Finally back on the ground, Anakin's first act was to appropriate a speeder bike and fire it toward Irenia's clinic as fast as possible.

When he pulled up out front, he didn't even bother securing the bike before going in. It was a different place when it was actually open — a lot more people around in general, and there was a real receptionist this time instead of someone's kid. That was all he really had the spare interest to register as he marched up to the desk.

"Get me Irenia."

"Um," said the woman. "Do you have an appointment?"

"What? No. I'm Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Knight, and I need to speak with her now. Go get her, please."

The woman stood up and almost fled. She was back in minutes, red-faced and hurrying behind Irenia.

"Mr. Skywalker," Irenia said, smiling like she would love to bite out his throat. "How can I help you?"

"We need to get that implant out, like right now."

Pleasant expression still frozen in place, Irenia nodded. "Certainly. If you'll follow me, we can discuss this somewhere more appropriate."

The wide eyes of almost every waiting patient watched them as they left, but Anakin hardly noticed. He followed Irenia to a small, empty room that was nearly filled with what looked like some kind of fabricating equipment. When the door hissed shut, every suggestion of friendliness dropped from her face.

She whirled on him. "What do you think you're doing, coming here like this? You do know that I have sick people that I am trying to—"

"Are you a surgeon? You can take the chip out, right?" Anakin honestly didn't have time for some kind of dramatic exchange. Why couldn't she see how important this was?

"Excuse me?"

"The implant—"

"Yes, I heard you!" Irenia shut her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose with a thumb and forefinger. Anakin waited as she let out a long, even breath. "Okay. Start over at the beginning, and if you would be so kind, please explain to me why you're charging in here, interrupting my work, and being horribly rude to my receptionist."

This had the echo of various "slow down, Anakin" conversations he'd had with Padme. He had said "please" to the receptionist, but he doubted whether Padme would have appreciated him bringing up that detail at this point, so he didn't. Taking a deep breath of his own, Anakin used a second to rein in his racing thoughts. Irenia was missing something, or she wouldn't be reacting like he was attacking her. What step had he skipped...?

Ah.

"The implant," repeated Anakin, this time calmly. He pulled out the OEI scanner and shook it at her. "This is what I discovered."

How much time would she need to read it? Anakin counted to sixty, watching Irenia's face darken as she scanned the readout, and then counted to sixty again even slower. Surely that was enough? "It's causing his amnesia," he said experimentally, "and the seizures. Slave technology."

Irenia shook her head, still staring at the holoscreen. "This is monstrous," she said, voice utterly flat.

"It needs to come out. Now."

This time, she and Anakin were finally on the same wavelength. She looked him in the eye, gave him back the device, and said, "Yes. And yes — I can take it out. It's a simple procedure. The only problem is going to be getting him to let me do it."

Anakin had thought of that. "Sedation?"

"Doesn't work. He wakes up if it's tampered with, even when he first came to us and we had him sedated to treat his other injuries."

"Sithspit." They could try and hack the chip in order to bypass the deactivation code, but Anakin was no slicer, and he didn't think Irenia was either. Obi-Wan was better at that kind of thing, and he couldn't do it. "Okay, um. Is there a way to short it out? And then remove it when it's inactive?"

Irenia gave him a dry look. "I kind of don't like that idea, since the implant is directly connected to Alpha's nervous system."

Anakin crossed his arms. That left him with only one real idea, and he didn't like it. He doubted Irenia would like it any better, so he kept it under wraps for now. At length, he said, "Well. I guess I'm gonna do what I did before."

"What's that?"

"Ask nicely." He shrugged at Irenia's unimpressed expression. "If I go get him, bring him here — will you do the procedure?"

"Yes. I guess I'll go guilt-trip one of my colleagues into taking my appointments." Irenia sighed, dragging a hand down her face. She stood perfectly still, eyes closed for a moment, and then straightened. "Okay. I'll wait for you in imaging."

"Where's that?"

"Alpha knows."

She was already moving to press the door release, apparently considering their business concluded. Anakin caught her wrist briefly, and she froze. She didn't look at him, didn't move, even when he released his grip, and Anakin knew what she expected him to say.

He said it anyway.

"You know this will unlock his memory."

She did. She looked at him, clearly hating him a little. "Perhaps. And perhaps you don't know him as well as you think you do." Irenia turned away, dignity as impenetrable as a stone. "If you'll excuse me, I have preparations to make."

When she was gone, Anakin shook his head briefly. She had healed Obi-Wan and clearly cared about him. For that, he had felt obligated to warn her. Now that he had, it was time to move on to his much more pressing task. Irenia would have to take care of herself, as she was clearly intent on doing.

