Adrift - PART VI

Anakin checked the flight computer for the umpteenth time, making sure that the coordinates where correct and that the ETA-class shuttle was hurtling through space into the right destination. He would have felt more at ease in the Twilight, but Obi-Wan had somehow managed to get Anakin's trusty old freighter blown up in Mandalore. Anakin hadn't had the heart to give his Master much flack about that, because of what had happened to Satine Kryze…

Resolutely, Anakin turned his thoughts away from Mandalore and its dead Duchess, and returned his focus back to the ship. ETA-class shuttles were good ships, and Anakin had flown them many times before, but he had upgraded the Twilight himself, and the freighter would have been faster and more – just more dependable. Anakin had known that ship like the back of his own hand.

He reached again towards the flight console, to verify that everything was in order, but was halted by a series of indignant peeps. R2 was standing next to the pilot's seat, domed head swivelling.

Anakin smiled feebly. "I know you do a great job, I just thought to check." R2's head turned around more slowly, and the droid gave two mournful peeps.

"I do trust you, buddy," Anakin assured R2, who was without doubt one of his rare true friends. "I just…I just need something to do." The small astromech droid burst into a series of encouraging peeps, which made Anakin smile more earnestly. He appreciated R2's attempt at reassurance, its claim that Obi-Wan was simply too wily and obstinate to not survive and that surely they would find him.

"Thanks," Anakin said, for a moment feeling as perhaps everything would be alright. R2 peeped once and surprisingly tactfully retreated back into the cargo hold. Anakin stared at the streaks of starlight through the transparisteel viewport, trying to hold on to the comfort and faith of a happy ending. But the feeling evaporated like smoke in an open air, leaving him restlessly trying to evade the darkest paths of his mind.

For a while Anakin thought about the moment, when he had first set foot inside the sleek Naboo Royal Starship, wide-eyed and determined, vowing to be the first one to visit all the planets in the galaxy. He chuckled darkly at the childish naivete of his younger self, and before his thoughts had time to turn to the reason of that first trip through the stars – to the person he had left behind – Anakin started to list all the planets he had been to. There were a lot. Many of them had not offered a particularly pleasant visit for the Jedi. But almost always, Obi-Wan had been there by Anakin's side. He was hard pressed to find a memory of a place, where his Master wasn't present. Varykino came to mind, but with it came also the image of Padmé, taking his hand at their wedding.

They had vowed to love one another always. They had sworn to respect and support each other, whether the days be happy or full with adversity. Anakin had promised to have faith in her and in their marriage, and Padmé had promised the same. They had pledged themselves to one another heart, body and soul. And yet – somehow – it had not been enough.

I just know that I can´t live like this anymore. I won't.

Padmé's voice rang in his ears, every word drawing forth fresh pain, like they were pressing against an open, bleeding wound.

I still feel unhappy.

Her confession of unhappiness made Anakin distressed. Had he let her down so badly that Padmé couldn't feel happy with him anymore? Or was it just the circumstances – the endless brutal war and all the pressures it laid upon their marriage – that had caused her to feel discontent and unease?

There are some things that are bigger – perhaps even more important – than my love for you.

Anakin shook his head, as if to dispel the damning words that he couldn't really understand. For what could be bigger, more important than love – their love for each other? When they had married, they had done so defying all the expectations, demands and duties set upon them both. Together, they had stood up against the whole galaxy that was trying to keep them apart. They had decided that love was worth all the secrecy and opposition, that love was a necessity, something as essential as food or air.

And now, it seemed, Padmé had inexplicably changed her mind.

A sharp signal sounded from the ship's communication console, informing of an incoming transmission. For a wild, heart-stopping moment – perhaps conjured by his despondent thoughts – Anakin believed that the caller must be Padmé. She must have learnt of his departure and wanted to rectify everything that had gone wrong between them at their last meeting.

However, when Anakin accepted the holotransmitter's call, it was not Padmé's graceful form that sprang to life in front of him, but a small, holographic image of the Supreme Chancellor.

"Chancellor Palpatine!" Anakin was surprised – and somewhat disappointed.

"Anakin," the Chancellor rasped, his bluish image flickering. "I was alarmed, when I heard you left Coruscant without notifying anyone. Where are you now?"

Anakin frowned. He hoped that Palpatine wasn't going to demand that he return back to Coruscant or that he was needed somewhere else – even the Supreme Chancellor's command wouldn't make Anakin stop his mission to save Obi-Wan. "I'm en route to the last known coordinates of the medical frigate Refuge."

"Then it is as I feared," the Chancellor said gravely. "I have been notified that all contact has been lost with the Refuge, and that it is likely that the frigate has been destroyed. Anakin, I understand that you want to find Master Kenobi, but the odds of him being alive…"

"I have to go there – I have to help Obi-Wan!" Anakin exclaimed hotly, Chancellor Palpatine's calm tone doing little to soothe his anxiety.

"My dear boy," Chancellor Palpatine said, pity in his voice. "I know you feel like you have to – that once again you have to save your former Master. However, this time…I'm afraid it will all be for naught." There was an awkward pause, during which Anakin didn't have anything to say. Then the Chancellor continued cautiously, "Of course, if…have you seen something that indicates that Master Kenobi is still alive? Have you…felt him with that bond you Jedi have?"

