Well, after being lax, here's a HUGE update. NOTE: stuff means "things that were in italics but didn't paste in properly."

-Tim



In my dream I found myself on the same foreboding planet that I had seen before. The sky was an angry red, and volcanoes darkened the sky with distant black smoke, while flowing rivers of glowing orange lava carved through the jagged obsidian ground.

As the air burned my lungs, making me feel as if I were inside a blast furnace, I looked around through the heat-distorted haze and felt a chilling, ominous presence behind me.

A presence with which I was now familiar.

I turned to see the figure, the one with the black robes and glowing red eyes. He stood poised and utterly confident, a lightsaber in his right hand.

"Welcome, young Skywalker," he said. "I have been expecting you."

"What do want?" I asked.

"Only your death, boy," he replied, a scarlet blade appearing from his saber as he charged forward.

Lightsabers clashed, and I found myself being forced back, unable to find an opening which would give me the initiative, to allow him to go on the attack. Instead, his blows were expertly timed, I found myself off balance, allowed only to react. I sensed fear. Fear that I would not survive. I began to channel my fear and frustration towards my enemy, and suddenly I saw an opening. I attacked in fury, but it was clear that he was experienced, that he could defend as well as he attacked. And then he slid his blade along mine, slicing into my right hand. I screamed in pain and dropped the saber, and then a vicious thrust ran through me.

As blackness closed in, I saw the chilling red eyes and heard the sound of laughter.

I had failed.

I was dying.

And I could no longer protect those I loved.



***

Lord Raptor was furious. Somehow, despite every measure of torture and pain that had been inflicted on him, Obi-Wan Kenobi had refused to reveal the vital information which his Master had ordered him to find.

He knelt in Lord Sidious' chamber, frustrated, angered, and fearful of his Master's wrath.

"What is it, my apprentice?" Sidious asked.

"He has refused to cooperate entirely, my Master,"

"It is of no consequence, my apprentice. He will break soon enough. Obi-Wan is brave, but foolish."

"But what of the Jedi Order? Surely Obi-Wan must have alerted the Council before he departed for Wayland?"

Raptor knew the Sith were powerful, and the huge numbers of troops on Wayland, protected beneath the massive bulk of Mount Tantiss, would decimate most attacking forces, but the plan to destroy the Republic Fleet centered on surprise and taking the initiative. If the Jedi were to learn what Obi-Wan had found, strategic surprise would be impossible, as the Republic would have time to concentrate its powerful but scattered fleet, not to mention the thousands of Jedi Knights. The Sith, he knew, were powerful because they remained hidden, subtle, and anonymous. This was how they had survived, and even, in the recent decade, gained considerable power, despite being grossly outnumbered.

"His mission was to investigate. They will not expect his return for quite some time and will not risk contacting him and revealing his position. This is time, my apprentice, that Obi-Wan does not have. He will break, or he will die. And by the time they begin to be concerned, they will be unable to stop our attack. However, order General Fett to step up loading our troops."

For several days, hundreds of transports had shuttled to and from Mount Tantiss, carrying the massive force of cloned soldiers to gigantic landing ships awaiting with the battle fleet near Planet 2179. In only a few more days, the entire invasion army would be loaded and ready.

***

However, unknown to his acolyte, Sidious had an entirely different scenario in mind regarding his recent captive. No doubt Kenobi would attempt to contact his apprentice, young Skywalker. And Skywalker, courageous and foolish as he was, would attempt to rescue his master.

And thus he, along with the entire government of the Republic, would play right into Sidious' hands.

***

When he awoke, his emotions were in a turmoil, even for Anakin Skywalker. This dream - or vision - was even more frightening and disturbing than the first, and once again the same strange man with the red eyes had appeared. Who is he? Why does he want me dead? Anakin asked himself, though he hadn't the faintest notion of an answer.

Yet it was Padme who occupied the forefront of his thoughts. Her lips, her silky, fragrant hair, the feel of her in his arms, all remembered with perfect clarity.

