Padmé Amidala Skywalker, last name kept strictly off the record because her husband would be expelled from the Jedi Order, watched in horror as the screen showed the execution of Sheev Palpatine and the battle between her husband and his brother in all but name. General Grievous was also putting both Anakin and Obi-wan on the back foot as he fought as though he was simply training the pair and not fighting like it was a duel that would bring an end to the Clone Wars. Thankfully, she and several other Senators had gotten into the bunker that was reserved for the Naboo delegation.
Riyo Chuchi and Bail Prestor Organa, some of her closest friends in the Senate, also watched. The Pantoran had a light blue hand to her mouth, eyes wide as crimson blades danced around the twin blade of blue. The cyborg General also looked different than what Padmé remembered Major Malevolence looking like. His darker yellow armor had been replaced with sleeker clean whitish armor, even the design was different. He was also wearing a white cloak as he used the two crimson blades, one was Dooku's and the other…
She couldn't believe that Palpatine was Sidious but the way Grievous had used that unknown truth serum that had made Palpatine speak in a monotone. His questions had been very particular and to the point that the last question was asked before Grievous decapitated the Chancellor. Padmé could only imagine the shock across the galaxy upon seeing the Chancellor's death, as she felt her own emotions in a boiling churned mess. Sheev had been somewhat of a mentor for her and Anakin, but if what Grievous had done was true, it was all a lie.
Gaslighting Anakin and grooming him, Padmé nearly whimpered out loud as she watched as Anakin was backhanded by Grievous before the Cyborg General focused on Kenobi with a ferocity that bordered on complete hatred. Given the history between the pair, the Naboo Senator wasn't really surprised.
Bail grimaced as he muttered, "Grievous isn't using a Jedi sword style, at least, from the way both Knight Skywalker and Master Kenobi are being thrown around."
Padmé frowned as Riyo blinked, "Y-you're right, Grievous is fighting with something else. He's simply toying with the pair."
That made Padmé have a very bad feeling about this.
Obi-Wan Kenobi was not having the best day as his blue blade weaving through a defensive velocity so bewilderingly fast that it was a wonder that he was still standing.
So now, facing the tornado of annihilating energy that is Grievous's attack, ObiWan simply let the Force guide him but the Force was acting like it was expecting to be attacked at any moment.
The electrodrivers powering Grievous's mechanical arms let each of the four attack thrice in a single second; integrated by combat algorithms in the biodroid's electronic network of peripheral processors, each of the twelve strikes per second came from a different angle with different speed and intensity, an unpredictably broken rhythm of slashes, chops, and stabs of which every single one could take Obi-Wan's life.
Not one touched him, except, that was because the Force was with him as these attacks were bypassing his Soresu defenses like a serpent slips through water.
Even though he had often walked unscathed through hornet-swarms of blasterfire, defended only by the Force's direction of his blade; countering twelve blows per second was only difficult, not impossible. But the Force was whimpering and crying as Grievous assaulted Obi-wan's defenses with the grace and mastery of a sword master.
His blade wove an intricate web of angles and curves, never truly fast but always just fast enough, each motion of his lightsaber subtly interfering with three or four or eight of the general's strikes, the rest sizzling past him, his precise, minimal shifts of weight and stance slipping them by centimeters.
Grievous ramped up the intensity and velocity of his attacks-sixteen per second, eighteen-until finally, at twenty strikes per second, he overloaded Obi-Wan's defense. So Obi-Wan used his defense to attack.
A subtle shift in the angle of a single parry brought Obi-Wan's blade in contact not with the blade of the oncoming lightsaber, but with the handgrip.
Grievous moved so seamlessly that it jolted Kenobi into a halt. The cyborg general had split his arm so he could hold the blue blade with his three taloned hand, the green eyes glowering at Kenobi as the fight paused.
"I would expect you to try and disarm me, Kenobi. I don't believe I want to have my caretaker yelling incessantly at me for disregarding my safety."
