Some of his memories were not what they should have been. Some distinctly belonged to his new life, that of Obito Uchiha the jedi padawan of Master Lee Eru, and some had a distinct flavor of Konohagakure and truth to them.
Some, though, were a bastardized mixture of both. It was as if someone had taken the play called Uchiha Obito's memories and placed them in an artistic, modern, setting in deep space like it was a particularly artistic rendition of Macbeth or Hamlet.
So instead of wearing kimono, the uniform of jonin and chunin, or even your standard civilian wear they were dressed in the drab and combat inefficient jedi robes and were seated in the temple gardens (which had clearly, in Obito's new memories, come to replace the Hatake gardens or Konoha's many training grounds).
The words though, those at least, came from Konoha.
They had just finished training, perfecting Obito's steadily improving swordsmanship, and were taking a moment to relax before they each went their separate ways. It was the kind of ritual Obito was very familiar with, in one world and the other. Most of Obito's days with Lee were spent without a mission, and those that weren't explicitly off were spent training and perfecting his craft into one you could expect from not just a chunin who barely scraped by but a jonin.
So, the burn of his muscles was almost pleasant and far from unfamiliar.
"Do you really think there will be a fourth war?" Obito asked her.
She rubbed a hand through her hair, wiping sweat from her forehead, and let out a long sigh. It didn't matter that, per this setting, there hadn't been a true war for the jedi in centuries. Konoha's constant gossip and all the training and preparation for the next inevitable conflict carried over.
"I think, finally, we've bought ourselves some time," Lee finally said, "Iwa's decimated thanks to Minato. An entire generation of their shinobi are now gone, that's not only manpower but also a significant amount of their expertise. It will take them at least ten years to recover even a portion of their strength. Kiri's a self-imploding mess right now that's headed for civil war as fast and as furiously as it can manage. That just leaves Suna and Kumo."
Lee ticked off her fingers, counting off the great hidden villages, "Suna suffered losses. They have a hokage new to leadership with no training from the previous hokage who disappeared into thin air, a new jinchuuriki, and don't have the natural resources to support the same number of shinobi as the other great villages. What they lack in numbers they try to make up in specialization, and they do it well, but they're not going to jump the gun anytime soon on us. That alliance we have with Suna should hold provided nothing happens and we don't do anything stupid."
"As for Kumo," Lee paused, her face darkened, "Those bastards might try something. We won and they know it, as soon as Iwa crumbled they surrendered fast, but they don't like it. They've always been very heavy on blood limits, very covetous of the Hyuuga's eyes especially, and Konoha has many known blood limits. They've attempted kidnappings in the past, if they judge the price is worth it, they'd do it again and throw us all into a fourth war."
She tried to smile then, though it didn't quite reach her eyes, "That said, Konoha's in an unprecedented state. We have more S-ranked shinobi alive and working than have ever existed in a great hidden village before and they're supported by a number of A-ranked troops. With Minato as kage, and myself in the field, we may be able to avoid war longer than ten years."
Obito considered that, considered the early memories of his childhood when the third war had just begun, and then slowly noted, "That's not peace."
Lee laughed, "I didn't say it was peace, I said it was time," her smile disappeared slowly, "Peace, well, I think we're far from peace yet."
She reached out a single hand, as if reaching for something in the difference, "Peace is like chasing rainbows, men have spent their lives, sometimes their very souls, following its elusive beckon thinking it's just beyond the next hill when it never gets any closer. It says a lot that the greatest and worst men I know of did everything in the name of peace."
She let her hand fall with another sigh, clearly intending to put the topic to rest, but her words had piqued both Obito's interest and his underlying ire.
"You mean Madara," he accused.
"And Senju Hashirama," Lee responded, "But yes, I do believe Madara destroyed the village, himself, my clone, that boy Uzumaki Nagato, you, and was prepared to do a whole lot more for peace."