Now, to Obi-Wan.

On his way, his comm chimed. He didn't hear it, and wouldn't have noticed at all if it weren't for its buzz in his pocket. "SKYWALKER," he yelled above the speeder bike's whine and the wind that roared in his ears. Ahsoka's voice was muffled and tinny in response, even though he had his comm basically stuffed in his ear.

"Hey Skyguy, you about done with your secret project?"

"I JUST STARTED, AHSOKA."

"I just wanted to let you know, you have maybe an hour and a half. We don't have much personnel left on-planet and Master Plo expects mobilization to be quick."

"WHAT?"

Frightened pedestrians leaped out of the way as Anakin flew by, apparently not having the same faith in his one-handed steering that he did.

"WE ARE LEAVING IN AN HOUR," Ahsoka shouted.

"OKAY, WELL—" He turned onto Obi-Wan's street and slowed drastically down. "Okay, well, if Master Plo starts to kick up a big fuss about where I am, comm me. Or better yet, have him comm me. I'll fill him in and have him delay departure."

"I don't think Master Plo is really the type to 'kick up a fuss', big or otherwise."

Anakin didn't have time for a pithy back-and-forth. He parked in front of Obi-Wan's house. "You know what I mean."

"Yeah, okay." There was a pause. "Do you really think they would let you delay departure for your secret project?"

Anakin honestly hadn't given it much thought, and therefore took a moment to do so. "Yeah," he said. "I'm pretty sure they would."

After a minute, Ahsoka replied in a tone of affected disinterest, "All right. Try to hurry, though, okay, Skyguy?"

"Will do. Talk to you soon."

"Very soon," she insisted, and then signed off.

It would be right about now that Ahsoka's curiosity would kick into overdrive, from a merely interested spark into a fully focused blaze. If all went well, Anakin didn't plan to leave her wondering for long.

He triggered Obi-Wan's door alarm and had barely taken his finger off the button when it was answered. There was a speaker and comm system to ask the visitor to identify themselves, but Obi-Wan just opened the door without bothering to find out for whom.

Just as he had when Anakin had shown up at the clinic yesterday, Obi-Wan visibly brightened upon seeing him. "Anakin!" he said, smiling. "Come in!"

Anakin just stared for one frozen moment, his heart kicking hard in his chest and leaving him speechless. Swallowing, he finally managed to say, "Hi." When he started to smile, it felt like he might never stop.

Grinning back at Obi-Wan, he stepped through the door feeling ten different kinds of at peace. The war? The encoded Separatist data? The fleet about to leave without him? Irenia's anger? The urgency of freeing Obi-Wan from the malicious chip? He was pretty sure he could manage all of it with ease if he could always make Obi-Wan that happy.

"You look better."

"The restorative qualities of sleep, I suppose," said Obi-Wan, incredibly uninterested in discussing his own health. "Are you all right?"

Anakin hadn't actually paused to consider his own appearance after waking up in the medbay. Hopefully, he didn't look deranged or like he'd just crushed an asteroid with the power of his mind an hour ago. Come to think of it, that might explain some of his reception at the clinic. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little tired."

"Can I get you anything to drink? How did your task— mission— go?"

"No thanks, I'm good." Anakin paused to note the difficulty Obi-Wan had even characterizing something to do with the war. The implant? Or not? "It went well. A couple hitches, a little intense there for a while—"

He paused again, frowning at the living area. If he wasn't mistaken, all the furniture had been completely rearranged since last night. Anakin took a second look at Obi-Wan, and then, in dawning realization, a third.

"You are bored as kriff, aren't you?"

Obi-Wan crossed his arms, but he didn't smokescreen or deflect. "I've had my arm twisted a bit, and I may have been foolish enough to promise that I wouldn't leave the house today. Something about 'rest'."

"Uh oh. Irenia's playing with fire."

Rolling his eyes, Obi-Wan shrugged. "I've eaten, studied, cleaned everything I can think to clean... I was trying to work on a few projects for the clinic, but I can't seem to focus." He glanced around, a thoughtful frown clouding his face. "I feel like I've done everything I can do here."

Anakin took a deep breath and tried not to seem like sheer intensity was about to make him leap out of his own skin. He hooked his thumbs in his belt and said, with a passable attempt at nonchalance, "Then it's a good thing I'm here to entertain you."

"Is that why you're here?" Obi-Wan eyed him with skeptical humor.

