Now things really go off the rails...

Chapter Three

"So it was a complete waste of time then?" Obi Wan asked after Anakin had told them what had happened. The three of them were once again in the Senator's quarters, this time arrayed around a table filled with specialities from all over the core worlds.

Anakin picked up a lilac fruit and began to peel it.

"I wouldn't say that, Obi Wan." he said.

Popping a piece of fruit into his mouth, chewing and swallowing, he continued: "For one I'm convinced now that a Force User is involved. The presence I felt... It was faint, very, very faint, but somehow familiar."

"Who was it?" Padme asked and placed her eating utensils on beside her laden plate.

"I don't know, Senator."

He ate the rest of the fruit while trying to think of a way to explain what he had felt to his wife. "It was... like a very faint whispering voice in a room full of normal conversation. It was barely there, and had my Force senses not been heightened by the battle already I would have missed it, I'm sure."

"Obscuring one's force signature like this is not an easy task." Obi Wan was sipping from a mug, some sort of broth. "He must have been trained, either by us or by..."

"I felt nothing of the dark side in the signature. What there was of it."

Obi Wan looked at him, the scepticism and worry obvious on his face. "Are you certain? The Dark Side of the Force is a devious foe."

"I'm not easily fooled, Master, unlike some in the Order."

Padme knew both men well enough to be able to tell that they were steering towards a confrontation that they had had several times before but from which neither could or would back down. As she had no desire to see it happen she decided to ask.

"But how can you tell whose Force signature it is anyway? Is it like an echo or an infra-red signature?"

The elder Jedi shook his head. "No, Senator. Someone's Force signature is much harder to define than anything that can be detected with technology."

He struggled for a way to explain it to someone who couldn't experience it. "How a Jedi perceives a Force signature depends on circumstance. Something like what Anakin describes is more an echo or afterthought within the Force, like ripples on the surface of a pond after you throw a stone."

Placing his cup on the table, he continued: "Now if you feel the signature of someone in the same room, that's a different story entirely. Take yourself and your two children for example. Your Force signature and theirs are distinct, easy to read if you search the Force for them and can easily matched to who they belong to."

Obi Wan was totally unaware of the detonator he had just thrown into the room, so he leant back in the armchair he was sitting in, closed his eyes and thought back to the first time he had managed to pick out a single signature from among the background life of the universe. He had been naught but nine standard years old at the time...

It took him several minutes to realize that all conversation and even movement in the room had stopped, but when he did he opened his eyes to see the Senator staring at his former Padawan, both showing no emotion at all. However he didn't need to be a Force user and a Jedi Master to see what was in front of him. No point ignoring the obvious now.

In a way he felt hurt. He was neither dense, nor an enemy. And yet they had chosen to keep him in the dark. He was just about to say exactly that when Anakin broke the moment. Obi Wan found that he was glad that he was given time to make a few decisions that would have to be made.

"In any case, the signature I felt was nothing like that of... the late Count Dooku. His signature was... dark, twisted, evil. In other words, your typical Sith Lord."

"What was the one you felt like?" Padme asked, also completely unaware of what Obi Wan had realized.

"Hard to say. I couldn't feel much beyond that it was not of the Dark Side. It was... troubled, yes, emotional, but not evil."

Obi Wan swallowed the 'Remind you of anyone?' that lay on his tongue and instead chose to watch the interaction between the two, but they declined to 'incriminate themselves any further', so he got back to the matter at hand, making a mental note to approach Anakin at the earliest opportunity. Better to brave the storm now rather than when... when.

"Which brings us down to the fundamental question Anakin. Who has access to Jedi emergency codes, albeit old ones, who knows that you are on Coruscant at the moment, because the HoloNet hasn't caught on to that yet, and who, we all agree, has to have had enough Force training to learn to conceal his signature. He also knew that if Anakin or I were out of contact the Senator here would deliver it to us eventually. That rules out someone like Grevious who is too evil and would never actually stoop to such tactics in the first place."

"No, Master. He would have just blown me up the moment I landed or sent even more of those Droids."