He wondered for a moment if it had been better had nothing happened at all, for it seemed all the worse to experience a tiny glimpse at bliss, only to have her say it was something she should not have done, should not happen again, and leaving only yet another memory to haunt him.

He knew if Obi-Wan were there the Master would predictably deliver yet another lecture on duty to the Jedi Order and how romantic love was forbidden. Anakin wondered, bitterly, what exactly Obi-Wan truly knew about such a thing. To Anakin, the Jedi insistence on repression of emotions such as love seemed not only impossible, but unnatural, stripping him of the most wonderful prerogative of a sentient being. Did not love come from life itself, and therefore of the Living Force? The Order acknowledged this fact, yet claimed it was not love itself insamuch as the secondary aspects that arose with romantic relationships: possession, desire, jealousy, attachment, and especially commitment, which interfered, it was said, with a Jedi's duty to the Order and to the Republic.

Anakin often felt as if he were being held to a different standard. He had not entered the Jedi in the usual manner, having been directly apprenticed to Master Kenobi at the relatively advanced age of nine. As a result, he often felt that his upbringing and introduction formed a permanent gap between himself and the rest of the Jedi. None among their ranks had been born into slavery or had remembered their mother. He had not the years of indoctrination in controlling is passions which had become ingrained subconsciously in the mind of younger initiates.

Quite simply, he felt very alone.

True, there was Obi-Wan, who was wise, courageous, and disciplined, in all aspects an ideal Jedi, and Anakin had a great deal of admiration and respect for him - but it seemed all to often that Obi-Wan, and the Council as well, forgot, or could not fathom Anakin's singular background. His attatchment to his mother and his tempestuous, passionate nature seemed so often viewed as a potential weakness, or perhaps they viewed him as just another young Padawan, with the arrogance of youth. And sometimes, he felt as if he were being blamed for the consequences of circumstances in his past over which he had no control.

Yet Padme did not seem to agree with this prevailing view. In spite of - or perhaps because - she was not a Jedi, it was she alone who understood him. True, his mother did, and perhaps Qui Gon might have, but they were now gone from his life. She was the only one left. And while he knew his feelings for her jeopardized his future with the Jedi, the abstractions of codes and doctrines seemed to pale in the face of his passions, and how could he deny them? Would he simply wish them away? He knew the idea was impossibly foolish. Faced with a difficult situation, he decided to go on his instincts. And that would mean speaking with her again, even if it resulted in his heart being broken. Yet he saw no acceptable alternative.

For the sake of his sanity, for his emotions, for his need to escape his fears and his nightmares, and the terrible feeling of solitude, he wished that Padme would understand him this time, above all others.

Banishing his thoughts, he cleared his mind and concentrated, attempting to locate her presence within the Palace grounds **

She expected him to come. No, she was certain he would. But that didn't make waiting any less distasteful, given what she had convinced herself during the long, sleepless night must be done. She leaned against the balcony rail, staring into the fiery rising sun, in almost the exact same location where Anakin had kissed her hours before.but she could not, would not let herself dwell on the memory, lest she loose her composure entirely.

Of course, it was at that precise moment when she heard his voice.

"Padme," he said simply.

"Hello, Anakin," she replied, turning to face him. For what seemed like an interminably long moment, neither spoke, though Padme thought the tension between them could have been cut with a lightsaber.

"I am sorry I left so abruptly last night, Anakin," she began, "But you must understand that we did something that we should not have."

"Then you are saying you felt nothing." It was not a question as much as a statement.

"What I felt, Anakin, is irrelevant. You are in training to be a Jedi. I am a Senator. We cannot simply ignore our duty for the sake of our feelings. "

"But you did feel something." He paused for a moment, as though in contemplation. "And what if I wasn't a Jedi, Padme?"

She was momentarily shocked by the question. "Anakin, you yourself told me you were supposedly chosen to bring balance to the Force. Surely, the Jedi need you."

"Yes, I know," he said, suddenly becoming angry "And I am tired of everyone constantly reminding me I am this 'chosen one.' What if I don't want to be?"

