Chapter Eight: Anakin and Obi-Wan

The coordinates Obi-Wan had given him turned out to be for a fairly out-of-the-way apartment building located near the Works, unassuming enough that it didn't even have a speeder garage—Anakin parked in a lot just across the way. As he strolled from his vehicle to the main entrance, he craned his neck to look upward, taking in the relative darkness. "Nightfall" was never something that ever truly hit Coruscant—the accumulated light pollution of the planet's trillion inhabitants was enough to render a view of the stars a distant dream—but this district was evidently quiet enough to have a sky dark-gray enough to pass for black. There was still a distant roar of traffic, but it was faint enough that you could every now and then hear the fading whisper of a gentle breeze. No doubt Obi-Wan had chosen the location partly for this lack of volume.

Ordinarily this kind of quiet would eat at him. But for once Anakin wasn't thinking about the ringing silence in his head, the emptiness around him.

He was thinking about what lay on the other side of the apartment building's entrance.

For one absurd minute, he just stood a few dozen meters from the main entrance—double transparisteel doors framed by a pair of artificial stone columns. You could still give up. Just turn around and head back to the speeder. He probably hasn't seen you yet.

One foot strayed toward the lot, and then he was closing the rest of the distance between him and the building. As he walked, his pace picked up, to the point that he was restraining himself from jogging by the time he reached the doors.

Before he could place a hand on them, they were opening outward.

For just a moment, he wondered who it could be in front of him. He had almost never, he realized in the space of that instant, seen Obi-Wan without sensing him—that final evening of him, Padmé, and his old master together at the couple's apartment had been the only time. To perceive him and not to perceive him, to see him without true sight, felt uncanny, alien, like looking at a perfect projected image.

Only it wasn't perfect, not really. Obi-Wan had changed. Not by much. A bit more grey in his beard, the lines in his face etched a degree deeper. But it wasn't the person Anakin remembered. I wonder, he thought, how much of me he's seeing for the first time too.

Then Obi-Wan's beard split into a smile, and Anakin felt his own grin emerge. "Master Kenobi," he said, giving a slight nod.

"Anakin." A single word, breathed out almost as if in pleasant surprise. My goodness, it seemed to say, it's really you after all.

The two just stood there for a moment longer, Obi-Wan propping the door open with his arm, Anakin shifting his boots back and forth. Then the Jedi chuckled sheepishly and gestured with his free hand. "Come in, it's cold out there."

Anakin came.

The short turbolift ride to Obi-Wan's floor was spent mostly in awkward anticipatory silence, each of them decidedly pleased to see the other—at least, Obi-Wan hoped Anakin shared this feeling—but waiting for someone else to make the first move. Finally, as they neared his floor, the Jedi cleared his throat and said, "I almost asked you to see me at the Temple, but I didn't know that you'd . . . that you'd care to come."

Anakin gave a polite smile. "Best if I don't. Besides, if Master Nu or Master Drallig saw me there I think I'd be in danger."

He forced a chuckle through the sinking feeling that had come over him. "Trust me, I'm still in danger around those two."

There had always been an effortlessness to his friend's speech. As if he were incapable of taking any situation entirely seriously, as if beneath the words was always that crooked Skywalker grin. For Obi-Wan, it had always stirred up a mixture of affection and exasperation, a constant desire for his student to be serious and an inability to truly be angry with him. Now when he spoke he sounded . . . lost. As if he too remembered that former easy grin and was vaguely bemused to discover it was no longer there.

The pattern repeated itself all over him. His steps seemed imperceptibly heavier, his eyes robbed of a sparkle you'd never think to look for if you hadn't seen it before.

They'd both grown old before their time, thought Obi-Wan. And they'd done it apart.

Mercifully, the lift doors parted. "At any rate . . ." Obi-Wan asked, sweeping his arm outward in a mock-dramatic gesture whose humor he didn't really feel, ". . . shall we take a tour?"

Not that there was much to see. Much like his former quarters on the Coelacanth or his bunk at the Jedi Temple, Obi-Wan preferred to keep this place simple and neat. A small shelf of old paper books sat in one corner of the main room; there was a chair, a couch, and a meditation rug. On one wall hung a painting he'd liked a few years ago; on the other, a window opened to the Coruscant skyline. "It's very, ah, brown," Anakin cracked, running a hand along the couch. "What exactly's the point of paying for a second home if you're not gonna use it?"

