Wan stood, arms folded, next to Luminara and Anakin. He peered in at the sleeping Clone. The Jedi healers were ministering to her.

"So. It was really Ahsoka who found her."

"Yes." Anakin stared sadly in at the clone of Barriss Offee.

Luminara touched the clear window. Her eyes sad. "And she remembers me? Or thinks she does, due to the imprinting?"

"Yes. She's been unconscious most of the way since we blasted out of the pirate hideout."

"And how is Ahsoka? Where, for that matter? The council would like to debrief her." Obi-Wan asked.

Anakin's fists tightened and he growled. "She is no longer a Jedi padawan to come at their beck and call. She's searching for something. Answers to why Barriss fell to the dark side. More about herself and who she is outside of the Jedi."

Obi-Wan shared a glance with Luminara. Clearly, Ahsoka's departure was still a touchy subject.

"But you brought back her data, and then some. That's good. I presume the pirates abandoned the base."

"Admiral Yularen and the Resolute came in right before we jumped to light speed and dealt with them. They scattered and blew up a lot of equipment but the evidence techs are going through the rest of what they left. Maybe they left a clue to who the Sith is, the Master."

"That would be nice."

Anakin gave him an incredulous look. "You truly are a master of understatement."

"I'm just not getting my hopes up. He's done a brilliant job thus far at covering his tracks."

"But we weren't meant to find this clone of Barriss. Or that lab." Anakin shook his head and turned away to the holo table in the medical lounge. He punched up the file. "I mean, look at this." The lab's contents were gruesome, clearly damaged life forms floated in and were obviously failed experiments. Clear shots of midichlorian counters and other devices for measuring force power. Shock restraints designed for Jedi. "This is not your normal pirate lair."

"No." Luminara was disturbed. "It's not. These are experiments the Jedi seek to discourage."

"It's worse than Jenna Zan Arbor and her experiments on Qui-Gon Jinn." Obi-Wan stared. "Or maybe it just seems so because we didn't find the failures that time."

Vokara Che came to the door, eyes narrowing at the trio. "Master Yoda is on his way. He would like to be fully debriefed. Her eyes fell on Anakin and she searched the room, as if looking for Ahsoka. He met her eyes, and his own still smoldered with buried anger at the way his padawan had been treated. She looked away in apparent disapproval.

"So how is our guest?" Obi-Wan asked politely.

"I prefer to wait for Master Yoda."

Anakin rolled his eyes. "You can't even tell us if she's all right? She fainted clean away and there isn't a scratch on her."

"It depends on your definition of 'all right'."

"Oh. Well. What's yours?" Anakin demanded impatiently. His attention jerked to the door just as Yoda sailed in on his hover chair. The old Jedi perused the group thoughtfully.

"Master Che?"

"The patient is now stable. It appears she was regularly dosed with a cocktail of drugs to keep her confined and test her reaction to them. Now that she's no longer getting them, her body is in withdrawal. To some extent, we shall have to reduce the drugs gradually to wean her off them."

Obi-Wan glanced at Anakin. He could see his thoughts written on his face. Why couldn't she have just told them that?

"The real danger is to her psyche. This is a clone grown far more quickly than with traditional cloning methods. Also….there is evidence of psychic manipulation."

"Meaning?" Obi-Wan asked.

"Someone attempted to….." Vokara hesitated. Closed her eyes and folded her hands. "I believe someone was attempting to brainwash her. In a far more complete and conditioned way than the average clone, which receives training and imprinting. Evidence says it was a powerful Force User."

"Terrific."

"Can she be healed?" Luminara asked quietly.

"Perhaps. I do not believe the attempts were entirely successful. Or perhaps, they simply weren't complete."

"Like to speak to her I would."

"Of course, Master." Vokara Che pursed her lips. "But only you, please, too many would overwhelm her at this delicate stage."

Yoda stumped through the door, well aware of Anakin's snort behind him.

The clone of Barriss lay in the fetal position, curled on her side. She straightened and sat up when Yoda came in.

"Master Yoda….Oh." She felt very awkward.

"Greetings, young one." Yoda neatly bypassed the name problem. He hovered next to her and gave her a kind look.

The girl blinked at him. Her thoughts were in confusion, her emotions tangled.

"If know yourself, you do not, hard it is to know what to do."

"Yes. Who am I, if I am not Barriss Offee? I'm just a clone, grown in a lab."

"Many clones have I known. All of Jango Fett. Yet none are he, and each are themselves."

The girl put her arms around her knees. "How did they find out who they are?"

"Experience. Training." Yoda observed her. "And perhaps….the wrong question you ask. Who do you want to be?"

