Chapter Six
Pain of the Brothers
Mace stood, stony-faced, in the dark holo-room. A blue hologram hovered in the centre of the room, casting ghostly shadows.
There, kneeling on the uneven, stony ground depicted in the hologram, was a Jedi Master with wizened features and a white beard. He was a Cerean, and as such he had two brains, which resulted in a tall cone protruding from the top of his bald head. Apart from that, he simply looked like an elderly human. On his wrinkled face was an expression of the deepest, blackest despair Mace had ever seen. The very thought of what had caused Ki-Adi Mundi to react like that made Mace shudder. Mace's face betrayed no emotion, but the Jedi Master was terrified for the life of his friend.
In the background of the picture, three Droidekas were visible, and six B2 super battle droids. A Geonosian spoke, his brown, insect-like body bounding up and down with every word.
"As you can see, we have the third in command of the Jedi Order," The Geonosian race usually spoke in clicks and whirrs, so the Geonosian's Basic accent was an unusual sound. "We also have news from our agents that General Grievous is alive on Utapau."
Mace exchanged a look with Plo.
"If you should happen to capture the General, we expect him to be returned immediately, or after receiving necessary medical care; he should be treated as any other POW. If we receive word from our many, many spies, that the general has been captured, and the Republic does not inform us, General Mundi will undergo the most comprehensive torture regime known to the Geonosian race."
The hologram zoomed in on Mundi, whose face was suddenly contorted by pain. Mace's eyes widened just slightly as they saw a tiny, thin laser-beam burning into Mundi's right eye. The eye burst, sending blue-tinged gore splattering across the hologram. Mundi winced in pain and slumped to the ground, a cry of anguish and agony escaping his mouth.
No words could explain what Mace felt.
Anakin pounded his fist on the control console, his face etched with worry.
"Order them to abandon ship! Now!" he roared, and he continued to pace up and down the bridge.
The Venator Star Destroyer on the port side of Anakin and Obi-Wan's flagship finally succumbed to heavy fire. The brilliantly bright green streaks that were enemy turbolasers punched through then the ship's formidable armour. A thousand explosions blossomed from the inside of the ship.
The very tip of the ship disappeared under a barrage of proton torpedoes and concussion missiles. Molten wreckage was blasted in all directions as yet more turbolaser shots from the enemy opened huge, gaping holes in the Star Destroyer's hull. Bodies, flash-frozen by the decompression, tumbled into space.
A trio of turbolaser blasts punched into the two bridges, destroying them in a brilliant fireball.
The last barrage was aimed at the bottom of the bridge tower's. Enemy turbolasers vaporised durasteel, metal, wires, plastic, and flesh on their journey to the Star Destroyer's reactor.
The Star Destroyer went nova. The white flash that followed the reactor's explosion blinded Anakin for a nanosecond, and when he could see again he saw the entire aft section of the ship, smashed bridge towers, engines, wings, everything, disappear in the ever-expanding fireball.
The front half of the ship floated away, explosions tearing it apart from the inside out as it began the slow tumble into Utapau's atmosphere, where it finally exploded, like a great firework in the dusk sky.
Tears of anger filled Anakin's eyes, blurring his vision, which was rapidly turning red-hued from anger. The remaining two Separatist cruisers were fighting like cornered Rancors. The other Separatist cruisers were destroyed, although one had attempted to crash into Anakin's Star Destroyer as the Separatist cruiser entered its death throes. But well placed gunnery had vaporised the enemy cruiser long before it endangered Anakin and Obi-Wan.
Another Separatist battleship exploded, and the remaining four Star Destroyers turned their guns on the last enemy capital ship. The shields on the mighty war-craft flickered, becoming a visible blue storm around the ship for a nano-second, before disappearing. Turbolasers, concussion missiles, and proton torpedoes streaked into the ship's bow hull, smashing through the armour and detonating the ship's main fuel depot in a maelstrom of multicoloured energy beams, and missile trails. The ship's remnants were suddenly blasted back about two kilometres before, with finally, comforting certainty, rupturing fuel lines and delayed-detonation warheads reduced the mighty ship into a scattering of atoms.
