Standing on the roof of an abandoned building, Steve faced Jasper Sitwell who smirked back at him. Behind Sitwell, the distant towers of the Jedi Temple stood stark and sharp against the darkening sky. Clint had promised that no one official could see or hear them up here, no matter how open it looked. It was the perfect place to interrogate someone.
Steve shoved Sitwell hard, and he stumbled back a few steps. "Tell me about Hydra."
Sitwell's eyes glinted behind his pale blue-grey glasses. "Never heard of it." Grabbing Sitwell's shirt at the shoulder, Steve pushed him to the edge of the roof. Sneering up at him, Sitwell said, "Are you trying to insinuate that you'll throw me off the roof? You're a Jedi—that's not your style."
Steve smiled, showing his teeth. "Have you ever met a Jedi Shadow?" He stepped back and to one side as Natasha came up and lifted her hand. A surge of power rushed past him, and Sitwell flew back into the empty air with a scream.
Looking down, Steve watched Sitwell's flailing form drop neatly into a speeder piloted by Sam, who immediately pulled back on the steering, sending the small craft into a steep climb. As it cleared the edge of the building, Sam shoved the steering column forward and landed hard, skidding across the roof.
Steve strode across the roof, his hands clenched at his sides. Struggling up from his undignified sprawl, Sitwell held both hands up palm forward. "I'm only an apprentice! Master Penetro doesn't trust me with all the details." His eyes, distorted behind his anachronistic spectacles, flickered back and forth between Steve and Natasha. This close, the yellow of his irises was clear even through the tinted lenses. A small smile curved his lips. "You're too late, you know. The targets are already locked."
His insides turning to ice, Steve demanded, "Targets? What targets?"
"You!" Sitwell waved a hand to encompass both Steve and Natasha. "The Royal family of Alderaan… most of the Jedi Council… anyone who's a threat to Hydra!"
Grabbing Sitwell's collar, Steve dragged him out of the speeder and held him up so his toes just brushed the roof. "And then what happens?"
Fear filled Sitwell's eyes, his smile draining from his face along with his colour. "Lord Penetro is going to kill me."
His jaw clenched so tightly it hurt, Steve shook Sitwell hard. The spectacles slipped down his nose to hang precariously just short of falling off. "What happens?!"
Swallowing hard, Sitwell replied, "The clones scratch them off the list."
Steve released him so suddenly Sitwell would have fallen had he not been Force-trained. Turning his back, Steve closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It was almost beautiful, the elegance of the plan. The clone troopers were everywhere, so much so that they faded into the background, nearly invisible. No one would be watching for an attack from them. It would be a massacre and, quite likely, the end of the Jedi Order.
Fear rose up and threatened to choke him, but he swallowed hard, wrestling it down. As Master Abra'im had taught him, he found his calm centre, set aside his emotions to deal with later, and turned back just as Clint's voice sounded in his earpiece: "Incoming!"
An armoured figure landed hard next to the speeder, red lightsaber plunging through Sitwell's chest before anyone had time to react. Bucky turned toward Steve and Natasha, batting an arrow away with his prosthetic arm. It exploded against the shining metal, but with no discernible effect.
Steve froze with his lightsaber in his hand, thumb on the activation switch. Natasha leapt past him, yellow blade raised. Bucky lifted a blaster with his metal hand, and Steve pushed through his mental fog, knocking her out of the way of the bolt. It barely missed him, and Natasha was shouting something about him being a fool, but Bucky's blaster was now trained on Steve.
Gazing into cold yellow eyes, Steve dropped his saber and raised his hands. "I'm not going to fight you, Bucky." There wasn't even a flicker of recognition in Darth Frigus' eyes as he pulled the trigger.
A flying body tackled Steve out of the way and they hit the ground in a tangle. Steve met Sam's brown eyes as the smuggler pushed himself off Steve asking, "You got a death wish, Rogers?"
Before Steve could formulate a response, "Drop your weapons! On your knees! Get on your knees! Now! Get down! Get down!" A squad of troopers led by Jedi Knight Brock Rumlow poured out of a transport onto the roof. Steve slowly got to his knees and clasped his hands on the back of his neck. He had been so sure of that flicker when he saw Bucky on Tatooine; he had been certain that he could get through to what remained of his friend. But this time, there was nothing there: the Sith would have killed him if not for Sam.
Frigus bent and picked up Steve's discarded lightsaber as Brock came to stand before Steve. "You're under arrest," he told Steve, "for crimes against the Order and the Republic, and for crimes against the Force."
Steve caught his breath. Crimes against the Force? That was the worst accusation a Jedi could level at another, usually used only against dark Jedi. Is that what they thought he was now? He raised his chin, meeting Brock's eyes levelly. No. If they really thought he had fallen to the dark side, they wouldn't be arresting him; they would be asking him to join them.
Steve climbed aboard the transport with Natasha and Sam, followed closely by two helmeted troopers whose blaster rifles were unwaveringly trained on them. Natasha met his eyes, and a ghost of a smile flashed across her face. "I've been in worse scrapes," she remarked.
Unable to summon up even a small smile in return, Steve sat across from her, his hands—like hers—in binders. "I'm sure I have too, but I can't seem to remember one right now."
Three Jedi—or, two Jedi and one ex-Jedi smuggler—would normally be more than a match for two troopers, but without their lightsabers it was too risky. There was a good chance someone could be hurt or killed if the troopers started shooting. And they might start shooting at any moment, to 'scratch them off the list'.
It occurred to Steve that he hadn't seen Clint since before their ill-fated meeting with Sitwell. It was possible the bounty hunter had sold them out. Steve had thought him trustworthy, but then again, he'd thought the same thing about the Jedi.
The doors slammed shut and the transport lifted off, knocking everyone off balance. With their hands in binders, unable to hold on, the prisoners were tossed against the walls. In the chaos, one of the troopers attacked the other, knocking him cold, then pulled off her helmet to reveal Jedi Master Maria Hill. "That thing was squeezing my brain," she announced. Glancing around at their stunned expressions, she grinned. "What, you didn't think we were all Hydra, did you?"