"I want to be Barriss. But is that what the people who made me want me to feel? And I don't know if it's a good thing, to want to be someone others see as a traitor." She paused. "Who became a traitor." She shook her head. "I am her and have her memories and yet in spite of that … I still can't see how she made such a decision."

"To many who support the Separatists, see us as the traitors they do."

She stared at him. "How do I decide?"

"Out of the situation you must take yourself."

"I think I'm already out of it. I was born in a tank. How can I be in it?"

"An agenda someone had for you. Fulfill it will you? Or choose your own? Said you did that this man was evil?"

She shivered. "It was like a cold hand touched me when he looked at me."

Yoda nodded. "Then on the right path you are. Know right from wrong you do. Help you we will, if you will allow us."

"Oh. Of course I will." She stared uneasily at him. "What…..becomes of the real Barriss? Will I be allowed to see Master Luminara? Or…does she not want to see me?"

"See her now, you may. As for Barriss…hard to say." Yoda's lips turned down. "Want her executed does the military. But already made one mistake we did, and cost us young Tano it has. And tell no tales will the dead."

"Will Ahsoka be all right? She helped me escape. But when I woke here, they said she was gone."

Yoda nodded. "Find her own path, she must. But welcome her back we will, if choose to come she does." Yoda sat and considered her thoughtfully.

"A free person you are young clone. So. Ask you I will. If too confusing it is to be a second Barriss, another name would you choose?"

The clone gaped in surprise. "I hadn't thought about it. May I?"

"Of course."

"Thank you. Oh. Will you thank Anakin for me? For bringing me here?"

"Mm. Yes. Let you thank him yourself I would. But too much company, allow it the healers will not." Yoda turned away. "Send in Luminara I shall."

Yoda hummed out of the room on his hover chair. "Like to see you she would, Master Luminara."

Luminara hurried forward, then checked herself to her usual dignified pace. Her own uncertainty vibrated the force. What responsibility did she have to the clone? Some? None? Did she want it?

Anakin stared after her, scowling.

"Wants me to thank you she does, young Skywalker."

Anakin jerked his eyes to Yoda.

"No doubt tell you herself she will, when allowed more visitors she is."

Anakin nodded slowly.

"It does feel awkward. It was a bit hard to get used to all the clone troopers with Jango's face. Somehow it's even stranger to feel from a Jedi."

Yoda nodded. "Disturbing this is, that to clone a Jedi they would."

Anakin still stared into space.

"Troubled you are." Yoda observed.

"Much too quiet for Anakin." Obi-Wan observed.

Anakin came back slowly, flushing. He flexed his hands. "Barriss was my friend. Ahsoka's friend. I don't understand how she could frame her. To disagree with the war…well, I may not understand it, but lots of Jedi have done that. But to commit murder and frame Ahsoka? Why? Why not just openly join the Separatists, or refuse to fight the war? And why Ahsoka in particular?"

"Good questions they are. The only answer, that to the dark side she has gone."

"But…." Anakin shook his head. "Look, I know I didn't know Dooku, so it wasn't the same for me. And I didn't really know any that have fallen. But I can see the disagreement, I just can't see destroying someone who you were friends with that way. To frame them?"

"Perhaps she was jealous. But that is pure speculation."

"Jealous of what?"

"Ahsoka. Or you."

Anakin's eyes widened in confusion.

"Vital to the war effort you are. If disapproves she does, hurting you a statement makes."

Anakin still looked bewildered. A comlink signaled. "Needed I am." Yoda sighed wearily and turned his hover chair away.

"Let's go get something to eat. No point hanging around here, Master Che clearly isn't in a mood to be accommodating."

Anakin would rather go to Padme. But he didn't want to make Obi-Wan suspicious either. Anyway, she was in the Senate. "Okay."

Anakin looked around at the temple dining hall as he and Obi-Wan took their seats.

"One thing is certain. We should always enjoy the food here. It beats starship rations."

"True." Anakin acknowledged. Though it didn't beat Padme's. Due to the constant separations, it was only recently he'd discovered she was an excellent cook.

"Obi-Wan?" "Yes?"

"Why would Barriss be jealous of me?" Anakin stared at him in puzzlement.

"You have received quite a bit of attention of late. You are a war hero Anakin. And like it or not, people look up to you. Also, you've had very nearly the same time to train she did, since she came at birth and you came late. Yet you were knighted far sooner."

"The council never seems satisfied. And yet they still call me the Chosen one and expect me to save them. From what or how they can't tell me, though they still think they can tell me how not to do it. It's hard to imagine why anyone would be jealous of that."

