Disclaimer: Read the first chappy legal peeps. Too lazy to repeat :)
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Chapter Twelve: Of Robed Figures
A clatter in the main room bought Bant rushing in from the kitchen.
"Ashden? Ashden are you alright?" Expecting to find her sitting on the sofa it alarmed the young Healer to find her on collapsed on said sofa and a small pile of datapads fallen on the floor. "Ashden?"
Bant checked her pulse and frowned. It was perfectly fine, a little elevated but that could easily be accounted for due to the high stress that saturated the entire Temple at the moment. There weren't any wounds, no burns to suggest an electric shock.
She was out for the count with no detectable reason why.
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Mace Windu was not pleased. Obi-Wan was over fifteen minutes late, and Obi-Wan was never late. Opening a secure link to the Temple the head of the search was quick to respond.
"Jedi Temple."
Mace kept his message short and to the point. Elaborate explanations wasted time that could cost lives.
"Master Rancisis, Obi-Wan is missing."
A new plan was organised in short order, with another team being dispatched to the next quadrant instead of Mace's team. Mace, Qui-Gon and Anakin would search for Obi-Wan instead, there was still a very high probability that he was still in the building somewhere.
"Stay within sight range, no exceptions." He ordered, voice unrelenting. Qui-Gon and Anakin nodded, and, with no further words exchanged the group moved on, their new mission in mind.
Qui-Gon stretched out with every sense available to him as far as they would go, looking for any hint of his former Padawan. When Mace announced him missing just minutes ago, he found his heart skipping an unexpected beat. Obi-Wan was stubborn, yes; he refused to see Anakin for what he was, yes; he was so busy searching the future he forgot the Living Force to an infuriating degree, yes; but in clearer moments like this, when Qui-Gon focused on a mission and only the mission he knew that the boy had achieved much, been through even more, and he, Qui-Gon, experienced Jedi Master, was probably just as infuriating.
These moments, however, were becoming more and more sparse in their occurrences.
"Master, why don't we try in here?" Anakin asked, halfway through the doorway of a particularly dismal looking, run-down room without even a window. Qui-Gon spared Mace, who was barely ten feet away and probing a control panel that looked like the last time it worked Yoda was an infant. About to agree with his Padawan's suggestion a pull through the Force caught his attention.
"Actually, why don't we try down here?" He watched Anakin swallow a frown with a smile and follow him obediently. The 'pull' as it where was actually more of a push, away from where he was now heading and echoed of Obi-Wan's Force signature. At some point Obi-Wan must have really not wanted any Jedi to come this way.
Naturally that was the way they were going. "Mace? I think there's something down here."
He didn't wait for a reply, hastening down their first, and so far only, lead.
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Decidedly today was not a good day. It was not even an okay day. It was undoubtedly a very bad day. He couldn't even release his pessimistic feelings into the Force because of the Sithly collar clamped around his neck.
Obi-Wan Kenobi was in a very bad mood.
On the upside to this landslide of a bad day the missing Jedi were locked in cells about and opposite him, and were all alive and none the worse for wear, save for tiny scratches on their arms identical to his.
Scratches like the ones left behind after a blood sample was taken. His mind re-ran constantly over that one, why kidnap Jedi and take blood? If that was the only reason why had none of the ones missing turned up?
"Has he said anything to you? Anything at all to indicate what he wants?" Despite having asked similar questions before, ones that assured Obi-Wan their captor was definitely a 'he', it never hurt to ask again. The Knight and three Padawans stayed silent, considering their times held captive.
Padawan Yana shook her head, "Nothing. He only came in here to deposit Saul, Larai, Cad-I-Lin and you off."
Obi-Wan nodded, fixing that into his memory along with the gathering bits and pieces of information that were beginning to pile up somewhere in the back of his mind. Yana had been here the longest, having been announced as missing about an hour before Saul Yiiy. It made sense that she answered. But the behaviour of the man didn't.
"Why isn't he gloating?" Cadi, it seemed, was just as perplexed as he. Any assassin, any bounty hunter, any kidnapper, any dark being who tried to capture anybody but especially a Jedi, always rationalised or gloated or boasted over the cleverness of they.
The fact that this man had done so such thing unsettled them all, Obi-Wan didn't need the Force to tell him that, it was evident in the way the Padawan's stood, the way Nal-Exan kept rubbing her fingers under the sleeves of her robe, the manner in which Cadi's eyes shifted, black irises twitching left and right periodically.
"I don't know Cadi," he left off the last part of his sentence, that it can't be good. A hidden door to their right opened with ease, alerting Obi-Wan to an important fact. He wasn't in the same run-down lower levels he had been earlier. Down there everything was rusted, broken or without power. Leading him to a conclusion he wasn't sure he wanted to reach, especially when the man that stepped through the revealed doorway radiated an unnerving familiarity.