Anakin's heart sank. "No…I haven't," he reluctantly admitted, "but I just know Obi-Wan is still out there, needing help!"

It was hard to discern the nuances of someone's expression through a flickering holographic image, but Anakin still got the distinct impression that the Supreme Chancellor was not pleased with his reply. The old man pursed his lips and then said gently, "Anakin…I'm sorry to say this, but as…useful as Master Kenobi has been to the war effort, in the end, he is just one man. And I fear you are unnecessarily placing your life in danger by going after him. The Republic needs you Anakin – we need you now in Coruscant, the public needs to see you, and soon enough, I have no doubt, you will be needed in the front lines."

Duty first – wasn't that what Obi-Wan always preached? What would his Master say, when he heard that Chancellor Palpatine held the same opinion as Obi-Wan? Anakin almost grinned with dark humour.

"Do you command me to return?" Anakin asked harshly, not bothering to even argue that the Jedi Council – or at least Master Yoda – had consented to his rescue mission, and because it could be considered to be purely an internal Jedi matter, the Chancellor couldn't order Anakin to halt the mission – not if there weren't any superceding orders from the Republic High Command.

Chancellor Palpatine was silent for a moment, and Anakin held his breath. He didn't want to go against the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic, not to mention one of his oldest friends, but he would, if he had to. Palpatine seemed to know it too, for the man frowned and then said, "Oh Anakin…I would not dream of standing in your way on a matter that is obviously so important to you…I just fear it will end in tragedy. For the moment, there is nothing critical that demands your presence – until there is, you can continue this mission."

"Thank you, Chancellor," Anakin said, relieved.

"I wish you all the luck," Chancellor Palpatine bid quietly. Before Anakin could answer, the transmission ended and the holographic image vanished, leaving Anakin once more alone in the flight deck. He immediately reached inward and let the streaking stars in his field of vision blur into the white and silvery strands of the bond he shared with Obi-Wan.

The Force pulsed around the dormant connection, and although the bond was inactive, quiet and cold, Anakin nevertheless felt enormous relief. Surely, if Obi-Wan had died, the bond would have been ripped apart – that was not something one could miss. Immediately however, the relief changed into apprehension and frustration; Obi-Wan was alive, but for how long? Anakin couldn't tell where his Master was, or in what condition – the bond stayed stubbornly silent, no matter how loud Anakin tried to call, no matter how hard he tugged at the strands of light, demanding attention. Obi-Wan did not answer, could not hear Anakin. The distance between them was too great. They were each of them alone.

Eyes prickling with unshed tears, Anakin's consciousness returned fully back to the cockpit. He resolved to try to contact Obi-Wan again later, when he was a little bit closer to the set coordinates. Anakin would try as many times as he had to – until his Master would answer. And so, for the moment, there was nothing to do, but to stare at the stars and try to avoid the dark recesses of his own thoughts. Anakin knew what Obi-Wan would have recommended he do – meditation. But that hardly ever brought any tranquillity to Anakin, and he couldn't bear to immerse himself in the Force…not when the thought of a momentarily peace was almost offensive and as unwelcome as the harrowing visions.

Knowing he could not sleep, and therefore not even bothering to try, Anakin shifted in the pilot's seat, searching for a more comfortable position. To his surprise, something hard poked at his side, and Anakin realized that there was something in the pocket of his outer robe. His throat tightened, when he drew a small, smooth stone from his pocket.

Anakin stared at the black river stone resting on his palm, wanting to both laugh and cry. Obi-Wan had given the stone to him at Anakin's thirteenth birthday. Obi-Wan himself had gotten it from Qui-Gon, also as a thirteenth-birthday present. For a long time, Anakin had considered the river stone to be his most precious possession, and he had carried it with him in the pocket of his tunic, always. Anakin could not remember, when – or why – that had changed. Somewhere along the way, the stone had been forgotten, and it had been left on the pocket of his spare robes, laying under his dusty bed at the Temple.

He closed the Force-sensitive stone inside his palm, feeling its reassuring, comforting warmth. As a child, he had appreciated the stone because it was something that had been passed along from Qui-Gon himself; the man that had freed Anakin and promised he would become a Jedi; the man that had been the ideal Jedi for the small slave boy. However, the stone also held a deeper meaning, one that a thirteenth-year-old Anakin hadn't fully understood. It was a promise from his Master – a sign of his confidence and regard towards Anakin. Despite all the difficulties of Anakin's early apprenticeship, the hardships that were to come, Obi-Wan had been fully committed to training, raising and protecting Anakin. Nothing could have told it clearer than Obi-Wan giving Anakin his most prized possession, relinquishing the gift Qui-Gon had once bestowed upon him and giving it to his own Padawan in turn.

For the first time, Anakin realized something about the stone that he had always sensed, but hadn't been able to put into words. The river stone did not only pulse with the warmth of the living Force; it also radiated with Obi-Wan's promise, with his Master's trust and faith in Anakin.

