Where Sidious is Revealed
The way they took was definitely enough to distract Ahsoka from everything that had been threatening to overwhelm her. She had no idea that the Temple maintenance was lit and guided by some sort of phosphorescent compound that labeled every wire and pipe throughout the darkness. After Force-jumping up to some sort of tunnel at the side of the Temple, they'd climbed up to a corridor of pitch black, lit only by writing all over everything, with arrows on the floor to what could be anywhere in the Temple! It was even all color-coded!
"Master," she said in awe, "how did you know about this?"
Obi-Wan only groaned.
"I did a report on it."
Ahsoka blinked in the darkness. "For what class?"
Anakin chuckled.
"Here and now, my old Padawan. We can't stay in these tunnels forever. And," he added ruefully, "no one knows about sneaking around the Temple like you do."
"What?" Anakin replied, his tone completely unrepentant.
It was such a nice dose of normalcy Ahsoka teared up. Again. She scrubbed at her eyes and sniffled, but pushed the feelings aside.
They were out into the halls of the Temple quickly. And what they saw made Ahsoka feel like throwing up.
There were bodies everywhere. Charred corpses, still burning, left a repugnant smell in the air as the three of them slipped between Masters, Knights, Padawans, and younglings, all dead on the floor, some in pieces.
Anakin looked down at one point, to the limbless torso of Cin Drallig, the greatest saber-master the Temple had, one who could teach any of the seven Forms. "This wasn't just clones," he growled.
Nothing more could really be said, and they moved on from there.
Any clones they came across were easily distracted. As long as Ahsoka didn't focus on the floors, she could almost think of it as a game, to make the clones think the Temple was haunted by all who had been killed.
That would be ironic.
But she didn't dwell on the thought. To do so would send her into a place of sorrow that would more likely get her killed.
They were going down a hall when Anakin stopped, sucking in a breath sharply.
"We can't go this way Master."
Obi-Wan shook his head. "I see little other choice. The other paths are too congested with clones and too circular. We can't linger here long. The Senate meeting will be getting out soon."
"Master, that's one of the clan crèches we'll have to go through."
Obi-Wan's gaze was weighed down with great sadness. "I know."
Suddenly, Ashoka was overwhelmed again, tears threatening to fall, but she took a deep breath, scrubbing at her eyes again. This would be difficult. She just... couldn't look down. Look through and focus on the door. Don't look down. Don't look to a crib. She could do this.
She couldn't. But she would anyway.
It was to all of their surprise, to find a large number of clone bodies in the crèche. And the body of Count Dooku. It took her a moment to fully realize what she was looking at. Master Plo... She shook her head, refusing to shy away from the thought. Master Plo had taught her how to analyze the carnage of a battlefield, explaining that one could often determine the story of a fight from the destruction it had wrought. During the war, Ahsoka had learned how to tell which craters from explosions came first, what wounds came from certain types of blasters, how to ascertain roughly who fell first and how. Looking in the crèche room, staring at the bodies, she started to see what had happened.
Dooku had escaped. She didn't even pretend to understand how that happened, but he had. Any number of possibilities was attached to that thought - wrecking havoc through the Temple, escaping unnoticed to plot revenge, watching the massacre in enjoyment. He was unarmed, was amputated, he had no means with which to be aggressive.
The clones, their bodies were scattered throughout the crèche; they did not sport lightsaber wounds; but they were marred with other marks. Scorch marks, but not from blasters, the scent of burnt hair, but no signs of fire. She knew these marks, and Ahsoka also knew that if she tried to move the bodies they would be stiff - but not from rigor mortis. They would be stiff because their bones were filled with calcium deposits.
A side effect of Sith lightning.
They had died by the hands of a Sith.
And a Sith was lying in the room.
Her eyes widened as she finally realized that Dooku had killed the clones. All of them. Her gaze snapped back to the old man, his body riddled with blaster burns, a fierce snarl on his lips; his eyes were still open. Behind him were the cribs, all pushed up against a wall as if by a Force push. His body was indelibly between the cribs or the clones. Had he...? Had he...?