"Good evening, Jedi, feeling well are we?" His gravel slick voice didn't sit well with Obi-Wan, but years of practice let him slip on the impassive face that was now reflected by his four comrades.
None of them replied.
The man carried on regardless of their refusal to dignify him with a return greeting.
The being, the man, wore the hooded robe that shadowed his face from his nightmares. The unseen face turned to face him, hands concealed in the voluminous sleeves.
"Tell me, Obi-Wan, are you afraid?"
"There is no emotion, there is peace."
"That is an outdated lie, Jedi. You live lives of lies based on ancient myths and fairytales. Isn't it about time you pulled your heads out the sand and faced the modern world?"
Obi-Wan didn't reply and the man didn't seem to care. He paused briefly, and then continued never looking away from the young Knight.
"Do you fear the Sith? Darkness?"
"There is no emotion, there is peace." He repeated.
"Then why do you break into a cold sweat at the thought of darkness overtaking the light? Of lives being consumed by anger? You must know that darkness will always kill the light, otherwise you would not do this."
A warning bell was screaming in his mind. Those were the things of his nightmares; of innocents slowly being destroyed by anger and fear… how did this man know that? Now, however, was no time to show weakness.
Voice confident and firm, Obi-Wan made sure his features stayed schooled in a neutral expression.
"The light will always prevail. Why don't you tell me something now, why have you kidnapped these people?"
The man laughed a sickening laugh, the kind that woke him at night when it and the nightmares invaded his sleep.
This was the being that taunted him. This was the being that claimed him as his own. This was the Master of the Apprentice from four years ago.
"I was, looking for something." He replied after his laughter died down to a throaty chuckle.
"Did you find it?"
The man cackled again, spun on a booted heel and stalked off back through the way he came.
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Author's Notes: Hm. Kinda been moved now. Ish. So um yeah... not written as quickly as I wanted it too. In the end I took a chisel and hammer to the Block ;)
More as soon as I can get it out to a decent degree :D Massive review thank yous attached to the replies as usual :D
Review Thank Yous...
Skye-Chan 12: You like?!? :D Yaaaya!
Walking Through Shadows: lmao...
MistiWhitesun: mwahaha :D
Hmm, i haven't seen DS9 for so long! Sky won't replay it any more so I can't remember that much of it.... i remember Jadzia though. She was cool!
Yea... the characters in Voyager did seem to alter quite a lot, it happens in other shows as well which is quite annoying. Seska was eeeevil!
Thanks for the heads up on accept/except, i'll go back and fix it when it's all finished :D I love chatty!
shadowjedi1: I know a few kids, which is kind of why Ashden changes in weird ways (as you've probably noticed)... I have a ten year old cousin who talks and acts like he's going on 50, a six year old cousin who is strange. I met my friend's 9 year old brother for about 10 minutes, not much time really, but he was showing her all about his school work lol.
Kynstar: -preens the story- yaay! new reader! I'm not disclosing things like that in a place like this!
Audreidi: A bit of a mystery story, but also not so much since everyone knows who the bad guy is already, lol.
Kusco: heheee I like all your theories! Makes me want to write a whole OTHER version of it! Ooo i never thought of doing that to Ashden! I'm so conscious of the fact that she's an OC lol.
Yeah, I'm more of a Smallville fan than a Superman fan, i've seen the odd episode of The New Adventures of Superman, but I've never read the comics. I used to read my bro's Beano's but that's about it lol -hides-
Snow-Glory: Meh... Legolas, Obi-Wan... both played by rather cute actors (for Obi i mean McGregor not Guiness :P) Does this chappy answer your question :D
CYNICAL21: Hiya! Ooo i gave you chills? :D That can only be a good thing! :D
master kaym: I have a style?! Cool! Yes there is definately more to come :D
Janna Hawkins: Delay, there was. Apologise for this, I do.
Aida: Well um, what's your defination of soon? -ducks- it didn't take me months though, just a little over a week... :D
Ciara: Heehee that line's from my mother's view on what she thinks she knows about me.... but I figured Jedi Master have the Force so they actually WOULD know everything :D Here was the next part! No cliffie really this time :D
Knight Kenobi of Eryn Lasgalen: I could never do that! Torture, pathos, pain.... yes.... kill? Noooo!
Author's Notes 2: Okay, next chapter possibly: Mace, Qui-Gon and Anakin search for the missing Jedi. Will they find them in time before their captor disposes of what he no longer needs? Will Obi-Wan find a way to stop the robed figure? Next time, same bat story, same bat address...