The shuttle whose landing lights had caught Plo Koon's attention on Cato Neimoidia carried more than Intelligence analysts and technicians. Yoda was aboard, along with the Jedi Master Obi Wan Kenobi, eager to see for what was discovered. Anakin was offered the chance to join them, but the Jedi decided that he was more interested in looking for any remaining droid starfighters that may be remaining in orbit. Obi Wan mentioned briefly that it was a form of meditation for Anakin: flying. The two Jedi agreed that Anakin best be left alone.

The technicians had succeeded in inducing the mechnochair's holoprojector to replay the image of Lord Sidious, and Republic cryptographers working with the Jedi were confident that the unique device would yield even greater secrets once it was relocated to Coruscant and examined thoroughly. Refusing to let the mechno-chair out of his sight, Vos had demanded to oversee its transfer to the waiting shuttle. He voiced something about the risks of sabotage.

Filled with uncertainty and feeling slightly unnecessary, Obi-Wan followed Yoda, along with Plo Koon. They had decided to take a stroll down the corridor of Viceroy Gunray's now appropriated palace. The venerable Jedi Master was pensive as they walked, the silence broken only by the sounds of distant blasterfire and the taping of Yoda's gimer stick as it struck the polished floor. Yoda was unreadable. Plo Koon was probably wondering if Yoda was pondering the image of Sidious, the rumored Sith Lord tormented the Jedi for so long like a lingering shadow. Obi Wan, in contrast, wondered if Yoda's thoughts hovered on the fact that two Jedi had been killed during the fighting on Cato Neimoidia days prior.

Every day saw more Jedi die. Many were as shot up as the clone troopers. Wounded, blinded, scarred, deprived of arms or legs… patched up by bota and bacta. More than a thousand Padawans had lost their Masters; more than a thousand Masters, their Padawans. When Jedi gathered now they talked not about the Force, but about their military campaigns. New lightsabers were constructed not as a meditative exercise, but to handle the rigors of close combat. Reaching the end of the long corridor, Yoda turned and started back, trailed by the battle hardened Jedi masters.

Without taking his eyes from the floor, Yoda said: "Found something important, you have, Plo Koon. That Count Dooku is in league with someone, proof this is. In this war, the Sith play a greater part than we realize. The fate of the Republic rests in our hands, only together, will we succeed."

The name Sidious had come up only once since the war began-on Geonosis, when Dooku had told an imprisoned Obi-Wan that a Sith Lord by that name had hundreds of Republic Senators under his influence. At the time, Obi-Wan assumed that Dooku was lying, in order to persuade Obi-Wan that he was still aligned with the Jedi, although attempting to thwart the powers of the dark side by his own methods. And yet, even after Dooku had revealed himself to be Sith-trained, Yoda and others on the Council continued to believe that he had been lying about this Darth Sidious. Two Council members were convinced that Dooku was the Dark Lord, having somehow tutored himself-by Sith Holocron, perhaps-in the use of dark side powers.

Now that Sidious appeared to be real, Obi-Wan didn't know what to think.

A hunt for Dooku's Sith allies had been going on almost since the start of the war. Dooku was known to have trained Jedi in the dark arts-Jedi Knights who had lost faith in the ideals of the Republic, Padawans fascinated by the power of the dark side, misinformed novices such as Asajj Ventress, undisciplined brutes like the Nightbrother Savage Oppress. Even Quinlan Vos was lured by the promises of the dark side when they tried to hunt down Dooku. It was only with Obi Wan's understanding that the Kiffar was allowed to return into the Jedi order with the council's blessing.

He wondered if that was why the Kiffar Jedi Master was so intent on safeguarding the mechno-chair. Could he be trying to condone for past sins by helping the Jedi capture their Sith enemies.

All the while, the question remained, who, if anyone, had been Dooku's teacher? Thirteen years earlier, when Obi-Wan had fought and defeated a Sith on Naboo, had he battled a Master or an apprentice? The question was rooted in the belief that the Sith, having essentially defeated themselves a millennium earlier, had learned that an army of Sith could never stand, and that there should be only two at any given time, lest a pair of apprentices conspire to combine their strengths to eliminate a Master. More a doctrine than a rule; but a doctrine that had managed to keep the Sith order alive, if well concealed, for going on a thousand years.

But the horned and tattooed Sith whom Obi-Wan defeated could not have trained Dooku, because Dooku had still been a member of the Jedi Order then. As clouded as the dark side made some things, there was simply no way Dooku could have been living a double life within the walls of the Temple itself.