She watched as Obi-Wan knelt down by the body, his face utterly closed off.
"Master Qui-Gon..." he whispered, "He never spoke of you. I wonder if something happened that hurt him. But your actions here, now..." The Jedi Master reached down and slowly, his hands gently covering Dooku's face, closing his open eyes. Ahsoka realized too late that they were no longer the red-gold color of a Sith, but their natural dark brown color. She had never seen it before. "In the end," he said, "You died a Jedi." Obi-Wan drew back, closing his own eyes and tilting his head back. The three of them stood there, over his body, in stark silence.
Ahsoka was confused, she didn't know what to feel with this discovery, couldn't decide how to react, and so she stood mute, staring at the sight and hoping she could sort herself out later. If there ever was a later. If there ever was a way to sort any of this out. She looked to her master for guidance, but his face was almost as closed off as Obi-Wan's. Only the bloodshot red of his eyes seemed to stand out, and he frowned fiercely at the scene. Perhaps he was as confused as she was. She shook her head slightly, mad that she couldn't process this the way Obi-Wan was.
The older master stood, finally, and took a deep breath. "Let's go," he said softly.
It was almost a straight shot from the crèche to the library - where it was everything Ahsoka could do to stay standing when she saw the body of Jocasta Nu. Filled with emotion, she almost blindly followed her master and Obi-Wan into the sealed archives where the holocrons were. Obi-Wan sealed the room with a wave of the Force, and only then did he and Anakin breath a sigh of relief. They were safe, for the moment.
Ahsoka took a moment and sunk to her knees; she was fully aware that it was childish to do so, they didn't have time for childish gestures, and yet she clung to the fact that her master said nothing, instead letting her put her head in her hands and just feel like a kid, a youngling, way out of her element and petrified over what would happen next. She took several shuddering breaths, fighting off her tears. Only a little more, she told herself, just a little more and you can leave and forget that this ever happened, pretend that it never happened.
"It did happen, Snips," Anakin said in a dark voice. "And it would be wrong to forget or pretend that it didn't."
She looked up, a little startled, but her master wasn't looking at her, instead filing through the holocrons. He pulled out one, studying it, before putting it back. "We have to face this," he continued, softer, almost like he was talking to himself. "We have to face this... If we don't, then no one else will..." He bent his head, running a hand viciously through his hair, before cursing and getting back to work. He was struggling too, it seemed, and Ahsoka felt better knowing that she wasn't alone. Enough that she closed her eyes and worked on her shields, wanting to spare her master more of her pain. Time for that would come later.
Obi-Wan was a marvel, in the meantime. His steps were even and sure, his face was calm and unmarred as he walked about the halls with the knowledge of one who had done so often as he pulled out certain holocrons, adjusted what he needed, and replaced them, repeating the process over and over. Finally, he stood at a circular holotable and tapped lightly on the screens, inputting the data he needed. It was only there he paused, taking a deep breath to understand the weight of his move, and hit a confirm key.
"It's done," he said softly. Even his voice was even and devoid of the pain he must be feeling. Ahsoka came up and stared, envious of his self-control. "The signal has changed to scatter and hide, and I've altered the encryption keys. Even assuming the clones figure out the signal has been changed, they'll be hard pressed to change it without intimate knowledge of Jedi sutras."
Anakin stepped forward, a holocron in his hand. Without a word he shoved the crystal into an open port and started calling on functions.
"Anakin, are you certain you want to see that?" Obi-Wan asked. Ahsoka remembered that they could never be completely silent to each other, and she dared to send her perceptions to her master. He was swirling with dark emotions but his presence was curiously neutral.
"Even though I saw the evidence, I can't bring myself to believe it," Anakin replied, loading up his holocron. "I need to see it myself. I don't know if I can forgive him like you did, but I need to know."
Ahsoka suddenly realized what she was about to watch, and her eyes widened as the holo-recording flickered to life.
