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“Master Windu, I must speak with you”
“Skywalker” He wasn’t surprised. It seemed whenever anything of consequence was happening, Skywalker was involved somehow. “We’ve just received word that Obi-Wan has destroyed General Grievous. We’re on our way to make sure the Chancellor returns emergency power back to the Senate.”
“He won’t give up his power.” Anakin seemed like he was pushing through the exclamation, struggling against his reservations. “I’ve just learned a terrible truth. I think Chancellor Palpatine is a Sith Lord.”
“ A Sith Lord?”
Mace’s mind blanked for a moment. It was beyond it worst case scenario, and Mace prided himself on imagining every possible contingency.
“Yes. The one that we’ve been looking for”
“How do you know this?” Even as he asked the question, Windu’s mind started to make connections. How Palpatine’s every action no matter how heartfelt felt… manufactured. He’d attributed it to politics at the time, the Chancellor wanting to seem gentle and benevolent instead of frustrated and stressed, but now that he gave it a second thought…
“He knows the ways of the Force.” Skywalker’s tone was grave, more serious than Windu had ever seen him. “He’s been trained to use the Dark Side.”
“Are you sure?” Even as he asked, Mace felt the Force shivering in agreement with Skywalker’s words.
“Absolutely.”
Skywalker responded with a bitter sort of finality.
“Then our worst fears have been realized.” Mace steeled himself for what he would have to do next.
“We must move fast if the Jedi Order is to survive.”
“The Chancellor is very powerful. You’ll need my help if you’re going to arrest him”
“For your own good, stay out of this affair” Skywalker might well be a powerful ally in the fight that would follow, but he was too close to Palpatine. The Sith were poisonous. Anyone who spent enough time in their presence could be considered compromised, even a Jedi of Skywalker’s caliber. “I sense a great deal of confusion in you, young Skywalker. There is much fear clouding your judgement."
“I must go, Master!” Mace felt a pang of guilt, that he quickly released into the Force. It was his own fault that Skywalker was so attached to the Chancellor. He’d allowed the boy to spend time in the man’s presence since the Battle of Naboo, allowed Obi-Wan to continue as the boy’s Master even though it was obvious that he’d done nothing to curb the younger Jedi’s tendency to become attached to anyone who showed him the slightest bit of affection.
“No. If what you’ve told me is true, you will have earned my trust. But for now, remain here.” He could tell his mandate didn’t sit well with Skywalker, but it was a Jedi’s job to ignore their feelings of disappointment and obey their superiors. If the boy was truly worthy, he would obey orders for once in his life. “Wait in the council chambers until we return.”
“Yes. Master.” Mace stepped onto the troop transport, and as the door slid closed obscuring Skywalker’s expression, he couldn’t help but feel as though everything was about to go wrong.
Anakin stood in the council chambers, unable to breathe.
The Force, which was usually a whisper in the back of his mind, subtly hinting that something was amiss, was screaming now. He couldn’t sit here and do nothing. He remembered the vision that he’d had the night before. Foggy images of Padme’s face screaming in pain, a glimpse of Obi-Wan distraught, trying to guide her through..
He pressed a hand up against the window, fighting his instinct to go protect Sheev, the man who’d guided him and comforted him for more than a decade, and almost faltered.
No. It wasn’t Palpatine. It was Sideous. Sideous who orchestrated the Clone Wars, who created his men, who threw him and his Padawan and his men into battle time and time again, who killed Tag and Tups and Fives and Heavy, who enslaved Rex and Kix and the rest of the 501st, who created Grievous, turned Dooku and Barriss Offee to the Dark, framed Ahsoka… and acted as a father figure to him. Gave him a friendly ear, praised him and kept his secrets.
He couldn’t untangle the man he had known from the Sith who had made the Galaxy tear itself apart, and it was torture. One way or another, he had to be there when the fight happened. Whether it would be to save Palpatine or Master Windu, no one could have said, least of all him. The Father was breathing his last cloying breaths, each one tainted with the taste of darkness. He knew the crisis was coming to a climax, and he could sense his young contemporary perched on a knife’s edge, ready to tip. Skywalker had thus far done as the Chosen One was meant to do. Keep the Balance. Embody both the Darkness and The Light in equal measure.
But without some help, he would fall.
