Chapter 112: Vader
"I'd like for the baby to be born on Naboo," Padmé said softly, brushing her long, dark hair and smiling at the Sith Lord upon the floor where he had previously sat meditating, and now just sat. Five red and gold pyramids floated around his head, slowly spinning and opened, spilling the soft whispers of ancient words into the air. Three of these were his, their knowledge already absorbed, but the other two he had found that afternoon on Serenno, possessions of Dooku while he had been alive, and now that he lay dead, the other Sith considered them his. After all, he was the one that killed him. Everything that had belonged to Dooku, by right, was now his.
"Babies," Obi-Wan gently reminded, and the girl flushed deeply, her eyes cast to the floor and a radiant smile upon her lips. The news was still new to her. Visits to the physician had been few and far between, pertly out f a sense of privacy, but mostly, Obi-Wan assumed, to protect her husband from confirmation of the rumors that were bound to be making their way through the Senate. Not that scans would be able to tell her anything anyway. The twins distorted and disrupted every procedure that was done, which Kenobi found nothing if not amusing. Not yet out of the womb, and already using the Force to manipulate their environment. Training these children was going to be an absolute joy.
"Babies," Padmé repeated, absolutely glowing, watching the Sith Lord in admiration as he plucked one of the holocrons from the air and held it to float before him, his golden eyes dilating and he exhaled a trembling breath as a shiver ran through him. "I want them to be born on Naboo."
"Does it matter where they're born?" Obi-Wan whispered, his rapt attention drawn to the voice that smoothly washed over his mind. "I can't trust Skywalker to stay on Coruscant. He'll come looking for you, and Naboo is one of the first places he'll look for you. Cody says he's contacted the current Queen and your family about your whereabouts. Naboo may not be safe."
"Is it less safe than anywhere else?" she asked softly, running her hand over the Sith's shoulder and looking out the wide windows at the forests of Serenno down the cliffs below. As soon as Kenobi had returned to Raxus with a new ship, he had relocated the woman to Serenno, the palace left quiet and abandoned since Dooku's death, though the arrangement was temporary. Now that Skywalker knew his wife was missing, Obi-Wan knew he'd stop at nothing to find her. Nothing would keep this woman safe from Anakin Skywalker. Nothing would save the children from their father's reach. The path was clear. For Satine, for Quinlan, for the children he would raise and for the one he never got to, Anakin Skywalker needed to be put in his place.
"No, I suppose not..." Kenobi mumbled, sighing softly at the feel of the whispers within him, the brilliant, perfect flow of the Dark Side as the ancient knowledge seeped within him, both things he knew and things he had never considered, all of it tempered in the depths of the darkness in which he sat. "I'm going to pull in a favor with Bo-Katan. I need someone to protect you while I am dealing with Sith Lords..." The hand on his shoulder trembled.
"...is there truly no saving Anakin?" she asked softly, and Kenobi's reply was immediate.
"You know as well as I there isn't. Not by me. Not by you."
"There must be some good in him," Padmé whispered. "There must be something, there is, I know there is."
"That changes nothing," Obi-Wan hissed, a quick gesture of his hand snapping the holocrons shut, and he grabbed them and gently put the glowing pyramids back into the bag he kept them in. "No amount of good can save a person from themselves if they don't believe they need to be saved, and I know better than most that the purest intentions can lead to darkness just as easily as something less noble. Perhaps more so."
Padmé frowned as she ran a lazy hand absently over the Sith's neck. "Well, there's good in you."
"Be that as it may, I am not a good man. There is no saving me, I don't want to be saved." His eyes were fixed blankly in front of him as he grabbed her hand and kissed the soft palm. "I fell to save the Jedi, I chose darkness to give me the power to destroy my enemies, and the Dark Side opened my eyes to the truth of what the Jedi have become. Skywalker is falling out of love for you, everything he does, everything is to protect you from what he perceives to be evil influences, and he would massacre the innocent if it meant keeping you to himself." He released her hand when she felt her inhale sharply. "Why. Do you intend to go back?"
Padmé shook her head. "I can't," she whispered. "For the safety of my children, I can't. And I won't, not after all he's done..."