"Anakin, don't say that."

"No, Padme, I'm serious!" He paced back and forth, slowly calming himself, until he turned to face her and spoke again, this time as though he was desperate, pleading with her.

"What if I don't want to be a tool of my destiny? What if I just want to be a normal man? Does being chosen mean I must live in misery and die alone? That I lose everyone I love?"

Knowing just how much he had lost so far, she had no easy answer for him. "You don't know that, Anakin. I don't want to hurt you but I couldn't let myself ask you to give up your training just for me." She paused, softening her voice, though she knew she could do little to ease the impact of her words. "I'm sorry, Anakin, but I care too much for you to do that."

He stood silently for a moment, looking at her with a utterly hopeless expression, and she found herself unable to bear looking directly at him. At last, he simply turned on his heel and slowly walked away. Before he dissappeared around the corner to return to his quarters, he turned back to face her again. His voice was icy, betraying very little of the emotion that she knew lied beneath.

"If you truly cared for me, Padme, you wouldn't condemn me to an empty life like this."

She wanted nothing more than to be angry at him, to tell her how much what he had said had truly hurt, but she knew she could not, and she was relieved that his leaving her sight concealed her tears.

**

"It is entirely too late, foolish Jedi. Even now our armies are deploying by the tens of thousands, our fleet is massed in a secret location, and your pathetic Republic hasn't a clue where we shall strike. You cannot stop us! We are the Sith!"

Obi-Wan was exhausted, near delirium, knowing that at best he had a few more days left until his broken, tortured body gave out entirely. Yet the words of the Sith, Raptor, he had called himself, refused to leave his mind.

He had considered Raptor may have merely been feeding him disinformation or had been trying to crush his spirit, but his instincts had told him that this was the truth, and having sensed the sheer size of the installation in which he was now imprisoned, knew that the Sith's claim of a huge fleet and army made up of genetically engineered clones was not only possible, but probable.

I have to escape, he thought. Or at least let someone know what is really going on here.

Temporarily ignoring his agony, he reached out for the familiar, unmistakable sensation of his apprentice, channeled his energy, his concentration, and uttered - no, shouted - a single word through the Force.

***

He did not look back, simply because he could not bear to do so. Although then he remembered he had been assigned to protect her indefinitely and now the prospect of being in close proximity with her seemed more to be endured than enjoyed.

It seemed that in a matter of a little less than a month, his life had fallen apart with frightening rapidity and utterly beyond his control. The visions, his mother's death, Padme.all had happened in so short a time, sending him emotionally reeling.

Is this the pattern of my destiny? He asked himself, though he knew he would find no easy answers - as if there ever were easy answers, he thought bitterly. And worse, he would have to deal with his pain alone, no one could be allowed to know what had happened on that fateful balcony, and the only other person who knew had made her feelings on the matter painfully clear.

He just wished he could return to his quarters, lie down, and when he woke up, be back and the Temple and realize that all of this had been another crazy dream, that none of it had taken place, that he was just another Jedi Padawan in training and things were as close to normal in his life as they had ever been.

But he was fooling no one, especially not himself, with that sort of wishful thinking. Though it was odd, he thought, that he didn't even feel particularly angry anymore, just.tired, and hoping that whatever was going on out there would end and end quickly, so he could recover.that is, if he could really ever recover.

Suddenly, he doubled over as a sensation of excruciating, intolerable, mind- numbing pain pulsed through him out of nowhere. He screamed in agony and felt himself falling forward, the ground rushing up to him with frightening rapidity, and before everything faded to black, he heard in a familiar voice twisted with incredible agony, a clearly discernable word:

"Anakin!!!!!!!"

**

A guard on patrol had noticed the young Jedi suddenly cry out and fall over, and had alerted the entire Palace. A squad of men had carried Anakin to the medical wing and had placed him in a comfortable bed. Padme, horrified, wondering what had happened, or if she were somehow responsible, had remained at his side, watching him. Every now and then he would thrash and moan something about Obi-Wan, though his words were not easily comprehensible.

