FORCE ECLIPSE: Episode I: Parallax

"And they were made to wander in the wilderness of unknown space, until all the generation that had done evil in the Force was forgotten. And behold, ye are risen up in your fathers' stead, a progeny of fallen men"

Prophecy of the Second Rising, The Accounting of Irtaz, Book III, 965 BrS

CHAPTER 1

For an abrupt moment, it seemed time smoothed out. Everything was still. The air hung immobile, blood hesitated in the veins, and even the particle shield that closed off the chamber seemed to pause in its deadly hum, dancing electrons falling silent in their dance.

A small hand, a child's hand, touched his shoulder lightly. He barely pulled his consciousness away from this moment of complete and unnatural quiescence. Time snapped back into place and the shields closing off the chamber obligingly snapped open. A second pair of feet thundered down the corridor, skidding to a shocked stop. "Sir! What happened?"

The Jedi stirred, picking up the lightsaber hilt that had fallen at his side. Action, not introspection, he thought, pushing aside his uncertainty. The child beside him was breathing the deep steady breaths of the unconscious yet unharmed. The man he was kneeling beside was badly hurt…but not dead. Breathe barely whispered past his rapidly bluing lips, his eyes already closed.

"Is there a stasis unit nearby?" the Jedi asked the new arrival, a pilot for the Royal Security Forces. Knowing that the man on the floor had a badly injured spine, yet knowing there was no other choice, the Jedi braced his arms under the elderly body and lifted him carefully, securely. "He needs to be stabilized immediately for medical transport."

The pilot shook off his worry and shock in recognition that answers would have to come later. "The hanger, sir – we have portable stasis pods there."

Curtly the Jedi nodded, and after a pointed look between the pilot and the unconscious child, set off down the hall and across the labyrinth of catwalks in long urgent strides. He did not need to look behind him to know that the rattled pilot was following his example, scooping up the unconscious child and hurrying to press his steps close behind. To the Jedi, the pilot fairly reeked of confusion, but also determination. That was good.

There was no one else in the cavernous underbelly of the city generator, but had there been an audience upon one of the empty catwalks between the massive pillars of plasma and empty space, it would appear to the observer that the Jedi was the very paragon of calm, controlled, implacable determination – despite the slipping strength and grievous wound of the man he carried. Indeed, even if one could have the ability to divine that warrior's deepest thoughts, they might have marveled at the determined clarity of his mind. Secure the injured. Find out what is happening. Fix it. He did not have time to think much beyond that – the moment demanded recognition of its own urgency. He clenched his jaw, biting down on the bad, bad feeling that wanted to be screamed out in warning. There was no time to debate his course of action. He had known this in an instant, in a touch, and acted according. It was as simple as that.

The main hanger had become an impromptu triage area for the Royal Security Forces. Emerging from the generator core, the Jedi and pilot carried their injured past the wounded soldiers lined up under the blue-sensors of the two overworked med-droids to a side chamber where stasis units were stored. As he calibrated the units to suspend and preserve the quickly fading life of the injured man, the Jedi was approached by a young dark-skinned RSF officer, surprisingly steady considering the heavy bandage across his left eye and the shallow scalp wound tracing back from his brow. "Sir! We have been trying to hail you on the com. With the central command computer destroyed, the royal compound is secured, but a unit of droidekas has pinned down Her Majesty and first squadron on the upper levels." The officer's singular eye that was not securely bandaged was red-rimmed in barely controlled panic. "They are attacking all who approach and are not responding to electronic command. Second squadron is covering from the east end of the hall, but we have already lost too many men to advance any further. Their shields are impenetrable!"

The Jedi frowned, ever so slightly. Droidekas. Royalty. It was an unhappy combination.

Nonetheless, it was the correct course of action. A weight settled on his shoulders as he felt the hope and trust of the men around him. Nodding, he turned to the pilot that had helped carry up the unconscious child and was even now hovering over the stasis pod where his charge was being put in suspended animation. "Lieutenant …?" the Jedi prompted.

"Gavyn Sykes, sir" the young pilot supplied.