"He won't stop until I'm dead and he has you. You understand that, don't you?" Her full lips drew into a thin line, and the Senator nodded, stroking the Sith's hair as he closed his eyes and seemed to drift away from the conversation. "I think, Padmé," he whispered, his voice growing distant and flat as he lost himself in the Force, as he so often did, "that you just like bad men."
"Maybe so..." She stroked his bearded cheek as she looked down at him, his golden eyes dull and hazy, his mouth moving slightly as he silently spoke to himself in a language she knew that very few understood, and she smiled warmly when she felt his hand reach up to stroke her swollen belly, delighting in the rush of warmth that rushed through her at his touch. "What should we name them?" she asked, uncertain f he could even hear her. "A boy and a girl, you said, what should they be called?"
"Quinlan and Satine..." he whispered, a soft tremor running through him as he pulled himself back and focused on the present, and he winced, the names upon his lips causing him physical pain, and he shook his head. "No," he choked. "No, not those. I won't burden your children with the weight of those names." He growled in frustration and swiftly removed his hands from the touch of the children moving beneath the woman's skin. "No other names come to my mind, there are no other names. You name them, they are yours."
"Luke and Leia," the woman said softly, watching Kenobi's face carefully to gauge his reaction, and she saw him draw back slightly, silently mouthing the names to himself before he nodded.
"It suits them, I think," Obi-Wan said, rising to his feet as the door open and Cody strode inside and swiftly saluted.
"Sir. You Master is calling you. Again." The Sith swiftly nodded, bent over to kiss the Senator, and he lingered just slightly longer than he intended.
"Time to face him, I suppose," the Sith muttered as he drew up and ran a hand through his hair to smooth it. "Cody, can you contact Bo-Katan and-"
"I already did it, sir," the clone said, hands clasped behind his back and rocking on his heels. "I was on Mandalore this morning and spoke to her. She's waiting in the dining hall."
"You're a man after my own heart, Cody," Kenobi said, smiling softly as he bowed to Padmé. "My lady, I strongly recommend that you get to know Bo-Katan. Can you find your way there?"
The Senator nodded, smiling softly, and the three of them left the room, Padmé heading in the opposite direction of Obi-Wan and Cody as they slowly made their way toward the study. They were silent for a moment, Obi-Wan focusing on the floor before him, but he could feel Cody looking sidelong at him, care and worry and concern pouring off the man. Kenobi didn't accept these emotions anymore. Compassion was for the weak, for those that feared the power of darkness that could only be brought by pain and grief and suffering, the fuel on which hatred and anger burned. But he accepted it from Cody, and briefly, he had felt the strength that came from sympathy through the twins. Through Luke and Leia.
"Mandalore?" Kenobi asked, and the clone turned his head toward the man, finally looking at him directly instead of sneaking glances.
"Precautions, sir," Cody said swiftly. "I thought you'd approve."
"Precautions for what."
Cody scoffed and rolled his eyes, almost as though he was offended that Kenobi even had to ask. "For your safety in the upcoming fight against Skywalker. You have assets you need to protect, so while I was on Mandalore, Bo-Katan and I had a little chat about you, and we agreed that it would do you no favors to lose another child." Cody bit his lip and looked away, fearing he had been too sentimental for the hardened man. "Also, the Senator's safety is of paramount importance in your manipulations of the Skywalker brat."
"Why were you even on Mandalore?" Kenobi asked, his voice dripping with disgust, the very thought of the planet making his skin crawl with revulsion, and Cody smiled sadly. Kenobi had loved Mandalore once, and as their Shadow King, willing or not, he was of paramount importance to the people there. His absence weakened Mandalore. Bo-Katan was a strong warrior, but she just wasn't the political might of her sister. The Shadow King had been a rallying cry to many, and watching him turn his back on a people that needed him, a people that had, as so many Mandalorians had done, adopted him into their culture, was painful. Kenobi was Mandalorian, as far as they were concerned. Obi-Wan Kenobi needed a people, and the Sith didn't have a people.
"I went to Mandalore," Cody said softly, stopping outside the door to the study where he would have to wait, "to protect you from Skywalker."
"Skywalker isn't on Mandalore, Cody, he-"
"I went to move Satine's body," he said swiftly, surprising himself with how even his voice sounded when he was so sure it would tremble. Kenobi's expression hadn't changed from the now so familiar emotionlessness, but his eyes seemed to burn, hatred and darkness with the promise of pain and murder and suffering for all those that his gaze fell upon. "To Kalevala," he said quickly. "Bo-Katan said Clan Kryze keeps a family tomb there. It isn't as spectacular as the one for the Mand'alors in Sundari, but...well, it's quiet and it's hidden, and I don't want Skywalker destroying you by desecrating her body."
