Chapter 8
Warmth.
Tingling.
He became aware of the beating of his heart, the regular coursing of life through his veins. His nerves tingled, his muscles twitched as each independently awoke.
Air hissing in and out of him, sterile and tinned.
Was this it? Was this the new awareness they'd told him of? Had he revived not as himself but as a tool of the Sith?
No ...
No, he sensed nothing of the sort. His thoughts, his will, were his own.
His eyelids fluttered.
He detected a presence nearby, felt a touch, heard a voice anxiously speaking a name. His name.
Tried to speak. Couldn't. Coughed against the invasive tube that filled his throat. He gagged as it was withdrawn -- slithering, lurching sensation. Then gasped in a breath.
Blood. Ash. Decay. Mustiness.
A veil, a murky gray veil, hanging before him. Blocking the way. Blurred shapes half-seen through it.
A thought, pulled whole from its thinker.
He's not going to make it, after all this, after what she did, he's not going to make it!
"Come on, Obi-Wan!" the voice urged. "Come back! Wake up!"
A sharp slap.
He lunged upright, crying out. Before he knew what he was doing, he had someone by the upper arms, was shoving that person against the wall.
The veil tattered and blew away.
"Anakin?"
The youth's face lit up with hope. "Master Obi-Wan? You're back!"
He let go and brought his hands to his face, dazed. "Alive. I'm alive ... and ... the Force ...so weak, but with me again ..." he turned his palms up, looking at them as if the answer might be written there. "How --?"
It popped like a bubble to the surface of Anakin's mind, though he tried to block it, tried to spare Obi-Wan the truth for a little while longer.
"No," he said turning almost against his will. When he saw her, it burst from him loud as thunder. "No!"
Slouched in the chair, arms dangling limp at her sides, head down. New scars on her legs matched the ones he bore, and there was spilled blood because Anakin wasn't as adept with a needle as Eliry had been.
He was beside her without knowing how he got there.
Cold, she was so cold! But ...
"Not dead," he whispered. "She's not dead!"
"I couldn't do it," Anakin said. "Couldn't take it all. I thought maybe if I just took some, it'd be enough to help you and not kill her."
He lifted her head, running his thumb over her lips to feel the breath she took in shallow sips. She was deeply unconscious, her mind utterly dark to him. Whether that last was from her condition or his weakened ability, he wasn't sure.
"I just couldn't," Anakin said softly. "I had to trust my instincts, right? Stop when I felt like it was okay, right?"
Obi-Wan swept him into a tight embrace. "Thank you, Ani."
"Are you mad that we came after you?"
"I should be. It was too dangerous, too great a risk. But under the circumstances, I can't scold you. You saved my life ... more, you saved my very soul."
Anakin nodded. "I know what they tried to do."
"The other Jedi --?"
While Anakin told him everything that had happened, starting from his vision on Sylvar, Obi-Wan wrapped Sabeeth in her cloak and fastened her lightsaber to his belt. It seemed to be the lot of these Sith to deprive him of his own; first losing one down a shaft then having a second confiscated.
"So we don't have a ship anymore," Anakin finished, a bit shamefaced, "and Admiral Antilles is going to pitch a fit ... but I figure that's the last of my worries right now. We've got to find Darth Tepes."
"We're in no condition to --"
"Not just because I promised Sabeeth. I mean, technically, since she's alive I don't have to avenge her; I can probably get out of that one. But I think he's going to do something. I felt it. He's going to do something to the Council."
Obi-Wan picked up Sabeeth. Her head rolled against his shoulder. She was beginning to shiver.
"Then we will need a new ship," he said.
Anakin nodded eagerly. "I'll find us one!"
That proved to be easier said than done; when they emerged from the tower they found that the Prhei had descended into a full-fledged riot. The city beyond the walls was in flames, mobs packed the streets.
"What's happening?" Anakin asked, staring out over the scene.
"They're rising against their rulers," Obi-Wan said. "The Bram have dominated this world for centuries, but I think that's just changed."
"Oops." He looked sheepish. "Uh ... we Jedi aren't supposed to get involve in other people's cultures, are we?"