Anakin panted heavily, his chest heaving. He curled his mechanical arm into a tight fist, listening to stressed metal as it screeched in protest. An inhuman roar escaped his gnashed teeth and pursed lips, and he slammed his prosthesis arm down on the arm of a gunner lieutenant's seat, snapping the thick durasteel arm clean off and sending it skidding across the bridge. The clones said nothing, and just got on with their work at the consoles. Anakin looked around, eyes narrowed, daring one of the troops to say something in disapproval. For once, he suddenly forgot that the clones weren't programmed; they were real people.
The only noise was the bleep of systems coming back online.
Anakin's breathing slowed, and he tried to control his anger. There is no emotion: there is peace. There is no passion, there is serenity. There is no death, there is the Force. Three selected lines from the Jedi Code washed over him, but did nothing to soothe him. Lapsing into his white-hot fury, which burned like a supernova, he wanted to scream the words 'lies'. The code was a lie. One big lie. There was emotion; although, at that time, Anakin only felt fury at losing his men. There was passion, of course; how else could Padmé and he love each other? And of course there was death, and it wasn't the Force; the pain and suffering of dying beings only fuelled the Dark Side, which was a perversion of the Force.
Anakin suddenly froze; the Dark Side was a perversion, and yet he called upon it in almost every battle. With droids, with Dooku, with Grievous… His rage was an integral part in his war-prowess.
But the Separatist ground forces, as well as their fleet, had been destroyed; news had arrived from the surface, saying that the clones on the ground had subjugated the last Separatist resistance pockets. From a politician's view, the campaign to neutralise General Grievous had drawn to a resoundingly successful close. The deaths of thousands of clones were insignificant; the war was virtually over. But Anakin still felt the pain and suffering, lingering where the destroyed mighty Republic Star Destroyers had once proudly flown and battled, like a bad aftertaste; a hangover.
But, with the knowledge that the campaign was over, there was jubilation in Anakin's heart. He would be returning to Coruscant! And after a tedious speech on the holonet, no doubt, Anakin would be free to visit Padmé, free to finally leave the Jedi Order and reveal his marriage, now that the Galaxy was again functioning with peace, security, order and justice.
How wrong he would be.
Anakin turned to see Obi-Wan, a look of disapproval characterised by the down-turned corners of his mouth visible under his strong beard.
"There was no need to break the chair Anakin," Obi-Wan said solemnly, although his eyes betrayed his sense of joy.
The two stood there of for a few seconds in what would've seemed like uncomfortable silence to the untrained eye, but was actually Anakin and Obi-Wan's little joke.
The two moved suddenly, without warning, with a shout. They raced forward and shook hands, grinning, slapping each other on the back.
The war was over!
After so much pain, and so much unnecessary loss, so much destruction, and so many deaths, the war was finally over. And then, as if following the two Jedi's lead, the clones in the bridge suddenly began to turn and celebrate with each other, roaring their approval.
The two Jedi, the brilliant partnership, had succeeded.
The war was over; without Grievous, the CIS would fall apart!
Long live the Galactic Republic!
Anakin grinned and looked at Obi-Wan, his mentor and friend, again, and saw tears in the blue eyes of his long-time confidant. Obi-Wan was so happy to see peace; he was a greater Jedi than Anakin could ever hope to be. For a brief second, Anakin felt out of his depth; not in terms of power, as Anakin was a greater warrior than Obi-Wan, but in wisdom, in serenity.
But then the fleeting feeling was gone, and the celebrating began.
"Right!" Obi-Wan bellowed, laughing and raising a hand. "Set a course for Coruscant; we're going home!" A deafening chorus of approval shook the bridge. "And when we get back, drinks are on me!"
