"The door is made of beskar, Alor. We can't get in."
Jango Fett curses. While Obi Wan doesn't understand the mando'a words, he recognizes the tone of it well enough.
"If we can't get them out, they will suffocate in there," one of the Mandalorians says and despite the fact that their voice is matter-of-fact and that Obi Wan has no access to the Force, he can practically feel how horrified the person is - probably because Obi Wan own heart twinges with a similar emotion.
"Is there any other way to open it?" The Mand'alor asks his squad, but there's an edge to his voice that suggest that he knows exactly what the answer will be.
A shake of the head is all the reply he gets and despite his current status as a prisoner, Obi Wan can't help but speak up.
"I don't suppose you have brought my lightsaber with you on this outing, Mand'alor?" he asks, though Obi Wan very much doubts it. Mandalorians are warriors who know well how the Jedi fight - they would have kept his lightsaber well separated from him. His captors might have even decided to keep it on the ship, which would mean it is now lightyears out of his reach.
Still, he has to ask. Because even though beskar rebuffed even lightsaber strikes, at its highest power setting and with repeated strikes, he should eventually get through.
The Mandalorian leader looks at him. "No, I didn't," he answers shortly.
"Please, Mand'alor, release my bounds," he beseeches.
"So you can get away, jetii?" the man scoffs. "There is nothing you can do here."
Perhaps that is true, but without being able to access the Force he has no way to even try. "I can help. The Force will guide me," he states serenely.
Jango Fett seems to simply stare at him for a long moment, though he could just as well be discussing it over the internal comms in their helmets. Either way, when he finally comes to a decision it is, rather surprisingly, in Obi Wan's favour. The Jedi doesn't really expect it, knows that the only reason he's even here is because they had been transporting him from the ship to some sort of prison and they were interrupted by the one thing that would cause a group of Mandalorians to divert from their objective - an emergency comm concerning children in distress.
It is also, clearly, more important than the enmity between the Republic and the Mandalorian Empire. The Mand'alor gestures at one of his people and they come up close to Obi Wan, grabbing hold of the Force Inhibitor cuffs but pausing when the Mand'alor speaks.
"If you try anything, I will make you regret it," Fett warns, proving himself more warrior then politician - not that Obi Wan ever doubted that.
He doesn't let the threat shake him. "I give you my word of honour that I will do everything I can to help rescue the younglings," he vows, and he means it. As a Republican General and with all the weight and knowledge he holds in this war, escaping captivity by the enemy is of the utmost importance. But Obi Wan is a Jedi first and foremost, and his duty is to guard innocent lives wherever he may find them - there is truly no contest here, no matter how much the Senate tries to press the Jedi Order into the role of soldiers.
His bonds are removed and the Jedi ignores the tense, battle-ready stances of his captors in favour of feeling the Force flow through him, greeting him like sunshine on bare skin, like an old friend providing a steadying hand after a rough mission.
After a long moment, Obi Wan opens eyes that he had not consciously closed and while his knowledge of the situation has not changed at all, he now feels certain of the path.
What he needs is a lightsaber, and as one of the few within the order who'd had been allowed access to the ancient holocron of Tarre Vizsla that is still present in the Jedi Archives, Obi Wan knows for a fact that there is a lightsaber out there. It doesn't matter that the holocron never mentioned the exact location, or that Mandalore is a relatively large planet, which should make the chances of it being nearby rather small. It doesn't matter because Obi Wan knows.
The Jedi turns slowly towards the direction he is being pulled towards and simply follows the call. He dodges past the Mandalorians and lets the Force guide his steps. It gives him speed and powers his jumps while he makes his way towards the ancient Temple.
The possibility of the Darksaber still being there should be infinitesimally small - Tarre Vizsla had been revered by his people as both warrior and Mand'alor, and many years had passed since then allowing more chances for discovery. And yet Obi Wan doesn't doubt the direction he's moving in, not even for a moment. The Force is clear in this, there is nothing to doubt.
There are Mandalorians in pursuit, using their jetpacks to keep up with him. They shout at him to halt, some even fire, but Obi Wan simply moves out of the way of the stun-shots and ignores them. They are not important, not at this moment. Right now there is one clear path - one way to get to the children in time to save them and it is this one.
He jumps high, onto the hillside, towards a formation of rocks at the top. The protests behind him are louder now, outraged even. He's probably committing a cultural slight here, but there is no time to argue his point, to be diplomatic. He has to act.
With the wave of his hand, the largest rock moves gently to the side and Obi Wan steps through the opening it reveals between the rocks. He goes in and jumps down, into the ancient Temple the rock formation had hidden.
The moment his feet touch down, he feels the Force welcome him. Strategically placed kyber crystals light up, bathing the large, round, underground area in blue and green.
Obi Wan doesn't pause, simply moves forward into the very center of the ring. As he steps onto the decorative central tile, a pressure mechanism activates which causes a stone pedestal to rise up in front of him.
On top of it the lay the Darksaber.
He ignores the sound of armoured boots hitting the ground somewhere behind him. Instead he folds his hands together and bows, a familiar motion that all Jedi practice at the start of a spar to show their respect.
Then he picks up the offered weapon.
Immediately the sound of a lightsaber igniting fills the arena, accompanied by a flicker of black-light.
It is not the lightsaber Obi Wan is holding, though, but one carried by an armoured figure who had appeared in front of him.
Tarre Vizsla inclines his head, looking entirely solid aside from the faint glow. Obi Wan nods back before igniting the lightsaber in his own hands.
A second later they both burst into movement and the Darksaber meets its phantom twin in the air, the strike echoing in the cavernous room. There is one pause as the two opponents assess each other and then the dance begins in earnest.
