Chapter Thirty-Three: Enemies of Enemies

Before the Count could reply, a second question spilled from Obi-Wan's lips: "Where's Qui-Gon?"

Arching an eyebrow, Dooku gently brought the covers of his book together and set it on the table beside him. "As far as I was aware, Master Kenobi, she was not missing."

He'd been so sure—the vision, the warning—but the Jedi's face flushed as he realized whatever the Force had been trying to tell him, it wasn't about the here and now.

Qui-Gon wasn't here. He'd felt Dooku alone.

Obi-Wan bowed in embarrassed deference; Dooku simply nodded and turned his attention back to Padmé, who looked about as surprised as Obi-Wan felt. "Still doing business with the Jedi Order, Madam Amidala?"

"What are you doing here?" she asked, not with hostility but genuine bafflement. "Why aren't you on Serenno?"

"It would seem," replied the old man, distaste entering his voice as though he'd stepped on a large insect, "that the Republic once again has need of me."

He'd aged visibly in the last two years. Even sitting, his posture held as much gravity as ever, but the grey of his beard was feathering white, and Obi-Wan could detect a tremor in his hand as he removed it from the book that would have been invisible to the naked eye. The rich baritone of his voice, however, hadn't changed—nor had the sharpness of his gaze, which fell on the Jedi once more. "I imagine," the Count said, "that you are here for much the same reason."

"Tarkin," Obi-Wan said—pointless to lie at this point, even if he would have been able to overcome his surprise at Dooku's presence enough to make something up.

The Count nodded. "He is most inquisitive."

"What exactly is he inquisitive about?" asked Padmé. The initial shock that had come over her seemed to be lifting; Obi-Wan noticed her gun hand straying toward the blaster that hung from her belt.

Dooku, impassive, simply looked her in the eyes. "If you intend to take me hostage, Madam Amidala, I am extremely curious as to the next step of your plan."

Rolling her eyes—something that made Obi-Wan have to refrain from wincing—she raised both hands from the belt, holding them palms open. "Look, I'm a little twitchy."

"I seem to recall it as your defining characteristic." As Padmé lowered her hands back to her sides, the Count told her, "At any rate, the two of you being here in the first place means you are already aware of the subjects that interest Director Tarkin."

"Yes, but—" Obi-Wan began, only at the last minute biting down on the rest of the question: —why should Tarkin come to you about the start of the Clone Wars?

Raptor's eyes met his own. "Master Kenobi," Dooku said. "I respect your position. Surely you must respect mine when I tell you I have no intention of prevaricating for the sake of the Jedi Order. And every intention of telling the Republic what was allowed to happen on Serenno."

In the long silence that followed, Padmé swallowed and shot Obi-Wan a glance he didn't need the Force to read. Shit, this is bad.

He very much concurred.

Dooku, careful not to catch his cape on the chair, rose to his feet. "I suggest you both escape the way you came, quickly. I have an appointment with the director, and if you both stay here you will be caught."

"What about Anakin?" Padmé hissed in a rush.

The Count, for the first time since the pair had stumbled into the room, looked bemused. "The two of you seem intent on invoking the names of those who are not present."

"You haven't spoken to him?" she shot back. It was less a question and more a plea.

Dooku's face showed at once understanding and something like pity. "Madam Amidala, surely if your husband were involved in this investigation, you would know better than I."

Face rearranging itself into stone, Padmé wordlessly took a step to the side, granting access to the door.

"Count Dooku," Obi-Wan said, resisting the urge to step forward and seize the old man by the arm. "What exactly does Tarkin want to know about Serenno?"

The Count did not deign to look in the Jedi's direction as he strode toward the door. "The only thing that should concern you, Master Kenobi, is what I plan to tell him. The truth."

Obi-Wan and Padmé both plastered themselves against the wall as Dooku slid the door open, ambient noise from the hall beyond whispering inward. Holding his breath, the Jedi kept a hand on the stun baton at his belt until the door once again swept closed.