"At the moment, I wouldn't worry about it."
The courtyard was silent, the action having moved into the city. They moved slowly, picking their way, trying to find a path through the dozens of bodies. Most were Prhei, but many were Bram guards.
"Wait," Obi-Wan said, catching sight of a black demon-visaged helm. "That one..."
Anakin inched over as if he expected the corpse to suddenly spring up and get him, though the man's chest was a caved-in ruin. He gingerly flipped up the visor. A human face, glassy-eyed and slack, stared back at them.
"I don't know him," Obi-Wan said, holding Sabeeth more securely in his arms. "But he was Jedi."
"Do you want me to look for his lightsaber, Master?" Anakin asked reluctantly, clearly not wanting to paw through the dead on such an errand. "Or... bring the body?"
"No." He sighed desolately. "We can't take him with us, can't give him the funeral a Jedi deserves ... we have to put the living first."
They found an intact skimmer. Obi-Wan studied it, then turned to Anakin with a questioning look.
"Yeah, I can fly it," he replied. "But it's a one-person craft, and even if we could all fit, it's only good for short-range flights."
"Then take it, search for a suitable ship, and return," Obi-Wan said, carrying Sabeeth to an undamaged section of wall and setting her gently down in a corner. "We'll wait here."
"Are you sure?"
"It's our only hope."
Anakin climbed inside, fiddled with the instruments, muttered to himself, and then the skimmer's engine chugged to life. He gave Obi-Wan a beaming thumb's-up through the canopy. Obi-Wan returned it with a half-smile, then turned away as the skimmer lifted off.
He sat down beside Sabeeth. She was still breathing shallowly but evenly, her pulse slow but strong. Her skin was even paler than usual, chalky, tinged faintly with blue. Resting on cold stones wouldn't help her, nor would the chill in the air.
Obi-Wan collected three red cloaks from fallen Bram guards, spreading one beneath and wrapping the others around them as he huddled beside her to share what little warmth he had.
His arm ached dully. Now that he had the leisure to examine it, he found a bruise flowering in the crook of his elbow and understood that this was where Anakin had injected him with the chemical extract. Better there than the neck, he thought, remembering the long needle sinking into Darth Tepes' flesh.
He took deep breaths ... calm, calmer ... and sent a mental warning to the Council. The effort left him with no inkling whether he'd reached them or not. No comforting sense of presence met his reaching mind. Too far away, or his own powers were still too weak.
No other options, then. They had to go after Tepes.
A grating, dragging footstep brought his head up sharply, and he realized with chagrin he'd fallen into a near-doze.
Something, someone, was moving across the courtyard. Limping, hunched over.
Sabeeth was still beside him, her color not improved. There was no sign of Anakin.
He was suddenly sure it would be Eliry, reanimated by some hideous magic and bent on finishing the job.
No. He had seen the spill of dust that was all that remained of her. This was... he opened his mind and instantly shied back in sweeping horror...
Worse.
The figure stopped, straightened up, and yanked off the black helm. Uri- Tan's familiar features were alien now. A wild light blazed in his eyes, his mouth was twisted in a snarl. Blood was dried in a smear across his cheek.
His clothes were in tatters, his armor dented from the damage he'd sustained at the hands of the Prhei. But aside from the limp, he was moving well enough, and as his gaze locked with Obi-Wan's across a heap of bodies, he raised an unlit lightsaber in mute challenge.
"Uri-Tan, no," Obi-Wan said, standing. "Listen to me!" It was no use, he knew that. The face was that of his friend, but the rest of him was no longer Uri-Tan. The –real-- Uri-Tan was dead, had died when Eliry's needle had found his heart and filled him with the essence of evil.
Resignedly, he drew Sabeeth's lightsaber and moved to meet Uri-Tan. Both of them were at less than peak, their respective ordeals bringing them to a fairly even match.
Uri-Tan looked at him without a hint of recognition, and activated his weapon. It was a shade of turquoise as vivid as a shaft of sunlight through the tropical waters of Marn, Uri-Tan's homeworld.
The beam jumped with a sputtering and spitting hum that Obi-Wan knew was the sign of a damaged power source. The handle was badly scarred.