The clones were efficient. They always were. They also knew exactly what a Jedi was capable of, especially-
"Rex?" she asked, staring at the tiny figure.
Anakin's shields were slipping, she could hear a string of curse words as the three of them watched the slaughter.
"He used the five-oh-first," Anakin muttered, his eyes darkening, the red lining under them bleeding into his eyes. "The Sith used my troops to assault the Temple." Pain exploded in her head and Ahsoka's hands shot to her temples. She wasn't ready for this; she wasn't ready to feel this all over again. She gave a soft cry as she tilted to one side, a foot instinctively shooting out to steady herself. Then, as suddenly as it came, it disappeared, faded to a dull throb as her master fixed his shields. She looked up a little tentatively, his black face and his red eyes glaring fiercely at the table before tapping a key and fast-forwarding the recording.
"Anakin..." Obi-Wan started.
"Not now," was the growled reply.
Ahsoka looked back to the holograms, images flickering back and forth until the Jedi found what he was looking for, reducing the speed to a normal playback.
"So you've finally revealed yourself, 'Master,'" Dooku, escaped somehow, appeared in the clan room they had found his body. His blue form stood tall; a wave of the hand sent the cribs back against the wall. He was surrounded by a semicircle of clones, blasters raised and ready to end him.
"And so have you." A second figure was there, cloaked in black and hooded. She couldn't see his face, but his voice sounded familiar. A glance up showed Obi-Wan's face drain of color. Anakin remained motionless, his red eyes brightening to orange. The pressure on her mind started to build.
"Tell me," Dooku asked, "Have you managed to turn my replacement? I've yet to see the boy fully succumb to the Darkside."
"Oh, he will. I have foreseen it."
"And have you foreseen this, then?"
"You know better than anyone how far I can see. And yet you still betrayed me."
"Passing me over for a whelp of a boy with no self-discipline; yes, I would say that you betrayed me. And now you parade about the Temple slaughtering children."
"My dear Tyrannus, I didn't realize you would spare your future enemies."
If possible, the small hologram of Dooku straightened even more. "I was willing to change the galaxy. I was willing to do what was necessary and what the Jedi couldn't see. But do not think that meant I would sacrifice my principals. In that respect, you and I are very different. Children can be trained to Sith. Yet you would kill them. Idiotic."
"Then we are at an impasse," the hooded voice replied, raising a pale hand. Ahsoka leaned forward, trying to see under the cowl. "See how you fare, unarmed as you are."
The holotable exploded into motion, the clones opening fire left and right, light flaring everywhere. Dooku remained unharmed, however, the blasts missing him by inches, and yet they never touched the cribs either. He lifted a stump of an arm, and lightning exploded from it, electrocuting the entire room of clones. The speakers were inundated with sounds of screams, and then just like that it was over, troopers falling to the floor, wisps of digitized smoke filling the air.
It left just the two of them.
"The farce if over," Dooku said calmly.
"Yes, it is."
The Sith opened with a flare of lightning, Dooku doing the same.
Obi-Wan turned off the recording quickly. They didn't need to see the rest of the fight; Dooku had fought valiantly and watching him be tortured before his death as he still tried to defend the younglings was not worth burning into his or anyone else's retinas. There had been enough burned into them in the last twelve hours to last the rest of his life. He stared blankly at the interface, struggling to reconcile what the three of them had just learned. That voice was unmistakable. The Sith Lord was no less that Palpatine himself.
Obi-Wan stared at the interface because he knew if he even tried to think of anything else, he would go utterly insane. The only thing he could imagine that could be worse was discovering that Anakin was the Sith; and looking at it that way he blessed his good fortune. There was good fortune in this, there had to be; there just had to be. Turning the images over in his mind, he realized that Dooku, in his way, had given them something - information, however minimal, on how Palpatine fought. That would be useful; yes, that would be very useful. Yes, coming here was a blessing; it was...
Stars above, it was Palpatine.
