Disclaimer: Joss, WB, UPN et al. own Buffy. LucasArts, LucasFilm, and George Lucas own Star Wars. Michael A Stackpole owns the intellectual rights to 'I, Jedi'. I do not own those things, but I do own the concept of the Arii'Marr, and Aruno Baas.

Title: Sunnydale Jedi: Chapter 9 Interlude…

Author: Paradigm Shifter

Feedback: It's what makes this story continue. You like, tell me. You don't like; tell me. But be gentle. I have a fragile ego.

Rating: PG-13. A note about this at the end…

Notes: The 'Interludes' are a look into how the story is going back with Obi-Wan and the others in the Star Wars Universe. Things are moving quickly…

Dedication: Teri: Hey! First review of Chapter 8: Interlude was by you! Thank you. And dammit, writers block is stalking round my mind again. This is not good…

*

The Sith had enclosed them in the Great Library. The Archives were hidden within the Library, and the great doors that held the Sith out were being slowly destroyed by the constant Force assaults that Sith were using on them. Jedi were working to reinforce them, but materials were scarce and time short.

Yoda and the Masters, along with Obi-Wan, had retreated into the Archives. Several Jedi threw questioning looks, among them Obi-Wan himself when he was told to follow the Masters.

"Time for external reinforcements, we do not have. Any Jedi outside of the Temple must fend for themselves if we fall…" Yoda's voice held a tinge of sadness, and more than a little apprehension. He had seen the Jedi order build itself up over nearly 800 years, and he had had a hand in a lot of them. The Jedi order had survived the galaxy for five times five millennia, and now they were to wiped out by a renegade splinter group of themselves.

It was a dark time.

Yoda looked speculatively down a corridor, which seemed to be sealed with many Force wards. Obi-Wan could barely make out anything other than the first ward, a ward designed to confuse the mind. Merely looking at it made his mind wander, and he shook his head in amazement at the sheer power that must have gone into its creation.

Seeming to come to an end of whatever internal argument raged, Yoda hopped down from his perch on one of the large bookshelves. "Obi-Wan, come…"

Obi-Wan followed without question, and watched as Yoda waved away the wards and shuffled through. He turned when Obi-Wan froze at the cusp of the entrance. "A luxury we cannot afford, time is, Obi-Wan. Come."

"Yes, master." Obi-Wan stared in amazement as the wards and seals reformed behind him. It reminded him of the laser fields that had been in the reactor core on Naboo during the defeat of the Trade Federation. A slight moment of sadness passed through him at that thought, as it brought memories of his master, Qui-Gon Jinn, dead at the hands of the Sith.

Mace Windu watched with interest as Yoda collapsed wards and seals he had not known existed there. Yoda's voice floated back to him. "Mace. Find the suits, you must. Protection, they grant you, from a light-saber. Of a degree…"

Adi stepped up to him. "Come, they are this way…"

*

Mace followed her, and was soon brought to a doorway, sealed by time and the Force.

"You must open the door. You have more power than I, and, other than Yoda, only you may open it."

Mace took a deep breath, and began to investigate what protected the door.

If he screwed this up, it might kill him…

But if he didn't do it, it would kill everyone…

*

Yoda led Obi-Wan through several small rooms, each packed full of trinkets and treasures collected by the Jedi over thousands of years. Holocrons lined the walls, in their hundreds. Strange and archaic light-saber designs were held on racks, in many different shapes and sizes. One was as big as Obi-Wan's arm, another, so small that even one of Yoda's fingers was larger than it was.

Yoda stopped, and gestured for Obi-Wan to reach up to a shelf high above his head. He pulled down what he found, and handed one to Yoda, before putting a few more in his pocket at Yoda's urging.

"What are they, master?" Obi-Wan asked.

"Glow-globes, they are, Obi-Wan. The forerunner of the glow-rods; they are the standard now. Soft, is the light they give out, but no less bright for that…" Yoda demonstrated by gently squeezing the globe, and moving off as the globe glowed a dull white.

Obi-Wan could not conceal his amazement at small spheres.

*

Mace Windu had succeeded in getting to the prize that Yoda had told him to find. He stared in awe at the racks of suits. Rack after rack, armour after armour, continuing for further than the eye could see. It seemed almost impossible that this room could be hidden in the archives, but when he thought about it, Mace now understood why the Archives had so many corners and walls in odd places that were unexplained. It hid rooms like this one.