Or was it? Because the Sith he fought on Naboo, the vengeful Darth Maul, wasn't killed after all. The Sith had begun to form a criminal alliance involving Mandalore and other various pirate factions. When Obi Wan faced off against him and Savage, his brother, Dooku and his allies were nowhere to be found. Memories of Mandalore stung at Obi Wan's eyes like boiling drops of water. Pushing them aside, he remembered when Maul resurfaced on a Mandalorian outpost, one where he found Dooku and Maul fighting alongside one another! Master Windu used this as evidence that Dooku may have been the Sith master after all, a finding that many Jedi agreed with.

However, no evidence has appeared since that Maul and Dooku have interacted further. And as revealing as the incident with Maul and Dooku was, it didn't explain how Dooku could have raised Maul under the pretense of being a Jedi. The thoughts were too much to keep silent and finally Obi Wan spoke aloud.

"Master Yoda," Obi-Wan said, "is it possible that Dooku wasn't lying about the Senate being under the control of Sidious?"

Yoda gave his head a quick shake while they walked. "Looked hard at the Senate, we did. We risked much by doing so. Questioning in secret those we serve. But no evidence we found." He glanced up at Obi-Wan. "If in control of the Senate Sidious was, would not defeated the Republic already be? Would not to the Confederacy the Core and Inner Rim belong?" Yoda paused for a moment, then added: "Perhaps at Geonosis, an accident it was that Dooku revealed himself. Had he not, searched we would have for Sidious, leaving Dooku to escalate his war. What think you, Obi Wan? Hmmm?"

Obi-Wan folded his arms. "I've thought long and hard about that day, Master, and I believe Dooku couldn't help revealing himself-even though he may have regretted it. When he was fleeing for his ship, it was almost as if he allowed himself to be seen; almost as if he was attempting to draw us into an engagement. My first thought was that he was trying to ensure the safe escape of Gunray and the other Separatist leaders. But my instincts tell me that he wanted desperately to demonstrate how powerful he had become. I think he was genuinely surprised to see you turn up. But instead of killing Anakin or me, he deliberately left us alive, to send a message to the Jedi."

"Perhaps he was suggesting that our order was collapsing already." Plo Koon spoke up, his face unreadable. "In the arena, he spoke about how our battle was finished. What if he was referring to the Clone Wars themselves?"

"Right you are, Masters. Pride undid him. Forced him, it did, to show us his true face and his true beliefs."

"Could he have been trained by this… Sidious?" Obi Wan pressed.

"Stands to reason, it does. Accepted by Sidious he was, following the loss of the Zabrak warrior."

Obi-Wan considered it. "I've heard rumors about Dooku's early fascination with the dark side. Was there not an incident in the Temple involving a stolen Sith Holocron?"

Yoda squeezed his eyes shut, as if recalling painful memories, and nodded. "True that rumor is. But understand, Obi-Wan, a Jedi Dooku was. For many, many years. Difficult the decision is to leave the Order. Influenced he was by many things. The death of your former Master, for one-even though avenged Qui-Gon was."

"Respectfullu, Master Yoda," Plo Koon interjected. "He's not the only Jedi to leave the Order" All Jedi bowed their heads regretfully.

Ahsoka Tano was still a sore subject, especially those who knew her best, which was represented by all the Jedi present in the hallway with the exception of Anakin, her master. Now, the Lost Twenty had Twenty Two, the other being Barriss Offee who was cast out for the bombing of the Jedi temple on Coruscant. To see a Jedi fall out of the order, not by fate but by choice, was nothing short of depressing. It served as a reminder that the Jedi had begun to lost their way. When Barriss Offee was cast out of the order, Obi Wan could still remember her words.

"I've come to realize what many people in the Republic have come to realize, that the Jedi are the ones responsible for this War. That we've so lost our way that we have become villains in this conflict, that we are the ones that should be put on trial, all of us! And my attack on the Temple was an attack on what the Jedi have become: an army fighting for the dark side, fallen from the Light that we once held so dear. This Republic is failing! It's only a matter of time."

Yoda finally glanced at Obi-Wan. "Complicated this is. Not merely by what we know, but by what we do not know; what we have to assume."

Yoda stopped, then gestured to a carved bench. "Sit for a while, we will. Enlightenment, we can find."

Obi-Wan sat, his heart wanting to race. If Plo Koon was struggling with what they faced, he didn't reveal anything beyond staring off distantly.

"A stern Master Dooku was, to Qui-Gon and others," Yoda began. "Powerful he was; skilled, disdainful. More important, convinced that lowering the shroud of the dark side was. Signs there were, all about us, long before to the Temple you came; long before Qui-Gon came. Gross injustices, favoritism , corruption… More and more, called the Jedi were to enforce the peace. More and more deaths there were. Out of control events were becoming."

"Did the Council sense that the Sith had returned?" Obi Wan asked.