"He always did say that," Obito responded darkly. That much, Madara had always been consistent on. His great, insane, plan went further than Senju Hashirama had ever dared to dream. Madara would give the world true and everlasting peace that didn't rely on the lacking goodwill of men and shinobi.
It was the only damn thing he'd ever said that was in the least bit compelling to Obito.
If he'd known the truth of his scheme, that the illusion was the side effect and simply the means for the vengeful Kaguya to transform and enslave mankind, Obito wasn't sure it'd make a difference to him.
Obito didn't like talking about Madara or his time in the cave.
He'd said what he'd needed to with T&I, recounted everything Madara had said to the best of his ability, and left them to sort out the mess and decide if he was psychologically stable enough to continue missions. Someone had given Obito the green light to become Lee's apprentice, that or Lee had just stormed into someone's office and made it so, and that was the end of it.
Now, if anyone brought it up, Obito didn't have to give them shit about what happened in there. For the most part, everyone respected that, and Obito lived by that.
Lee though, she'd been there at the very end, and sometimes that made it feel okay to bring him up. She had the context to at least come close to understanding that bleak period of Obito's life.
"What the hell would that have even looked like?" Obito asked, "Madara's peace."
That, Madara hadn't been consistent on. If he succeeded, there'd be peace for everybody, but he never described in detail what that would mean or look like. No children in war, no grief or loss, but what did that look like? If they weren't all shinobi then what the hell would they even be doing in the peace illusion while Kaguya munched on their plant zombie brains?
Lee considered that for a moment then said, "Well, either he'd respect Hashirama's marriage and be in a threesome with him and Uzumaki Mito or he'd kick Uzumaki Mito to the curb, multiply Hashirama by ten, and start a harem."
Obito almost died choking on his own spit.
Lee just spared him a look, "He was already starting in the cave, the man clearly knew what he wanted."
Obito wished he could refute that. He really, dearly, wished he could refute that. He didn't think he'd seen anything sexual going on with Madara and any of the zetsus. They'd always been too creepy and inhuman to strike Obito as something you could even pretend to make love to. That said, Madara had been festering in those caves a long time, he'd also been noticeably hung up on the fact that the white zetsus were made from mysterious white goop as well as Senju Hashirama's remains. The man was also noticeably hung up on Hashirama period, often going on mad rants out of nowhere about how the man was an idealistic fool who'd only made things worse. Hashirama's peace, he'd often sneered, was a joke his clan had been so willing to believe in.
The point was that Madara had a collection of plant zombie Senju Hashirama slaves, was clearly hung up on Senju Hashirama and had probably always wanted to marry or bed the man himself, and a lot of free time on his hands.
And if Obito had ever heard the man moaning out of sight accompanied by the sound of rustling leaves…
Lee, however, had no such debilitating horror imagining Uchiha Madara going to town with an enthusiastic enthralled Senju Hashirama, "But, if you were asking me seriously, I honestly have no idea because I think he had absolutely no idea what that would look like."
"That was his trouble, he gave up on the idea of peace in reality, peace won by mankind, because he had no idea how it could possibly happen or what it would look like. He pinned everything on an illusion, a fantasy, because peace to him was nothing more than a fantasy."
Lee frowned, considering Madara's great illusion, "For the kind of peace he wanted, I always imagine that mankind would have to change considerably to suit it. Humans would become incapable of many of the negative emotions that have helped us to survive. Not just grief, rage, hatred, and despair but bitterness, jealousy, caution, you name it. Lying would be gone, even polite lies. The world would simply expand with all the resources necessary to support infinite generations in a reality where death doesn't exist but children still are born and grow into adults. People might have jobs and careers, but at best they'd be particularly engrossing hobbies, and every day would look like the last."
"It'd be fine, for some," Lee concluded softly, "Provided you never really believed in people in the first place."
And that he supposed was the difference between the likes of Senju Hashirama, Lee, and Madara. Lee longed for peace with the same intensity, had the power to make it a reality, but her greatest belief was that peace was to be earned by the likes of Namikaze Minato rather than granted on high by the gods.