"Lietenant Sykes, see what you can do about getting transport for the injured." Turning on his heel, he allowed the RSF officer who had carried the summons to lead the across the hanger to the correct entrance out of the city power complex Seeing that the young man was too injured to go much further, the Jedi touched the officer's elbow and jerked his chin back down the hall. "Go back. I will take it from here." With the injured seen to, the Jedi cast out his senses and sprinted down the abandoned passageway between the compounds, emerging at the base of giant glass and marble rotunda that stretched up thirty levels in a dizzying spiral of pillared balconies. Evidence of a heavy firefight was immediately apparent in the scrap-metal heaps of disabled droids abandoned on the marble floors, casualties of battle incongruous with the golden daylight streaming though the antique glass-paned windows.

His eyes were drawn urgently upward. The Jedi vaulted up the sloping spiral ramps that connected the rotunda's many levels. Long before the final turn of staircase, where the pathway broke through the vaulted ceiling supporting the final floor beneath the rotunda dome, he could feel the anger and the terror of the cornered security forces and hear their sharply raised voices over the staccato exchange of blaster fire. Second squadron was arrayed in the sun-filled top level, hunched behind a towering white statue of an ancient king, his hand raised either in benediction or warning. A pale and sweating RSF captain, the graze of an indirect blaster-hit evident across the shoulder of his red armor, signaled to the new arrival. In hurried tones he explained that these droidekas, as the Viceroy's personal guard, must have not been tied into the central command computer that had been destroyed, immobilizing all other droid units. They were still acting on their last received command to protect the throne room.

The Jedi slid along the curving marble base, darting to the side of the room and moving quietly along the outer wall to where the domed chamber opened onto the entrance of a large hallway. A flash of movement, barely enough to register in the human eye, much less a droid's visual receptors – and the Jedi knew all he needed to. He spotted three droidekas guarding the end of the cavernous hall at a distance of about 90 standard meters, where two side passages intersected before of a sealed durasteel door. The wheel-like droids were unfolded into battle-stance, their shields engaged and weapons trained down the main passage, relying on the superior long-range aim of their twin-mounted Colocoid blaster cannons to suppress the greater numbers of RSF forces carrying S-5 heavy pistols. The hall's curving ceiling retreated to four times the height of a man, leaving only empty space in the line of fire before the dangerous droids. The half-pillars studding the walls between the large recessed windows may have provided some meager cover to advance towards in the hallway, but would be insufficient for any sustained attack. Any sane tactical analysis could yield only one conclusion: direct assault would be suicide.

"This should be easy" the Jedi muttered lightly, though his remarks lacked an appreciative audience. He unclipped the saber hilt from his belt, its solid weight and grip both unfamiliar and familiar in his hand. He turned back to the squadron's captain, signaling to hold their positions. In a snap-hiss the lightsaber sprang to life and all concerns were pushed aside but for the long open path before him. With a tense twirl of the wrist that sent the green blade in a humming circle, the Jedi launched himself forward. Lunge low. Leap. Snap back two blaster bolts. Leap. Kick off the wall. Redirect. Land and pivot. Lunge. As quickly as he changed direction, the droidekas' blasters followed his erratic progress. Errant shots busted open windows and walls, unleashing a maelstrom of glass and plaster. Bolts deflected by the quick slash of a saber snapped back harmlessly into the droideka's shields. None hit their moving mark; in the space of two breaths, the Jedi had cut the space between them in half. Shifting from a two-hand to one-hand grip, he felt the pure potential of his actions curling around him. Throwing out his free hand, a push of the Force battered down the hall to the three droids, thrusting them flush against the durasteel door they had been blockading. Their ray shields sputtered and flared brightly at the inescapable foreign intrusion of the durasteel barrier, but the droidekas continued firing as he continued advancing. Blaster bolts rained down around him, and the droids' shields flared a brighter and more uncertain blue as each bolt was deflected backwards. Sweat beaded down his spine as he pushed forward, holding down the droidekas with an outflung hand. Snapping and flashing under the combined strain of the deflected blasts and the intrusion of the durasteel door within their protected circumference, the droids' ray shields began to overload, their heatsinks incapable of dissipating enough of the excess energy. The Jedi, somersaulting forward, knew this as intimately as he knew the explosions of his own breath, as he knew the currents of blaster-charged air that surrounded him, as he knew the unyielding matter of the durasteel before him and the splintering atoms of the glass around him.