"Well... no." Anakin made a face at his master, but then lapsed into seriousness. This was going to be difficult. Subtlety was not one of Anakin's strongest skills, so he was going to have to play to his straightforward nature — but not be too straightforward. The last thing he wanted to do was provoke another seizure. "I'm here because my fleet is going to have to depart pretty soon. We're done on Centares."

Obi-Wan blinked. "Oh."

"But — I did discover how to reverse your memory loss."

"Oh?" he repeated himself, this time with an entirely different tone and an arched eyebrow.

"Yes." Anakin was not going to joke about this, even if Obi-Wan wanted to. Not even a little. "So now you have a decision to make. Come on, let's talk."

Like before, he picked a spot on the living room run and sat down.

"Is the sitting on the floor part required?"

"Yes," said Anakin firmly.

Honestly, if you weren't meditating, there was no reason not to stand or sit somewhere like a normal person, but it had worked last time, and Anakin had taken a liking to it anyway. It made serious conversations seem less threatening. He might start making Ahsoka sit on the floor with him whenever they had to talk.

Obi-Wan huffed, but joined him. "So, you think you've found a way to perform a miracle."

"I'm something of a miracle specialist, actually," said Anakin, mostly to see Obi-Wan's narrow-eyed look in response. "But that's not what the decision is about. You said you wanted your memory back, but—"

"We already settled this."

"Yeah, but you don't know anything about your life before, so you haven't had the ability to make an informed decision."

Anakin could practically see the ice form in Obi-Wan's eyes. "Anakin," he said, far too calmly, "the fact that I don't know anything about my life is informing my decision."

Delighted at his early success, Anakin was also thrown into unnerving flashbacks of half-faded teenage memories. He might not be a miracle specialist (although Anakin personally thought he could make a half-decent claim to that title) but he was pretty sure he was the uncontested expert in the art of provoking Obi-Wan Kenobi. In that vein, he pressed on.

"Think about it," he said, delivering this slap in the face with artless sincerity. "Here, you have this life, a purpose, people who care about you. Back home, it's not all a garden of Ithorian roses."

"I don't care what it is. I care that it's mine," said Obi-Wan, his irritation still only shown through rigid coolness.

Stubbornness drives fully engaged, Anakin judged. Excellent. Time to pivot in another direction.

Apologetically, Anakin said, "You know, I can't tell you much about what we do — it's all pretty classified. But you do have enemies. We are at war. What Ventress did to you happened because of what we do, and it's only a tiny taste of how awful the war can be. Even on good days we're always on the run, very little sleep..."

All of those statements were true. They were also vague enough hints to appeal exactly to that part of Obi-Wan which hated for there to be anything that he did not know.

Eyes narrowed and knowing, Obi-Wan looked at Anakin hard. "What are you playing at?"

"I just want to make sure you know what you're getting into."

Anakin was as pure and innocent as a kriffing angel. He widened his eyes at Obi-Wan, spreading his hands, palms upward in a cards-on-the-table gesture. A long pause as Obi-Wan held his gaze, and Anakin hoped he hadn't outsmarted himself already. He had needed to get Obi-Wan's back up, but didn't want his master actually angry with him.

"Thank you for your concern." Obi-Wan's sarcasm was well-sharpened, but Anakin bit down on a grin. He was still just sparring. "But this doesn't change anything. I don't think you quite understand, Anakin. I have nothing. I don't know where I come from, what I've done, what I like or dislike — nothing. I don't know who I would be with my memory restored, but it doesn't matter. It would be enough to be able to be me."

"Master—"

For a moment, thought of anything else fled Anakin's head. Blindsided by Obi-Wan's honesty, he could only respond in kind. He could hear the longing in his master's voice, and that formless question was back in his eyes, the lines of his mouth, the divot between his furrowed eyebrows — like if he just stared long enough and hard enough, he would see the hidden answer he sought.

"You are you."

"You know that." Obi-Wan jabbed Anakin's chest with a single finger. "I don't. I don't know who I am — but I want to, more than anything. Trust me, I've had a long, long time to imagine all the worst possible things I could find out. It doesn't matter."

A brief, wry smile pressed at the corner of his mouth, and Anakin returned it with a shade of resignation. It was almost time, if he wasn't mistaken.

"More than anything," Anakin repeated quietly, chasing about six thoughts at once. "Enough to give up everything you have here?"

Obi-Wan looked at him, eyes dark. "Maybe," he said after a pause, "I won't have to."

When Anakin laughed the sound was brittle. It was the same unconvincing lie he tried to tell himself every time he had to leave Padme for the war front, and shocking to hear from Obi-Wan's mouth. A little bit of something jagged and sharp, familiar from the last, tumultuous year of Anakin's apprenticeship, fell between them. "You can only have one or the other. I know you, Master."