Despite what he knew was true, Obi-Wan could not attack first. He stood his ground and waited as Uri-Tan came to him.
It was like a training match in slowed motion, both of them with reflexes dulled. But Uri-Tan's intent was earnest enough to overcome that. He slashed so fiercely that he nearly disarmed Obi-Wan, which would have ended things in short order.
Obi-Wan felt the searing heat pass his wrist, a shower of blue-green sparks stinging his skin and leaving tiny smoking holes in his sleeve. He retaliated, knowing he didn't dare attempt any maneuvers other than straightforward saber-play.
They ranged back and forth through the corpses, death-stink rising sickly all around them. Obi-Wan, still barefoot, slipped in congealed puddles and streaks of Prhei blood.
Turquoise and amethyst, flashing, flashing.
Uri-Tan's lightsaber cut out just as he made to parry, and Obi-Wan's strike landed on his shoulder. A chunk of armor fell away with glowing red-hot edges, leaving the skin beneath blistered and black.
He swung with the unlit hilt. It cracked Obi-Wan in the head, by malign mischance hitting him right on the already-swollen lump left over from the assault on the Vigilant. Novas burst across his vision and he dropped to his knees.
Making low guttural noises of anger, Uri-Tan pounded the hilt into his palm and shook it. The beam sprang on, went out, sprang on again and stayed steady.
A surge of transcendent energy poured into Obi-Wan. Raw and untamed. Sabeeth... Suddenly he could sense her, like a tiny glimmer in the dark. Through the bond they shared she let the last of her strength flow into him.
He was on his feet and flipping backward as the turquoise lightsaber sliced through the spot where he'd been only a fraction of a second before.
His powers were fully restored. He vaulted over Uri-Tan's head. A well- placed kick in the small of the back sent Uri-Tan face-first to the ground, but he held onto his lightsaber and rolled to bring it up just as Obi-Wan jumped toward him.
The turquoise beam nearly impaled him but he twisted in mid-air and swung hard, severing Uri-Tan's arm above the elbow and scoring a deep charred trench in his side.
Somehow, Uri-Tan got his weapon up in time to intercept a follow-up blow, but on the hilt rather than the beam. Metal split asunder, the blue-green light went hot yellow-white, and then Uri-Tan was engulfed in flames.
He reeled backward with a terrible scream, the exploded remains of his lightsaber still clenched in his hand. His legs tangled with those of a Prhei corpse and he fell, rolling and howling.
Obi-Wan ran to him, but the heat was too intense. He stood helplessly, unable to give the killing strike that would have been more merciful, watching as his former friend burned alive.
It went on far longer than should have been possible. Maybe an effect of whatever they'd done to Uri-Tan. Or maybe it only seemed that way to Obi-Wan.
At last, the blaze died down enough for him to get close. But by then, there was no need.
Obi-Wan bowed his head, just as if it had been a proper Jedi pyre. Then he turned his attention to Sabeeth.
He took her in his arms. "Sabeeth..."
To his surprise her eyes fluttered opened. "Obi-Wan..." her voice a faint whisper.
He caressed her cheek. "Hush, don't try to talk"
"You shouldn't have done it..." he scolded her mildly. "Not for me, not for anyone."
"I wanted to..." her eyes got a glazed look as she began to drift out of conscious. Her breaths only shallow sips. He could feel her pulse beginning to flicker.
"No! Don't leave me, Sabeeth." He willed her heart to steady it's rhythm, willed her to breathe. He tried to give back some of the strength she'd given him. He pressed his forehead against hers. I will not loose you...
He heard an engine approaching and his restored senses told him it was Anakin without even having to turn around.
The boy approached hesitantly, eyes fixed on the leaping flames. Probably remembering the funeral of Qui-Gon ... but such a difference! Qui-Gon had seemed at repose within the fire, the shell of his body being burned away as his spirit moved on to a new freedom.
"Your friend?" Anakin asked softly.
"A good friend," Obi-Wan replied without taking his eyes of the unconscious woman in his arms. "It's better this way."
Continued in the next chapter.