Kenobi didn't say a word. He just leaned his arm against the door and pressed his forehead against it, his shoulder's shaking slightly, but Cody knew better than to touch him or say anything. Some things needed to be handled alone. Sometimes, the Sith Lord just needed to drown in the pain, dive so deep into it that it passed the point of pain. "What do you suppose he did with Quinlan's body?" Kenobi asked softly, his voice shaking with more emotions that Cody could put words to.
"I don't know, sir," the clone said softly. "When we swept the remains of the Enigma, we couldn't find the bodies of the slain. Please, just don't...don't think about that."
He wouldn't now, but Obi-Wan tucked it away for later, yet something more he could draw pain from, and he felt relief wash over him in the knowledge that at least Satine was safe, a task that he didn't think he'd have the strength to carry out himself. This clone was a gift of pain management and damage control. Obi-Wan felt him through the Force, so like his millions of brothers but so, so different, and knew that one day, he'd lose Cody too, his genetically enhanced body programmed to age at double the rate of normal humans. They were a pair, and had been for years. The man that aged too quickly, and the man that didn't age. Cody would grow old and die, Obi-Wan would lose him, and he would be alone.
But not today. And not because of Anakin Skywalker.
"Thank you..." the Sith whispered, and he could feel modesty within the man. This wasn't a task to be thanked for. This was just his job. Dooku had asked once if Kenobi had the ability to direct the Force he drained from others into a body other than his own. He didn't know, but perhaps such a thing could be done with Cody. He'd have to experiment.
"Do you have a plan for your Master?" Cody asked, changing the topic to get his Master back on track, and after a moment of silence, the Sith pulled himself away from the door and faced the clone.
"I'm uncertain," he mumbled. "Dooku's holocrons have shown me that there is much I do not know, and Sidious has a vast collection. My Master is more powerful than I realize, and certainly more powerful than he lets on. Sidious will need more time, and I don't plan on giving it to him. Skywalker is off-balance, and if ever there was a time he'd choose him over me, it's now. I need to wait for the right time to strike, and that will be easier to do at his side when he becomes complacent in the birth of his Empire."
"And...you think you can get him to end the war now?" Kenobi shrugged as he punched in the code into the door controls, and they hissed open.
"I don't know," he said softly. "We'll have to see." Kenobi stepped into the room, and it hissed closed behind him, leaving the man in darkness to contact Darth Sidious.
Palpatine stood in his office, his hands clutched tightly behind his back, and observed the glowing lights of Coruscant at night, the city just as bright, just as busy as it was during the day. Something was wrong with his apprentice. In all the years he had known him, all the time he had trained him up from broken Jedi to Nexus of the Dark Side, Darth Lumis had always been available to him, had always answered his Master when he called. He was a good apprentice. He was better than good, and that was part of the problem. Lumis had been growing powerful, not more than he could deal with, but strong enough to become a concern, were his careful grip on the boy to slip at all. Given enough time, Lumis could rise to become a rival, were he not safely contained under the mantle of Apprentice.
Satine's death had been an annoyance. The child she bore was to be the culmination of the Sith, a boy that Sidious had planned to raise into the perfect apprentice, powerful in the Dark Side and beholden only to his Master, set to killing his father when Lumis became too difficult to handle. Satine would have been killed after she bore the child, of course, and he would make Lumis himself do it to complete his fall, to finally sever his last tie to Obi-Wan Kenobi. She had died prematurely, and perhaps it had been to his benefit, for Satine's death had been a gift to both Lumis and Sidious. For Lumis, he received power beyond his previous imagining, along with the will to wield it without remorse or restraint. For Sidious, he was given the means to control his apprentice through the flames of insanity that raged through the young man. As long as Lumis was mad, he could be controlled, and Sidious had no intention of allowing the boy to heal.