With complete and unerring trust in the Force, the Jedi lunged forward one last time: pivoting and leaping high to the ceiling, tucking into himself, tumbling down delicately between the three droidekas just as their shields sputtered to darkness, unfurling his body at the last moment, sweeping round in a full turn as he allowed gravity to take hold, lightsaber wheeling out in a single arc slicing through the unprotected droids… and it was done. The severed components fell silent to the floor even in the same second he landed in a drop-stance; one leg crouched against the impact of gravity, catching his falling weight, the other stretched before him unhindered, ready to propel into action. The long slim braid that hung behind the Jedi's ear fell forward over his shoulder.

Behind him, the clatter of approaching feet signaled the end of the battle. Standing and deactivating his lightsaber, he turned to the scarred durasteel door. It slid back to reveal an assembly of RSF forces that flanked a regal young woman in battle dress standing beside a bank of sunlit windows. He bowed, exhaustion tugging tentatively at his limbs, his stamina draining along with his certainty. The last of the most obvious dangers were removed… and that was not precisely a comfort.

The young royal motioned him forward, while turning to the RSF commander at her side. "Is that the last of the droids?"

The Jedi came forward into the round chamber to stand beside the Queen. He heard the RSF commander reply in the affirmative, but his attention had been arrested by a sight in the half-mirrored surface of the window beside her. The young monarch, blaster still in hand, turned to her rescuer. "We are once more in your debt, Jedi Kenobi." When the Jedi so addressed failed to respond, failed even to move his eyes from whatever had riveted his gaze to the window, a frown marred the Queen's face. "Is everything alright? Is that terrible warrior…"

"Dead." he said, with abrupt finality. He did not need to ask what terrible warrior she was talking about. Dead and fallen into an unshielded reactor pit, cut cleanly in half, sai tok – he remembered that much. A kick to the jaw, pain like a white starburst… tumbling…

"Where is Master Jinn? Anakin? Are they ok? "

The silent Jedi passed a tired hand over his face, pressing away the anxiety that was cramping up his temples and blurring his sight. He turned away from the window to face the young monarch. He did not know what to say. Her Majesty's control began to waver, concern stuttering across her features.

"I do not know" he replied, softly, uncertainly, wearily, clipping the saber in his hand back onto his belt in an unconscious gesture.

The injured leader of second squadron stepped forward, comm unit in hand, looking nervously between the Queen and the quiet Jedi. "Queen Amidala, Jedi Kenobi, sir, I have word from Lieutenants Sykes and Typho in the main hanger that the conditions of Master Jinn and Anakin have stabilized in the stasis pods. Ric Olie is currently trying to scramble transports to Central Medical for our injured, but the vehicles that were not damaged in the fight seem to have been sabotaged by the Trade Federation."

The Queen turned to the Jedi for explanation.

"I do not know what happened" he began to say, shaking his head before bring his eyes up to meet the Queen's sharp, worried gaze. He turned the names over in his head. Anakin, Jinn, Amidala…none of them made any sense. "I do not remember." The Jedi turned back to the reflective, half-mirrored surface of the sun-lit window. A young man gazed back at him, his ginger hair bristling and fading into the shafts of sunlight that washed across the windows, his blue-green eyes half mirrored back, half receding into the far-away vista. A stranger.

A message arrived on Coruscant, somewhat later than expected. To those who listened attentively to such things, something had trembled, risen, and stilled in the distant spark of the Force known as Naboo two days previous. Yet no message had immediately followed. Below its five gleaming spires, the bristling antenna on the Jedi Temple picked up long-range signals of all types and frequencies, attentively stretching into the barely audible and barely visible – to mechanical eyes and ears only – broadcast signals and holonet transmissions that linked together members of the Order across the known galaxy. And so it was somewhat of a delayed surprise to receive a packaged subspace databurst – the technology was old, cumbersome, and not often utilized beyond a last resort. Clearly, the damage the Trade Federation had wreaked on Naboo's communications systems had not been fully addressed.

The message bore news both welcome and unwelcome. A holovid of Queen Amidala reported that the Trade Federation invasion had been halted, but the crisis continued. Efforts were underway to relocate the humans and Gungans that been held in detainment camps, but the cities' infrastructures had been badly damaged. Engineers were needed almost as desperately as food and medical supplies. Along with interplanetary communication, all transports capable of travel outside of Naboo's system had been uniformly sabotaged. The databurst also contained the first of a set of security records and official requisitions for Senatorial disaster aid.