"Never absent they were, Obi-Wan. But stronger suddenly. Closer to the surface. Spoke much of the prophecy, Dooku did."

"The prophecy of the Chosen One?" Plo Koon asked before Obi Wan could.

"The larger prophecy: that unfold the dark times would. Born into their midst the Chosen One is, to return balance to the Force."

"Anakin," Obi-Wan said with certainty. Yoda and Plo Koon alike regarded him for a long moment, discerning truth from desire.

"Difficult to say," Yoda said quickly. "Only time will reveal the mysteries of the future. More important the shroud of the dark side is. Many, many discussions Dooku had. With me, with other members of the Council. Most of all, with Master Sifo-Dyas."

Obi-Wan waited. Plo Koon leaned forward, as if his ears were perking up with interest.

"Close friends they were. Bound together by the unifying Force. But worried about Master Dooku, Sifo-Dyas was. Worried about his disenchantment with the Republic; about self-absorption among the Jedi. Saw in Dooku the effect of Qui-Gon's death, Sifo-Dyas did. The effect that resurfaced the Sith had." Yoda shook his head mournfully. "Knew of Dooku's imminent departure, Master Sifo-Dyas did. Sensed, he may have, the birth of the Separatist movement."

"And yet the Council dismissed Dooku as an idealist," Plo Koon said. "We let the Separatist movement begin and believed Dooku too pure to have ulterior motive."

Yoda gazed at the floor. "Saw with my own eyes what he had become, and refused to believe it, I did."

"But how could Dooku have searched out Sidious? Or was it the other way around?" Plo Koon asked.

"And what of Maul?" Obi Wan added with worry. "Could he have been involved somehow?"

"Impossible to know" Yoda answered with grimness, his hands reaching out to his gaffer stick. "But accept Sidious as a mentor, Dooku did. The Zabrak may have been a former apprentice, that when discarded, replaced by Dooku. Perhaps, Dooku competed, in secret, with Maul. Groomed the winner, Sidious could have."

"Could Sifo-Dyas have foreseen that, as well?" Plo Koon asked. "Could he have learned of Maul's replacement and Dooku's role in that switch?"

"Also impossible to know. Believed he might have, that Sidious Dooku would hunt down. Sidious and Maul, that is. To destroy."

"But could that have motivated Dooku to leave the Order?" Obi Wan asked." Was he afraid of getting caught?"

"Perhaps. But by the power of the dark side, even the most steadfast heart can be seduced."

Plo Koon turned to face Yoda. "Master, are we certain that Sifo-Dyas ordered the clone army?" Facing Obi Wan "And not Dooku? Tyranus?"

Yoda nodded as Obi Wan felt a headache form in his skull. "Contacted the Kaminoans, he did."

"Without your knowledge?"

"Without it, yes. But exists, a record of his initial contact."

Obi-Wan gave in to some of his frustration. "I should have questioned Lama Su more extensively. I could have learned vital information about Tyranus sooner. We could have been more prepared."

"Questioned, the Kaminoans were. Furnished much they did."

"Did they?" Obi-Wan said in surprise. "When? Last I recalled, they tend to be very sensitive about their methods. Remember the incident with Master Tiplar? And the clone? They seemed very uneasy about us trying to investigate anything further."

The grand master lowered his head with concern, almost taking offense at Obi Wan's questioning. Feeling slightly guilty, Obi Wan offered his hand to the Jedi in an attempt to ease his troubled mind.

"Before the war, Master Kenobi. Reticent they were when first to Kamino I went. Only what already they had told you, I heard. That Sifo-Dyas the order placed; that Tyranus the donor clone furnished. That for the Republic the clones were. Seen by the Kaminoans, neither Sifo-Dyas nor Tyranus was. But later, after attacked Kamino was, more I learned from Taun We and Ko Sai. About the payments."

"From Sifo-Dyas?" Plo Koon asked.

"From Tyranus" Yoda answered. "Dooku. Then, from the Jedi archives erased Kamino, he did. Of that tampering, Master Jocasta Nu found-proof of Dooku's action, though well concealed it was."

Obi-Wan recalled his visit to the archives to search out the location of Kamino, only to be told by Jocasta Nu that the planetary system didn't exist. What had caused him that day three years earlier to stare so intently at the library's bronzium bust of Count Dooku?

"Nevertheless, the clone army continued to be financed and built," he said at last. "Tyranus may have manipulated Sifo Dyas?"

"Of our ignorance, another example this is. But playing both sides Jango Fett clearly was. By someone on the side of the Republic, chosen he was on Bogg Four to be the clone template. But serving Dooku he was, as a hired killer."