And it is a dance, the both of them trusting in the Force to guide them through steps that are as natural as breathing. Their styles differ though, Tarre Vizsla fights like a Mandalorian, fierce and solid - and is an expert duelist in Shii-Cho.
Obi Wan has mastered Soresu, which has similarities to Form I, but is the more defensive style. He was also trained in Ataru, though, and he balances his own style with the more aggressive, aerial style for the sake of the duel.
He has a strong preference for Form III. To him, Soresu is not just a fighting style but a creed - to fight, but in the spirit of defence, to not back down, but allow your opponent the chance to retreat and make different choices.
This is a duel, however, and though the ancient Mandalorian Jedi has played no part in the situation, there are innocent lives at stake. Obi Wan cannot not afford to hold anything back, he must fight to win.
Sabers flash, two forces meeting where they whirl in the air. The Jedi are a storm of clashing thunder and unrelenting rain, never parting for long - always ready to meet the next strike. But underneath that chaos lies a familiar steadying drum - the light and peace of the Force.
They are both familiar with battle, and both of them have the Force to aid them. There is no easy way to get the upper hand. Obi Wan has fought against Sith and held out against overwhelming numbers but never once has he faced someone whose battleskills seems almost insurmountable.
Unlike the spars in the Jedi Temple there is no give, neither of them is willing to back down even an inch. So Obi Wan jumps into another Ataru attack and slashes down, where the Darksaber he wields meets another. He dives in closer than is wise and manages to score a hit against the other man's beskar'gam. During his retreat, however, he is caught on the end of the other man's weapon and the phantom saber burns his skin, just as a regular lightsaber would. Obi Wan doesn't pause, though, his movements flow into a counterattack while he lets the pain in his shoulder bleed away into the Force. He is aware of the injury, yes, but it is not severe and he does not need the warning the pain represents when there is something far more important that requires his full focus.
Right now, the only thing that matters is this saber in his hands, and the right to wield it. Because there are frightened children, locked into the darkness of an ancient tomb that was never meant to be opened again after it closed, and their young lives snuffing out senselessly is not something he can accept.
Afterwards, he wouldn't be able to tell how long the battle lasted. Only that it halted as suddenly as it started, with Obi Wan's saber held firmly to the Force ghost's vulnerable neck.
Tarre Viszla lowers his own blade and steps back. The two of them bow. Then the mirage of the Mand'alor of old fades away entirely.
Loud yells and cheers errupt from around him and he blinks and stares into the gloom at the edges of the temple, finding the group of Mandalorians that had followed him - with Jango Fett staring at him silently, right at the front of them.
Obi Wan looks away from them, up towards where he had entered the Temple.
"The younglings," he manages to say, his voice a little fainter than he would have liked. To be fair, he's still feeling raw from the rush of the Force returning to him after days in those cuffs, and tired to the bone from the fierce battle using an unfamiliar weapon - the Darksaber with its heavy hilt is so much different than his own.
His shoulder twinges, now that he's no longer fiercely focussed on the duel, and he grimaces a little but doesn't pay it any more attention. Instead he jumps up, steps back out into the daylight and rushes towards the old tomb that those Mandalorian children had so unwisely chosen to explore.
There is no urgency, no warning in the Force. There is time. Obi Wan knows this, but he doesn't want to leave the frightened younglings in there any moment longer than they have to be. So he calls upon the Force to give strenght to his tired limbs and he runs once more.
The Darksaber is heavy in his hand, not weightless like his own lightsaber. It was made by a warrior, for the use of a warrior, and if the only enemy Obi Wan needed to face with it is a beskar door, well if that is what stood between him and precious young lives, than it was a battle worth undertaking.
He raises the weapon and strikes. The door rebuffs the lightsaber, but that is fine. Soresu is resilience, after all. So Obi Wan strikes again, and again, and again, focussing on the exact spot the Force urges him to strike. It is almost a meditation - though more like the battle-meditations of old than any the Jedi Order would consider conventional nowadays. Eventually, though, the door falls to his persistence and Obi Wan steps back while the Mandalorians rush forwards to take their children to safety.
His limbs are trembling in earnest now, but that's less of a problem than it would have been, because there's an armoured arm behind him, helping him stay on his feet.
"Easy, verd," someone says and it takes him a moment to recognize that it is the Mand'alor speaking. The voice is almost unfamiliar for the warm support it offers. Obi Wan turns his head just enough to blink up at the man and finds himself faced with a human face wearing a friendly smile. "Take a moment, jeti'ika. We've got it from here."
They do. Obi Wan could agree with that assessment, because the children are already being carried outside and fussed over by the Mandalorians. So he nods and, tired past the point of caring about propriety, simply leans back against the armoured form of the Mand'alor.
AN: Ok, so I thought, hey you know what would be awesome? If the Darksaber was like this old legendary artifact that had been hidden away on Mandalore and you had to win a duel to use it, so of course there would be Obi Wan vs. Tarre Vizsla with a whole bunch of Mandalorians watching, all stunned silent at the collective awesomeness of two mandokarla Jetii.
Then I realized halfway through that I was trying to write a fight. Which yeah, no, fights are hard, why do I even?
It's just that all of the Mandalorians would be like: Kriff, that Jedi.
And Jango is all: That was hot. Also the holos my people took of all of that are probably already trending. Political prisoner or no, it would cause an outcry if I took the darksaber from him after that. But hey, maybe I can just keep the entire jetii and be done with it?
Also, I need a copy of those holos. For reasons.
PS: NorthernRanger has written this story from Jango's pov, with a bit of a follow-up. It's Reassessment over on AO3 for anyone interested.