"Get as many of these suits out as possible!" he turned to give orders to those waiting behind him. "I want all Jedi to be vested within the hour!" he suited words to action by lifting down a dozen or more suits and carrying them out of the room, to be distributed. Adi raised a questioning eyebrow at his manual labour, but he smiled back. "If we do not show the Knights and Padawans that we ourselves must work, as well as them, we have as good as lost."

Adi nodded to his logic and followed his example.

*

Mace and Adi stood in front of the massed ranks of the Jedi, and stared in awe at the sight of hundreds, perhaps thousands of armoured warriors. Mace rolled his shoulders and looked over to Adi. His own suit was comfortable enough, and allowed an only slightly restricted movement zone, but if what he had heard about this material were true, the slightly diminished movement would not prove a disability. The tight suit looked stunning on Adi, and Mace spent several seconds trying not to show his stupor. Adi felt his approval in the Force, and gave him a slight smirk. Jedi were not meant to entertain such feelings…

The suits were a composite material, made of flexible fibres and reinforced with other substances. One of these was a threadlike weaving of Cortosis Ore, a mineral that resisted light-saber's and created an infinity loop within the power unit, causing a catastrophic power failure. It wasn't a particularly impressive mineral, useless for just about everything else, but for this one thing, it excelled. The second material was not so much woven into the suits as woven onto. It was a fine crystal structure, caked between two layers of Cortosis and then on top of the fibres themselves. It was found on a deserted world parsecs from the Galactic Centre, and it was found to have strange Force related properties. The exact nature of what it did was still not fully understood, but it seemed to warp any Force influences directed at it, weakening them, if not nullifying them completely.

Mace raised his light-saber and spoke quietly, the Force amplifying his words, sending them to the ears of every person in the room. "We… Will… Endure!"

A screaming cry went up from the haggard Jedi Knights, and the Padawans and others joined in moments later.

"The Sith Will NOT Win!" Was Mace's second call.

It seemed impossible to Mace and Adi, standing at the front of it all, but the cheers got louder.

"To your positions!" Mace finally shouted after a few seconds. "When the gates fall, be ready!"

The only reply was yet another increase in volume…

*

Yoda stood back from a small fighter, one of the prototype fighters used by Adi Gallia and several of the other masters. But Adi was the chief technician amount the Masters, and as such, it fell to her to test any new equipment.

Obi-Wan was sat, somewhat apprehensive, in the cockpit. "Uh… Master Yoda… are you sure about this?"

Yoda nodded, and hit a button on the console near him, opening a blast door in front of the fighters nose. "Sure, I am, Obi-Wan. Find the Sons of Freedom you must, lest we fail."

Obi-Wan didn't want to entertain the idea of the Jedi finally loosing against the Sith, but he knew in his mind that it could happen…

"Yes, Master. Are the coordinates that you gave me complete?"

"Complete, they are, Obi-Wan. Go, Jedi Knight, and with speed bring us aid."

Obi-Wan nodded and hit the canopy button, taking his last breath of Coruscant air for a time, before the fighter was sent hurtling through the blast door and out of the bay built into the side of the Jedi Temple.

Obi-Wan pulled back on the stick, and leaned the craft sky-wards. As it reached vertical, he nudged the stick, and was sent spiralling into Coruscants pollution leaden sky.

No one was near enough to hear Obi-Wan's scream, part exhilaration, and part fear…

*

As the fighter left the bay, Yoda turned away. He had to prepare the Sanctuary for the Arrival…

And ship out all that the Sith would want to get their hands on…

Gimmer stick clicking on the polished metal of the hidden fighter bay, an echo in the Force from his departed student told him two things…

Xander was the first of the new Jedi. If he survived where he was. But, what weighed on Yoda's mind was not that. It was the fact that…

He would be the last of the old Jedi…

The new order would soon be here…

*

Also: the 'Sons of Freedom' are listed in the Star Wars Encyclopaedia. They aided the Jedi during and after the Clone Wars. Also, they are interchangeably called 'Sons of Freedom' and 'Freedom's Sons'. And, out of interest, some of the graphic novels and other stuff that was written before 'Episode II: Attack of the Clones' had the clones as the bad guys, not the good. But those have conveniently disappeared after the release of the film…