Otherwise, it'd be little more than a fantasy, and mankind would cease to be anything remotely human.
Madara though, he didn't care what mankind was or did anymore. If he couldn't make men find peace in his lifetime then he'd bend the will of mankind until it suited his peace. He missed the irony that, in doing so, he made himself unworthy of his own dream.
Funny, though, that for all the equivalents the Force had managed to find for Obito, it had never found an Uchiha Madara equivalent. The trouble was that it was the Force himself that was the Uchiha Madara equivalent, he just didn't have the insight to realize it.
Obito Uchiha was not the first to fall to the dark side in the course of the civil war.
There had been others, notably, there had been a number of padawans who, when confronted with the death of their masters and comrades, had plunged into the dark side and abandoned the Order.
Some disappeared into the ether, lashing out like mad dogs at the jedi when they were tracked down, and often died suffering and alone in the wilderness.
Some joined the Separtist cause, pretending they were Sith apprentices of old, and never realizing that while there could be more than two in the dark side there were only two that mattered. They, too, often died in agony as they bitterly realized that they had been little more than cannon fodder for their new allies.
So far, the order had found and dealt with every last one of them. Only Dooku remained known but unaccounted for, the last and most fearsome traitor to the order. The master, whoever it was, he'd come from outside of the jedi.
Obi-Wan, sitting now in the council, wondered which path Obito Uchiha would choose.
Staring at Lee, standing once again in the center of the room before the council, was likely wondering the same. It'd only been three days since she stood there and yet by the look of her it could have been two lifetimes. Then, as always, she'd been proud and indomnitable, just daring the council to yet again reprimand her for her foolishness and the ideals that were sure to kill both her and her padawan. The boy, now almost a man, had stood behind her as a quiet pillar of support. There'd always been a hint of defiance in his dark eyes, something he could never quite smother, as if constantly asking the council what they dared to do not just against him but her.
Obi-Wan had always mused to himself that Obito Uchiha had seemed far more loyal to his master than he ever had the Order.
The boy had always been a troublesome case. Were it not for Lee, he would have been sent to Telos and everyone knew it, including Lee herself and the boy. Obi-Wan had often wondered if the boy wouldn't abandon the Order someday, or if he'd go as far as falling, but he always thought that for all Obito might turn on the Order he'd never turn on Lee.
Three days later and it seemed that he was wrong.
Lee was still silent, still standing in proud defiance, but it lacked the same effect. Without the padawan behind her it felt as if something was missing, it made her paler, weaker, and looking as if a stray wind might knock her over.
Lee had chosen wrong, as she had been warned, and now they all knew it.
Now she waited for them to condemn her to do what needed to be done.
It was the council, Mace Windu, who spoke first, "It seems, Master Eru, that your faith in your padawan has been misplaced as we warned you it was misplaced five years ago."
Lee said nothing and made no expression. Instead she watched the council as if watching a viper and waiting for it to strike.
"The boy is likely fleeing into the Separatist clutches as we speak," Mace continued, lacing his hands together and giving Lee a knowing look, "More, he appears to have gained unnatural abilities that have never been documented, he will be a great asset to our enemies."
Lee still said nothing, she likely knew what they would say next and why she was here. Truthfully, there didn't need to be a council meeting for this. The council was busy and the solution was obvious. The order had already been passed down through the ranks, one the that the jedi hesitated to give, but would not hesitate from in war time. Capture if possible, otherwise kill on sight.
Given his performance the night before it seemed that capture might be impossible or at the very least extraordinarily difficult. Anakin had him pinned down with the Force and yet, somehow, the boy had been able to fade physically not into the Force but instead out of the Force's grip entirely.
He could have faded from reality but Obi-Wan suspected that the boy would return, perhaps had returned already, and instead had gained the strange ability to slip in and out of the Force as he pleased.
If they found him again, the'd have microseconds not simply to subdue him but also to implant force blockers. Death, no matter how it went against the Order's principles, would be a far more feasible solution.