However, it was the second holovid in the databurst that had been received by the Jedi High Council with mingled horror and relief. The 25-year old senior padawan stood stiffly in the holorecorder's pick-up range, arms into the sleeves of his robe: This is Obi-Wan Kenobi reporting from Naboo. The Trade Federation invasion was overturned by a coalition of Naboo Royal Security Forces and Gungans. Master Qui-Gon Jinn has been severely injured by a lightsaber stab to his torso, severing his spine and collapsing a lung. He is in stasis but requires immediate transport –local medical facilities are unequipped for the current crisis. There are no ships to transport even the most severely wounded out of system. Master Jinn was injured fighting a Force-trained attacker, a Zabrak trained in the dark-side… The hologram Padawan shifted nervously, his long braid falling behind his shoulder… The attacker is dead. I am physically uninjured but I – I regret to inform you that I have no memory. No memory of anything occurring before the attack. I did not even know my name until I was told it …the Padawan looked down, as if somehow he could escape the gaze of the holorecorder. A moment passed, the slightest hesitation. The tiny transparent figure was unnaturally still, even for a hologram, as he picked his head back up to continue speaking, gazing at some unseen and unknown point beyond the scope of the recording. In light of current necessities, I am acting in accord with the mandates of a Senatorial Ambassador to document and mediate the situation here. Queen Amidala and Boss Nass of the Gungans are drafting a treaty to formalize the new terms of their cooperation. Federation Viceroy Gunray is under my guard in Theed, awaiting transport for trial, and I am aiding in the organization of the recovery efforts by the remaining Royal security forces and Gungan volunteers. I await your counsel.

Mace Windu sank into a contemplative posture as the council members around him stirred in discussion of plans and deployment. Two days previous, while sunken deep into mediation, Mace had been seeking out the diamond planes of cause and consequence in the Force when he felt something – something distant, something huge – shatter. This message raised as many questions as it answered.

Year 968 ABR [3: 4: 33]

His name was Obi-Wan Kenobi. He was a Padawan learner of the Jedi Order, apprenticed to Master Qui-Gon Jinn. He was on the planet of Naboo, whose elected monarch – a fourteen-year old girl – he was assigned to protect. No matter how many times he told himself these things, he could not remember them. They were facts without any basis in experience. Were it not for the complete though unexplainable certainty that succumbing to fear was unacceptable, Obi-Wan would have crumbled into a terrified paralysis days ago.

He stood on the venerable Bassa Bridge at the city's center, the swollen Solleu River surging beneath his feet. Healers at Theed's Central Medical station had nothing new to report and after allowing Obi-Wan a brief visit, had taken note of the Jedi padawan's own exhaustion and forced him out of their ward with the promise that any change in the conditions of Master Jinn or Anakin Skywalker would be immediately reported. Nothing was likely to change. Both remained in suspended animation, Qui-Gon's injuries too severe to treat and Anakin's coma utterly unexplainable. Still, danger seemed to coil in the force around them both, and Obi-Wan worried for them, though he could not allow worry for himself. Leaning against the bridge's balustrade, Obi-Wan turned his eyes to the sky with the vague wish that that even class 4 hyperspace engines could travel faster. That morning, engineers had at last restored holonet capabilities, bringing with it news that the newly promoted Chancellor Palpatine would be arriving on Naboo within a day, bringing with him relief supplies, emergency workers from the Republic Judicial Forces, and Jedi.

Obi-Wan's hand passed gently over the lightsaber that hung at his belt, a weapon he knew to be not his but his master's. He had reviewed the security holos of his fight with the dark-sider in the Generator complex fight. They conformed to what he remembered of the confrontation and revealed nothing new in the moments after the Zabrak's defeat: recoding that Anakin had run unerringly to the reactor pit only moments after landing in the hanger, recording Obi-Wan unmoving beside his master's prone form, recording the moment the small boy touched both Jedi and slumped unconscious beside them, recording the arrival of Lieutenant Sykes who had followed Anakin's unexplained sprint through the generator complex, recording the instant Obi-Wan's queer stillness was shook off to look after his master and his young charge – the holovids recording everything had happened but showing no reason why. There was simply no explanation for his own loss of memory, the loss of everything that had come before the moment their fight spilled into the power station with a kick to the jaw – no explanation for why he could remember every thrust and parry, every leap and fall, and yet not remember who he was, where he was, and why in the only memory he possessed he had screamed as if it had been his own body injured when forced to watch and not act as the red blade swung around to meet unprotected flesh..