The Father could do this. His vigil was ending. Both of his children had passed before him, and to live even a moment without them was agony. He welcomed death like an old friend, but he couldn’t allow the Galaxy to pass with him. He closed his eyes and reached out to touch Skywalkers mind. The boy was cloaked in Darkness. It layered over him like a cloak, and it was smothering him. With his last breath, The Father pushed with all his might, and the cloud around Anakin Skywalker was dispersed. It was all that he could do, and he could only pray to the Force that it would be enough. Anakin stumbled on his mad rush down to the speeders. He knew what he had to do. He needed to be in that room when the Chancellor was arrested so he could kill-
save-
Capture him. He
tapped a button on his belt, starting his speeder and prepared himself to depart when a quake hit him. Anakin fell to one knee. It wasn’t an earthquake, he could tell because the deck wasn’t moving. It was the Force. The realization came just as Anakin’s head hit the cold durasteel.
“Execute Order 66”
Clones across the Galaxy gunning down their Jedi.
The Temple under fire, as he marched toward it at the head of the 501st.
Mace Windu ejected out the window of the Chancellor’s office, missing a hand.
Master Kenobi screaming, eyes red with tears, framed by blackened rock and smoke. “You were my Brother, Anakin. I loved you!” Anakin could feel his heart breaking at the words as the vision disappeared with a flash of burning pain, as if his body had been cast into a star.
His wife, giving birth, screaming in pain as
Obi-Wan held her hand.
Luke. Leia.
Her funeral procession on Naboo.
For a moment, darkness.
His former Padawan in a Dark temple. She’s older, her Montrals standing so far above her head now. He watched as she dueled with a towering figure in black, wearing a helmet like a skull. He watched as the temple closed on them, a slash in the helmet revealing the being’s glowing right eye. It was
him. The fight ended with a red lightsaber through Ahsoka’s stomach. The glowing yellow eye didn’t even blink.
Anakin gasped as the Force released him.
The memories didn’t fade like they did in Mortis. He was convinced, suddenly, that this was what the Force had been trying to show him for months. This is what the clouding Darkness had been hiding from him. His Future.
He pulled himself up off the ground and boarded the speeder. There was so much work to be done, and almost no time.
Anakin pressed the button on his commlink, and Captain Rex’s face appeared.
“Rex.”
“General?” Appo seemed confused.
“Kriff, sorry Appo. I need you to do something.”’
“Name it, General.”
“Pull the 501st, all of them, back to the Resolute. Disable all comms. Don’t allow anyone on board unless they transmit my personal Security Code.” Appo looked at him, confused.
“Sir?”
“There’s a… possibility that.. Sometime in the next hour a viral data transmission will be sent out from Coruscant that will corrupt your training programs. Make you hostile to the Jedi.’”
He’s bullshitting now, but Appo doesn’t know that. The Commander looked confused, but he agreed anyway, and promises to block all comms to the Resolute II. “Before you cut comms, Commander, spread the word to the fleet. Block all incoming comms from Coruscant, authority of General Skywalker. Authorization Code 45236” Appo nodded, ending the call.
Anakin fired up the speeder, and headed for the Senate building, frantically dialing Shaak Ti at the Temple as he drove.
Masters Kolar and Tiin were cut down in seconds. Kit almost followed them into the force a moment later, sustaining harsh wounds. He was lying on the floor, unconscious, as Mace pushed all of his energy into the duel with Sideous. He knew that without intervention, Fisto would die, but even a momentary break in concentration
would doom them both. The Nautolan would have to hold on until the fight was over.
Sidious’s Mastery of Juyo was disturbing,but it worked to his advantage. He was able to create a feedback loop, channeling the Sith’s own anger back at him. Their duel pushed his skills to the brink, but he began to notice a flaw in Sidious’s movements. The Dark Lord’s fury, or perhaps his arrogance made him
overextend himself.
He kept trying for the kill with a deep jab that left him wide open for retaliation. He’d opened with the same move, killing Agen Kolar, but it wouldn’t work twice. Mace had his number.
When Sideous lunged, trying to bring the fight to an end, Mace batted his saber away, deflected his rebound strike and kicked the profane weapon out the window.
The fight was over. Sidious scrambled backwards, away from Windu’s blade. He kept glimpsing at the doorway, and Mace knew exactly what he was waiting on.
“He’s not coming, Chancellor. Skywalker is a Jedi. Your attempt to poison him has failed. You’ve lost.”
“NOOOOOO”
and the room lit up with Sith Lightning
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Are.. are you sure, Skywalker?” She asked skeptically, the comm warping slightly as his speeder hit turbulence
“Master Ti.” Anakin slipped into what Rex called his ‘General’ voice. “I wouldn’t tell you if I wasn’t. Evacuate the temple. NOW.” He paused for a moment. “We’ve been betrayed. I’ve ordered the Open Circle Fleet into orbit, told them to cut comms to the surface, told them to spread word to the entire GAR. Get as many of the Jedi in the Temple to a central location that the Republic doesn’t know about, then delete it’s coordinates from the Archives.”