And one thing above all others seemed clear in the Force: the boy could not be left to his own devices.
He, above all else, would be the turning point in the war and the thing to cause both the republic and perhaps the Jedi Order's destruction.
"Master Eru, if and when you find him again, are you prepared to do what must be done?"
Finally, Lee spoke. Her lips curved into a bitter smile, her eyes seemed to glow, and looking directly at Mace Windu she said, "Assassination is not the Jedi way."
"Subdue him, you must," Yoda said, "Prepared to destroy him, you must be. Otherwise, destroy you is certain."
"The Sith who come from the Jedi Order," Obi-Wan said, making sure Lee was looking directly at him when he said it, "Have historically never spared their former masters. In fact, usually, they make it a point not to."
Dooku had not come for Yoda, his own master, but Yoda was more powerful than he was and he knew it. Others had lacked Dooku's pragmatism and self preservation and often returned to murder their former master at the behest of their new Sith master. That, or even if they were not Sith, they made a point to physically sever what was left of the padawan bond.
Obito Uchiha would come back for her.
Lee just pleasantly smiled, "Well, when I see him again, I'll be sure to ask him why he felt the need to plunge headfirst into the dark side and if he couldn't send me back a post card."
"Taking this seriously, you are not."
"Trigger, there was not," Lee noted contemptuously, "There is always a trigger, always something that sends a Force Sensitive toppling over the edge. Forgive me if I'd like to know exactly what it was."
"Matters not," Yoda chided, "Come back to you, he will not."
"You don't know—"
"Master Eru!" Ki Mundi snapped, "Others have been lost before, you are not the first master to lose an apprentice, do not be so foolhardy to think you are an exception to all others."
"The boy was struggling for years," Mace Windu said, "You knew that better than anything else. More, I'm sure you know exactly what it was that sent him over."
Lee had spent the past few days with him. The boy had only briefly seen his friend Rin in the medic bay, briefly met with Anakin, and the rest of the time had been either spent in the archives or spent with her. If anyone knew what had happened to him, it was her, and she was refusing to say a word.
"Be prepared," Obi-Wan said, "When he comes for you."
Lee said nothing to that, perhaps had nothing to say, or more likely what she had to say would only infuriate and exasperate the council. Lee had always been so willful, both before she was a padawan and now after she was a master. She was extraordinarily talented, well versed in the Force and in control of her emotions, but she always pushed the envelop.
Any other master would have completely severed the bond by now, would have let whatever lingering attachment (that she never should have allowed to develop in the first place) dissolve back into the Force. Yet, even now, Obi-Wan was sure there was a single red thread tying her back to her apprentice.
She would find Obito again someday but Obi-Wan doubted she would have the strength to do what had to be done.
Instead, Lee asked, "And what of the Sith master?"
"What of the Sith master?" Obi-Wan asked with a sigh.
"Why should we waste so much energy chasing my padawan, who has so far done nothing more than run down a hallway like an epileptic chicken then have the gall disappear into thin air, when there's still a far more dangerous threat on the loose?"
"You make a valid point, Master Eru," Obi-Wan said, "However, we have no idea who the Sith master is, only that Dooku is the apprentice."
"Don't we?" Lee asked with a small, amused, smile, "I'm sure he's right under our noses, lurking in the last place we expected to find him."
Another council member spoke up with a sigh, "Even if they don't get a hold of your wayward padawan, that boy has proved that he can easily become a threat."
"Not an existential threat," Lee said, "Trust me when I say that Obito, even high on the dark side, would not bother with the whole of the Jedi Order. You haven't offended him enough to be worth his time. The Sith on the other hand, their priorities have always been clear."
"The Force believes he is an existential threat greater than the Sith," Mace cut in, "You know this as well as any of us, Master Eru."
Lee opened her mouth and then swiftly shut it. Strange, it was not the look of someone who didn't know what to say. Someone who wanted to scream something but found that their opponent had made a point so devastating there were no arguments left. Instead, it looked as if she knew exactly what she wanted to say to that, but for some reason didn't dare to let the words leave her lips.