"That makes one of us."

"No," said Anakin, flat. "You know exactly what I'm talking about."

How many times had Obi-Wan made this choice in the past? He lifted his chin, looking young and mulish, and made it again. "I want to know who I am."

Anakin exhaled. He took a protracted minute to refocus.

His master didn't know anything. There was no point in getting hung up on memories of long-ago arguments — not when he'd gone over and over all the things he'd do differently, if he had the chance. Obi-Wan's eyes were still bright with a stubborn light, and Anakin smiled. Maybe they would still come back to those disagreements later, in a better way, once Obi-Wan could remember.

"Okay, then, the only other thing you have to decide is — do you trust me?"

Obi-Wan had all but told Anakin off for suggesting that he might be untrustworthy, before. Now, Obi-Wan just tilted his head a little. The confrontation was draining out of him, leaving room for reflection, which was... good. Probably, anyway. He couldn't afford to think too much.

"Why?"

"You always acted like you don't believe it can be done," said Anakin. "Restoring your memories, I mean. Like it's impossible. Delusions of grandeur, you said."

"You must admit that it seems unlikely," said Obi-Wan, too carefully.

Anakin was starting to sweat.

Honestly, Obi-Wan was too smart for this plan. If he were able to fire on all cylinders, he would have seen through Anakin's frankly transparent maneuvering ages ago. For all that the chip seemed to block him from pondering too long on certain topics, this was only going to work if Obi-Wan wanted it to. His master was an expert at avoidance and willful blindness, especially when it came to himself, Anakin knew, and he was going to need all of that skill right now.

Shrugging, Anakin tried to look casual and not like he was about to scream from sheer tension. "I can do it, Master. I promised you I would, right?"

Obi-Wan nodded once, but reserved anything beyond that.

"I'm gonna make you another promise." Anakin moved a little closer, so that their knees bumped. He took a second to think, and then met Obi-Wan's cautious gaze. "I won't let anything bad happen to you, okay? I'll die first."

Somewhat nonplussed, Obi-Wan looked as if he wanted to say something. Anakin hurried to beat him to the punch.

"You should think about whether you believe that, because if you don't, then you shouldn't let me near you. But if you do, then I'm going to need you to trust me."

Obi-Wan, in full command of his memories, would have said something like, Trust you? After what you pulled on Mawan? or perhaps, Says the boy who purposefully drove through a power coupling yesterday. But the unvoiced answer would still have rung clear as a bell: Yes.

Now, since Obi-Wan lacked the context for implication or connotation, Anakin had the rare privilege of hearing him say exactly what he meant.

"Yes. I trust you, Anakin." He added dryly, "Even though you are obviously setting me up for some kind of trap."

"No trap, Master. I just wanna make sure it's going to work, and it won't unless you're all in."

"Well then, consider me all in."

"Okay." Unfolding his legs suddenly, Anakin stood. "Then it looks like we're going to have to break your promise not to leave the house."

"Where?" Obi-Wan took Anakin's offered hand and pulled himself up.

"The clinic."

That gave him pause. "Oh."

The hesitation was worrying, but Anakin thought he recognized the source of it. "Irenia's waiting for us already. I went there first," he explained, and watched Obi-Wan relax. Success.

That out of the way, he didn't question anything else. Irenia, with all that maybe you don't know him as well as you think you do stuff, could honestly suck Anakin's exhaust fumes.

"Are we going now?"

"Yeah. Let's take your speeder," said Anakin, who was still thinking about exhaust fumes.

"All right, but you're not driving."

Momentarily stupefied by a sudden realization, Anakin followed Obi-Wan outside. During his apprenticeship, no matter how vigorously and dramatically his master had always complained about his piloting, Obi-Wan had never refused to let him fly. Anakin had been flying both of them continuously since he was twelve years old.

What did that mean? Surely if Obi-Wan had hated it so much, he would have said something years ago exactly like he just had?

"By the way, Anakin?"

"Huh?" Anakin blinked vacantly at his master for a moment before he was able to shelve his thoughts for another time. Obi-Wan already sat at the speeder controls, and Anakin hopped over the side and into the passenger seat. "Yeah, what?"

"I want you to remember — I want my memory back."

"Yeah," said Anakin slowly. They had just settled this for like the fourth time. "That's the whole point of this."

Obi-Wan didn't look at him. His eyes stayed fixed on the speeder dashboard, and then on the path in front of them as they pulled away from the house. "I just want you to remember. I might not — It may be impossible for me to be enthusiastic."