It became a delicate balance to manage Lumis' insanity, though not a difficult one to maintain. Once sparked, the fire was difficult to extinguish, and the boy launched himself into madness at the mere mention of Satine's name, at the slightest hint that he had failed to save the son he already loved, at the thought that he could never love again. Of course, too mad, and the man became a liability, too sane, and he was a power that Sidious could no longer control, but he had found the balance between the two, and he had kept Lumis there. For a time. After Lumis killed Dooku, a thing that Sidious was immensely pleased by, the boy had found his focus and his center as the madness fled, giving way to the clarity necessary to handle Tyranus' former position.
Sidious had thought the pressure would have made the madness worse, but Lumis was proving to be terribly resilient, and with focus came an independence that was not appreciated. The boy was actually rising to the occasion, proving himself to be a shockingly effective leader, and having proved himself to already be capable of managing an Empire, the need to control Lumis became even greater, and with his madness waning, with Sidious' control slipping, there was only one thing left to do.
Kill Quinlan Vos.
Yet another powerful thread to the stubborn Obi-Wan, Vos had joined with Lumis in the Dark Side, and they had become inseparable, to the point where Sidious had correctly guessed that not only was this attachment drawing the young Sith away from his insanity, but Lumis was positioning the fallen Jedi to serve beside him as his own Apprentice, and this could not be allowed. The only use the Kiffar former Jedi had for Sidious was as fuel to reignite Lumis' madness, but Sidious knew that his apprentice would never kill the man he called friend. Vos was all he had left, and when he was gone, all that would be left was the Dark Side and the Sith. All beings existed to serve the Sith, as allies, as tools, or as stones to be stepped upon, and Quinlan Vos had only ever been one thing.
Fortunately, Sidious had Anakin Skywalker to accomplish this task for him. The boy was soaked in the Dark Side, driven to it for his hatred for Kenobi, for his fear of losing his wife, out of grief for his fallen Master, and it had all worked out beautifully. Skywalker was every bit as magnificent as he had hoped, ruthless and without mercy, obsessive and possessive and would stop at nothing to hunt his target when he was angered. For every bit as cold and calculating as Lumis was, Anakin was equally hot-tempered and wild, a brutal, powerful arm that lacked subtlety, but made up for it in the fear he inspired. Lumis had never been one to be feared, though those who were smart did fear him. Anakin Skywalker would be one that would openly invoke terror, and Sidious needed them both.
He needed Anakin to act as the face of the Dark Side, the physical manifestation of the might of the Empire. Swift and brutal and so, so powerful, Skywalker took the Force and bent it, shaped it, forced it to heed him, removed those who were meant to live, destroyed that which the Force protected. He needed Lumis to continue as he had been, a shadow operative for situations that needed a delicate hand, where gentle coaxing and a well placed touch of the Force was needed when terror would be a detriment. But most importantly, Lumis held the secret to immortality, and while he had told his Master how it was done, Sidious had no success thus far. He had managed to get away from Coruscant for a short time and had attempted the technique, but he couldn't find the thread to unravel the Force in the creatures he had selected, the sentients dying, the Force fading from them before he could get a grasp on it. He'd need to watch Lumis to see how it was done. Perhaps it could only be accomplished by stealing the life from those in tune with the Force.
When Vos had died, Sidious had felt something stir the Dark Side, so deep that he could feel the currents in the depths begin to pull and shift, the swell of the water rising and disrupting even the calm, cold serene of the furthest reaches of darkness. Sidious thought it could be Anakin Skywalker, the boy reaching new heights of his power as the Dark Side roared and thrashed under his powerful grasp as he murdered three considerably powerful Force sensitives. It could also have been Darth Lumis, the boy sinking even deeper into darkness, the Dark Side itself holding him under the waters while he willingly drowned, the final push into power and madness from which he could not return. And still, Lumis had been ignoring him. It was possible he was lost within his insanity, sunk do deeply in the Force that he couldn't find any light to guide him back, but it was just as possible that Lumis now obsessively hunted Skywalker. All of this was troublesome, but not impossible.
Then the incident on Colstev happened.
The premature initiation of Order 66 was a potentially disastrous problem for Sidious. It wasn't that he wasn't ready to take the Republic as his own, because he was. What he was waiting for was the opportunity to get Skywalker and Lumis working together instead of against the other, two vergences' in the Force that spun together, creating a mighty storm, instead of opposite, canceling the other out. He could do it, but he needed time, and if Order 66 needed to be executed prematurely, Sidious would have to force them to fight so that one could be slain and the other would rise as his one true Apprentice. Perhaps that is what was meant to be, two cyclones in the Force, always meant to fight, but never venture down the same path, but Sidious never bowed to the whims of the Force. He commanded the Force, bent it to his will, and made it subservient to his will. He wanted them both. He needed them both. And Darth Sidious always got what he wanted.