It was true though. The boy's fate, his presence, lingered about in the Force like a great mocking warning. For letting him escape, the Jedi Order had almost guaranteed his destruction unless he was dealt with immediately. Obi-Wan had never felt the Living Force so certain, so fixated, on anyone or anything before.
Obi-Wan was about to note this but Lee's eyes drifted upwards to the windows. The sky was filled with speeders, the usual midday Coruscant traffic, but nonetheless a small and bitter smile grew across her lips.
Then, with a grin, she said, "Try telling that to Grievous' armada."
Without another word she walked out of the room, robes billowing behind her. Only a second after she disappeared the alarms began blaring in the temple and Grievous' fleet dropped out of hyperspace not simply in the orbit of the core worlds but above Coruscant and the very heart of the undefended republic.
In Anakin's opinion, he made it onto Grievous' commanding ship in record time. Only a half-hour since the fleet warped in, stranding all the clone and Jedi forces in the dust on Separtist colonies or at the very edges of the core planets. A half hour, one sprint to the temple's remaining fighter jets, strapping in R2, a few dog fights in orbit, a kidnapped chancellor, and finally Anakin blasting his way onto the ship.
In his humble opinion, he deserved a medal. As it was Obi-Wan was still stuck out there somewhere, shooting his way through the enemy ships. Unfortunately, the first thing he saw was Lee waiting beside a metallic door in the landing bay, slain droids all around her, looking bored and like she'd been waiting there hours.
"How the hell did you beat me?!" he asked as he vaulted out of his fighter and jogged up to her.
"Anakin, good to see you too, glad you have your priorities in order," Lee said with a small wave of acknowledgement, turning towards the door and punching in the identification code that she either miraculously knew before hand or picked off of someone.
"I do have my priorities in order," Anakin spat back, "And I know that there's no way you could have beat us here."
"Well, Anakin, a magician never reveals his secrets," she said as the door to the lift wooshed open and they both stepped inside.
"What about your priorities?" Anakin asked with a sneer, "If you got here before me why did you even bother to wait?"
"I make it a point to never willingly meet the chancellor alone," Lee said as if this was the most natural thing to say in the world.
"He's been kidnapped!" Anakin snapped back.
Lee, however, as always didn't care about the chancellor's wellbeing or the fact that he wasn't here voluntarily, "Yes, funny that. That man never goes anywhere or does anything he doesn't intend to do. Though I admit, this is a bit flagrant for him, so perhaps this wasn't his idea. Perhaps this is Dooku getting tired of taking orders or else feeling the edge of the knife against his neck. I'll bet you one-hundred credits that the man ends up dead after today."
That was so typical of her. Lee had a deep inexplicable hatred for the chancellor that went years back. Anakin never understood it, Lee had never explained it, but for some reason she loathed the man's guts and the way she talked about him you'd think that he was the Sith master. Anakin had tried to ask the man exactly what had happened between him and Lee, he and Lee weren't always like that after all, but the chancellor had nothing to say. Just that, perhaps since it was a mission on his behalf that Tobirama Senju had been lost on, she still blamed him for that.
She probably hoped that by stalling and waiting for Anakin, the chancellor's captors would kill him off and Lee would get away with the excuse that she was simply waiting for backup before she dared to confront a Sith. No, even for Lee that was a bit much.
Probably, she hoped that by stalling she wouldn't run into her former apprentice out here alone.
That was probably it, Anakin thought. He hadn't had a chance to talk to her since then, no, he'd made a point not to. His life was a mess as it was, Padmé's death taunted him every time he closed his eyes, and he did not need to scream at Lee that everyone and their brother had seen this coming.
He also didn't need the reminder that he'd been the one to let the rat slip through his fingers.
Obito could be anywhere in the galaxy right now, could be on this very ship, and all because Anakin had hesitated to cut his miserable head off.
