Yeah,I know. It's been ages since I updated. Don't blame me. I moved. ;) Anyway, here it is. Pardon any lack of quality; I'm a bit rusty.

Jedi Master Yoda

Yoda was not one to question the ways of the Force. It always seemed to know what it was doing. Yet this seemed rather… senseless. All the time they had spent trying to protect Luke and Leia from the Emperor, and Anakin Skywalker crops up, completely unexpected.

But the Jedi Master remained calm about the whole mess as he escorted Leia and Padme into the lower level of the bunker. A twitch from the Force poked the button that opened the starship-class blast door, and Yoda hurried his charges inside.

Padme Amidala, that face still young but with those impossibly old eyes, whispered something to Leia. The little girl nodded and toddled off as her mother turned to Yoda, the grief in her eyes again. "What is going on?" she asked, quiet.

Yoda remembered. They had told her that Anakin had perished in the defense of the Temple – which was true, from a certain point of view – in order to assuage her pain. Se thought he was dead. Dead and gone. Taken from her by Palpatine.

Yoda brushed the thought aside, then: "If you do not know, for the best it will be."

Padme showed a momentary flash of anger – the old Senator – but shrugged, nodded her thanks, walked back into the inner chamber. Yoda turned away as the blast door hissed shut behind him and the durasteel barrier lowered into place. Thicker than a lightsaber's length.

As he raced back up the corridor to the security room, he wondered if she had ever thought about that, how everything was tailored to defend against… Sith. The thick barricades. The hidden turrets with shielded schematics. The ray shields along the halls. All to stop Palpatine.

Alderaanian security could handle stormtroopers, but a Sith Lord? No. Even Yoda could not bring down Palpatine in the moment of his power. He tried not to think about those nearly fatal moments, the black hole in his mind, the sudden opening of a wellspring of power, seeking, crushing, blazing energy. Failure. He let the shame fill him, then, with an effort, he forced it out.

Skywalker would come, and he would find them. Yoda would be ready. As he always was.

And, as he stepped up to the holoprojector, he knew that he would have… backup on the way.
Far off Tatooine, distant sand-pit, raped by hot winds, ravaged by the Hutts, a shell, devoid of value. This was what anyone who was not Obi-Wan Kenobi saw. Obi-Wan Kenobi saw a valuable safe haven, a place where he only had to worry about dodging stormtroopers and bounty hunters. No self-respecting Sith would set foot on this rock. Except maybe Darth Maul. And look where he was.

Obi-Wan barely scanned the holopad in his hand, barely seeing the words that shimmered on the screen. His mind was distracted by the movements and channels of the Force he felt maneuvering in the back room of his little hovel, far off from what passed for civilization. Such strength, he thought.

Luke Skywalker was an amazing little boy. Kenobi had come to that conclusion some time ago. As strong as his father. Maybe stronger. Hopefully. The boy learned so quickly, and mastered his lessons with easy, childish grace.

A loud beep cut into his thoughts and he rose. The holocomm. He strode into his bedroom. On the floor to the side of his cot was a starship-class full-body holopad, a gift from Bail Organa so that he and Yoda could communicate. An incoming message from Alderaan.

He stepped onto the holopad and waved his hand over the activator. As he expected, Yoda suddenly appeared, scanned into existence by a laser beam. "Hello, Master. How are things on Alderaan?"

Yoda told him.

Luke waved goodbye from the arms of his Aunt Beru as Obi-Wan's one-man craft slowly lifted from the desert sands and fired its sublights. Grit and dirt ballooned from the makeshift launch pad, and Kenobi was off.

His thoughts raced as he closed his hands over the alien controls. General Grievous' personal craft. He was still using it after all these years – according to Imperial records it was destroyed at Utapau, so no danger remained in zipping around the galaxy in it.

But that was a momentary distraction. Yoda's words still weighed in his chest, as if he had suddenly caught pneumonia.

Here, Anakin Skywalker is.