During the following hours, during the relentlessly bleak march of time, Anakin kept the river stone securely enclosed in his hand, letting it warm his aching heart with hope.

-o-

Obi-Wan drew the thermal blanket more tightly around himself, his breath misting up in the frigid air. His whole body shivered with cold; he had given up trying to control the tremors some time ago. How much time – that he did not know. To his annoyance, Obi-Wan had dozed off a few times quite in spite of himself, and he had lost his sense of time. His best guess was that he had spent about three hours in the dark, drifting escape pod, but really, it could have been more or less time than that.

The life pod continued to slowly spun through the wreckage, occasionally pumping into various pieces of debris, making the whole pod shudder and groan. The uncontrollable journey through the graveyard of destroyed ships was nerve-racking, not least because Obi-Wan could do nothing but watch, as it was yet too dangerous to turn on the escape pod's flight control and other systems. The Separatists were still tenaciously searching through the extensive wreckage for survivors; as the pod had once again turned, Obi-Wan had seen one of the destroyers stationed outside the debris field, a blue-green planet behind it. A pod hunter had also flown past, passing Obi-Wan's escape pod only with hundred meters between them.

The Separatists were being uncharacteristically thorough. Usually they didn't bother with the survivors, not if it wasn't imperative that no one should survive their attack. It bothered Obi-Wan greatly that they still continued to comb through the debris, when they hardly could be sure that Republic fleet wouldn't drop in on them at any moment. Or could they be certain that no one was yet coming? And why would survivors from a mere medical frigate matter to the Separatists so much? Instead of any insightful answers however, all that the speculation did was to make his head throb more severely.

Obi-Wan tried to keep his focus firmly on the view outside, but often he found his thoughts wondering far away, into moments long past. Startled, he became aware more than once, that time had once again got away from him as Obi-Wan had been immersed in memories of long-ago missions, of long-lost friends. Frustrated with himself, Obi-Wan banished Qui-Gon's eyes, with their crow's-feet, from his mind; he resolutely pushed Satine's deathly pale face from his thoughts; Anakin's impish smile evaded capture the longest, but finally Obi-Wan took hold of it and determinedly locked it inside his heart.

Focus. He had to focus. Survival depended on it.

The pod shook as a large piece of twisted metal suddenly scraped against its side; Obi-Wan gritted his teeth. Squinting, he could just discern the Separatist destroyer in the distance, it was just a small dot behind the countless warped fragments and molten chunks of destroyed ships. The escape pod was nearing the end of the debris field, and as the amount of wreckage decreased, the pod became more noticeable. Soon, hiding would not be an option.

Obi-Wan glanced to the back of the pod, where the shut down AZI-2 lay against the bulkhead. He debated with himself if he should turn the droid on right then, to get an extra pair of hands to help with the pod when the inevitable happened and the Separatists discovered them. Or should he wait as long as he possibly could, until they had reached the very edge of the debris field?

Relying on his instinct, Obi-Wan got up stiffly and rubbed his hands together to get a little warmth to them. His injured left arm felt like a heavy block of ice, numb and unwieldy. He looked at the piloting console, running through his mind the different tasks he had to do, when the pod's power would be turned fully on. Luckily escape pods were highly automated; once operational, the pod would automatically calculate the flight trajectory to the nearest habitable planet and start to send the distress signal.

Waiting only a few minutes more, Obi-Wan finally hunkered carefully down next to AZI-2. The little droid had an unerring talent to get on Obi-Wan's nerves, but he couldn't deny that AZI-2 had managed to do fairly well in a situation where there hadn't been any clear guidelines. Not delaying the unavoidable any longer, Obi-Wan switched the medical droid back on. Instantly, its large round eyes started to fill with light.

"General Kenobi," AZI-2 intoned flatly, "I am fully functional in 7.3 seconds – 3.2 seconds..."

Not bothering to reply, Obi-Wan hurried back to the piloting console, eyes scanning the debris field around the pod. He couldn't see any pod hunters yet.

"I'm going to switch on the pod's systems," he informed grimly. "I need your help. I'm going to focus on the flight systems and getting us in one piece on the nearest habitable planet – let's hope there is one – and you are going to monitor the communication frequencies. If the Republic answers our distress signal, be ready to rely all the relevant information about our situation."

"What about the Separatist Droch-class boarding ships?" AZI-2 asked as it hovered next to Obi-Wan.

"They are still there." Obi-Wan grinned joylessly. "So, it's going to be a bumpy ride."

"Oh, that's not good." The little droid sounded anxious as it peered outside the viewport.

Obi-Wan barked with laughter. "Not good is just a normal day for me. AZI-2, I have faced much worse odds…" – although, usually Anakin has been with me, his treasonous mind whispered – "…and this is just another kriffing day on the job." It was possible that Obi-Wan was still a little concussed, if the droid's surprisingly human-looking expression of alarm was anything to go by.

"Ready?" Obi-Wan's fingers rested against the main switch.

"Yes sir," AZI-2 squeaked.

Obi-Wan flicked the switch. All the systems started to power up as red, green and yellow lights blinked to life on the flight console. The pod buzzed, and then warm air started to flow into the cabin and the lighting came on.

And then, naturally, all hell broke loose.