The roar was even louder that time. Clones were whipping their helmets off and shouting triumphantly in basic and Mandalorian.
Anakin added to Obi-Wan's speech in a stage-whisper. "Master, the last time you had a drink, you cut someone's arm off!"
The clones laughed a little, but Obi-Wan's expression faltered; that'd been in the prelude of the war, shortly before the clone army had been discovered. But then the grin returned, and the celebrations went on as fighters flew into Star Destroyer hangars, and the comm was filled with shouts of triumph, mingling with tears at lost friends.
Suddenly, twelve ARC-170s swooped up, flying past the bridge viewports in a blur of red and white, and then swooped back, stopping dead in front of the viewports and waggling their wings in salute to the two Jedi Generals, before racing off again.
Long live the Republic!
A minuet later, the entire clone ground army and starfighter force had returned to the Star Destroyers, and the hangar bay doors swung shut. All pilots who'd ejected from their stricken craft had been rescued, and the wreckage of the battle would be cleaned up later by a battle-analysis team.
The Star Destroyers jumped to hyperspace in unison, the screech of the hyperdrive sounding like the song of an angel. He was returning to Coruscant, to see Padmé! He sobered, remembering his vision but he was jerked back to the celebrations by a wounded clone trooper with a few bandages on his chest rushing over to shake Anakin and Obi-Wans' hands. He identified himself as Jay, a trooper who'd been rescued by the Rimsoo called in by General Kenobi.
Half an hour later, Anakin found himself standing alone, apart from three clones, in the communications room. The vast room's dim, white light was flecked with the multicoloured glows of buttons and screens. A holoprojector, a wide, bowl-like object made of metal, sat in the middle of the room. Anakin stared, unseeing, into it. All he could think about was his vision. He had to get home to Coruscant. He had to save Padmé.
The holoprojector crackled once, and Anakin's eyes suddenly darted to the clone manning the device. The clone, wearing his white armour but no helmet, reached out and hit a button. Instantly, a blue-hued figure floated out of the bowl.
Mace Windu's holographic image was tinged blue, but the anger in the Master's eyes was still visible.
"Anakin," Windu spoke quietly, almost inaudibly, but the rage in the words seemed to magnify the sound, "The Council have a message for you and Master Kenobi; a message of utmost importance."
Anakin was taken aback, but he nodded slowly. He didn't even bother to contemplate what the transmission would contain; all he cared about, all he could even think about was getting back to Coruscant. Getting back to Padmé
"Yes, Master," Anakin's face hid his excitement almost completely; the only giveaway was the slight twitch of his jaw muscles.
"Ki-Adi Mundi has—"
Master Windu's image suddenly flickered, becoming a thousand scrambled blue pixels. Then the image vanished with a white flash. The clones in the room looked up, their helmets hiding the looks of confusion on their faces.
And then the lights flickered, their white light dimming and then dying completely.
The room was plunged into darkness, and then there was a horrendous, screeching sound. Anakin reached into the Force, his mind suddenly alert. He soon realised that the ship had dropped out of hyperspace; a hyper-mine (a space mine that would use an artificial gravity well to pull a passing ship out of hyperspace), perhaps?
Anakin had to find out.
Just as Anakin burst onto the bridge, which was filled with talking clone troops, the emergency lighting kicked in, bathing the bridge in harsh yellow light. A clone was stooped over his sensor readout; Commander Cody stood behind him. Anakin strode over quickly, trying not to look as flustered about being stopped as he felt.
"Commander!" Anakin failed to keep the desperate urgency in his voice. If Cody noticed, his features were unreadable.
"Yes sir?"
"What just happened?" Anakin's question wasn't inquisitive; it was nothing short of a demand. Again, Cody seemed unfazed.
"It was a hyper-mine. It disabled some of our basic systems when it pulled us out of hyperspace, too: lighting, holo projectors, and food processors."
"Are there any ships in the area?"