Obi-Wan was not ready for this. He was not ready to face his friend in combat, to strike to kill. He simply could not do it. And since he couldn't do it, he'd choke up, not be able to fight, and Anakin would kill him, kill Yoda, steal away Padme and Leia, chaos, a broken galaxy, shattered by reckless powers beyond the understanding of those who wielded them, clashes of Dark Side energy obliterating all that was yet good in this universe, everything the Jedi had fought for, everything they had defended, the Force gone, wiped out, all life…

Obi-Wan stopped, breathed in, sucked in the fear, and breathed out, releasing the stress. He would go. He would do what the Force told him to do. No more. No less.

Even if it means killing Anakin?

The satchel charge in that particular part of the street, just where he'd been told. The Hooded Man was standing off some distance, watching for any intrusions. None. No civilians, not even Order Enforcement was around here. This pleased Fett.

Then, activating the timer, he fired his jetpack and got behind some cover. Five kilos of heavy ordnance wouldn't do much for him. He waited for the ground-shaking explosion.

It came.

Fire and brimstone shot dozens of meters into the sky, melted durasteel, scraps of duraplast and ferrocrete. The Hooded Man was already moving, diving through the hole even before the dust had settled, and Boba Fett followed him, yanking back the bolt on his flamethrower.

He heard the buzz before he saw what produced it, and when he did, his heart jumped into his throat. Which, for Boba Fett, was saying something.

The Hooded Man was carrying a blue lightsaber.

Fett swore, once, twice. A Jedi! The Order that had killed his father. The Hooded Man gave him a single look, then strode forward into the flaming wreckage of the room that they had emerged into.

Fett scowled beneath his helmet and cursed the man with everything he had. He couldn't kill him; the guy could probably take his head off almost instantly. All he could do was his job. Well, fierfek.

The explosion had not really surprised Yoda. He was ready. Obi-Wan was on his way, should be here soon, traveling at twice lightspeed, as fast as his ship could go. He felt calm now, wrapped in the Force, a bulwark against the twilight that moved his way.

He drew his saber, felt with the Force for his enemy, who was slowly roving through the halls. Viciously. Yoda spotted several guards writhing on the ground, castrated, limbs missing, scorched from Sith lightning. Some with wounds from a blaster rifle. That would be the Mandalorian Anakin had brought with him. None dead. Curious.

Suddenly, he felt a surge in his enemy's power and he charged ahead, trying to confront the blackness, the Dark Side, before it found what it sought. He rounded the corner, speeding in the Force, and stopped short –

Anakin Skywalker, clad all in white, was standing at the end of the hallway, dismantling a security guard. Beyond him was a man in green-accented armor, blaster rifle blazing away, driving back security.

Yoda clenched the green bar of plasma in his hand, gathered himself, and lunged.

Anakin felt the attack coming, heard the alien scream behind him, whirled, saber coming up, deflecting the vicious blow, spinning aside, throwing back his hood.

He recognized this figure. "Master Yoda."

Yoda gathered himself again, crouched low, prepared to attack once more. "Young Skywalker. Come for your wife and child, have you?"

Anakin nodded, flourished his saber, remembering the Temple. "I have. Stand aside, and you shall not be harmed."

Yoda raised his brows. "Threats? Perhaps learn you should, about the danger of threats. Distract, they do."

Anakin laughed, that cocky chuckle of his. "Thank you for the lesson, Master Yoda. Now stand aside."

Yoda straightened. "No."

Anakin's eyes narrowed, the scar above his eye crinkling. "Very well."

Obi-Wan Kenobi raced through the smoke-filled hallway, feeling the clash of the two powers, hoping against hope that he would not have to do anything, closer, drawing closer, rounding one corner, shooting through a room, into another hall, hearing the clash of lightsabers now, praying to the Force, please, please, please…

He stepped into the hall. And there they were.

Anakin Skywalker and Yoda, faced off, sabers locked, hissing like jewelsnakes.

And he knew what the Force was calling him to do.