"Well, I don't pay for it, technically," Obi-Wan confided. "The Temple keeps residences on hand for all of us who live on the planet to keep up appearances. You never needed one because you live with Padmé." Even as he said it the information sounded callous, but it was too late to take it back. Just another reminder of the thing they'd once shared and that was now a wedge.

When Anakin replied, he did sound faintly stung, but not by the reference to the Jedi. "How come you never told me about this place?" he asked, eyes roaming around the bare furnishings. "I'd have . . . I don't know, invited myself over for dinner. Bought you a really tacky plant or something."

"Well," the answer sounding lame even as he said it, "I'll be honest with you, Anakin—I've only been here a few times myself." When he'd opened up the door and stepped inside this afternoon, after the conversation with Luminara and Qlik, it had been the first time in months. "You know me, I prefer being at the Temple. But"—and here he cast about for the first easy lie that came to him, hating himself even as the words left his mouth—"until Master Drallig is convinced of Temple security, she thought it might be best for the Jedi on Coruscant to spread ourselves out some more."

Anakin's brow wrinkled in concern. "Wait, convinced of your security? The CIS didn't make it to the Temple, did they?"

"Oh no, you needn't worry about us. But with the possibility of clones still being out there, and the damage they could do if they discovered this place . . . well. Many in the Temple would like to make safety the watchword of the Order for the time being." That in and of itself was the truth, but it was what he'd left unsaid that made Obi-Wan want to blush with guilt. However, Master Drallig's idea of safety is for the Temple to stay locked down, not to disperse. I'm here because it's not safe for someone with a government summons to be spending his nights in the Jedi Order's lodgings.

Nodding, Anakin shot an intent look back at the painting on the wall, as though suddenly suspicious of it. "Well, I don't think they'll be making the Classical District a priority. Intelligence traced most of the activity we haven't accounted for yet to the Underworld."

"Ah yes!" the Jedi said, seizing upon this suddenly concrete diversion. "Tell me about what you're doing in your job. You've got two years' worth of stories to tell, I'm sure."

He'd hoped his old friend would perk up at this—Anakin had always liked telling stories in the old days, whether they entailed past adventures or were simply colorful explanations of how a piece of tech worked. Instead, the younger man tensed as though Obi-Wan had accused him of something. After a moment, he relaxed his shoulders with a visible effort and said, "Nah, you know me. Politics bore me, I was just unlucky enough to have the chancellor like me."

"Surely he doesn't just have you working in politics." As Obi-Wan said this, he wondered if that was a touch of desperation in his voice, then wondered why he was stumbling over every sentence even when he wasn't hiding the truth. Surely it's just that it's been so long. That it's always awkward when friends who've been apart for a long time come back together. It wasn't that he was trying to . . . to bait Anakin into talking about Palpatine.

Luminara's voice. Maybe Skywalker knows something.

"Trust me," said Anakin, suddenly forceful, "I'm just an errand boy. Like I was with you, officially, only without the fun parts." He hadn't raised his voice much, but in the muffled space of the apartment the extra volume mattered.

Something entered his face then—an emotion Obi-Wan couldn't sense through the Force but didn't need to. He'd come to know Anakin's face, his responses, and their time apart had done nothing at all to rust that knowledge—Anakin was afraid. Not of the chancellor, but of himself. Of the possibility that his brief lapse in control had just broken the tentative truce they'd only just formed.

Seeing that, Obi-Wan felt his stomach twist in on itself. He trusts you, said a voice that at once was and wasn't his own. After all this time.

The younger man's words came out all in a rush, as without seeming to realize he took a step closer to Obi-Wan. "So what are things like with you? You can't tell me you've been up to nothing."

Obi-Wan thought of the summons. Qlik and Luminara's nervous faces. The murmurs and hisses throughout the Temple in the aftermath of Palpatine's announcement of the new Grand Army. Mace Windu's certainty that something was wrong, and Anakin could be the key to unraveling it.

Always in motion the future is, he heard Yoda say. Here and now is where you may know, and act.

He let it all go.