Anakin wouldn't make the same mistake twice, not with Lee here to be hurt in the crossfire.
Still, he had to say it, "Have you seen Obito yet?"
"He's not here," she said. She wasn't looking at him, instead staring straight forward at the door and the lights rushing past as they moved higher and higher into the ship.
If they were lucky, if the Force was willing, it'd take them all the way to the bridge and straight to Grievous, Dooku, or whoever the hell felt it'd been a great idea to kidnap the chancellor.
"How do you know that?" Anakin asked but Lee just gave him a dry look.
"I just know. He's not here," Lee repeated, giving him that mysterious all-knowing look she sometimes got, "Whatever this is, it has nothing to do with Obito."
Anakin didn't know, he couldn't say he knew Lee's apprentice that well, but a hair brained scheme to kidnap the chancellor out of nowhere and attack Coruscant without the forces needed to hold it, yeah, he could see Obito thinking that was a great idea.
The timing, especially, was very suspect because of that.
"You know what's going to happen to—"
"Oh, for the love of God, Anakin," Lee interrupted him, finally turning to look at him, "It's been a day! It's been a day and the worst he did was disappear! Forgive me if I'm not eager to blow off his head just yet."
"And what are you waiting for?" Anakin asked, "For him to go and kidnap the chancellor. Oh, wait, a second—"
"You know whatever the council's said about him they've said about you," Lee spat back, eyes burning that unnatural, unnerving, green, "How would you feel if the instant you happened to stick your toe into the dark side, Obi-Wan instantly resolved himself to hacking off the limbs you have left and lighting you on fire."
"Do not bring Obi-Wan into—"
"Why not?" Lee asked, "You want to make this personal, by Jove, let's make it personal."
They fell into a tense, awkward, silence, the only sound that of the elevator rushing higher and higher. His synthetic hand fell to his lightsaber blade, ready to call it forth in a moment, Lee did the same.
Finally, the lift came to a sudden halt and the doors opened.
The bridge was curiously empty, the other lifts leading here closed, and no droids or sentients at any of the many radars or controls needed to command not just the ship itself but the fleet. Compared to the red and green blasters of the battle outside it was oddly serene.
Slowly, the commander's chair just in front of the windows, mechanically turned towards them to reveal the chancellor. He looked grim faced, a determined stoicism about him, but unharmed. Apparently, for all their enemies had dared to kidnap him they had not dared to dispose of him, he was the leverage they needed for a surrender.
Anakin made his way towards him, not rushed but not slow either, while Lee trailed behind, searching for an enemy or trap in every shadow.
Upon making it to the man Anakin immediately asked, "Are you alright?"
Lee said nothing, just looked down at him with contempt, as if she really had been hoping he'd be dead before the time they got there.
Palpatine said nothing in response, instead his eyes slid past Anakin, and he said gravely, "Count Dooku."
"Well, Anakin," Lee said quietly as she released her saber from her belt, "It looks as if you're on the path to owing me a pile of credits."
"Shut up, Lee," Anakin spat back, but his heart and focus wasn't in it. This time, he could not fail, he had failed to subdue Dooku once before, failed with Obito last night, but this time he must win.
Dooku flipped down from the bridge and stalked towards them with all the grace and lethal intent of a predatory animal.
Behind them, Palpatine said in a tense voice, "Get help. You're no match for him, he's a Sith Lord."
"You should listen to your chancellor," Dooku mocked as he pulled out his red saber, "You were no match before, why should things be any different now?"
Anakin ignited his blade in time with Lee, "Because I have double the power I did then."
"That just makes you twice as arrogant," Dooku said with a smirk, "And your fall twice as hard."
The fight, as always, was both a blur and in focus. The steps were familiar, honed through years of training and guided by the Force. Anakin parried and fought Dooku up the stairs then down them again, barely noticing as Lee was flung into the wall and out of range.
Dooku, however, was not winning the fight and he knew it. Their blades met, Anakin pushing into his with all his strength, forcing the red and blue lights towards Dooku's vulnerable neck.
