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[bring_balance]

"Anakin, something wonderful has happened."

Ever since Padme said the words, Anakin had been running them over and over in his head.

Five months, they'd been stuck in the Outer Rim, fighting battle after battle, and Anakin had begun to wonder if they'd ever get to go home. At one point, he was sure he'd heard the word 'indefinite' come down through the ranks, supposedly directly from the Chancellor himself.

But now the war would soon be over. Anakin had nearly ended it single handedly by finally killing Count Dooku. The leader of the Separatist movement was dead, and now all that was left was to track down and apprehend General Greivous. The war would be finished. Ahsoka and her contingent of Clones were making headway on Mandalore, and soon she would come back to the Order. He was sure of it. Soon, the Jedi could become peacekeepers again. Things could go back to the way they used to be. The revelation brought with it a sense of calm, even as his stomach twisted with dread.

The end of the war.

Anakin should have been completely glad at the idea of it, but truthfully, there was a part of him that dreaded the end of the Clone War. For so long, he had lived it, savored each victory over the Separatists, even as he longed for the space between battles. Without the war, Anakin was unsure of his place. And now... with Padme's news, both of their lives would change. He could leave the Order, she could leave the Senate... he could hear Obi-Wan's admonishment now, see the disdain in Master Windu's eyes.

But the longer he was with Padme that day, the more his fears faded away. She talked of leaving for Naboo, having the baby there, and all Anakin could focus on what how truly lucky he was. Obi-Wan had said time and time again that he relied too much on luck, jumping into situations without thinking and figuring it all out as he went along. Only now did Anakin truly feel lucky, back on Coruscant with Padme, their bright future laid in front of them.


Hours later, there was only screaming.



Padme crying out in great pain. Crying out for help, crying out for him.

Anakin woke with a start in a dark room, springing upright as he gasped for air, his heart racing. It had only been a dream. But it'd been years since he'd had a dream like this one. His mother, in great pain as well , crying out for help. He hadn't completely known what it meant then, at least not until it was too late. Not until he'd found her and...

My grown up son. I'm so proud of you, Ani.

Padme was going to die. Anakin couldn't let that happen. He wouldn't let that happen. He was sure of it. He'd been late before, if he had left Naboo just a day earlier, if he had gone to her against the Council's wishes, then she'd be alive now. He couldn't let it happen again.

There was a long moment before Anakin remembered where he was, shaking off the last bits of sleep and trying to will the images of the nightmare away. Only, where there should have been Padme's apartment on Coruscant, there was somewhere else entirely. And his wife, who should have been resting next to him, was nowhere to be found, nor could he sense her.

Standing, Anakin reached out with the Force, focusing his thoughts. He'd find answers to this, he just needed to be patient. For once, he was willing to try it.

Comments

[larger_world]

"Isn't it?" Obi-Wan asks. "Can you truly say the Council did its due diligence when it came to what Fives was telling us? That we properly investigated the story we were told by the Kaminoans? That we looked as deeply into the information about Master Sifo-Dyas as we could have?"

The words he's speaking, said on Coruscant, would have been cause for some sort of disciplinary action, he's certain. But here, after all these weeks, Obi-Wan has had little else to do but meditate on the way the events unfolded. Not only that, but consider all the things he regrets in trying to train Anakin to be a proper Jedi, when being a proper Jedi goes so against his very nature. Obi-Wan hadn't been so terribly different once upon a time and the Order had dealt with it by giving him their own rebel in Qui-Gon.

Perhaps he had been the wrong Master for Anakin. Whatever the case, those events have weighed on him every moment of every day he's spent here and he means not to make the same mistakes. Not if there's another chance to make it right.

[bring_balance]

Those words from Obi-Wan are surprising, to say the least, to hear his doubt of the Council when time and time again he's chastised Anakin for his own mistrust.

"No. No, I can't," Anakin admits, and his frown deepens, thinking of how Fives had begged them to listen, tried to warn them all.

"But the Chancellor's own doctors found the parasite," Anakin says, because that was when the investigation had ended. They'd been satisfied that they'd found the cause of Tup and Fives's erratic behavior. But Obi-Wan was right, they'd accepted that answer and left it at that. At the time, Anakin couldn't think of any reason to doubt they were being told the truth.

Somehow the Separatists had intercepted the investigation. It had been a plot just as Fives told them, and it went deeper than any of them realized.

[larger_world]

"The Chancellor..." Obi-Wan pauses. "Anakin, the Chancellor was the one who gave the order for the clones to turn on us."

He has no idea how this is going to be received. Though Obi-Wan has long mistrusted Palpatine, he knows the man had been grooming Anakin all this time, without the knowledge of the Jedi. Feeding him lies, breeding discontent within him. He cannot be blamed for it all, as Anakin had made his choice, and Obi-Wan had failed to do the right thing by his Padawan, but Palpatine certainly shoulders much of the accountability for how things unfolded.

"I'm sorry to tell you, Anakin, but some of the Council suspected him for some time," he says. "I fear we were brought into the loop too late."