Suddenly, several hours later, he shot up, at once wide awake, looking at Padme with damp, ruffled hair and wild eyes. "It's Obi-Wan! He's in terrible danger! I have to rescue him!"

Padme started to try to calm him but it was no use, he was already on his feet and heading for the door.

"Anakin, shouldn't you notify the Council?"

"I don't have time!" he said, whirling around to face her. "He will die soon if I don't get to him."

She struggled to keep pace with his massive strides. "Then I am going with you. You're going to need help."

He turned to face her again, perhaps to tell her she should stay out of this, but he saw her determined expression and seemingly thought better of it.

"All right," he replied. "I'm going to need a fast ship and anyone you can bring with you, along with their weapons."

She rushed off, and a few minutes later returned with her three surviving handmaidens and a squad of Naboo infantry under Panaka's nephew, a young lieutenant named Typho, whose unit had been assigned to Padme's ever- increasing list of bodyguards following the attack in the gardens.

"Lieutenant," she said to the young dark-skinned officer, "take your men to the barracks and grab whatever weapons you can carry."

**

Anakin blasted out of the Palace hangar at full throttle, Padme sitting next to him in the navigator's position, as she was a pilot of considerable abilities.

Neither spoke to each other aside from necessary communication in flying the Royal Starship, although Anakin was too preoccupied about his Master, and the pain that he had felt him in, and the shocking weakness of his condition that he had sensed, which for the moment displaced any uncertainty regarding the silence between Padme and himself.

Obi-Wan, fortunately, had given Anakin Wayland's coordinates, and he saw the brilliant blue tunnel of hyperspace vanish and the small, barren planet looming in the cockpit windows.

**

"Lord Raptor, a single vessel is approaching an entry vector," the young duty officer reported.

"It may be Skywalker," the Sith said. "Run a sensor analysis on the ship."

The duty officer pressed a sequence of keys on the sensor scopes and a display of an elegant Nubian J-type yacht appeared on the readout along with detailed specifications regarding the vessel's performance and capabilities.

Raptor knew it had to be Skywalker, and perhaps the Naboo senator was with him. His Master, as always, was right. Sidious had known that Anakin would attempt to rescue Kenobi, and that his rashness would bring the young Jedi directly into his hands. His Master had made it clear that he wanted Anakin alive and undamaged if at all possible.

Raptor, however, had no intention of delivering his Master his own replacement. Since there were only two Sith, Sidious' intentions had not been difficult to divine. Perhaps if something unfortunate were to happen, he would be forced to kill Skywalker.

Such a pity.

"Let him land, Duty Officer. Send up no patrols, give no indication we are aware of his presence."

**

"What is it?" Padme asked him.

He didn't want to tell her about the disturbance he felt, the presence in the Force of that nightmare figure from his visions. But he had sensed it at once, as soon as the Royal Starship had dropped out of hyperspace. That cold, dread chill which seemed to manifest itself in his very depths.

He forced himself not to remember his last vision. He could allow no distraction if he were to save his Master.

Yet those dark, insistent, and entirely too beautiful brown eyes continued to bore into him.

"I think we can rule out simple mechanical failure," he said "otherwise, had my Master found nothing he would have simply asked the Temple to send a rescue ship. There must be something - or someone - down there on that planet."

It was not a lie, but it was by no means the entire truth. He could tell she didn't seem to be entirely satisfied with his explanation, but he would not tell her of the terror he felt, of the horror he had sensed.

"Can the ship survive an unshielded atmospheric entry?" he asked her.

"It should," she replied. "The tail finials were designed as heat sinks for the sublight engines and the hull was extensively modified after the Trade Federation's invasion with military-grade durasteel."

"Good," he said. Military spec durasteel was able to maintain its integrity through a wide range of temperature extremes. "Calculate an orbital entry vector. If there is anyone down there I want to go in quietly. I'll shut down nonessential systems and throttle back the engines, and we may just look like a meteorite on their sensor scopes. Once we get under their sensor net we'll go to full power."