Grievous yanked his blade sideways, pulling Obi-wan off his feet and throwing him into the far wall. Hitting the durasteel wall was hard on his back, as he grimaced and got up to spot Anakin slamming his blue blade against the duo of crimson. Grievous crossed his blades in a scissors like pattern before slashing them across Anakin's blade with enough force to throw him a few steps backwards. He then jumped at Anakin with the speed of a speeder, blades slashing in that same manner that was clear that his onetime Padawan's style of combat would not counter.
It couldn't counter it as it was a subtle sword style that was not taught to the Jedi. One that was barely held back by Soresu but was a complete counter to Shien/Djem So, as Anakin was becoming overwhelmed near utterly before Grievous kicked Anakin across the room before he growled.
"It seems that you both are completely outclassed…unworthy of earning a warrior's death."
The contempt and disgust was easily heard through the mask as Grievous marched up to Kenobi, one of the crimson blades deactivated as he grabbed Obi-wan by the back of his robes and threw him into Anakin. Groaning as he collided into his Padawan, Obi-wan wheezed as his bruised body was given more bruises.
"You know," Obi-wan snarked, "if you had fought as easily as you did after Hypori, we might have actually stepped up, General."
Grievous snorted, "Like you could learn another sword style…I would be impressed as your guard is heavily influenced by sword shields, but that is for another time. I have one more Sith to execute."
This is the death of Count Yan Dooku:
A starburst of clarity blossoms within the mind of Dooku, when he says to himself, "Oh…so this is how my life ends. On the screen of every holonet in the galaxy."
It is that simple, and that complex.
And it is final.
Dooku is dead already. The rest is mere detail.
The play is still on; the comedy of a Cyborg General and the two faces of the Republic warfront and propaganda ending in only both Jedi having been brutally beaten by a being that had terrified Sidious. And now, Dooku was pulled into the waiting grasp of the General by some force of power that made his own Force Sensitivity howl in agony.
Dooku's decades of combat experience are irrelevant. His mastery of swordplay is useless. His vast wealth, his political influence, impeccable breeding, immaculate manners, exquisite taste-the pursuits and points of pride to which he has devoted so much of his time and attention over the long, long years of his life-are now chains hung upon his spirit, bending his neck before the ax.
Even his knowledge of the Force has become a joke.
It is this knowledge that shows him his death, makes him handle it, turn it this way and that in his mind, examine it in detail like a black gemstone so cold it burns. Dooku's elegant farce has degenerated into bathetic melodrama, and not one shed tear will mark the passing of its hero. Nobody will remember the man that had created the Confederacy of Independent Systems after Grievous tore out his reputation by making him the accomplice of Sidious's plan for the Galaxy.
Outplayed and outplanned by a former alien warlord.
Outdone by a being that had been called Qymaen jai Sheelal, Kaleesh Warlord that broke the Yam'rii's back in the Huk War.
Grievous looks down upon Dooku and sees not a Lord of the Sith but a beaten, broken, cringing old man. A man that had ordered the shuttle of Qymaen to be destroyed, blaming it on the Jedi, a shameful excuse if there ever was one. Dooku watched as he was forced to his knees by the General before spotting his own lightsaber in Grievous's hand before it came to life. The crimson blade held out to the side as the cybernetic General hissed at him.
"So ends the traitor to the Confederacy. Take this to your grave, Dooku, at least you raised up enough acolytes for me to use in the war going forward."
And Dooku-As he looks up into the eyes of General Grievous for the final time, Count Dooku knows that he has been deceived not just today, but for many, many years. That he has never been the true apprentice. That he has never been the heir to the power of the Sith. He has been only a tool.
His whole life-all his victories, all his struggles, all his heritage, all his principles and his sacrifices, everything he's done, everything he owns, everything he's been, all his dreams and grand vision for the future Empire and the Army of Sith-have been only a pathetic sham, because all of them, all of him, add up only to this.
He has existed only for this.
This.
To be the victim of Qymaen jai Sheelal's ascension as the sole leader of the Confederacy.
First but not, he knows, the last.
Then his own blade comes down as the final color he would ever see or know in the living world is as red as the blood he had spilled on Sidious's orders.
Slash.
And all of him becomes nothing at all.
IG-One Eight Eight stepped out of the shadows as the power that his master wielded dispelled itself the moment he moved out of his station. The fight was over, the traitors dealt with and the Republic dealt a heavy blow to its morale and navy as the battle turned in the favor of the CIS.