What? Anakin frowned, and then noticed that he was pretty much mirroring the expression on Obi-Wan's face.

"Regardless, I am telling you now that what I want is my memory. That is what I want you to act on. You understand?" Even now, Obi-Wan didn't risk a glance at him. "Make it happen, Anakin."

That tone had Anakin instinctively straightening and answering, "Yes, Master."

He had his mouth open to say that he didn't see why they were going all over this again — and then he saw Obi-Wan's painfully white-knuckled grip on the speeder throttle. Ah. A single narrow-eyed look took in all the signs Anakin had been missing, familiar from last night's abruptly-ended conversation about apprenticeship oaths.

How bad could it be if Obi-Wan seized while driving?

They weren't going too fast. Anakin thought he would probably be able to get them both out alive in the event of a crash. Still, he kind of wished Obi-Wan hadn't chosen to try and pretend he wasn't talking about the forbidden topic that he was talking about at a time when he was operating a moving vehicle.

"No matter what," said Obi-Wan, sounding as if he'd forced the words out through gritted teeth.

"Yeah, I understand, Master. I've got you."

On the one hand, Obi-Wan had pretty much obliquely given Anakin permission to remove the chip by force even if he tried to back out of the procedure, which... was a somewhat disturbing thought. On the other hand, it was quickly becoming apparent that Anakin needed to do something fast if he didn't want his day to include a fiery speeder wreck.

"Hey," blurted Anakin, "do you know the average albedo of Centax-2? The moon?"

Now Obi-Wan did look at him, only to frown as if he suspected Anakin had finally lost his mind. "Um. 0.152," he said. "The brightest satellite of Coruscant."

Anakin grinned.

"What?"

Instead of answering, Anakin said, "Where we live — at home—"

"Coruscant?"

"Yeah — There's a planetarium. They use it for all kinds of things, like teaching astronomy, navigation, and astrophysics to the younglings and stuff. The holos they have are incredibly high-res. They fill the whole room, and you always feel like you could almost grab and hold the planets and stars that float by. Even though, you know, they're just projected holos."

"It sounds beautiful."

Obi-Wan had relaxed noticeably, Anakin saw with satisfaction. "Yeah, it's pretty amazing. I had some classes there, but," he shrugged, "I get bored after a while. You, though — I would always find you there."

Eyebrows raised, Obi-Wan glanced at him. "Oh?"

"Hours, Master. You could spend hours there. First I thought you were just really into astrography, which you are, but... anytime you were stressed, or had a problem to think about or something, that would be one of two places I would know to look for you. Once, when I was a kid," Anakin said, warming to a memory he hadn't thought of in a long time, "I tried to see if I could outlast you."

"You fell asleep."

Shocked delight burst warm in Anakin's chest, and his eyes widened. He also may or may not have been gaping like a fish, for one wild moment convinced that there had been some mistake and Obi-Wan knew everything after all. Obi-Wan eyed him with something like a smirk before he had to turn back and watch where he was going.

"I don't remember," he said. "It's just obvious."

Anakin wondered if he should be insulted. He tried to summon some indignation, but it was impossible and he quickly gave up. "Yeah, well. I woke up the next day in my own bed. You had carried me back, and I'm pretty sure I spent the next year actively trying to forget the visual of being carried like a baby in front of everyone."

When Obi-Wan laughed he actually threw his head back, and the amusement did not fade from his eyes afterward. "How old were you?"

"Eleven, maybe?" He hadn't been at the Temple for too long, but he had certainly been old enough to be stung by the embarrassment.

They turned, and the clinic came into view ahead, and it was like the sight drained away Anakin's words. Just keeping up a constant distraction wasn't going to be enough to see Obi-Wan through this, he knew. Could Obi-Wan fight the chip's influence long enough?

Make it happen, Anakin, Obi-Wan had said.

If the implant overpowered his master, and Anakin had to hold him down with the Force... could he? Should he? He couldn't deny that the possibility had crossed his mind long before Obi-Wan himself had hinted at it. It was the only idea he'd had left after he and Irenia had discarded the other options. If it became necessary, would Irenia still do the procedure? Anakin had chosen not to mention it to her for a reason.

Thinking about restraining Obi-Wan and taking out the implant while he struggled and resisted was repulsive to Anakin. That was probably how Ventress had put it in. But. He had promised Obi-Wan his memory back. He would do it, if he had to. Anakin took a deep breath. He would put his trust in Obi-Wan's stubbornness, and hope that it wouldn't be necessary.