"Well," he said, letting a touch of storyteller's enjoyment sink into his own voice, "officially I lead a rather boring existence as well. Consulting with Bail, enjoying my retirement from Typhoon. Off the books . . ."

It was right around the time that Obi-Wan was reaching the climax of his third tale of adventure—something involving a blackmail plot, a village in need of food, and a nest of gundarks—that Anakin felt himself break into a chuckle.

His old master broke off, smiling, and raised an eyebrow. "Am I amusing to you?"

"Sorry, it's just"—he turned away for a moment, faking an intense interest in the wallpaper long enough to wipe his face serious—"you didn't think of maybe bringing a rope?"

"I had my hands full with my lightsaber and the grenades," Obi-Wan shot back, the not-entirely-fake note of defensiveness making Anakin bite down on his lip to restrain another laugh. "If my pack hadn't had a hole ripped in it two days prior then perhaps—"

Anakin let loose a great snort of amusement, coughed, then laughed again. There was something warm behind his chest, and whatever it was was making it very hard for him to stop—he was certain the two were connected even though he had no idea what the sensation was.

Then Obi-Wan was softly chuckling too. "I suppose I was rather silly, yes," he said, shaking his head ruefully. "Seems to be my curse—whenever I operate alone I end up needing someone to rescue me." His expression brightened, as though he'd just remembered something important. "Ah! Which reminds me, the reason I asked you here. If you'd be so kind as to follow me to the kitchen, you'll find what I need rescuing from."

The sight that greeted him as he rounded the kitchen counter made Anakin swear softly. "Holy hell, Obi-Wan, what is this?"

"Well, as I explained," said the Jedi, sounding embarrassed, "I don't come back here much, which means that when I arrived today the refrigerator unit wasn't working. I tried to get it back in proper order, and I . . . didn't."

That was one way of putting it. Wiring snaked out from behind the fridge and unspooled across the floor as though Obi-Wan had disemboweled the thing. Pieces of disassembled metal were scattered across the tile at their feet and the counter, and all the interior racks lay haphazardly along the wall. A toolbox sat reluctantly against the open fridge door, looking like a dwarf facing a giant.

Anakin gave a peal of horrified laughter that rang through the kitchen. "This is the worst thing I've ever seen."

"Not exactly what I wanted to hear."

Grinning, he knelt down, careful not to step on any of the components at his feet. "Get me a wrench, will ya?"

First things first, a hefty length of electrical tape had to be wrapped around one of the wires, which Obi-Wan had somehow inadvertently slashed with a screwdriver by the looks of it. Then the real work began—the Jedi had managed to disassemble not any part of the fridge that would get at the problem but the majority of its lower base, which meant the chassis was in danger of pitching forward. "You are never allowed to touch anything metal ever again," Anakin said, trying to work out how that particular screw had even come undone. "Ever."

This continued for the next half-hour—putting back together the things Obi-Wan had destroyed for no reason, then fixing the right things, his master handing him the proper tools and making defensive comments as to his mechanical aptitude.

As he fell into the rhythm of his work, Anakin found himself hesitant to talk too loudly, as though doing so would break some spell. All the time apart, the time spent wondering what Obi-Wan was doing, where he was, whether he was wondering the same about Anakin, rolled off his shoulders like a stone worn smooth. It felt as though, were he to close his eyes, when he opened them again the two of them would be standing not in an apartment kitchen but in the mess hall of the Coelacanth, on their way to yet another adventure that would leave them with new scars and new stories to tell.

Finally, it was finished. Anakin shoved himself up off the floor and admired the now gently humming hunk of metal, then wiped at his brow with his flesh hand. "Next time just call me before you try to fix it, huh?"

Chuckling and taking in the restored unit himself, Obi-Wan put a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Well, as we were saying earlier, perhaps neither of us was cut out for solo operations, whether they're adventures or repairs. At least you've still got Padmé to pull you out of whatever scrapes you manage to land yourself in."

Instantly his mind flitted back to the warehouse, to the Spice Dancer, and a cold wad of guilt plunked into his stomach. Almost as suddenly, a hot wave of anger rose to meet it—not here, not now, he wasn't going to let what had just happened ruin this now. With one part of his mind, he visualized his anger as a hand forcing the guilt down below an ocean surface; with the other, he summoned the quickest out he could think of. "So what, you're still waiting on your next student to help pull you out of fires?"