He closed his eyes, a hand rubbing over his forehead, raking it through his hair and then over his beard. It made so much sense; so much it was scary. It all clicked into place and suddenly the last fifteen years spun into sharp focus, and Obi-Wan could point out almost every move Palpatine had done to undermine the power of the Jedi Council, solidify his seat as Supreme Chancellor - even become Supreme-
He was behind the crisis on Naboo.
He was the master to him. The Zabrak that killed Qui-Gon.
The memory hit him completely by surprise, and he didn't have enough mental fortitude left to set it aside. He saw the red energy, his master kneeling on the floor, gathering himself. He saw the tattooed Zabrak. He saw the fight, he saw the blows, he saw the clip to the jaw, he saw the stab, he saw the look on his master's face, and he felt the pain all over again. Obi-Wan took a deep shuddering breath, accepting the memory and acknowledging that he would never be able to change it, letting go of the tragedy of that day and putting it away for later.
Managing this, however, was difficult beyond measure, because he was suffering the one great strength and great drawback of having such a deep bond with his apprentice. He saw everything going on in Anakin's mind.
It was a testament of how far his former student had come that his shields and filters were still up and tightly wrapped around himself - one whimper from Ahsoka and he hadn't slipped since. But Anakin's bond with his Padawan paled in comparison to his bond with his former Master. Anakin was filled with black cloud of negative emotions - anger, betrayal, anguish, others that were hard to sense without the filters lowered. He was almost physically shaking with the darkness surrounding him. Space, his eyes were orange. Their bond was congested with the negative attitude and it gave Obi-Wan a nearly unbearable headache. Focus was difficult; the Jedi Master could hardly imagine what it was like for Anakin.
"Do you know how close you are to the Darkside?" he asked once he'd put away his thoughts of his master. He needed his full focus for this.
Anakin said nothing, still glaring at the empty holotable. Had he even heard?
Obi-Wan tried again. "Did you know your eyes are nearly as yellow as Dooku's?"
An orange eye twitched.
"Anakin," Obi-Wan gently prodded, matching his words and tone with the pushes he was doing along the bond. "Do you see the road you are walking?"
Nothing. Obi-Wan almost wished the Jedi would throw one of his tantrums, at least then he would expend all his energy and they could move on to rational conversation. He didn't like that Anakin was holding all of this in; it wasn't healthy.
Obi-Wan took another deep breath, reaching out and wrapping a hand around the taught arm muscles, closing his eyes and narrowing his focus. He knew it was going to hurt, but he needed Anakin back, and so he dropped all his filters on their bond, taking his emotions and piercing it through Anakin's: his worry, his vision of Anakin at that moment, his unceasing headache, his fear for Anakin's mental wellbeing. In doing so, he also dropped his defenses against Anakin's negativity, and it was like he'd fallen into a planet of lava. The darkness was absolute, hot and vicious and sharp and painful. It breached his mind, burned, invading it in a way Anakin never would have. It broke trust, broke faith, broke pieces of their bond, and Obi-Wan could only moan, swaying on his feet as it felt like everything would be turned upside down and inside out.
Then, just like that, it all disappeared, and the arm he had been gripping was now holding his; and when his eyes blearily opened he saw Anakin's face.
Blue eyes... Ah, at last...
Anakin's face crunched up, pain stretching every line to the extreme.
"Master...?" he asked weakly, his voice cracking.
"Anakin," Obi-Wan sighed, taking another deep breath and tipping his head down, touching his forehead to Anakin's in a way they had once done, oh, it seemed like a lifetime ago. "Let go of the fear." It was all he could say; they had had this conversation - this meditation - over and over again, and this was a stark endorsement of why his former Padawan had to let it go. Another moment like this and Obi-Wan openly feared what would become of this man who was so intimately tied to him.
Anakin nodded, but Obi-Wan could feel the resistance, the conflict, and he knew nothing would be done. All he could do was sigh, closing his eyes and pulling his focus back together. The headache was gone now that the darkness was no longer active in Anakin, and Obi-Wan pulled himself - themselves - together.