"But I thought those droids were part of his personal Guard?"

"Yes, Senator." Obi Wan replied, "But we've seen that model elsewhere more and more often recently. I think that their... fame and reputation as Jedi-killers has spread so more examples were constructed."

"But tells us that the people who attacked Anakin clearly are connected to the Separatists."

"Not automatically, Master. You know as well as I do that there are more groups out there wishing the Republic harm than the Separatists." Anakin said and sighed. "Though I doubt the Hutts would do it. If anything, they would profit the most from the war going on forever."

He paused. "Though I doubt we can do anything more right now. Unless and until that person contacts us again.

"I agree, Anakin. Senator?"

Padme would have liked to spend more time with them, but she knew that she had to take what she could get.

"Of course, Obi Wan. I will have my droids monitor my comm-traffic and everything will be copied to you as soon as I get it. If I think of something I will call one of you first."

Their meeting broke up then, with Anakin and Obi Wan returning to the temple.

Later that night they parted ways. Padme to bed, as she had a meeting with several other senators in the morning, officially to discuss relief efforts for the millions of refugees. In reality to discuss what could be done about the Chancellor's emergency powers, something which she had kept secret even from her own husband. All they knew was that she was increasingly uncomfortable with Chancellor Palpatine's emergency powers, and now that he had been granted even more Anakin's friendship with Palpatine was bound to cause some friction between him and his wife.

Anakin returned to the temple with the firm intention of leaving there again as soon as he was sure that no one would notice.

Obi Wan on the other hand claimed that he would approach an old contact of his among the local Corellian community, 'trying to nose around about any Droid smuggling'.

Instead he made sure that Anakin really went to the temple and hid in the level's droid maintenance bay. While he waited for what he knew was coming, he let his mind wander on what he had seen, trying to decided what to do about it.

He knew that whatever he decided, the other would feel it as an intense and very personal betrayal. Would he have to choose Anakin over the order or the other way around? It was not a place he wanted anyone to be in, and part of him hated Anakin for putting him there. What was he thinking anyway? Throwing a life's work as a Jedi and Guardian of the Republic away for...

For what exactly? He had no idea about a huge part of his former Padawan's life, and it was not the way of the Jedi to make a rash judgement.

And yet... Obi Wan felt oddly hurt that Anakin had decided to keep this from him for at least several months and had never even considered telling. Did the both of them think him that dense?

Though looking back, he had to admit that there had been a fair few signs, but someone had chosen to ignore it, probably a certain Jedi Master hailing from Stewjon. All those times Anakin had left the Temple in the middle of the night and come back before sunrise, his eternal impatience to get back to Coruscant whenever they on their way home from a mission or his unwillingness to hear a bad word said about the Senator.

Looking back at it now it was actually fairly obvious.

But that still didn't allow him to decide what to do. He would have to talk to them though, and brave the storm that would create. He had to, because he sure could not go on like this.

Happy to have decided at least something he settled down to wait.

But he didn't have to stay in the spacious but still cramped compartment for long, because less than an hour later the lift doors opened and out stepped Anakin. Obi Wan almost sprang out at him then and there, but he prevented himself from doing so and continued to hide his Force signature.

He followed his former Padawan at a respectful distance. Even as he was hiding in the shadows and alcoves of the expansive corridor Obi Wan tried to decide how to talk to them both.

Anakin reached the door and pressed the button that announced his presence, but instead of entering, he opened his arms and threw them around the senator that threw herself into his arms. Even as he approached, Obi Wan was too far away to hear the whispered conversation they held, but he could see the happiness shining on both their faces.

They kissed.

Obi Wan waited for a minute to give them some time before stepping out of the alcove he had been hiding in.

He cleared his throat. "So, I guess it is true after all then."

tbc

There is no way that Obi Wan was dense enough to not even suspect what was going on, he and Anakin spent far too much time together for that. I hope that my approach to this has been semi-plausible. Again, him finding out is meant to be just a plot device, not the point of this story.