He realized he said this as much to reassure himself as to inform her of any brilliant plan. The space around Wayland was clear and he didn't believe meteorites were a common occurrence, but the Royal Starship was more freighter than fighter, and if whatever was down there had any starfighters or ion cannons, he wasn't going to take any unnecessary chances.

"Two minutes on current course, then down five degrees pitch, then a ten- second burn, maximum thrust," she said.

"Everyone strap in," he said over the com channel to the main passenger cabin where the handmaidens and Typho's squad were traveling. "We're making an unpowered entry."

He focused all his attention now on the instrument panel, forced his hands and feet to steady on the controls, as now he had to fly with precision if they were to survive the transit into Wayland's atmosphere. His hand moved slightly on the pitch control, letting the attitude indicator slowly creep down to negative five degrees, and then jammed the throttles forward to maximum sublight velocity, glancing at the chrono and in ten seconds, chopped the throttles back to just above idle, letting Wayland's gravity pull them in closer.

**

"Contact has powered down and entered a decaying orbit, my Lord," the watch officer informed Raptor.

"Trying to fool our sensors, no doubt. Skywalker is said to be an excellent pilot. Continue tracking him, he should pull out just before impact. And tell Colonel Jetti that should any of his batteries attempt to engage that ship I will rip the man's still-beating heart from his chest."

"Yes, my Lord," the watch officer replied, unable to control his fear in the Sith Lord's presence.

**

The ship was getting hot inside. Unbearably hot, thought Anakin, as he struggled to keep an eye on the ship's altimeter and concentrate on the Force, sensing the falling ship's position relative to the planet below. The ship's nose, he saw, glancing momentarily out the cockpit windows, was glowing orange. The hull temperature monitor was climbing toward the red danger zone with sudden rapidity, and he pulled back slightly on the control column, flaring the ship slightly in an attempt to slow the descent.

He closed his eyes, ignoring the now blaring warning alarms, drew on the Force again.

And he waited.

And waited, ignoring Padme's insistent urging that he pull out before the hull failed, before the fuel tanks exploded, ignoring the ever-increasing number of critical alarms...

NOW!!

Suddenly, he wrenched the control stick back and shoved the throttles forward to half power. He glanced down at the altimeter, now showing 300 meters.

Another fraction of a second, he knew, and they would have been a permanent feature of Wayland's landscape.

** Anakin pitched the Naboo starship upward at a radical angle, and for a moment Padme thought that the ship was going to stall and crash, but instead Anakin applied power to the twin Nubian radials and the ship surged forward, the nose at last lowering as the ship skimmed over the vast forests of Wayland.

"Hull temperatures returning to nominal," Padme announced, as the shields began absorbing some of the excess heat. "So," she asked him "where are you planning to start looking?"

"I feel a strange presence in the Force," Anakin replied, "and I believe my Master is nearby."

**

"I.have lost him, Lord Raptor," the young officer reported, terrified of the Sith's potential anger at his failure.

"He's flying under our sensor net," the Sith stated. "But it is no matter. He will find his way here, and I will be waiting for him."

The young watch officer breathed an audible sigh of relief, as he had seen the fate of those who failed the Sith before.

**

The forest canopy streaked by in the cockpit windows as Anakin flew the starship only meters above the treetops at full speed.

"See that mountain ahead?" Anakin asked, indicating a large, dark mass looming on the horizon.

Padme nodded. "Is that where you're headed?"

"That's where the Force is leading me," he said. "I plan to get closer to the mountain's base and find a place to land. Then we can make the rest of our way in on foot."

An hour later the ship had landed after Anakin found a gap in the trees large enough to set the vessel down.

He and Padme unstrapped themselves from their seats and made their way to the main cabin, where the handmaidens and Typho's men were waiting.

Padme opened the ship's weapons locker, and she and the others began an inventory of their available firepower.