As it became apparent that answers were not quickly forthcoming, it had seemed equally evident to Obi-Wan that brooding would be unproductive. It would take wisdom greater than his to coax answers from this confusion. Faced with the suffering of so many on Naboo, he gave himself over to what had to be done now, what could be done now – trusting to the demands of his duties as a Jedi and ambassador for the Republic.

The tired padawan shifted restlessly against the ancient stonework of Bassa Bridge. Duty rested for the moment. He knew he should make his way back to the Palace compound, but something also bid him to stay his feet and rest awhile on the ancient, though hardly fragile, bridge. And so it was that in the hour Obi-Wan stood there twilight came to Theed, a soft retreat that cast an indigo haze on the surrounding mountains and laid a blanket of darkness on the valley floor long before the last tips of golden light faded from the cliff-top's gently rounding towers. The city was quiet, though to Obi-Wan's senses it felt that a thread of wariness and sorrow was woven through the great surging clamor of the city's victory, a susurrus of mournful wind beneath the crashing roar of the falls. His reverie was interrupted by an approaching presence, a keen solidity in the Force that was felt long before any soft footfalls were heard. A slight figure in a handmaiden's hood and cloak hurried across the bridge, slowing only when realizing that she was being watched. Obi-Wan bowed as she walked closer. "Your Highness" he greeted her, casting his voice softly so as not to unduly broadcast the Queen's presence when unaccompanied by her usual protectors. "Even with the Federation army disabled, it is still not safe to move about without some kind of escort."

She held up a hand that wavered between an imperious command and a casual brush-off. "I am not wholly defenseless. This is my home, my city. I am not afraid – and do call me Padme."

"Your skill and bravery are not at question -- my lady." he replied stubbornly, motioning for her to continue on where she had been walking. It was just as well that he had been led to wait on the bridge, as he could now accompany her back to the Palace. "But the bloody-minded determination of your enemies should be likewise acknowledged."

Padme Amidala Nabierre sighed, in something as close to resignation as Obi-Wan had ever heard from the queen. "I was just checking in on Anakin and Master Jinn and then heading straight back." She shook her head, forestalling his objections. "I know nothing has changed, but I had not yet seen them for myself."

Obi-Wan could feel the competing tides of worry, guilt, and exhaustion pull at the queen. Compassion is both her extraordinary strength and her weaknes he thought Obi-Wan laid a gentle hand on her shoulder, knowing that nothing he said could be an adequate reply. They walked circumspectly, avoiding the wide-open processional plaza and making their way back to the palace through the quiet side streets of Theed. Slowly, Padme pulled herself away from grief to a place of quiet contemplation, and Obi-Wan let his guiding hand drop from her shoulder, venturing to comment "In any regard, Captain Panaka and Sabe would not be pleased with this use of your decoy system." Taking a different tact, Obi-Wan let amusement color his voice. "If you will not take my word as your guide, at least consider it on Panaka's behalf. He does fret and worry so."

Padme gave him a smile whose humor failed to reach her eyes. "Just because you can see through the use of decoys, my dear Jedi, does not mean that it is an imperfect security measure."

Obi-Wan regarded her with a guileless placidity. "I must say that for a politician, m' lady, your duplicity, which intrinsic to your occupation, is at least admirably concrete rather than ideological in expression."

"Obi-Wan!" Caught off guard, she laughed. "Well then I must say that for one sworn to serve the Republic you seem to have very little respect for its political representatives."

Obi-Wan's earnest face parodied his usual seriousness. "I would remind you, madam, that a politician alone does not the Republic make."