Warmth.
Tingling.
He became aware of the beating of his heart, the regular coursing of life through his veins. His nerves tingled, his muscles twitched as each independently awoke.
Air hissing in and out of him, sterile and tinned.
Was this it? Was this the new awareness they'd told him of? Had he revived not as himself but as a tool of the Sith?
No ...
No, he sensed nothing of the sort. His thoughts, his will, were his own.
His eyelids fluttered.
He detected a presence nearby, felt a touch, heard a voice anxiously speaking a name. His name.
Tried to speak. Couldn't. Coughed against the invasive tube that filled his throat. He gagged as it was withdrawn -- slithering, lurching sensation. Then gasped in a breath.
Blood. Ash. Decay. Mustiness.
A veil, a murky gray veil, hanging before him. Blocking the way. Blurred shapes half-seen through it.
A thought, pulled whole from its thinker.
He's not going to make it, after all this, after what she did, he's not going to make it!
"Come on, Obi-Wan!" the voice urged. "Come back! Wake up!"
A sharp slap.
He lunged upright, crying out. Before he knew what he was doing, he had someone by the upper arms, was shoving that person against the wall.
The veil tattered and blew away.
"Anakin?"
The youth's face lit up with hope. "Master Obi-Wan? You're back!"
He let go and brought his hands to his face, dazed. "Alive. I'm alive ... and ... the Force ...so weak, but with me again ..." he turned his palms up, looking at them as if the answer might be written there. "How --?"
It popped like a bubble to the surface of Anakin's mind, though he tried to block it, tried to spare Obi-Wan the truth for a little while longer.
"No," he said turning almost against his will. When he saw her, it burst from him loud as thunder. "No!"
Slouched in the chair, arms dangling limp at her sides, head down. New scars on her legs matched the ones he bore, and there was spilled blood because Anakin wasn't as adept with a needle as Eliry had been.
He was beside her without knowing how he got there.
Cold, she was so cold! But ...
"Not dead," he whispered. "She's not dead!"
"I couldn't do it," Anakin said. "Couldn't take it all. I thought maybe if I just took some, it'd be enough to help you and not kill her."
He lifted her head, running his thumb over her lips to feel the breath she took in shallow sips. She was deeply unconscious, her mind utterly dark to him. Whether that last was from her condition or his weakened ability, he wasn't sure.
"I just couldn't," Anakin said softly. "I had to trust my instincts, right? Stop when I felt like it was okay, right?"
Obi-Wan swept him into a tight embrace. "Thank you, Ani."
"Are you mad that we came after you?"
"I should be. It was too dangerous, too great a risk. But under the circumstances, I can't scold you. You saved my life ... more, you saved my very soul."
Anakin nodded. "I know what they tried to do."
"The other Jedi --?"
While Anakin told him everything that had happened, starting from his vision on Sylvar, Obi-Wan wrapped Sabeeth in her cloak and fastened her lightsaber to his belt. It seemed to be the lot of these Sith to deprive him of his own; first losing one down a shaft then having a second confiscated.
"So we don't have a ship anymore," Anakin finished, a bit shamefaced, "and Admiral Antilles is going to pitch a fit ... but I figure that's the last of my worries right now. We've got to find Darth Tepes."
"We're in no condition to --"
"Not just because I promised Sabeeth. I mean, technically, since she's alive I don't have to avenge her; I can probably get out of that one. But I think he's going to do something. I felt it. He's going to do something to the Council."
Obi-Wan picked up Sabeeth. Her head rolled against his shoulder. She was beginning to shiver.
"Then we will need a new ship," he said.
Anakin nodded eagerly. "I'll find us one!"
That proved to be easier said than done; when they emerged from the tower they found that the Prhei had descended into a full-fledged riot. The city beyond the walls was in flames, mobs packed the streets.
"What's happening?" Anakin asked, staring out over the scene.
"They're rising against their rulers," Obi-Wan said. "The Bram have dominated this world for centuries, but I think that's just changed."
"Oops." He looked sheepish. "Uh ... we Jedi aren't supposed to get involve in other people's cultures, are we?"