He looked over his shoulder when he heard the soft twang of power running through his holoprojector as it turned onm the lights in the room dimming as light poured from the middle of the office, and a moment later, Darth Lumis knelt before him, his head bowed and his eyes heavy lidded as they swiftly darted about without any aim, any focus, and Sidious sneered as he turned from the window to stand in the projection's field.
"Where have you been?" he hissed, sharp and angry, and Lumis' shoulders shook, the man groaning softly at the Master's fury.
"Lost, Master..." Lumis muttered softly, and Sidious' rage slowly fell away when the boy whimpered, a soft, keening whine that carried with it all the pain and grief and loss that his apprentice had felt. Sidious stood before the hologram of his student, waiting patiently for him to look up at him, and found his eyes vacant and hollow and waiting to be filled with direction, meaning, the will of another to replace the soul he had lost. It was perfect.
"It was truly inspired work that Skywalker has been doing," Sidious said, slowly, stretching out each word, each pause as long as he could to watch anger and hate and violent intent twist Lumis' face, and then fade completely, cold and despondent, and Sidious could feel the apprentice embrace the pain and drink deep of the Dark Side, the rush of power lessening the grief that threatened to overcome him. "In one fell swoop, he corrected Tyranus' failure in killing his assassin, ended a powerful Jedi on the Council, and destroyed that would-be Sith Apprentice of yours." Lumis answered only with a pathetic whimper, bowing his head as he shivered. "Soon, he will come to our side, and then we shall see the rise of our Empire."
This time, Lumis looked up, his eyes blazing in their intensity as he focused on Sidious. "Master...you aren't planning on taking Skywalker as your apprentice, are you?" Sidious sneered in irritation, his withering glare making the kneeling man begin trembling again. Good. Lumis should cower before his Master's displeasure.
"I will do as I wish, Apprentice," he sneered. "If I wish to rule the galaxy, I will, and if I want the living vergences' of the Force at my command, I shall have them, and you, Lumis, will obey me when I say that you will put aside your petty grievance against Skywalker when I demand it of you." Sidious' eyes narrowed when Lumis looked up at him with a flash of defiance in his eyes. "Am I understood?"
"He murdered Quinlan!" Lumis cried, and Sidious loomed over him, watching carefully as the fight, the anger, the disobedience slowly faded from him, the Master's mere presence enough to cull the apprentice into subservience.
"All that means is Skywalker had the strength to do what you could not," Sidious snarled, and Lumis hung his head, defeated, and slowly, softly began to laugh in his madness. "Quinlan Vos held you back, Lumis. It needed to be done. That you didn't do it was your failure."
"...yes, Master..." A slow, pleased grin spread across Sidious' face. Lumis was compliant and could be controlled. All that was left was to bring Skywalker to the same state, and together, the entire galaxy would fall to Sith rule.
"We have a more pressing matter than dead Jedi," the Master growled. "A clone malfunctioned and it's programmed initiative was executed." He frowned deeply, searching the apprentice's face when he looked up toward the seething Sith master. "This single matter could have exposed us if the clone wasn't delivered directly to me, and if other clones malfunction as this one did, the entire plan of ours will be exposed." Sidious' eyes flashed in sudden anger. "You didn't happen to have anything to do with this, did you, Lumis?" The man stared at him as though he didn't understand the words.
"...I've been lost," he gasped, a soft whimper escaping his throat as he grasped his head tightly between his hands. Sidious hissed in irritation as he watched Lumis softly mutter to himself. He was hoping that this was the fault of a spiteful apprentice. It was a problem easily solved with a sharp, swift reprimand to a child that touched that which was not his. But if this was a simple malfunction, the matter was far more serious. It could have been an isolated incident, but if not, he'd be forced to execute the order prematurely, which was an irritation that would cost him either Skywalker or Lumis. It was an acceptable loss when measured against the completion of the Sith imperative and their final revenge against the Jedi.