He smiled in return, though, as Padme laughed again and teasingly jostled him with her shoulder. "Have you always had a low opinion of politics or is it only since coming into my company?" she asked. Then, seeing her companion stiffen, her merriment fell in the realization of her mistake. "I am sorry, I did not mean to…"

"No" he replied softly, "there is no reason to apologize. There is no harm in speaking of it." He shrugged. "I know that most politicians are untrustworthy, the same way I know that a parsec is 3.62 light years, or that the planet of Yag'Dhul sits at the intersection of the Corellian Trade Spine and the Rimma Hyperspace Route. It is something I know without remembering how I know it." Seeing that this explanation had failed to assuage her concern, he smiled gently. "I can not explain it, but I trust in the Force. If it can be righted, it will be."

Padme hesitantly offered her smile back, before dropping her gaze away from her Jedi companion. Even so, her doubts were easy to read – she felt there was too much chaos in the cosmos to trust to its own righting. They had reached the palace steps, where the scars of tank fire marred the triumphal monuments to 800 years of unity. Looking around her, her sorrow dropped away. "There is so much that needs to be righted" she said – determined, fierce – and then, with a clear gaze, she turned back to Obi-Wan. "Actually, there is one thing that can be accomplished right now. Would you follow me?"

Obi-Wan nodded, following the Queen's lead across the Palace entry hall, up a turbolift and into to her private office. Like the rest of the Royal palace, even this small chamber was built on the scale of grandeur with the airy grace that transmuted the Naboo's habitual formality into a coolly cultured aesthetic – teetering as it was on the edges of the civilized galaxy. Yet, in the past days that had been spent in this room implementing recovery plans with Panaka and the Gungan delegation, Obi-Wan had come to recognize beneath the stacks of flimsiplast and datapads the small signs that this office had been something of a haven for the Queen before the war, though now her treasured books of law and few personal holograms were now swamped in the sudden chaos of war recovery. What the Queen pulled out from her desk drawer, however, was a relic of Obi-Wan's former days and not her own. Padme watched Obi-Wan's reaction carefully. "The work crew cleaning up the generator station this evening found it at the bottom of an reactor shaft."

As Obi-Wan took the proffered item from her, he did not need to ask whichreactor shaft. There was much he had forgotten, but he remembered that much. He turned the battered lightsaber hilt over in his hands, the hilt he knew was his. A lightsaber is a Jedi's life he thought, running his finger along the long crack in the metal casing. He did not question where the thought arose from; it was a knowledge that did not bear questioning. The interior lens array was sure to be badly damaged. Lightsabers are resilient, but the velocity at impact after such a long fall would be considerable. Is it beyond repair?

Nodding to Padme, he unconsciously allowed something of what he felt, the great confused jumble of it, to touch his features. "Thank you." With a bow he retreated, and she let him go without further comment. She understood, a little, what it was like to have something so inextricably dear to you be returned to your care broken.

Obi-Wan did not immediately retreat to the solitude of his guest chambers. Turning aside his confused swelling of emotions, he instead walked back down into the Palace Plaza. It was a simple progression of logic. If his lightsaber had been recovered from the Theed Generator Complex then so had the body of the attacker. He did not ask where the body was held, though in truth he did not need to ask. He allowed his feet to walk as they will, his consciousness spilled out in nothing more than the awareness of the moment, the now-ness and the thing-ness of it all. It was the same trust in his own two feet that had gotten him safely through the first confusing moments after the Zabrak's attack. It was a trust that had seen him safely through the past week, and it did not fail him now. He found himself back at the Royal hanger attached to Theed's power generator, standing before a locked storage chamber, extending out his senses. The mechanical lock could be easily triggered. A twist of concentration and the door snapped open. Resting on two crates was a long silver container with a transparisteel top.