“Skywalker, I was given command of this Temple and I will not cede it. Our Order has resided here since the end of the last Sith War-”
“Well a new one is about to begin, Master Ti. And if Sidious makes the Clones march on the Temple you will all die. The Temple is just a building. The Jedi must survive.” There was silence on the line for a moment.
“Understood, Skywalker. I’ll order the retreat.” She sounded numb, a feeling he understood intimately.
“Thank you. Skywalker out.”
Lightning hurt, even when you were blocking it. Mace’s hands were going numb under the onslaught of pure hate, but he pushed through it. It was almost over. Sidious was burning himself with his own power. Soon enough he wouldn’t be able to maintain it, and it would end. The moment it did, Windu pointed his blade at the gnarled old monster.
“The oppression of the Sith will never return. You have lost.”
Sidious wasn’t even looking at him now. A single stroke could end it. Mace felt the old darkness in his soul screaming at him to take the swing. Cut his head from his shoulders, forget arrests and the Senate.
“No, no, no, you have lost” Palpatine shrieked. He flung out an arm, and Mace looked over to see Kit Fisto. Bleeding, half conscious and clutching his lightsaber. Palpatine grabbed him with the Force and flung him out the window.
“No!” Windu’s resolve broke, reaching out with the force to catch one of his oldest friends. In a flash of red, his hand is gone, and Sidious is cackling. A second scarlet lightsaber blazed in the monster’s hand. A new burst of lightning threw him down, and the Sith Lord rears back to strike him down.
Anakin passed the Senate building and banked around it, moving towards a docking platform. he was transmitting his landing coordinates when he spotted, out of the corner of his eye, a body flying out of a window.
He pulled the speeder out of a slow descent and
into a steep dive to get below the plummeting figure, but he pulls it off. Anakin softens their fall with the Force, and the body softly lowers to the ground. Jedi Master Kit Fisto lies unconscious, bleeding out on the floor of his speeder.Hehas to get up to that office. He puts the speeder into hover and leaps.
Mace prepares for the blow, knowing that there would be no escape. He only hoped that his sacrifice wouldn’t be in vain, that the rest of the Order wouldn’t be following him into the Force. He opened his eyes wide, ready to meet the blow without flinching—
And a dark blur flew through the window, slamming Palpatine hard and sending him spinning off into the room.
“”Mace, are you okay?” Mace waves his cauterized stump in Skywalker’s direction as a response. “...Fair enough”
“Anakin, My boy. This traitor tried to assassinate me.” He gestured with his blade at the Jedi Master on the floor. “You came just in time.”
“I didn’t come to stop him from arresting you, Chancellor. I came to help.”
“Oh, my boy. I had such high hopes for you.” Skywalker’s lightsaber dropped from his grip and deactivated as he was lifted by his throat. “Now you will Fall, you will slay Windu and kneel at my feet. Or I will let your wife die in agony, and if she fails to I will personally help her along.”
“No, Anakin. He’s lying” Mace forced out, struggling to stand. It’s useless, his nervous system was still in shock from the lightning.
“You will Fall, but first the Jedi Temple shall.” Sidious pulled out a Commlink. “Commander Fox, Execute order sixt—” A blue blur struck the commlink out of his hand, atomizing it. Skywalker motioned with his hands, and the Force chokehold shattered. Mace looked, blearily, as a new shatterpoint formed around the boy- No, the Knight.
His own lightsaber and Mace’s respond to his call in the force, flying to his hands, and he ignited them.
“You should know by now that I don’t respond well to threats, Chancellor.” Anakin leapt forward, slashing downward at his old friend.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The second the fight began the Chancellor was running his mouth, trying to undermine Anakin’s resolve. He spat insults and accusations, each one vile and laced with contempt.
“You were nothing but a slave whelp and a runt of a jedi before me, Anakin. I made you the Hero With No Fear.I remade your mind in my image, and I will unmake you again if I must.” The jibe was accompanied with a flurry of slashes that stood no chance of penetrating his defences. Anakin was apprenticed to the undisputed Master of Soresu and taught the most talented Jar’Kai wielder in three generations. With one blade for defence and one to attack he held Palpatine off effortlessly.