"Sir," He said, "what shall we do with the Jedi?"
Grievous stood silently as he looked at the beheaded corpse of the traitor Dooku before he said, "Stuff them into an escape pod and launch them at the nearest Republic vessel, I want to end them on the battlefield as a warrior would."
"Understood, Sir," IG- One Eight Eight nodded before motioning at the other shadows to come out, more of the custom rebuilt Magnaguards coming forth to pull the defeated Jedi onto their feet.
"And the bodies?"
"Space them"
"Understood sir."
The Neimoidian Captain Cishrilb Brimmen was quickly getting his bridge crew back into order when a droid near the back said "General on the Deck!"
General Grievous swept into the bridge of the Invisible Hand, his cloak of white pristine as the General waved them back into their seats.
"Captain, open a comm to the rest of the fleet."
Cishrilb pressed a button on his command chair before looking at his commanding officer, "you're connected to the fleet, general."
Grievous grunted before speaking "All ships, retreat. This is because we have done what we have come to do. We have pulled out a great victory against the Republic."
Across all of Coruscant space, the CIS fleet turned and jumped away, leaving a very ruined defense fleet behind. Captain Cishrilb watched before one of his officers said that an escape pod with two life forms and one droid were launched at the still limping form of the Republic of Freedom.
"Captain, having the Invisible Hand return to Confederacy space, I'll be going through neglected projects and other issues that I have left in my mental absence for the last three years."
"Understood, General. I'll alert you when we return to friendly space."
"Also have the ship head towards Raxus Secundus," Grievous also ordered before turning away, heading back towards the entryway, "The Separatist Parliament will be wanting my explanation of what is happening and why I did what I did."
"Understood sir, anything else?"
Grievous paused before pointing at the Captain, emerald eyes glowing softly, "Send a message to Acolyte Sev'rance Tann to gather the rest of Dooku's acolytes and arrive at Raxus Prime in a week's time. If we are still gonna be using Force User's, I want the ones I can personally verify and work with over the ones like Ventress."
"Understood, I shall alert the commander."
"And send a tight beam transmission to Kalee," Grievous said, hand lowering as he spoke, "Tell them…Tell them that "The Dreamer has Awoken"."
Anakin Skywalker groaned as he woke up in the Jedi Healing halls, and couldn't help but groan as Vokara Che, Chief Healer of the Halls of Healing, came over and glowered at him.
"Knight Skywalker," She said, calm and collected but clearly not pleased with him, "mind telling me why you came into my halls, again?"
Anakin grimaces, Che's expression of controlled annoyance a reminder of his own mother, Shmi. He still remembered the time as an eleven year old that he had called her mom, though he was high off painkillers and other drugs because he had done something very stupid. Che didn't say anything against it but after the death of his own mother, she had been one of the only Jedi that had taken him to the side and let him vent.
"I stupidly let my anger at the death of the Chancellor, my friend…cloud my own judgment. I got my own ego handed to me on a silver platter by Grievous." He answered honestly, to which Che nodded before pulling out a datapad.
"Indeed, you also cracked your rib cage, strained your muscles and bruised everything from your skull to your feet. You have a week of bedrest ahead of you and no, you may not leave to work on anything mechanical. I'll bring it to you, and I'll make sure that Master Kenobi is put next to you as you both clearly need me to handle your medical needs as your Clone Medics, Kix and Needle, have gotten pushed past regular healing."
Anakin flushed as he was chidded by the older Twi'lek before nodding, "Yes Healer Che…or is it Mother Che?"
His teasing got Vokara to give him an amused glower before she rolled her eyes, "Its still Chief Healer, Anakin. Don't you forget it."
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN ANAKIN AND OBI-WAN GOT THEIR BACKSIDES HANDED TO THEM?!"
"Ahsoka, calm down-"
"REX! I'm livid! Who the kriff did this?!"
"Uh…General Grievous did."
"Major Malevolence did that? How? What?! Rex, get us to Coruscant as quickly as this bucket of bolts can!"
"Yes Commander."
For those of you wondering, Grievous is in his Animated 2003 form or as this story puts it, "The prototype body".