Obi-Wan's hand slid off Anakin's shoulder. He blinked once, a quick sharp motion, as though reacting to something striking him on the forehead. He hesitated just long enough for Anakin to notice; then, he replied with a casual tone so free of care that Anakin knew it wasn't real, "Oh, I haven't taken another student." Another hesitation; then, rapidly, "I thought it best to wait until the war was over, you see. Especially with all the Knights needed right now. As long as the conflict continues to drag on, I don't see myself being in a place where I can devote energy to teaching."

It was, Anakin knew even without sensing what was going on underneath the Jedi's skin, a true explanation provided to hide some deeper secret. He didn't want to press Obi-Wan, but some stubborn part of him couldn't just let it go—wanted his friend to just say It's because I still miss you. "Not everyone can be a quick study like me, huh."

Obi-Wan gave a chuckle then, his guarded cheer giving way once again to genuine warmth. "You certainly learned by doing. Not all the right lessons, I fear." He sighed and shook his head, looking at some point far off in the distance. "When I first started teaching you, my master told me I could do as good a job as he could. But I think you grew as much as you did in spite of me, if I'm honest."

In that moment, Obi-Wan looked . . . small.

Anakin had been reflexively preparing to fire back a piece of banter, something Obi-Wan could catch and lob back at him. Instead, he studied his old master's slightly slumped form, the distance in his eyes. And said, softly, "I wouldn't sell yourself short."

Obi-Wan looked into his eyes with intense gratitude and something like . . . well, something like Anakin saw in Padmé's eyes on a good day, or Palpatine's. Suddenly Anakin felt, more than anything, a consuming desire to share what his friend felt—to truly understand it, as he had so many times before when he could still touch the people he was connected to. To experience Obi-Wan's gratefulness flooding through his own mind like a warm current, the two of them united by their bond, by the power that bound them to each other and to everything else in existence.

Then Obi-Wan swallowed, paused, and asked: "Have you ever . . . thought about coming back?"

Looking back, Obi-Wan would wonder if the words had been his or something else moving through him. He'd had no intention whatsoever of asking Anakin the question before it left his lips, and as Anakin's eyes had widened in surprise he'd felt shock coursing through his own mind.

Asked, however, it could not be taken back. And if Obi-Wan had posed the question, the least he could do was make his case.

"Things are . . . difficult, as of late," he said, weighing how far to go in admitting the state of the Temple after the CIS attack and how much to keep in reserve to spare his Order's dignity. "Even before the attack, there have been some who want the Order to focus on protecting its own. And while I don't agree with them, it's hard to deny that the war is spreading us thin. Knights and healers are trying to cover too much. And . . ."

For a moment, he hesitated. There was no set rule on which of the Order's secrets should remain secrets—still, Obi-Wan knew what "too far" was, and what he was about to say definitively crossed that line. But Anakin faced him twice. Jedi or not, he's earned the right to know.

"Maul has been eluding us," he said, dropping his voice to a register barely above a whisper. For the space of a second he thought he felt the dark side's chill, and though he knew Anakin could no longer touch that feeling, he saw the shadow that passed across his old friend's face. "It's why more and more of the Order have been pulled off the battlefield. We've been dispatching Knights to find him and end the war, and none have come back."

It was extremely difficult to sense the emotions of someone who'd cut themselves off from the Force—the fingers of Obi-Wan's perceptions could touch Anakin's aura, but they skidded and slipped as though his presence were an oil slick. Still, he could see the way Anakin's jaw tightened at the thought of Maul, the way his mechanical fist clenched unconsciously. Aloud, when the young man asked, "How many has he . . ." his voice was a croak.

There was no point in being delicate. "At least a dozen. Probably more."

Anakin let out a long slow exhalation. "Shit." He looked past Obi-Wan, out the window, in the direction of a place neither of them could see. Capitol Plaza, Obi-Wan thought. The spot where Maul and Valis's flagship had come hurtling down, and killed . . . thousands? "And you . . . what. You think I could stop him?"

He could have chosen to frame it delicately. But he owed Anakin honesty. "I think you are the person I know who stands the best chance."