"As a bounty hunter" Obi Wan clarified, recalling the incident with the Mandalorian armored warrior. Who wore the same armor as the members of Death Watch, the very collection of rogues that tried to undermine the authority of the late Duchess Satine. Despite her pleas to become a planet of peace, the warlike supporters of Mandalore's past opposed her fiercely. Then, when Maul arrived, it cost her-

Obi Wan turned his thoughts away. These would not help him now. He returned his thoughts to a time before the war. Obi-Wan pictured Fett in the execution arena on Geonosis, standing behind Dooku in a box reserved for dignitaries.

"He had knowledge of both armies. But he couldn't have killed Sifo Dyas. The Pykes were the ones we traced the murder to." Obi Wan asked.

"In both scenarios," Plo Koon answered. "They must have covered their tracks well, as seen by how long it took to discover his remains."

"Did the Kaminoans say whether anyone had tried to persuade them not to build the army?" Obi Wan asked further.

"Intercede, none did. Reveal themselves too soon, our enemies would have."

Obi-Wan fell silent for a moment. This discussion was meaningful and he felt as if secrets were being eroded away with their collective exchange. "When I was being held captive on Geonosis, Dooku told me that the Trade Federation had been allied with Sidious during the blockade of Naboo, but that they had later been betrayed by him. Dooku said that Gunray had gone to him for help, and that Dooku had tried to appeal to the Council. He claimed that, even after several warnings, the Council refused to believe him. Is any of that true, Master?"

"More lies," Yoda said. "Building a case to enlist you in his cause, Dooku was."

You must join me, Obi-Wan, Dooku had said, and together we will destroy the Sith! Obi Wan recalled that Dooku claimed this was all the information that he needed to know to stop the growing threat to the Republic.

"If Gunray hadn't been so keen on assassinating Padme Amidala," Obi-Wan mused. "If I'd failed to trace the saberdart that killed the changeling…"

"Ignorant about the clone army, we might have remained" Yoda answered.

"But surely the Kaminoans would have contacted us, Master."

"Eventually. But grown greater in numbers the Separatist army would have. Invincible, perhaps."

Obi-Wan's eyes narrowed. "Mine wasn't a case of blind luck."

Yoda shook his head. "Meant to learn of the clone army, we were. Destined to fight this war, we were."

"In the nick of time." Plo Koon spoke up. "Perhaps he never believed that the Jedi could become generals and serve on the front lines."

"Nonsense," Yoda said. "Warriors always have we been."

"But are we helping to return balance to the Force, or are our actions contributing to the growth of the dark side?" Obi Wan asked, following Plo Koon's train of thought.

Yoda grimaced. "Impatient with such talk I grow. Cryptic this conflict is-the way it began, the way it unfolds. But for the ideals of the Republic we fight. To prevail and restore peace our priorities must remain. Then to the dark heart of this matter will we burrow. Expose the truth, we will."

Yoda was correct, Obi-Wan told himself. If the Jedi hadn't learned of the clone army, Dooku's Separatists would have suddenly appeared on the scene with tens of millions of battle droids, fleets of warships, and seceded from the Republic without contest. But there would have been no coexisting with the Confederacy. Ultimately it would have bled the Republic dry. War would have been inevitable, and the Jedi would have been caught in the middle, as they were now.

But why hadn't Yoda told him sooner about Sifo-Dyas? Or was this yet another lesson, as the search for Kamino had been? Yoda's way of telling him to search for the thing that didn't seem to be there by analyzing its effects on the world around it.

The difference between knowledge and wisdom, Obi-Wan's friend Dex might have said, as he did on identifying the source of the saberdart that led him to Kamino. Yoda was regarding the two masters when he lifted his head and faced Obi Wan, addressing him individually.

"Reveal you, your thoughts do, Obi-Wan. Believe I should have told you sooner, you do."

"Yours is the wisdom of centuries, Master."

"We look to you for the best guidance" Plo Koon added.

"Years matter not. Busy fighting a war, you have been. Mentoring your headstrong Padawan. In pursuit of Dooku and his minions…Darker, events became. Attempting to turn this war to their own uses, Dooku and Sidious are."

"We'll have Dooku soon enough" Obi Wan spoke.

"Yes, the fate of the galaxy depends on it" Plo Koon answered, putting a comforting shoulder on him.

"Lifted the veil of the dark side wasn't after your success on Naboo, Master Kenobi. Grown beyond Dooku this war has. Even with your discovery, Master Koon, the storm of war grows more intense. Now to justice all must be brought. And to justice all those Sidious has corrupted."

Yoda looked hard at Obi-Wan and Plo Koon. "Uncover Sidious's tracks, we must. A chance to conclude the war, we have been given."