"That was not coincidence," he murmured, wishing nothing more than to collapse into the Count's chair.

"You think they set this up? They knew we were coming?" Padmé asked, her whisper rising in alarm.

The Jedi shook his head. "Not in that sense. The Force wouldn't just arrange for us and Dooku to fall into each other's laps for no reason. It wanted us to talk to him. To find out that Tarkin brought him here."

"Not in time to do anything about it," she growled. "Old bastard was right, we can't just stop him from talking to them now that he's here and we're stuck." She began to pace across the quarters, their tiny dimensions meaning she was confined to about four steps in either direction. "Gods, we're so stupid. We hadn't even thought about enemies the Jedi would have besides Palpatine, and now Tarkin's rounding them up. What's next, a gods-damned Sith Lord showing up for a hearing?"

"He's no friend of the Republic either."

"Great, so he decided to collaborate with the enemy of his enemy even though they're also his enemy. I don't care what his personal feelings on Palpatine are." She stopped pacing and looked him in the eye. "You know exactly what Dooku telling the truth about Serenno means."

With a great sigh, Obi-Wan suddenly found himself sitting in Dooku's chair after all. "Names. Many of them. Anakin's, Qui-Gon's, Tyyria Nox's. Mine, not that Tarkin needed a reason to go after me. He'll out every Jedi who was present."

"They don't need Anakin," Padmé breathed, hands clenching into fists in a motion not so different from her husband's. "They have a whistleblower with or without him."

Nodding, Obi-Wan felt another revelation crystalizing too late. "Starting the Clone Wars isn't enough of an accusation to hang the Order with. Bail openly started them and kept his Senate seat. But if Palpatine can paint multiple Jedi as responsible for one of the greatest tragedies of the war—our actions directly leading to the deaths of thousands . . ."

Turning on her heel, Padmé reached for the door. "We have to find a way to spy on that interview."

"Padmé, wait," he hissed. As she turned back, Obi-Wan pulled himself standing. "We already know what Dooku's going to tell Tarkin. You have to get out of here—and I don't appreciate being left behind while you gallivanted off on a—"

"We are not just leaving it there, Kenobi."

"Padmé," he said, his voice rising to as much volume as a strangled whisper would allow, "I will stay behind and look into things, if you like. I am not going to have putting you in even greater danger on my conscience, not when your name is clean as it is."

"Kenobi, if you would just think for a second you'd know it's not anymore." She stepped forward and stabbed at his chest with her index finger. "If you'll remember, the Jedi weren't the only ones at Serenno. I rescued you, I brought Tyyria there, I held Dooku prisoner when you staged a gods-damned coup. Anakin or no Anakin, I'm screwed as soon as Dooku opens his mouth. That's all there is to it."

She fell back a step, seeming suddenly to shrink. Even so, she held his gaze defiantly, as if daring him to tell her she was wrong.

It was true, he realized. All this time, he'd counted on plausible deniability and being Anakin's wife to save her in the end. In his mind, after they'd gone their separate ways—after he'd ditched her, he corrected himself, prettying it up was cowardly—she would just go back to her old life, somehow. Patch things up with her husband. Raise her child. Live her life.

That route was closing now. And it had never really been open in the first place. Padmé couldn't live like that. He knew that.

All this time, you've been wanting to save her by abandoning her. To be her friend by getting her out of your way.

Had they been safely back on the ship, he would have apologized—not just for this moment, for today, but for everything he'd put her through since they'd talked at the Starfire Diner weeks ago. But Dooku was already ahead of them, and one way or another, if they didn't keep moving they would be found.

Instead, the Jedi simply extended his hand. "Partners, then?"

Glare remaining fixed on him, she gripped his fingers hard enough to hurt, then turned once more to the door. "Get a damn move on."