"Anakin, I am proud of your many successes. But you were knighted earlier than average. I don't say this because of any doubt in your abilities, but just because war forced it to be sooner, casting aside a need for further experience in some areas. We have few enough healers, Barriss being one, but they seldom get a thank you either."

"And here I thought Jedi weren't supposed to want thanks."

"Yet here you are complaining you don't get it."

"They've never approved of me and they still don't. No matter how many victories, how hard I work, how much I give, the council still looks at me as if I'm defective. I just want them to stop looking at me like that."

"You are the Chosen One and therefore they demand more."

"And I'm still human and I need the same as any man. I agree with Ahsoka on this, on why she left. There doubt wears on you. But for me it's always been there. To her, it was a shock. She grew up believing the Jedi were her family and it would always be there. They saw her as one of them. Then she's just cast out, just like that. They had already decided before calling her to judgement with only a minimal investigation." Anakin's lips pursed. "If they weren't convinced I'm the Chosen One, I know they'd do the same to me."

"She was accused of murder, Anakin. And it was not a unanimous decision." Obi-Wan sipped his drink, eyes roaming the room and noting how comparatively empty it looked. So many Jedi dead or in the field.

"Who voted for it?"

"It doesn't matter." Obi-Wan replied, knowing Anakin would probably guess nonetheless.

Anakin didn't reveal his own inward shiver. No-one had accused him, but he knew how they'd feel about what he'd done after his mother's murder. What would become of him if he was cast out? Yes, he had plenty of skills. But he still felt somehow as if he would be losing protection against something. What the something was, he wasn't sure. "Accused, not convicted."

"For whatever it's worth, you know they rarely agreed with Qui-Gon either. And in many ways, you do take after him. You have that independent streak."

"I really wish I thought that was the only reason." Anakin poked moodily at his meat. "That they just thought it was age…or doubted because it was Qui-Gon who found me….I." He considered. "It doesn't feel like a compliment, but if they treated him that way…"

"He'd understand." Obi-Wan tore a bite out of his biscuit, chewing carefully and swallowing. "I think, getting back to my point, that the needs of the Jedi and our role as peace keepers has changed. We aren't all comfortable, let alone happy about it. You and your independent streak fit what we need in the here and now. But what happens when the war ends? You've become a fine warrior and leader of soldiers Anakin. One of the best. But will you be as fine at keeping the peace? You have that ability, but it hasn't had the chance to be nurtured."

Anakin stared hard at him. "You don't think I can do it, either."

"On the contrary. I think you can, but you do need practice. Anakin, everyone has a weakness. Like a muscle that needs to be exercised frequently or it atrophies. Your 'peace keeper' muscles are yours. You know how to deal with the conflict when it starts. Keeping it from starting? That's another matter." Anakin sighed and reluctantly turned to his food. It gave him time to think.

Finally he asked, "What will they do with Barriss? The real Barriss?"

"Right now, the council and various other Jedi are trying to find out why she did what she did."

"They didn't do that with Ahsoka."

"They were asked to give her to the military."

"And they didn't ask for Barriss."

Obi-Wan paused, uncomfortable. "They have now. It took longer. I think they just were embarrassed at how close they came to killing the wrong person."

"But the council hasn't voted to give her over."

"Not yet, no. They want answers."

Anakin's eyes were narrow at this. "It never occurred to them to challenge Tarkin. Did it occur to any of them that he might be biased against Ahsoka from the start? Remember how Master Piell gave her those hyperspace plans before he died? Tarkin was pretty unhappy that she wouldn't share them. He felt they should go straight to the chancellor and only him. But because Master Piell ordered her to give them to the council, she did. Did they forget that?"

Obi-Wan sighed. "No. Do you really think Tarkin is a traitor? That he intentionally would convict an innocent?"

"I didn't say that. Just that he was predisposed to disbelieve her and not investigate further from the start. I wonder if Barriss knew that … "

"Anakin, do you really want them to execute Barriss? Don't you want answers too?"

"No. But it's not fair to treat her better then they treated Ahsoka. Was it just because she was my padawan they found it so easy to cast her out?"

"Oh Anakin." Obi-Wan sat back in exasperation. "Do you really believe that?"

Anakin looked down, stirring the few pieces of food on his plate.

"I think they cared more about politics than justice." He replied, sidestepping the question.

"Normally you are all for appeasing the military and the Chancellor."

"This isn't normal. Our house, our rules."

"And your padawan." "That too."

To be continued.


Note:

Jenna Zan Arbor and her experiments on the Jedi are told in the Jedi Apprentice series by Jude Watson.