Obi-Wan
Obi-Wan jolted out of his fitful sleep, gasping for breath. The presence he'd felt earlier was suddenly stabbing at his subconscious-from a distance, perhaps, but with such intensity that he could hardly breathe.
Gulping down air, he pushed himself up and reached over to press the alarm that would wake the members of the Council currently in the Temple. Surely they would sense it too.
Yoda was the first to arrive, bright eyed, a considering expression on his face. He'd probably been awake all night.
"Do you feel it?" Obi-Wan asked without preamble.
"Guide me closer, you must," Yoda murmured, closing his eyes and reaching out his hand. "Sense it, I do, but distantly, as though hidden it is."
Obi-Wan grasped the ancient Master's hand and pulled his mind down into the vast depths that was the alien Force presence. Obi-Wan heard faint footsteps as Mace entered the room, then Ki-Adi-Mundi; their presences latched onto his mind and followed him into the deep. The four of them sat in a circle, enveloped in a tense stillness.
"Is it the Sith Lord?" Mace asked, his voice tight.
"It may be a Sith," Obi-Wan said, opening his eyes. "But this is an utterly new presence. I think it is not the one we have been hunting." He paused, trying to decide if he should reveal what he knew.
Yoda looked up at him, a knowing look passing across his face. "More, you know."
The others looked at him as well. Obi-Wan crossed his hands.
"This is a danger we have never known," he said slowly. "Masters...I told you that Bail Organa had captured a valuable asset, an asset I removed to our cells, and that I would brief you on it in the morning..."
"This asset knows of the presence you just showed us?" Mace asked, more calm than Obi-Wan would have expected.
"Count Dooku," Obi-Wan said, and waited. Ki-Adi-Mundi's eyes widened, but Yoda and Mace looked unsurprised.
"Suspected, I did," Yoda said.
"But how was he captured?" Mace asked, the faint eagerness in his tone suggested he'd been longing to ask Obi-Wan this since he mentioned the asset a few hours before.
Obi-Wan shook his head. "Too easily. He has lost his ability to sense and use the Force."
Silence.
Finally, Yoda said, "Impossible, that is."
"I have seen it for myself," Obi-Wan said. "Someone took it from him, or blocked him from accessing it, and then commanded him to forget all he had seen. I believe it is this presence we feel now. I sensed it earlier myself, though I did not understand the significance of it at the time."
Mace was staring at the ground. "The woman? The one you did not trust?"
"I don't think so," Obi-Wan said, too quickly, and he wasn't sure why. "I scanned her thoroughly. She has no Force ability."
"No Force ability to speak of, or no Force ability?" Ki-Adi-Mundi asked quietly. "One who could take away another's ability to use the Force would certainly be capable of hiding themselves from a Jedi."
"If you also crossed paths with this person, why are you safe and well?" Mace asked, dismissing Ki-Adi-Mundi's words with a wave of his hand.
Obi-Wan felt a wry smile cross his lips, unbidden. "Because Dooku had the audacity to try to recruit her-him-whoever as a Sith. It is possible, though not certain, that we have a powerful ally."
"But dangerous," Yoda said in an even tone. "No right does any creature have to take away the will of another."
No one brought up the girl again-Elan, she'd told him, and he wondered if that really was her name-but Obi-Wan knew he had to find her. But-the Force whispered somewhere in the back of his mind-for some reason, he needed to...protect her? The idea could not be dislodged.
She is important, he thought, and cursed himself for not understanding it earlier. He'd be so focused on Dooku, and the Separatists, and the Sith, that something vitally important had been before him and he hadn't done a thing. Important for what? No answers came.
And then the presence disappeared, as though it had never been there.
"Hidden again," Yoda said softly. "Why appear for such a short time?"
"I don't know," Obi-Wan said. "But I'm going to find out."