“I told you, Anakin. The Jedi Council has never trusted you. They’ve been holding you back. Chaining you!” Palpatine was moving faster now, engaging both of Anakin’s sabers easily, as his self control began to slip. The Darkness was encroaching again, turning his vision red. “Your pathetic Master and your little Senator betrayed you.”
A raised hand flung Skywalker across the room, and pinned him to the wall. “I am the only one you know you can trust. Who are you going to betray, hmm? An old friend who has only ever had your best interests in mind, or the corrupt council of fools who have raised you as a disposable weapon?” He slammed the Jedi against his desk with the force. “Your weak Master? Your adulterous whore of a wife?”
“I am-” *hgrurk*
Palpatine rose into the air, clutching at his throat.
“SHUT. YOUR. MOUTH.”
Skywalker closed his fist, shutting off the Sith’s airway, and Mace decided it was time to go. The Anakin had spent the later half of the Clone Wars treading a fine line between the Light and the Dark, and it seemed like Palpatine’s word had finally pushed him over. Even if he won the fight, it wouldn’t be a happy ending. The dark shatterpoint forming around him showed hellish reflections of the future. He would not- Could not let it happen. This was what Palpatine wanted. Even if he died here he would get his new Sith Empire
“SKYWALKER” He pushed himself onto his feet, bulling through the lingering effects of the lightning. “Control yourself. You are a member of the Jedi Council. Comport yourself.like one.”
-
Mace Windu didn’t believe in miracles, but somehow, for the first time in Anakin’s miserable life, the boy listened to orders. He opened his fist— And shoved. The Force
of his blow flung his Sith Opponent through a Duracrete wall and deeper into the building.
“Good. now get up. We’re leaving.”
“A-are you joking? This has to end. Here and now.” Skywalker stepped closer to him. “If we leave now, we effectively cede control of the Republic to the Sith.”
“Even if that was true, Skywalker, the Jedi Order has weathered greater storms than a single Sith Lord leading the republic. We survived Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Dromo, we survived Revan the Butcher. We will survive this. Now come.” He staggered to the window, and in that moment Anakin made his choice. There was no way Mace could make that jump without killing himself.
He gathered his will, and Force Pushed Master Windu out the window.
Not seconds after he did that, dark energy began to pour into the building.
The Force screamed as if in pain, and he felt a tingle in his bones like he was about to enter Hyperspace.
Palpatine’s body floated up out of the hole he’d been shoved through, glowing with the Force.
Anakin sighed, and leapt out the window as the structure behind him imploded.
Mace Windu landed in the speeder ass over teakettle and almost threw up. Skywalker had thrown him, that insolent little motherfu-
“WE GOTTA GO!”
Speak of the sith and he shall appear
. The second Skywalker’s body hit the seat he gunned the engines,
and it lurched violently forward.
“SKYWALKER, WHERE THE KRIFF ARE YOU GOING?” The buildings blurred past too fast to make out, but they were clearly going the wrong way.
“CoCo town. You two are in no shape to fight round two. I have a friend who’ll hide you for a bit, and get you off planet if necessary.”
“Off-planet? Why the hell would we-” Skywalker swerved again, cutting off that line of questioning rather effectively.
“The Temple is going to be attacked. It may already be under siege.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Forcing the grate off its hinges, Anakin slipped up onto the ground level just behind the temple gates- and was immediately met with an ignited lightsaber.
“Anakin! Where are the Masters?” Gatemaster Jurokk deactivated his ‘saber as soon as he recognized the other Jedi.
“Masters Windu and Fisto were gravely injured and couldn’t make it back to the temple. The rest were…” Anakin winced “...killed in action against Darth Sidious.” The expression on Jurokk’s face shifted from surprise to utter horror, and honestly he could sympathise. The idea that a single Sith Lord could injure or kill four members of the Jedi High Council singlehanded
was
horrible. “Listen, Jurokk, where is
Master Shaak Ti?”
“Ever since you commed her earlier, she’s been running around like a Purra-bird with its head cut off trying to lock down the temple and
find some way to get the younglings and the padawans out. Apparently your message earlier triggered some kind of vision from the force while she was meditating. What the hell did you say to her?”
“The same thing I’m about to say to you, Jurokk. Lock down the gates, destroy the outside terminal, and get inside.” Anakin looked out into the city, as a
Venator-Class Star Destroyer bore down on them, setting up a blockade. “ The entire Coruscant Guard is about to come knocking. Chancellor Palpatine is laying siege to the Jedi Temple.”