"I sense great fear in you, Skywalker," the man hissed as they circled one another, blades still interlocked, "You have hate, you have anger, but you don't use them."
The man ducked, retreating, and allowed the fight to continue. One wrong move, one mistake, and it was another hand or even Anakin's life at risk. Padmé would die, his child would die, and this man would live yet another day and sneer whenever he thought of the arrogant Skywalker brat who tried so hard to kill him.
In the corner Anakin could see Lee picking herself up, stumbling towards them with her blade, but she was too far. Her swordsmanship had always been less than his, always the weakest of her many talents, and she would be no match with a blade against Dooku.
And then there it was, the opening. For a second, Dooku's hands were down, both clutching his blade while Anakin's blade was in the exact position needed. With a single stroke Anakin severed both Dooku's hands, the wound cauterized immediately by the heat.
Before Dooku's blade could clatter to the ground Anakin summoned it into his own hand, ignited it, and used it and his saber to form a triangle against Dooku's unguarded neck. If he so much as twitched, if he did anything but stumble backwards, his head was off his shoulders.
"Anakin!" Lee shouted from somewhere very far away.
"Good, Anakin, good," the chancellor laughed in relief. A breath, a final laugh, and then softly with a smile in his voice, "Kill him."
Dooku turned to look at Palpatine in undisguised horror.
"Kill him now."
Slowly, shaking, Dooku turned to look back up with Anakin. Gone was the arrogance, that smug superiority, and instead only a naked terror as Dooku looked into the face of his merciless death.
"I shouldn't."
It wasn't the jedi way, hadn't that been what Obito had mocked him with the night before? Just try ot kill him, try to assassinate him in cold blood, when that was not the jedi way. Death in battle happened, it was a reality Anakin had known now for three years, but death to an enemy already defeated…
Anakin's silver hand mocked him along with the stark terror and budding hope in Dooku's eyes. The man was beginning to think that he might survive this.
"Do it."
Before Anakin could Dooku shuddered then just as suddenly crumpled forward into Anakin's blades. Anakin stepped back in horror and Dooku hit the metal floor, his spirit gone, fled from this world and into the next.
The chancellor slowly turned his head to look at Lee, who was stalking quietly towards them, placing her saber back into her belt, "He was too dangerous to be kept alive, isn't that what you were about to say, chancellor?"
The chancellor said nothing for a moment, then, he smiled, "Ah, Lee, you always were too clever."
"Not clever enough to escape the realities of war," Lee said, and then pinning Palpatine with a glare, "Or the apparent need to kill unarmed prisoners."
"Neither a Sith Lord nor a Jedi is ever unarmed," Palpatine said with a smile, "Not with the Force at their beck and call. You did well, Lee."
Anakin quickly fumbled with the chancellor's cuffs, releasing him from the chair. Lee however just stared at the man, her expression unreadable and her eyes burning with anything but the serenity expected of a jedi.
Finally, a smile was back on her lips, and she was striding out of the room while Anakin and the chancellor followed, "Try not to look so disappointed, chancellor, I'm sure you'll goad Anakin into chopping off someone else's head next time."
"She doesn't mean it," Anakin apologized under his breath to the chancellor, "She's just upset that she had to do that. She's not—"
"Oh, Anakin," the man said with a smile, patting Anakin's shoulder, "I do not hold it against her. She has always held noble and admirable goals, it's just a shame that the war has slowly taken each from her."
Obito had no idea where he was except that it wasn't dangerous. There were no jedi here, no sense of the Force present, and for the first time in months but what felt like years Obito was truly alone.
He was in a strange space filled with nothing but shadows and what looked like thousands upon thousands of dark boxes. The space stretched out in all directions, long past where even the sharingan could see, with nothing but Obito inside.
This, apparently, was the place you reached when you let the mangekyo sharingan take you from the world entirely. At least, one iteration of the mangekyo sharingan.