It was easy to see where the base had gotten its name. There was the obvious—the weather—but beyond that, Padmé thought, surfaces here seemed slick, easy for her eyes to slide across without taking in. The same slate-grey corridors, so uniform they could have been transplanted straight from a Star Destroyer. The occasional clusters of white armor marching past, each face the same. Hell, in the stolen officer's uniforms she and Kenobi had knocked a couple people out to obtain, it was almost as though she could feel the two of them starting to bleed into the whole thing. Just two more fixtures of surroundings so boring they slid into the invisible.

Just as well. Her mind wasn't exactly on staying hidden.

You told Obi-Wan you didn't think he was involved. You even believed it.

And yet as soon as Kenobi had felt that mysterious presence, she had known. Known that Tarkin had a kidnapped Jedi trapped within the base.

Known that Anakin had something to do with it.

And after the initial shock of running into Dooku had dissipated, after it had become clear there was no Jedi locked up in the basement more than anything she'd found herself feeling . . . disappointed.

Surely if your husband were involved in this investigation, you would know better than I.

To their left, the corridor suddenly opened up, the walls not metal but transparisteel. Padmé dimly took in the view below—a hangar, peopled with three shuttlecraft and a pair of AT-RT scout walkers. A blizzard raged at its mouth, but only a few puddles of water lay at the edge—particle shielding, she supposed, flash-melting the snow. Dimly, reflexively, she filed it away for future reference—useful to know about, if they had to make a hasty escape.

It was so much easier to think of him as Palpatine's man through and through. To think of her husband as someone she used to know, someone who'd been lost to her since he left the Jedi. Since the last time she'd seen Dooku, come to think of it.

Absolutes she could live with. The question was worse.

Because if Palpatine didn't trust Anakin as much as Anakin thought he did—if Dooku turned over the Jedi names behind the fall of Serenno, her husband's right there among the rest—what if he were in as much danger as the rest of them?

What if he was in the midst of a trap, the same as her?

"Two more hangars were in the directory we found," Obi-Wan breathed. "One north and one east. If this is Tarkin's base of operations for just the investigation, he's expending a lot of resources on it."

"Guy like him has to have a few plates spinning," she muttered back, the banter rote, automatic.

Obi-Wan looked at her, concern showing on his face, but before he could say anything another squad of white plastoid emerged ahead of them. Bringing his eyes forward, he nodded at the gaggle of helmets as they passed.

Unbidden, an image rose in her head: her, Obi-Wan, and Anakin, the dream team reunited once more, playing cards in a holding cell. Amusement at the inane thought rose so fast that she had to work to suppress a snort. The three of them together again, and all it would take was an interplanetary investigation years in the making.

Well, the four of you. Once you have it.

She froze, for just a step, then hastened to catch up with Obi-Wan. There it was again—her other current problem, the one that had a habit of coming at her from the side when she was busy dealing with everything else the gods had decided it would be funny to throw at her. The one she barely thought of even now.

You're going to be a terrible mother, Amidala. Just terrible.

The computer room's set of double doors was shut; inside, Obi-Wan could sense a handful of minds paying none-too-close attention to their duties. Easy, he supposed, to slack off when one worked here. After all, who was going to come knocking?

To his left, Padmé laid a hand on her blaster. "Just in case," she clarified. "They might not be weak-minded, after all."

Once again, he almost asked her if she was all right. But then she shot him a Well, get on with it glare, one he knew better than to argue with. Besides, they were already wasting time.

He pressed the door panel, then immediately broadcast a forceful command of You want to go to sleep through the Force as loudly as possible.

Sure enough, inside four souls slumped forward in their chairs, one of them dangerously close to pressing all the buttons on his console at once with his drooping face. As the doors swept shut behind them, Padmé swore softly. "Gods, Kenobi, I could feel that."

Rather than reply, he gripped the shoulders of the technician closest to him and hauled the man out of his chair, letting him collapse gently to the ground. Padmé took the next one, then immediately hunched over his console and started pulling up interfaces. "We'd better hope the cameras for this place have sound."

After several swipes, she waved for her friend to lean over. "Got it, looks like they're already going. You listen in if you want to, I'm gonna poke around in here."