"Is it truly a problem, Master?" Lumis asked softly, his breathing slowed into a state of calm control. "We are ready for the Empire to rise, why not just execute the order and be done with it?"
"Patience," Sidious hissed. "There is still work to be done, my apprentice. I need more time to secure the final stages of my plan. Can you extend the conflict a while longer?"
"Yes, Master," he said softly, bowing his head. "I won't fail you."
"See that you don't," the Master growled, and he used the Force to power off the holoprojector, leaving the room in dim lighting for a moment before the lights slowly illuminated the chamber. That would suffice, at least for now. There was nothing that could substitute a physical connection with his apprentice, but for now it appeared as though Lumis was capable. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, sunk into the Dark Side and found it...turbulent. Disturbed. Sidious' eyes flew open and narrowed. Something was still wrong, still unbalanced. Perhaps it had nothing to do with Lumis after all. Perhaps-
Sidious was pulled back quickly into himself, effortlessly slipping into the guise of Palpatine as one would step into a well-worn coat, and a moment later, Anakin Skywalker burst into the office, the locked doors forcibly torn open and the Dark Side ripping around him like a powerful wind, all fury and rage and fear with no control to speak of. Palpatine's eyes narrowed.
Or perhaps it had everything to do with Lumis.
"She's gone!" Anakin shouted, his voice cracking in his frantic, panicked state. "She's gone, Padmé's gone, he took her from me!"
"Gone?" Palpatine murmured, not a little surprised. She had been in the Senate just that evening, being the pest she always had been. She was slightly off, yes, but pregnancy had altered the feel of Satine as well, and while Lumis had said the child wasn't Force sensitive, the strain of carrying a child did alter a woman's body. Sidious sucked in a sharp, sudden breath, imperceptible to the unbalanced Jedi in his office when he realized that it was just as likely that this was one of Padmé's extremely good body doubles, and not the actual woman herself. And if that was so...when had Lumis taken her? How had he been on Coruscant without his knowledge, how could he not have felt his apprentice nearby? And why hadn't he been told?
"Gone!" Anakin snarled, pacing the room quickly as if the motion would ease his tension, but it only served to make him more frantic. "She's gone, and the Jedi don't care! I've had visions of her death, visions all the time! Of him, of Kenobi killing her! It's happening, and nobody's helping me stop it! The Jedi are actively preventing me from going! I can save her! I can save her!"
It was bad. There was too much fear in Anakin Skywalker, too much panic, a sense of helplessness that kept him unbalanced in the Force, the Dark Side ripping at him instead of bending before him as it had on Stewjon, as it had on Enigma. This fear could be turned into hatred and anger, which could in turn be used to fuel his power to new heights, but not now, not yet, not without training and focus, and it seemed that would not be regained without Padmé Amidala. And Lumis had taken her, of this, Sidious was certain. Skywalker was correct in his assessment.
"Peace, Anakin," Palpatine said softly, calmly, but the quiet, subtle compulsion of the Force did nothing to ease the powerful young man. "We'll get her back. In the morning-"
"How! Anakin snarled, dangerous and angry and striding quickly to stand over the Chancellor, the old man quietly slipping into his seat and carefully observing the Jedi he looked to recruit. He would need more time than he thought to tame Anakin Skywalker, to make him receptive and amenable to working with Lumis. Still, it could be done. "How am I supposed to leave! The Jedi have grounded me! Me! Their greatest General, they are trying to sabotage the war effort! And all because of Kenobi!" He growled deeply, savagely, like a feral animal that had been trapped and contained, and Sidious privately smiled. The time wasn't soon, it was now.
"You think the Jedi have been...influenced by this man? Palpatine asked in quiet surprise, and with a snarl of fury, Anakin began pacing the room.
"I know they have been! They have talked about meeting with him, working with him to bring peace! There can be no peace, no order, not while he lives! The Jedi are traitors, and they would keep me from the war because Kenobi made them doubt me, and now I am under investigation for what happened on the Enigma when I killed Kenobi's filthy friend!" His breathing suddenly became fast and labored, new anger flooding him and gripping him with panic, and Palpatine frowned. He was so unfocused, so unbalanced, it threatened to ruin the masterpiece that he had worked so hard to create. He had to be reeled in and secured.
"The Jedi don't command the army, they serve in it," Palpatine said softly. "I'll send you for Padme."