[bring_balance]

"The Chancellor a Separatist... that's impossible," Anakin replies easily. He can't think of anyone he'd suspect less. Chancellor Palpatine has been nothing but kind and generous ever since Anakin has known him, since he was a Padawan. He's done nothing but give Anakin advice and listen when the Council would not. He's understood Anakin when he was sure Obi-Wan would not.

The idea that he would order the clones to turn on the Jedi is laughable.

"What proof do you have of this?"

[larger_world]

"Not a Separatist, Anakin, he never wanted the Separatists to win the war either," he explains carefully. "And he is no longer a Chancellor. He named himself Emperor before the Senate."

The proof is in the very statements Palpatine had made in public, but they are statements Obi-Wan understands Anakin has never heard. If he desires physical proof, something Obi-Wan can show him now, he'll never have it.

"He destroyed the democratic system we were trying to protect and publicly denounced the Jedi as traitors," he continues, as calm as he can be all things considered. "And there are others here in this city. Others who come from our galaxy, but who are from years into its future. Who have witnessed his rise as Emperor and who have suffered at the hands of the Empire. There is no deception in them, Anakin. They are not lying when they speak of the world and what it became."

[bring_balance]

The Senate had asked Chancellor Palpatine to stay on longer in his role. They'd voted him Chancellor in the first place.

"You must realize what you're saying," Anakin says, and he stands, pacing to the other side of the room before he faces Obi-Wan again, "You're talking about a mentor and a friend. I've known him almost as long as I've known you."

The Chancellor has been nothing but a kind ear. Anakin has told him things that he couldn't dream of telling Obi-Wan, or even Padmé. He even knows what happened at the Tusken camp.

But even as Anakin says the words to Obi-Wan, he's remembering how much power the Chancellor had amassed during the war, and realizing that he senses no deception in Obi-Wan. Nothing about this makes any sense.

[larger_world]

As much as Obi-Wan wishes he could take it all back and tell Anakin he's right, everything is fine, he knows he cannot. There are things he can't tell him, things he's still yet to entirely deal with himself, but he can't simply lie to him and pretend everything in the world they've left behind is going to work out for the best when he knows that isn't the case.

If he's going to be a proper Master this time, if he's going to take care not to make the same mistake, then he cannot begin here with deception.

"I know, Anakin," he says. "It was a blow to us all, but I know how difficult it is for you to hear these things. But even you must have suspected. Master Windu asked you to speak with the Chancellor, he asked you to report on his behaviour and you agreed. I cannot imagine you would have done so if you had not thought there might be something worth reporting on."

[bring_balance]

Asked to spy on the Chancellor for the Council. Anakin can't envision a situation where he would have willingly agreed to do such a thing.

"What you're talking about is treason," Anakin says, and it's something he never would have thought Obi-Wan would suggest. He's always firmly held on to his allegiance to the Senate, and to doubt them in this way seems wrong. Obi-Wan has never been the Chancellor's biggest fan, though, and he's made that clear plenty of times. In his own way, of course.

"You're saying the Council asked me to commit treason and I willingly agreed?"

Had he known? Perhaps Obi-Wan is right, and at some point Anakin had suspected what they'd all come to find out. But from the way his former Master explains it, it had all come too little, much too late for any of them. For the clones and for the Jedi as well.

He'd been too late again. Too late to save the people he cared about.

[larger_world]

"We were trying to protect the integrity of the Senate," Obi-Wan answers. "The Senate as a whole, as a system is what we were meant to defend."

He pauses then and exhales, standing from the couch once more.

"This is not the time for these discussions," he says. "You have enough to adjust to without trying to sort through such things. I assume you can sense Senator Amidala is here, yes?"

They may not have ever spoken of it and he must assume Anakin thinks his relationship with Padmé is still a secret, but Obi-Wan knows much more than they others believe. He knows Anakin is the father of the baby Padmé was carrying, last he saw her. He knows Anakin is in love with her and suspects that she, too, loves him deeply in return.

[bring_balance]

On the contrary, Anakin believes that right now is exactly the time for these discussions. The Clones turned on the order and the Chancellor was behind it all. They've found themselves in this strange place that feels unlike any place Anakin has ever been before, and now Obi-Wan wants to end the argument there.

The subject he brings up next, however, is enough to get Anakin to pause.

"Yes," he says, ignoring the sinking feeling in his stomach as he tries to put his nightmare behind him, if only for the moment. More than anything, he knows that he needs to go to her and make sure she's safe.Explaining to Obi-Wan why that's his first priority, however, is easier said than done.

"I sensed the Senator when I arrived. Did you end up here together?"

[larger_world]

"No," Obi-Wan answers. "She's only just arrived herself. She is... from an earlier time still than you are. I imagine you and she will have much to discuss."

He feels as though now is also not the time to tell Anakin what he knows. There is just so much he must hold onto, at least for a little while, though he must balance this carefully. The last thing he wants is his Padawan to once again feel as if he's been lied to. If they're to repair what has happened in the past, they must both be honest and it is up to Obi-Wan to find the correct way to make this happen.

"You will have quarters here," he says. "And credits. You'll want for nothing."

Except, perhaps, a war to fight in.