"Let's get back to the corvette. The emergency session is likely over by now and we need to tell Bail and Padme what we've learned."
Just that small mention dropped a shadow over Anakin's face, and Obi-Wan knew it was only a matter of time before Anakin fell completely.
He prayed he could stop it.
Padme sat back, her heart somewhere down below her stomach. "So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause."
It hurt.
It really, really hurt.
Palpatine was someone she had relied on and trusted for so many years, over a decade. He had been a kindly uncle that had been at her service when she pleaded her case about the disaster with the Trade Federation before Chancellor Valorum. He'd had advice and ideas and was always there for anyone who stepped into his office, either as Chancellor or Senator. He even remembered birthdays, like those of her nieces. "Nothing is too small for a beloved queen, even a retired one, such as yourself." And she had believed it to be genuine.
What a fool she was.
Looking at him, after listening to hours of "evidence" that he'd been presenting all day long of a Jedi conspiracy (out of the question!) seeing him use his scars and disfigurement to garner sympathy and support... seeing him declare himself Emperor...
It had been an act. All those years had been an act. There was nothing genuine about him. No sincerity. Everything he did was a calculated act to get what he wanted when he wanted.
The man she respected, despite how his policies had been going lately, was a sham.
It hurt.
And when Anakin realized this, he'd be hurt even more.
Because while Anakin didn't hold Palpatine as family the same way he did for Obi-Wan, there was no denying Anakin's loyalty. And for anyone to break that loyalty would be to break a part of her beloved husband.
Really, was there anything else that could hurt her husband any more?
Padme sat up straight, looking at Palpatine again. His hood covered his face, but from her lower angle, she looked at him. Really looked at him.
And even from this distance, she could see golden eyes.
Padme was not one given to cursing or swearing. But she used every word she knew, borrowed many from Anakin, and created a few for this specific occasion.
Yes, there was something that could hurt her husband. And it would be so much worse.
Mon Mothma was already talking. "We need to start consolidating Senators. Not just our delegation. We need to create a voting block to stop this." Bail was already nodding.
"No," Padme said firmly, turning to face them. "You must vote with anything he says. Because if you don't; you'll likely disappear. He won't tolerate any opposition. Especially open opposition. You need to resist in a different way."
Mon blinked. "Don't you mean we?"
She shook her head, looking down. "I don't think I'll live long enough."
Mon paled, no doubt thinking of all the dinners Padme had hosted for Jedi who needed a break.
Bail, however, was looking at her differently. He'd overheard and knew a great deal. She still didn't quite know how much of everything, but the way he was looking...
"The vision," he said quietly.
Padme nodded. "He's been doing everything and will do anything he can to stop it. But..." she trailed off, looking to Palpatine again. If that man... that Sith... Sidious... had played both sides of the war like a child played with toys, then she wasn't sure anything her husband could do would stop her death. Even if she survived childbirth, Sidious would likely find another way.
Unless she faked her death.
Something to consider.
"Milady." The healer that Anakin had insisted follow her (oh, what a good idea that was... who knew what Sidious was planning), leaned forward, dressed as a handmaiden. "All things considered, I think we should be on our way."
"Yes." Because she'd be safer up on the Tantive IV than Coruscant. And once Anakin and the others arrived, they could go to Naboo first. Plan. Look at things. Because this was still so much to take in and she would not do anything rash.
She wanted to raise her child with Anakin, and she would do whatever it took to make sure she could. Because he would be coming back.
... She didn't think she could survive without him.
Author's Note: Nice to reference things we had waaay back in the first arc. Dooku's demise feels more dignified that Anakin just lobbing off his head and it was... not as evil. And despite everyone knowing that it was Palpatine but the Jedi, the Jedi have now been sufficiently knocked on the head with it. Particularly Anakin. He wouldn't believe anyone about this without proof.
Hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving! We certainly did. We're too stuffed to think of what other things to point out. Other than the fact that the next chapters are The Awesome.
Next week: Anakin just keeps sinking without realizing it.