I have spent too much time gazing into stasis pods, Obi-Wan mused, the difference being that the pair of silent stasis pods in Theed Central Medical still held living charges – though death was close to each, both boy and man. Every time he visited them, Obi-Wan reached out to feel the banked embers of their Force presences beneath the electric hum of the machines that kept life and lifelessness in balance. He did not truly know them. He knew their faces only in squinting against the silver glow that lit the fragile skin of each unit's inhabitants with unforgiving clarity, revealing every fine wrinkle of age, the tender perfection of scuffed skin over half-grown bones. Closing his eyes briefly, Obi-Wan pushed aside these thoughts to center his concentration on the actual pod before him. This stasis pod in the hanger-side storage chamber was calibrated for static containment rather than animated suspension. Moving quietly to stand beside the powered-down unit, Obi-Wan gazed at its contents dispassionately. The body within was badly mangled, its former shape almost unrecognizable beneath the black cloth. His features were barely decipherable, red on red. The twisted black tattoos that had transformed his face into the stuff of a youngling's nightmare were the only testimony to the Zabrak's former ferocity. Obi-Wan wondered that he felt nothing for the remnant of a living being before him. He did not anger at his ferocious attack, nor fear for that attack's implications and consequences. To his shame, he felt not grief for the senseless waste of life, nor compassion, nor even pity that the Force could have been so corrupted in one sentient being, so much potential lost. Indeed, it seemed a wonder that the darkness of his former presence did not squat in the ruined flesh. The evil intent that had surrounded the Zabrak in life had been a nearly palpable thing, a clammy musk… blackness thrown between the clashes of red, blue, and green energy, careening between pillars of superheated plasma, a kick to the jaw, pain white as a starburst…tumbling. He shook his head at the sudden surge of memory. It stood out, solitary in his mind like a sore nerve, pained at the slightest touch. Yet in wrenching away his focus from the elusive past, something glimmered in Obi-Wan's mind, a moment of prescience like an enemy seen in the far periphery of the eye. This dark-sider is dangerous, he thought. IS, not was. Obi-Wan shook off the sudden, ill feeling. That makes little sense – concentrate on the present moment. That thought, inexplicably comforting, was enough to turn Obi-Wan's attention once more to the ruined body in front of him. Feeling out through the Force again, there was something there: a presence, a resonance in the inanimate flesh, a rotting bitterness – just nothing of the overwhelming darkness in Force that he remembered. Obi-Wan locked the storage room as he left. He was done here.

The senate transport hesitated and touched down with the slightest hitch of disengaging repulsorlifts. With little ado, a boarding ramp opened, spilling out a blue-armored line of Senatorial guards and a heavily robed middle-aged human, a diminutive figure though his velvet-scaled chest puffed out in pride.

Chancellor Palpatine and his impromptu procession paused before the Jedi padawan who stood respectfully before and aside of the Queen's party. The chancellor smiled. "We are indebted to your bravery, Obi-Wan Kenobi. The sacrifices of the Jedi will long be remembered on Naboo." Chancellor Palpatine spoke with the manner of one magnanimously concerned and charmingly grateful. But the discerning eye could see the stiffness in Obi-Wan's gracious nod, as though he was taking refuge in stoic diplomacy.

The discerning eye in question belonged to one long used to such observation of Padawan Kenobi. The Chancellor barreled on towards Queen Amidala, his guards flowing past and around Obi-Wan like a rock in the stream, but it was apparent that the padawan's attention was truly trained on the presences in the Force now coming down from the ship. Obi-Wan heard the greeting between the two politicians without truly listening, bowing instead to the beings before him. Jedi. Their presence sang with it. The foremost of the group, a bald dark-skinned human in the prime of his age looked to the smallest of his companions, a wizened green-skinned creature, with a sharp comment etched in his raised brow. Masters Yoda and Windu were ushered forward and introduced to the gravely formal Queen of Naboo. They noticed the quietly desperate scrutiny with which Obi-Wan attended the introduction of the newly arrived Jedi contingent, committing their names and faces to memory as if for the first time. The worst possible of their suspicions were confirmed. Padawan Kenobi had recognized them as Jedi, but did not truly know them.

Mace was more than familiar with Qui-Gon Jinn's padawan. The friendship between the Korun councilor and Qui-Gon has thrived despite, or at times seemingly due to, their long-standing disagreements. Young Kenobi existed in the eyes of many only as a shadow of his renegade Master, the quiet obedient perfect padawan, but in the past years Obi-Wan had grown into a valued third voice in Mace and Qui-Gon's private debates. Though he disagreed dearly with the manner in which it was raised, Mace had agreed with Qui-Gon's assertion to the Council that his padawan was ready to face the trials. Now – faced with the irrefutable fact of this padawan greeting his fellow Jedi with neither his Master nor his memory intact, faced with the prospect of so much lost for the sake of a Sith's defeat – it uncharacteristically disturbed the Jedi Master to remember that the trials of Knighthood took a different form for every Jedi.