"In what!" Anakin shouted, louder than before, his voice beginning to become raw from misuse. "He stole my ship! And he took Tarkin with it!"
The feeling of unease that Sidious had been experiencing suddenly erupted into silent rage and simmering anger as the pieces fell into place. The abduction of Padme Amidala could have happened anytime between now and when Anakin was last on Coruscant a few months back, but Palpatine had met with Wilhuff Tarkin just the day before. Lumis had been here, and recently, not only in enough control to slip undetected past the Jedi, but with the wherewithal to target Anakin Skywalker specifically, and make of with one of the few things capable of sending the young, quickly falling Jedi teetering off-balance, his anger reaching new heights, but the fear keeping him from harnessing his true potential. It was a cold, calculated move, one that required careful planning and intense focus, a swift and clever mind working at its full potential not just to beat an opponent, but to undo them before they even had the chance to fight. This was not the mind of a madman, not the actions of one lost in the flames of insanity. This was focus, pure and cold and cruel, insidious and manipulative, and exactly how he had trained the boy.
Lumis had lied to him.
His insanity, his submission, his dependence, all of it faked, and with that in mind, given that Skywalker was the target, it was extremely likely that the clone malfunction had been Lumis' doing as well. Sidious had never been so angry, nor so proud of his apprentice. He had become a real threat, and he needed to be brought back into line, and quickly. He found that time was no longer a luxury, and it was Lumis' doing.
"That clever little bastard..." Palpatine snarled under his breath, his hands tightly grasping the armrests of his seat, and the air snapping with cold as the Force rushed to him, and with a gasp, Anakin fell to the ground, the Dark Side fleeing to aid the Sith and leaving the young Jedi with his fears and his panic and his paranoia, but deprived of the power to do anything with them. Blue eyes widened in sudden understanding, and slowly, he stood, a hand on his lightsaber.
"You have the Force..." Anakin gasped, and the mask of old, fragile Palpatine fell away, leaving Skywalker looking at the glowering face of Darth Sidious.
"And my apprentice has overstepped his bounds, he's become a threat," Sidious spat, and despite the fear, Anakin didn't leave. He couldn't. The Jedi had been infected, corrupted by Kenobi, and if Palpatine was the Sith Master...
"You're Sidious," he whispered, and the Chancellor nodded his head. "You're the Master of the Sith, it's you!"
"And my apprentice has risen against me, it would seem, he needs to be brought back into line or destroyed." The Chancellor smiled as he watched fury and anger and hunger wash over the man, his hatred for Lumis consuming and driving his every action, his fear for Padmé leading him to do whatever it took to keep his vision from occurring, his mistrust of the Jedi keeping him with the Sith in the office instead of flying to the Council.
"You would destroy Obi-Wan?" Anakin asked, breathless and yearning and desperate, and Sidious nodded.
"It may have come to that, yes." He stood and slowly walked to Skywalker, the man kneeling upon the ground and looking up at him, lost and alone and desperate for direction and understanding. Sidious extended a hand to the Jedi. "You are right about all of this. Obi-Wan, Lumis, is controlling the Jedi. You are right to mistrust them. Join your strength to mine, Anakin, and I'll give you the strength you need to save Padmé and kill my apprentice." Without a second thought, Anakin reached out and clasped Palpatine's hand in his own, his body shaking and trembling with fear and anger and power as darkness rushed through him.
"Help me," he gasped. "Tell me what to do, please!"
"Embrace the Dark Side, Anakin. You already have, but you have been denying it, and it has made you weak and unfocused. Take it within you and let it's strength guide your actions." Anakin closed his eyes, and with a shivering breath, he took the darkness within him, the currents of the Force raging and swirling around him as he drank deep of the Dark Side, and he groaned in satisfaction as the power swelled within him.
"What do I do, Master?" Anakin asked softly, looking up at Sidious with eyes that were filled with adoration.
"Lumis still has allies, and you do not," Sidious growled. "Deprive him of them. Seek out General Grievous and destroy him." Anakin grinned wickedly and bowed his head.
"I'll get it done. I'll kill him, and after that," he growled, "I'll kill Obi-Wan and save Padmé, and the screaming will stop."
Sidious chuckled as he felt Anakin harness the rage within him. It was over. Anakin Skywalker was his. "Rise, Darth Vader," he said softly. "Go and do my bidding."