Legend had it that there were many different forms of the awakened sharingan and that each had a different and devastating power. Madara's had allowed him to return from the dead after his battle with Senju Hashirama, had then transformed into the rinnegan which he bequeathed onto an unwitting Uzumaki Nagato for his future use. Others, supposedly, allowed the creation of irreversible and unbreakable genjutsus far beyond what any other sharingan could create. Others created a space outside of space and time where the user could gather whatever information they pleased while their victim was tortured. Obito's apparently, allowed him to slip through the grip of space and time until he ended up in this place.
Which left him enough time to catch his breath, sit down, and desperately try to collect his thoughts.
Everything he'd thought until only a few hours ago was a lie. Obito was now public enemy number one and probably at the top of the Jedi hit list. Lee would think he'd gone mad, mad like Uchiha Madara, and be expected to do something about that. Lee was his only reasonable way out of this place, but even if she listened to him, she'd have to break the genjutsu in order to remember what she was capable of.
Obito had just pit himself against a god with no hope of winning.
"But when has that ever mattered?" Obito asked himself and the empty space.
He'd made it this far, he could go farther, would go farther. It didn't matter who waited on the other side of the board, it could be a kage or a god, Obito would find a way.
Somehow, he'd find a way.
"The eye of the moon," he said bitterly to himself.
That's what he'd said to the dead Jinn, wasn't it? Or was it just what he'd thought? It hardly mattered. It wasn't truly the eye of the moon, that was specific to Obito's own dimension. It was an illusion that was the combination of the awakened sharingan and the near limitless power of the jyuuby jinchuuriki. The Force had had that kind of power available to him to begin with, as Lee had it with her to begin with.
The fact was that Obito simply lacked the power on his own to weave such an illusion or to break it.
But in his own world, he could have, Madara had had a plan and it could have been possible. Given ten, fifteen, years and Obito could have done it. He could have wrenched the bijuu from each of the jinchuuriki, pushed his body past all mortal limits, and done the impossible.
He'd seen it, glimpsed it, on the October 10th that had never happened.
If Obito gained that kind of power here…
If he gained the power of the jyuubey jinchuuriki in this place, with his own mangekyo sharingan, who was to say he could not break the illusion and tear through this place by himself. More, he knew the Force would never see that coming, because Obito was just a humble sentient.
He'd distract himself with Lee, send his Jedi out like dogs to hunt Obito down, and by the time he realized what was happening it'd be too late.
"But there are no bijuu in this place," Obito said.
True, he only had his jedi past to rely on now, but Obito had the feeling the Force didn't make up all of it. He'd hoped Obito would go along with it, Obito doubted he planted false knowledge in preparation for the moment Obito turned on him.
There were no bijuu, was no shinju tree as the great source of chakra on ancient Earth, instead there was only the Force. But…
But yes, there were great resevoirs of the Force, pools and gysers of the light and dark spread throughout the galaxy. If he could reach one of them, could find one of them, he might be able to absorb enough power to be equivalent to what he could have been in his home dimension.
There was one beneath the temple, legend of a great rift in the Force, one that had fed the dark side and the Sith for thousands years only to be purified by the Jedi themselves. However, that was too close, the jedi would surely find him there the moment he touched anything. He'd have to fly to one of the others, find one of the others on some forgotten planet, and somehow not die along the way.
Well, if there was one thing Obito was good at, it was not dying when he was meant to.
He took a look around him again at the empty and infinite space that had undoubtedly saved his life. It offered nothing back to him, no alternative plans or ideas, nothing that would allow him to find Lee sooner and more reliably than he could if he went off on his own.
The Force would be distracted, he had a child on the way and a republic to disintigrate, and Obito had under eight months to find a way to tear his world apart.
Obito would make that bastard regret ever thinking that nothing could come from a single sentient.
Author's Note: Will Obito's crazy scheme work? Will the jedi hunt him down or fall to pieces first? Just what is Lee up to and thinking? Find out next time, or the time after that at the very least.
Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, Naruto, or Star Wars