Typho's infantrymen were well equipped, Typho with a powerful pistol, six of his squad carried blaster carbines, and two more carried the team's most valuable asset - a light repeating blaster and a removable lightweight tripod mount. In addition, the squad had two thermal detonators, several concussion grenades each, vibroblades, and each man carried two blaster cartridges for the repeater and the assistant gunner carried a spare barrel. The handmaidens and Padme each were armed a pair of pistols. They also had either on the ship or in the soldiers' web gear several field rations, medical supplies, some water, and other useful items.

In addition to his lightsaber, Anakin armed himself with a high-power pistol and several cartridges, while Padme selected an automatic carbine and some concussion grenades.

Anakin headed for the ship's entry ramp, Padme in tow.

"Let's go out and take a look at our surroundings," he said.

**

Anakin and Padme stepped out into the dense forest. Anakin could hear the chorus of sounds made by Wayland's abundant and varied contingent of animal species. Looking around, he saw that the forest was extremely dense, and judging from the size of several of the tree trunks, some nearly two meters in diameter, quite old.

Padme, a few meters away, was examining their surroundings as well. Anakin forced himself not to continue looking at her. He could not afford this distraction now, he knew. His Master's life was in jeopardy, and if his dream was a vision of the future, so was his own. It crossed his mind that if he were to be killed here, he would not have even had the opportunity to say that he loved her.

No!

He imagined his Master's voice.

Clear your emotions, Padawan. Dispel your thoughts and reach out into the Force.

He paused for a moment, closing his eyes, stretching out his senses in the Force. He sensed a flowing current of different nonsentients all around him.wildlife, no doubt. Stretching his senses deeper, however, he felt an odd sensation that he could have sworn he encountered before.it felt like a huge mass, as though a signal were being duplicated and amplified thousands of times, but with tiny variations, as though of an identical frequency with varying amplitudes. And, seeming to flow beneath the current's surface, was the chill of an icy hand, seeming to trace a finger slowly up his spine.

He cried out and suddenly opened his eyes wide in terror.

"Anakin! What's wrong?" Padme asked him, startled by his sudden cry.

"He's here. They're here. In the mountain." His words were spoken between clenched teeth, and he was breathing heavily.

"Who, Anakin?"

"The clones, Padme. It was the same feeling in the Force I sensed on Naboo, only there seem to be a huge number of them. Thousands. And he is with them.the man in my dreams."

"Man in your dreams?"

"I don't want to talk about it now. I can't dwell on it if we are to succeed here. But that mountain is full of clones, so we had better rescue my Master quickly and get out of this place."

**

"Lieutenant, leave two men here with the repeater to protect the ship. Have them find a position with good fields of fire but out of sight. The rest of you grab your gear and get ready to move out."

Lieutenant Typho saluted Padme and dispatched the gun team. The unspoken implications of Padme's orders, sensible as they were, were disturbing. The gun would be too cumbersome to carry through the dense forest, and if that much firepower became necessary, they would be in serious, quite possibly mortal danger.

Anakin wished the ship had not been finished so brightly, as the massive reflective hull would act like a beacon to any sentries or patrols. Yet, at the same time, there was no way to camoflauge the ship effectively. The only positive was that the dense forest would make the ship visible only from above or from very close range.

Everyone checked and double-checked their weapons. The handmaidens had changed from their conspicuous orange robes into darker, closer-fitting garb better suited for action and concealment. Padme adopted an identical outfit to remain further inconspicuous, as it would be impossible for anyone other than a close friend or relative to determine which of the young women was the Naboo Senator.

It was decided that Anakin, with his heightened Jedi senses, would take point. Padme and the handmaidens would follow him, far enough back to disguise their numbers, but close enough to help if Anakin ran into trouble. The remaining seven men, Typho's squad, brought up the rear of the column, the seventh man, a young corporal, was to cover the rear and conceal their trail from any roving patrols.

"Normally I would have us move at night," Anakin said, "but we don't have much time, and this is a very dangerous place. Follow directly behind the person in front of you. It will hide our numbers, and there may be mines, traps, or warning devices."

He drew his blaster from his belt. "Let's move out."