As Obi-Wan stepped closer, Padmé thumbed the volume upward. Hovering just above her hands was a hologram image of a simple conference room, much like the one Obi-Wan's own interview had been conducted in. It was almost surreal to see Dooku, lord of Serenno, seated in a plastic chair at one side of a flimsy table.

And across from him was Tarkin, hands steepled, looking on intently as the Count spoke.

". . . agreed to conduct this interview so that my testimony would be present on the record," Dooku said in his rolling baritone, continuing on from some previous point. "I have no interest in speculating on matters that do not concern me."

Tarkin's reedy voice replied, "Of course, I do not ask that you speak on any matters with which you are not comfortable, Count. But it seems to me that, in the name of the Republic's security—"

Dooku's sneer could be seen even through hologram static. "I believe I have made my thoughts on Republic security quite clear, Director Tarkin. Serenno finds herself a member of this government only because she found herself with no choice after a tragedy the Republic directly engineered. That no inquiry was conducted in the aftermath of that tragedy was an insult. That is the reason I am speaking to you."

The director gave a curt nod. "Very well, then. To return to the matter at hand . . ."

"Jackpot," Padmé hissed, jabbing a minidrive into her terminal.

Obi-Wan fought the reflexive urge to snap the camera feed's volume off, as if Dooku and Tarkin could hear them. "Yes?" he asked, glancing away from the standoff.

"Got some documents in here that look like they could be promising. Something about Typhoon Division, another one that might have something about the Temple." She paused for a moment, swiping through a field of text. "Make that the enclaves, looks like they're not touching Hutt Space but they're combing for leads on the others."

The Jedi felt a pang of relief. He'd been right to advise the evacuation back to the primary Temple, at least. The former matter, on the other hand . . . "They haven't spoken to Typhoon Division, have they?"

Padmé frowned. "This is mostly just background files on everyone. Cody, Reyes, Sawshark Squadron. If I had to guess, though, they're gonna interview each and every one of them about the start of the war."

On the feed, Tarkin was speaking once again. ". . . already have a growing file on Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Qui-Gon Jinn we've suspected dating back to the beginning of the investigation. Tyyria Nox is, of course, deceased. This matter of the Sith, however, is of potential interest. The warlord Maul and Sephone Valis—if either one of them had been at any point a member of the Jedi Order, it would be of great importance."

"Fantastic as it may seem, Director," replied Dooku, "I did not know personally of every single individual admitted for training during my tenure as a Jedi."

Despite himself, Obi-Wan felt a great sense of personal satisfaction at the ill-disguised irritation on Tarkin's face. It was fleeting, however. "If they've suspected Qui-Gon . . . I don't suppose anything about her is available?"

"Not anything that's unencrypted," said Padmé after a few moments, "and I somehow doubt your friend Cal is gonna be of any more help there. Lucky for her she's in the middle of nowhere right now, huh."

Thoughts flitting back to his vision, Obi-Wan sighed. "I'm not so sure."

If she's not here . . . what did it mean?

In the hologram below him, things were drawing to a close. ". . . been quite helpful," Tarkin told Dooku, rising from his chair and extending his hand. "Should the matter of Serenno come up in public hearings on this matter, may I ask if you'd be willing to testify before a government commission?"

"You may ask," Dooku said, drawing himself up to his full height. He could still look intimidating when he wanted to, Obi-Wan thought—his cape fluttered like that of some looming creature of the night. "I am no friend of the Order, Director Tarkin, but neither am I yours. Chancellor Palpatine would do well to remember it."

"You do make it quite hard to forget," said Tarkin, who held his arm out one moment longer before snapping it back to his side. "Very well, then. Your shuttle is not scheduled to depart for another several hours, if you wish to return to your quarters in the meantime—"

"And what of Anakin Skywalker?"

Padmé involuntarily swore. Obi-Wan, who'd begun to breathe a little easier at the way things were going, rose an inch out of his chair before sitting back down again.

