Джуд Уотсон - Secrets Of The Jedi

He had to do something.

"Any ideas?" Taly asked.

"Yes. Hang on," Obi-Wan said as he flipped the ship upside down.

It was a maneuver he'd seen Anakin do, fly backward and upside down. Though I wouldn't recommend it, Anakin had said with a grin.

Obi-Wan headed straight for Magus. Padme zoomed out of his way, then up out of the trench for a moment. Evading fire, she managed to zoom past Magus and start back along the trench, marking time. Good move, Padme.

Obi-Wan did some quick calculations. His fingers flew on the weapons-system control board. It was hard to fly at the same time.

"What are you doing?" Taly asked.

"Disarming a concussion missile by half."

"Let me do it." Taly worked over the keyboard, fingers flying. "Done."

Obi-Wan slowed his speed. He didn't want to get too close — he had to be far enough away, past the top end of the missile's range, so that he didn't severely damage the ship. All he needed was shock waves. That, and Siri's command of the Force to know what was coming before Magus did.

He fired. The concussion missile flew and exploded.

The shock wave jolted Siri, but she recovered quickly.

Magus went flying. Obi-Wan saw him bounce out of the seat. At that instant, Siri dropped through the hole she had created.

The ship was careening crazily now. Siri was fighting for control. Obi-Wan reversed again. He thought he saw a dark shape move across the cockpit.

"They're fighting," Taly said.

The ship listed to one side. It spun out of control and clipped a gigantic pipe. Smoke began to pour out of the exhausts.

"The hydraulics are failing," Taly said anxiously.

Obi-Wan began to follow the route of the dying ship. He pushed the engines, but he watched in horror as the ship crashed into the trench. Sparks as big as fireballs flew in the air as it bounced against one wall, then another, then smashed into the side and stopped. Something flew out of the hole on the top, bounced and lay still. Magus.

Obi-Wan screamed down to the trench bottom. He activated the cockpit cover and leaped out. Magus was unmoving but he wasn't dead. Obi-Wan scrambled on top of the cruiser and dropped inside.

Was it now, or was it twenty years ago?

She lay on the floor of the cockpit in a crashed ship. Her blond head was pillowed in her arms.

He landed on his knees by her side.

He touched her hair. He could not bear to touch the pulse on her neck. He could not bear not to feel life there. "Siri."

"Blasterfire." She groaned as she turned slightly so she could look up at him. "Magus."

Obi-Wan glanced out of the cockpit window where Padme now stood, holding the rifle at the unconscious Magus. She was taking no chances. Taly stood next to her, a blaster in his hand, also pointed at Magus. Obi-Wan could see something working in Taly's face, a temptation to fire. He had, at his feet, the being who had killed his parents.

Above, in the sky, he saw Anakin diving around the attack cruisers, pummeling them with fire.

"Padme has him covered. We're safe for the moment."

"Everything is so gray."

"That was such a risky move," Obi-Wan said.

"It worked, didn't it?"

His relief at her sharp tone was erased when she winced, and he saw she was in great pain.

"I'll get the bacta…"

"Don't leave me." Siri's hand dropped on his. "I wanted to say — "

"Siri, I must get the med kit — "

"For star's sake, Obi-Wan, I'm dying. Do you have to interrupt me now?"

Tears sprang to his eyes. "You're not dying."

Her fingers plucked at her belt. "I can't… Get it for me."

Get what? he almost asked, but then he knew. He slipped her crystal out of her belt and pressed it into her hand.

"No… yours." She let it fall into his palm. "Now I will never leave you."

"You will never leave me," he repeated.

She touched his cheek, and her hand fell. "Don't worry so much," she said.

Her eyes closed, and she was gone.

He lay his head on the cockpit floor and held her hand. He did not know, at that moment, what living was for, if he had to carry this pain.

Anakin had been out of his mind with the frenzy to find her. He had attacked the ships again and again, determined to slip through.

When he saw that a ship had crashed, he had thought Padme was dead, and his heart had become a fist. Revenge was all he wanted.

And then as he swooped down he had seen her, blaster rifle in her hand, her face turned up toward him. He held her to him only seconds later.

"I'm afraid for Siri," she whispered.

Obi-Wan climbed out of the ruined ship. He came toward them. Something in his face, his walk was different.

"She has joined the Force." He spoke the words to them, but he was looking down at Magus. The bounty hunter was beginning to stir. Taly gripped the blaster tighter. Anakin saw strain and anguish in his face.

He wants to shoot, Anakin thought.

For the first time since he'd known Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin was afraid for his Master. He saw the way he looked at Magus. His eyes were dead, as if now there was nothing at his feet, not a living being, just clothes and hair and skin.

Obi-Wan activated his lightsaber.

Padme looked at Anakin, her eyes wide. Say something, her face pleaded. Stop him.

Anakin recognized that there was something here he could not stop.

Taly's breath caught. He did not take his eyes off Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan crouched down and held the glowing lightsaber to Magus's neck. He locked eyes with Magus. Anakin saw the flare of fear in the bounty hunter's eyes.

"You kill without thought or feeling," Obi-Wan said. "But I am not you."

He stood.

"Take him aboard," Obi-Wan said. "He is now a prisoner of war."

The codebreaker was lost in the Battle of Azure Spaceport. The fusion furnace blew, an explosion that came close to leveling the spaceport itself. The smoke that rose served as cover for the evacuation of Republic ships. General Solomahal was captured with the codebreaker as he attempted to escape with it. He blew it up instead of handing it over. Two days later, he managed to escape and was given another command.

The Separatist forces bombed Taly's laboratory. All his notes and documents were lost. It could take him years to reinvent what he had discovered… if he could reproduce it at all. In the meantime, he was taken in secrecy and transported to a Republic outpost.

On Coruscant, Anakin and Padme met before dawn in her apartment on her veranda. It was their favorite time to meet, under cover of darkness, but with the beginnings of morning freshness in the air. Even in the darkest of times, it made them feel hopeful.

"I am being sent away again," he told her. "Obi-Wan and I leave this morning."

"There is a vote I must attend this morning," Padme said. "So we must say good-bye here."

"A vote is so important?"

"They are all important now. Senator Organa needs my support."

Anakin made an impatient gesture, but he did not want to fight. He was still struck with the horror of almost losing her. But he did not understand these Senate votes, useless during a time of war when only battles won mattered.

"I will wait for you to return," Padme said. "I will wait as long as I must."

Anakin's eyes lifted to the Jedi Temple. What did they know, Yoda and Obi-Wan and Mace, of this? Of this moment of agony, being torn from his wife. He fought for them and alongside them, but they no longer had his heart. They no longer understood him.

He had thought for a moment on Azure that Obi-Wan had loved Siri. He thought he'd seen it in his Master's eyes after she had died. But Obi-Wan had stood over the man who had killed her and spared him. If he had loved Siri, could he have done that? Of course, it was what a Jedi should do. But the way Obi-Wan had spoken had been so measured. With a temperament like that, it was impossible to love, Anakin was sure.