"At the moment, I wouldn't worry about it."
The courtyard was silent, the action having moved into the city. They moved slowly, picking their way, trying to find a path through the dozens of bodies. Most were Prhei, but many were Bram guards.
"Wait," Obi-Wan said, catching sight of a black demon-visaged helm. "That one..."
Anakin inched over as if he expected the corpse to suddenly spring up and get him, though the man's chest was a caved-in ruin. He gingerly flipped up the visor. A human face, glassy-eyed and slack, stared back at them.
"I don't know him," Obi-Wan said, holding Sabeeth more securely in his arms. "But he was Jedi."
"Do you want me to look for his lightsaber, Master?" Anakin asked reluctantly, clearly not wanting to paw through the dead on such an errand. "Or... bring the body?"
"No." He sighed desolately. "We can't take him with us, can't give him the funeral a Jedi deserves ... we have to put the living first."
They found an intact skimmer. Obi-Wan studied it, then turned to Anakin with a questioning look.
"Yeah, I can fly it," he replied. "But it's a one-person craft, and even if we could all fit, it's only good for short-range flights."
"Then take it, search for a suitable ship, and return," Obi-Wan said, carrying Sabeeth to an undamaged section of wall and setting her gently down in a corner. "We'll wait here."
"Are you sure?"
"It's our only hope."
Anakin climbed inside, fiddled with the instruments, muttered to himself, and then the skimmer's engine chugged to life. He gave Obi-Wan a beaming thumb's-up through the canopy. Obi-Wan returned it with a half-smile, then turned away as the skimmer lifted off.
He sat down beside Sabeeth. She was still breathing shallowly but evenly, her pulse slow but strong. Her skin was even paler than usual, chalky, tinged faintly with blue. Resting on cold stones wouldn't help her, nor would the chill in the air.
Obi-Wan collected three red cloaks from fallen Bram guards, spreading one beneath and wrapping the others around them as he huddled beside her to share what little warmth he had.
His arm ached dully. Now that he had the leisure to examine it, he found a bruise flowering in the crook of his elbow and understood that this was where Anakin had injected him with the chemical extract. Better there than the neck, he thought, remembering the long needle sinking into Darth Tepes' flesh.
He took deep breaths ... calm, calmer ... and sent a mental warning to the Council. The effort left him with no inkling whether he'd reached them or not. No comforting sense of presence met his reaching mind. Too far away, or his own powers were still too weak.
No other options, then. They had to go after Tepes.
A grating, dragging footstep brought his head up sharply, and he realized with chagrin he'd fallen into a near-doze.
Something, someone, was moving across the courtyard. Limping, hunched over.
Sabeeth was still beside him, her color not improved. There was no sign of Anakin.
He was suddenly sure it would be Eliry, reanimated by some hideous magic and bent on finishing the job.
No. He had seen the spill of dust that was all that remained of her. This was... he opened his mind and instantly shied back in sweeping horror...
Worse.
The figure stopped, straightened up, and yanked off the black helm. Uri- Tan's familiar features were alien now. A wild light blazed in his eyes, his mouth was twisted in a snarl. Blood was dried in a smear across his cheek.
His clothes were in tatters, his armor dented from the damage he'd sustained at the hands of the Prhei. But aside from the limp, he was moving well enough, and as his gaze locked with Obi-Wan's across a heap of bodies, he raised an unlit lightsaber in mute challenge.
"Uri-Tan, no," Obi-Wan said, standing. "Listen to me!" It was no use, he knew that. The face was that of his friend, but the rest of him was no longer Uri-Tan. The –real-- Uri-Tan was dead, had died when Eliry's needle had found his heart and filled him with the essence of evil.
Resignedly, he drew Sabeeth's lightsaber and moved to meet Uri-Tan. Both of them were at less than peak, their respective ordeals bringing them to a fairly even match.
Uri-Tan looked at him without a hint of recognition, and activated his weapon. It was a shade of turquoise as vivid as a shaft of sunlight through the tropical waters of Marn, Uri-Tan's homeworld.
The beam jumped with a sputtering and spitting hum that Obi-Wan knew was the sign of a damaged power source. The handle was badly scarred.