"Yes sir. A Theta class light shuttle. Republic make. We've managed to discern its ID; it's the one that went missing half a year ago, with Asajj Ventress and Advanced Recon Commando Alpha on board."
Anakin froze suddenly, his body becoming a tall, motionless mass of tense and rigid muscle. His face was suddenly ashen, his eyes wide and terrified. His jaw worked as if he was trying desperately to say something.
Ventress! Dooku's apprentice. The bald, white-skinned alien who'd wielded two lightsabers. The Dark Jedi. The one who'd scarred Anakin's cheeks so many months ago.
But Anakin cared about none of that; as far as Republic Intelligence had been able to discern, Asajj Ventress had been unconscious after being captured; she was being transferred to Coruscant for questioning by an ARC clone. Then, the shuttle had gone missing in transit. Asajj Ventress hadn't returned to the CIS, or been heard from again.
Anakin didn't care. Only one, frozen image, swam into his vision, which had become blurred and unfocused.
The image of Padmé. Padmé, with a lightsaber wound.
"Is the shuttle in tractor beam range?" barked Anakin. His suddenly hoarse voice seemed to fill the entire bridge with its booming, echoing command. Cody flinched, something Anakin had never seen before.
"Yes sir."
"Bring it in! Now!" Anakin's voice was almost a scream. He didn't care. His head was swimming. But he knew, in his bowels, in his heart, that he had to kill Asajj Ventress.
He'd been foolish to imagine that the Jedi would touch Padmé. She'd long stood by them. But Ventress! Surely Ventress would kill Padmé if she got the chance! Anakin had injured the deranged Dark Jedi many times. If she somehow knew about Anakin's marriage…
"Should we open fire, sir?" asked Cody.
"No!" yelled Anakin. Ventress had escaped many such attempts on her life with subtle, wily tricks and sheer luck. Anakin wanted to kill her, irrevocably and for certain, with his own blade.
Cody raised an eyebrow as Anakin suddenly turned and raced out of the bridge. The tractor beam officer was already carrying out his orders.
The shuttle itself was a dull silver colour, with a rounded front and an array of weapons. It had three stubby wings; two on the lower corners of the fuselage, and one, slightly bigger wing sticking straight up from the top of the fuselage. Its hull was covered in scrapes, and blackened dents. The paintwork was scratched and grazed; a large, dark scar no doubt caused by a laser marked the side of the main cabin.
The ship's pilot, no doubt aware of her peril, had swung into a sluggish banking turn. But it was already too late.
Inside the Star Destroyer, the hangar bay doors slid open soundlessly, an atmospheric shield engaging to stop any clones or ships being sucked into the cold vacuum. Then, a distant hum started, which soon became an incessant whine, as an invisible tractor beam shot out, towards the fleeing shuttle, which was instantly ensnared by the force beam.
Slowly, but surely, the shuttle was dragged into the hangar bay. Then it was manoeuvred into the bay, and dropped with a metallic clang into an empty spot in the hangar. With a hiss, the rear boarding hatch slid open, and a ramp slowly lowered itself down, like a snake's tongue tasting the air.
Just two hundred metres away, a turbolift door slid open.
Anakin Skywalker stood in the lift, his face red faced with rage, his cloak billowing in the windy blast from engines being tested.
His eyes were glowing a fierce orange.
And, in his right hand, a right hand constructed of metal motors, wires, and joints, encased in a black glove, there was a lightsaber.
Anakin's eyes, those horribly, insanely infuriated orange eyes, held the promise of murder, just as they had held that promise when Dooku had knelt, defeated, maimed, begging for his life. Just as they'd promised General Grievous that he would die, as Anakin had held and defeated the general under a barrage of hate-fuelled, crackling blue lightning.
Just as they had when he'd faced Ventress for the first time, on the jungle moon of Yavin.
Snap-hiss.
The sky blue blade of Anakin's weapon spat into existence. Anakin raised it and strode slowly forward, like a mindless automaton, marching towards what was his sole purpose…