Anger Obi-Wan would have understood. Would have accepted, and even been glad for. But when Anakin replied, there was something else in his voice—a deep, low fear of the kind Obi-Wan had only encountered when they'd first talked about this on Had Abbadon so many years ago. "You know why I walked away. Why I had to. It's bad for me, Obi-Wan." He returned his gaze to the Jedi's, his eyes filled with a raw hurt that made it clear he had thought about this offer long before Obi-Wan had made it. "The last thing I did as a Jedi was let thousands of people die." He laughed then, a terrible scoffing sound. "Guess Maul and Valis and I are about even, huh?"

A few years ago, Obi-Wan would have tried to debate it. Would have said All of us who were there share the blame—I think about it every day. Or The Confederacy pulled the trigger. It's not your fault you couldn't get the city out of the way in time. But he knew from his own nightmares about Serenno that those responses weren't enough, were insulting. You led me here, he said to the Force. Show me what to say.

And then, after his silence had stretched on long enough that the hum of the refrigerator unit had become audible, he looked at Anakin and said, "Follow me."

Obi-Wan's bedroom was as simple as the rest of the apartment—a bunk, a second meditation rug (for those occasions when one simply had to ponder the mysteries of the Force on blue fabric rather than red, Anakin thought but didn't say), a dresser, and a desk. Atop the desk was something Anakin recognized. Obi-Wan indicated it with a slight tilt of his head. "Do you remember when we made this?"

In spite of himself, Anakin felt a bemused smile cross his face. "You kept it?"

The old backup saber lay there gleaming in the lamplight, shiny enough that Anakin suspected it had been recently polished. Looking at it, he almost wanted to laugh—the pair of them had assembled it under an onslaught of compromises, since it could have ended up being used by either of them. It had the quickdraw D-ring Anakin favored sprouting from one side of its pommel, but on the other Obi-Wan had affixed the locking mechanism that would join it securely to his own belt. The grips were the tapered rubber that allowed Anakin's mechanical hand not to grind against the hilt, but to accommodate Obi-Wan's lighter touch they were so delicate that they looked almost comical. Even its length was an in-between, balanced so it could be either a heavy one-handed sword or a light two-hander.

Before he'd realized what he was doing, Anakin had picked it up with his flesh hand, feeling the cool metal beneath his fingertips.

"It's been mine ever since I lost the old one," his old master admitted, a trace of embarrassment in his voice. "I didn't want to waste time building another one fresh, and . . . there's something about this one. The best of both of us," he finished softly, watching Anakin run his fingers along the hilt.

He knew better than to ask, but before he could stop himself he already had. "So what'd you do with mine? Cycle it into the armory?"

Obi-Wan shook his head. "I keep it with my things at the Temple like you asked." He gave a chuckle that wasn't really amused at all, but wistful. "At times, I tell myself it's . . . in case you ever need it again."

And if Anakin were honest with himself, he'd pictured it again and again after he'd pressed the weapon into Obi-Wan's hands—what it would feel like to pick it up again, heft the familiar weight first with his flesh hand and then with his mechanical one, then press the activation switch and watch the blue blade burst to life. He'd dreamed of it—and in those dreams, though there was no logical connection between the two, when he'd brought forth the lightsaber's hiss of energy he'd feel the sudden warmth of the Force flood into him and through him.

Even now, he felt his thumb straying toward the green backup saber's switch. Felt the muscles in his arms tense as he prepared to summon emerald plasma.

Then he blinked, and behind his eyes he saw platforms falling from the sky.

Gently, careful not to scratch the finish, he lowered the lightsaber back on the desk. "Some dream, huh."

When he looked back to Obi-Wan, pain had filled the Jedi's eyes, so much that Anakin almost moved to take it back. But then his old master smiled that sad smile he wore with such experience and said, "You're the best man I've ever known, Anakin. And you know where I believe you can do the most good. If ever you agree with me again . . . just know I'll have it in safekeeping."

"And where are you off to after this?" Obi-Wan asked a few minutes later, doing his best to inject a note of cheer into his voice.

Anakin, attempting the same, replied, "Oh, like I said, I'm an errand boy. Chancellor has me looking over some new defense materials with him and some bigwigs. Equipment for the new army."