Despite what he knew was true, Obi-Wan could not attack first. He stood his ground and waited as Uri-Tan came to him.
It was like a training match in slowed motion, both of them with reflexes dulled. But Uri-Tan's intent was earnest enough to overcome that. He slashed so fiercely that he nearly disarmed Obi-Wan, which would have ended things in short order.
Obi-Wan felt the searing heat pass his wrist, a shower of blue-green sparks stinging his skin and leaving tiny smoking holes in his sleeve. He retaliated, knowing he didn't dare attempt any maneuvers other than straightforward saber-play.
They ranged back and forth through the corpses, death-stink rising sickly all around them. Obi-Wan, still barefoot, slipped in congealed puddles and streaks of Prhei blood.
Turquoise and amethyst, flashing, flashing.
Uri-Tan's lightsaber cut out just as he made to parry, and Obi-Wan's strike landed on his shoulder. A chunk of armor fell away with glowing red-hot edges, leaving the skin beneath blistered and black.
He swung with the unlit hilt. It cracked Obi-Wan in the head, by malign mischance hitting him right on the already-swollen lump left over from the assault on the Vigilant. Novas burst across his vision and he dropped to his knees.
Making low guttural noises of anger, Uri-Tan pounded the hilt into his palm and shook it. The beam sprang on, went out, sprang on again and stayed steady.
A surge of transcendent energy poured into Obi-Wan. Raw and untamed. Sabeeth... Suddenly he could sense her, like a tiny glimmer in the dark. Through the bond they shared she let the last of her strength flow into him.
He was on his feet and flipping backward as the turquoise lightsaber sliced through the spot where he'd been only a fraction of a second before.
His powers were fully restored. He vaulted over Uri-Tan's head. A well- placed kick in the small of the back sent Uri-Tan face-first to the ground, but he held onto his lightsaber and rolled to bring it up just as Obi-Wan jumped toward him.
The turquoise beam nearly impaled him but he twisted in mid-air and swung hard, severing Uri-Tan's arm above the elbow and scoring a deep charred trench in his side.
Somehow, Uri-Tan got his weapon up in time to intercept a follow-up blow, but on the hilt rather than the beam. Metal split asunder, the blue-green light went hot yellow-white, and then Uri-Tan was engulfed in flames.
He reeled backward with a terrible scream, the exploded remains of his lightsaber still clenched in his hand. His legs tangled with those of a Prhei corpse and he fell, rolling and howling.
Obi-Wan ran to him, but the heat was too intense. He stood helplessly, unable to give the killing strike that would have been more merciful, watching as his former friend burned alive.
It went on far longer than should have been possible. Maybe an effect of whatever they'd done to Uri-Tan. Or maybe it only seemed that way to Obi-Wan.
At last, the blaze died down enough for him to get close. But by then, there was no need.
Obi-Wan bowed his head, just as if it had been a proper Jedi pyre. Then he turned his attention to Sabeeth.
He took her in his arms. "Sabeeth..."
To his surprise her eyes fluttered opened. "Obi-Wan..." her voice a faint whisper.
He caressed her cheek. "Hush, don't try to talk"
"You shouldn't have done it..." he scolded her mildly. "Not for me, not for anyone."
"I wanted to..." her eyes got a glazed look as she began to drift out of conscious. Her breaths only shallow sips. He could feel her pulse beginning to flicker.
"No! Don't leave me, Sabeeth." He willed her heart to steady it's rhythm, willed her to breathe. He tried to give back some of the strength she'd given him. He pressed his forehead against hers. I will not loose you...
He heard an engine approaching and his restored senses told him it was Anakin without even having to turn around.
The boy approached hesitantly, eyes fixed on the leaping flames. Probably remembering the funeral of Qui-Gon ... but such a difference! Qui-Gon had seemed at repose within the fire, the shell of his body being burned away as his spirit moved on to a new freedom.
"Your friend?" Anakin asked softly.
"A good friend," Obi-Wan replied without taking his eyes of the unconscious woman in his arms. "It's better this way."
Continued in the next chapter.