As he rushed inside the Temple, leaving Jurokk to seal the gates, Anakin felt the first shit hit the Temple Shields. He’d led the 501st long enough to recognise that the shot was from an AT-TE’s heavy Cannon. Kriff, that didn’t take long. He
Rushed up the stairs towards a set of lifts that would take him to the Temple Guard chambers and the communication center, the most likely place to find Shaak Ti. He made it like halfway there when she found him, along with Cin Drallig, a column of Temple Guards, and various Jedi Knights.
“Skywalker. Thank the Force, you’re here.”
Shaak nodded at Drallig, who waved at the Temple Guards to stop. “What,
exactly
, was the meaning of the warning that you sent us?”
“It’s a long story, Master Ti, and we don’t have much time.” Anakin nodded backward towards the entrance, as a second boom shook the shield. “Suffice it to say, the Supreme Chancellor is a Sith and a traitor. Master Windu’s force that he took to apprehend him was defeated, and he and Master Fisto are in critical condition.”
Master Jurokk called out from the entrance, and they all turned to go see him sprinting up the Great Hall steps. Outside, beyond the gates, the Coruscant guard was massed. “Aaaand that-” Anakin gestured with his lightsaber, igniting it as he did “ is what I warned you about. The Force showed me the GAR marching on the Temple.
Wulff Yularen had spoken to
Commander Appo nearly two hours ago. Since then the Resolute II had sat in orbit, ignoring any and all comms from the GAR as General Skywalker had ordered. They had been coming more and more frequently, and he was beginning to sweat. His commlink was the only one on the ship that was still linked to the Holonet, so he was personally responsible for the potential treason they were committing together, ignoring all incoming orders.
Skywalker’s orders had been rushed, and the cover had been flimsy at best. Honestly,
some kind of viral transmission corrupting the trooper’s anti-aggression chips? It was clear that he was doing that because he was ignoring some set of orders from High Command. Even from Skywalker, he had expected better.
Skywalker often bent and stretched his official orders, but he’d never gone so far as to completely ignore them.
Yularen couldn’t stand for it. He reached over to the switch that would reactivate the Resolute’s comms array. A blaster bolt struck the control panel in front of him, and it sparked and went dead. Standing in the doorway behind him was Commander Appo.
“With all due respect, Admiral, good soldiers follow orders.”
Sidious sneered, hurling his comm link against the wall of his secret sanctum.
Somehow, Anakin Skywalker had blocked every signal he'd transmitted off planet. The boy predicted his checkmate, and staved off the final blow against the Jedi Order. It wouldn't save them, he'd only prolonged the battle, but it was still infuriating. Worse yet, he'd somehow thrown off thirteen years of deeply planted manipulations and mental conditioning, and turned down his destiny.
All that hard work, leading Skywalker to the edge of the cliff, pushing him, tempting him, and Skywalker refused to take that final step.
Just as well. If Skywalker proved untenable, there were others that would prove capable apprentices. None of them were the Chosen One, but they would prove useful nonetheless. He donned his black robe and made for the Senate Assembly building. It was time to salvage this mess.
“I’ll go with Master Drallig, then, Master Ti?” Anakin started, confused. When she rattled out orders to the knights and guards present, she hadn’t included him.
“Actually, Skywalker… I believe your talents would be wasted guarding the entrances. We have almost 50 younglings and padawans in the temple, and I need you to get them out somehow.” Anakin balked at his orders.
“With all due respect, Master Ti, I know the GAR tactics and the ways in and out of the temple better than anyone. I can hold it against the CorGuard. I hold enormous respect for Gatemaster Jurokk and Battlemaster Drallig, but I’m the best kriffing General on Coruscant right now. You need me here.” She sighed, distraught.
“Knight Skyw-
Anakin. I understand your desire to defend the temple. Trust me, I feel it too.” She placed a hand on his shoulder in a surprising display of emotion. “But it’s not tenable. Every Knight and Temple Guard out there
is willing to die to defend this place, and they are going to.” Anakin balked at the blunt assessment of their chances.
“We can’t just give up on the Jedi Temple.. On the Jedi Order like that.”
“ If Commander Fox fails to breach these walls, Palpatine will undoubtedly call in more troopers. Even without calling in off-planet reinforcements, there are more than enough clones on planet to overrun us eventually. No General can prevail outnumbered a thousand to one.” The temple shook again, this time from a much heavier blow. Orbital bombardment from the Star Destroyer overhead. The Jedi Order doesn’t need your skills as a General right now, but as a pilot. You need to take the old Masters and the younglings and get them away from here so that the Jedi Order can live on.”
She looked at him for a long moment before nodding and walking away. Anakin cursed in Huttese under his breath, and stalked away towards the Creche