Ah yes. That. Yet another in the long catalog of things the Jedi Order had on its mind these days, one the part of Obi-Wan that was still a Defense Force general rankled at even more than the rest of him. He knew without asking what Anakin's feelings on the matter would be.

Aloud, he said, "I suppose improved armaments will come in handy in case further defense is needed. I do hope it won't be, but what with rumors of clones in the Underworld and this investigation that's being conducted—"

Anakin turned around sharply, and a second too late Obi-Wan realized what he'd said.

"Investigation?" his old apprentice asked, sounding taken aback. "What are you talking about?"

It had been a genuine slip—he'd given up any intention of coaxing information out of Anakin—but at the same time . . . he'd just assumed Anakin would know about any investigations in progress, if Palpatine had been the one to start them.

"I . . . well, I . . ." he stuttered, aware that every passing second of his failing to give a coherent reply left him looking worse. "The Temple was made aware," he finally managed, doing his best not to look as though he were wincing away from Anakin's suddenly alarmed expression, "that the Office of Special Investigations is conducting an inquiry into Maul and Valis's attack." And then, because lying about his own involvement would only make things worse, "In fact, I've been asked to make a statement."

"I—wait." His old friend's eyes narrowed. "You've been asked?"

"I imagine they're simply consulting me in my role as ex-general," he replied, horrified at the false lightness of his explanation even as the words came spilling out of his mouth. "And as someone who has a good deal of experience with combating Maul and Valis. I only mentioned it because I assumed you—"

"What?" The word was sharp, almost barked, and Obi-Wan realized with increasing alarm of his own that he didn't know whether this was because Anakin was angry at not knowing about the investigation or angry because he knew Obi-Wan was lying about why he thought he'd been called in.

Though he refrained from squeezing his eyes shut, he forced himself to take a long breath and stop letting words form through panicked reflex. "I should not have presumed to know what the chancellor keeps you informed upon. I apologize."

As if belatedly realizing in turn how visibly he'd reacted, Anakin took a faintly shaky breath in turn and shook his head. "Nah, it's . . . it's fine. I'm sorry." And then, before Obi-Wan could say anything, he had turned around and put his hand on the door. "I need to get going, I'll be late for Palpatine."

"Anakin, I—" He pleaded with the Force for the right words.

Silence was his answer.

As Anakin turned around, Obi-Wan extended his hand. "Thank you," was all he could say. "Thank you for coming."

For a moment he hoped it would be enough. But the hesitation in Anakin's eyes died with a quick blink, and then he was gripping Obi-Wan's hand with his mechanical limb as though afraid he'd break it. "Yeah, thanks for having me," he said. "Lemme know if that kitchen gives you any more trouble, yeah?"

Even as the reply formed on Obi-Wan's lips, his old friend had swept out into the hallway.

The Jedi Master stood there for a long time afterward, staring through the open doorway as though waiting. Eventually, he shook his head as if to wake himself from a dream, then knelt on the meditation rug beneath his feet and tried to meditate.

As was happening more and more often lately, nothing came.

Republic Archives: Districts of Coruscant - The Works

[excerpt from "Districts of Coruscant," a historical guide by tourism writer Merino Trinduar]

The Works began life as a company town, a massive plot of Coruscanti property owned by Brinafair Steelworks Development Corporation. Apartments, restaurants, shopping centers, and factories were all constructed by Brinafair Steelworks, who had the intention of mining and repurposing the abandoned buildings in Coruscant's lower city layers.

The project was doomed before it began. Brinafair, an offworld corporation from the Mid Rim, had done insufficient research prior to their purchase of the property. The buildings below their newly purchased space had long since been stripped by the scavengers of the Underworld. Their company town—which had by then picked up the nickname it still bears today—was sold piecemeal for a fraction of what Brinafair had paid for it, dooming the company to extinction.

Today the industrial styling of the buildings remains in place, a reminder of the ill-fated company that constructed The Works. Factories have been converted into power plants, though most other buildings retain their original purpose. Most of the property on the outskirts of The Works is relatively affordable by Coruscant standards. At the center of the district, a resurgence of independent shops and luxury craft businesses has caused the cost of living to increase considerably—the "Central Works" have become a destination for young and affluent Coruscanti professionals.