Tarkin himself looked . . . interested. "I beg your pardon?"

"Of the names I gave you, his is the only one you inquired about no further. I find it odd that, if you're willing to press me on Jedi matters which I know nothing about, you would not be interested in his own testimony." When Tarkin said nothing, Dooku sniffed. "Ought not a former Jedi, Chancellor Palpatine's direct subordinate, be an asset of considerable importance to this inquiry?"

"You've kept tabs on him since Serenno, then."

"No. But one hears things."

A poison smirk formed on the director's face. "I was under the impression, Count, that you had no interest in speculating on matters that do not concern you."

But, Obi-Wan added, the Count knows very much who they do concern.

As Dooku swept from the room, Padmé continued to stare down toward the hologram. Tarkin had returned to his seat and was poking at a datapad with a stylus; it wasn't him she was looking at, though. Indeed, Obi-Wan didn't think she was concerned with the camera feed whatsoever.

"Do you think he knew we were watching?" he asked, his voice barely above a murmur.

"Dooku? He's not stupid, Obi-Wan." She snorted softly. "I doubt he thought we'd actually turn tail and run. Didn't stop him from blabbing about you, though."

The Jedi shook his head. "I've been known to Tarkin as a Jedi for a while now. And it's not as if we should expect Dooku to have any loyalty to any of us, after what happened. Seeking whatever justice he can from this mess is the only thing he can do for his people."

"Not his fault, is that what you're saying?"

It's everyone's fault, he almost said, before sighing and pointing out, "He could have given us up."

"Well, he hasn't left the facility yet," she said, ripping the minidrive from the console. "This place may be a ghost town while it's under construction, but we're fresh out of chances and there are still troopers all over the place." Pocketing the drive, she lowered a hand to check her blaster. "We've got what we came for. I put everything unencrypted on this, got some encrypted stuff we can try and have Bail's people unscramble. And we know now this isn't limited to Had Abbadon. Time to bounce."

Obi-Wan nearly objected, but he knew that every second they stayed lessened their odds of getting away exponentially. Padmé was right—they could process the data dump later, at the home of whatever ally was nearest. For now, it was time to—

Something tickled at the back of his mind. A warning, not of danger, but of being too hasty.

"Wait."

Before them, the distant view of Tarkin was the same—the solitary director hunched over his datapad. But as Obi-Wan and Padmé stared down at it, he snapped the device's cover closed and deposited it in a pocket on his uniform. Reaching downward, he pressed an unseen button on the conference table. Waited.

Padmé took a step back. "Kenobi, whatever he's doing, we can't just sit here and—"

A burst of static emitted from the audio feed, though Tarkin remained motionless. Perhaps, Obi-Wan thought in a moment of panic, he'd jammed the audio signal, knew they were monitoring him?

But then the noise snapped off, and it was the director's turn to speak.

"Ah yes, Chancellor. Do forgive me for the hour."

Jedi Archives: On Matters of Mental Influence

[excerpt from a Jedi instructional text concerning techniques for performing the so-called "Jedi mind trick"]

One must take great care in selecting the precise degree of mental suggestion they wish to exert on a subject. Though it is true that the Force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded, what shape that influence takes is up to the Jedi projecting it.

Influencing an individual is simpler than influencing a group of people—though the number of persons involved is not the primary factor affecting the technique's difficulty. Rather, one must measure the "distance from reality" they are trying to guide their subjects.

Small nudges—suggestions to divert attention elsewhere, or believe small untruths—are a simple matter. When fantastical falsehoods come into play, a Jedi may find themselves flirting with danger. A subject's mind may not handle well, for example, being asked to see something that is not really there. One would do well to beware the unintended side effects of performing a particularly difficult "mind trick." It is not unheard of for strong mental persuasion to inadvertently muddle an unwitting passerby's memory, or render a subject unconscious. Exercise caution, lest your mind trick reach farther than you mean it to.