[Jedi Quest] - 06(22)

Anakin puzzled over that. She had risked thousands of lives for his. Why?

Chosen, you may be. But for what? Your question to answer, it is.

Was that why she had saved him?

If that was the reason, he could not bear the responsibility. Her death was his fault.

A pair of dusty, muddy boots appeared. Obi-Wan crouched down.

“Something terrible has happened,” he said. “I felt the Force surge, and then retreat, like a vacuum. Tell me.”

“Master Yaddle is dead,” Anakin said, his voice muffled.

Obi-Wan breathed in, absorbing his shock. “How?”

Anakin told him the story in a neutral tone. If he added his feelings to the telling, he would not be able to finish.

Obi-Wan was silent for long moments. He sat back on his heels and looked up at the sky.

“She went below for me,” Anakin said. “She saved me first. If I hadn’t been captured…”

“Stop.” It was Obi-Wan’s sternest tone. “Jedi do not go down the path of ‘ifs.’ You know that, Anakin. You choose in each moment what your next step will be. You do not look back in judgment.”

Obi-Wan stood. “Yaddle made the only choice she could, and she made it freely.”

Obi-Wan reached down. Anakin’s lightsaber was in his hand.

“We will mourn her, but not now. Now it is time to be a Jedi.”

Anakin took the lightsaber. He rose and tucked it into his belt. His Master’s words should have made Anakin feel better, but they hadn’t. They had almost seemed automatic, as though Obi-Wan didn’t really mean them.

Even Obi-Wan thought Anakin was responsible for Yaddle’s death.

Sorrow and guilt filled him up so far he felt he was drowning.

And then there was an explosion of light and sorrow… He had lost, in fact, everyone he loved, including Obi-Wan.

The vision had been right.





CHAPTER THIRTEEN


Obi-Wan contacted Yoda on the emergency channel. He hated having to be the one to break the news. He would bring Yoda great pain. He felt the pain himself, in the way his body moved like lead. He had barely been able to summon up the right words to say to Anakin, and he knew his words had not reached him.

All he could think of was Yaddle. She had been part of his life from his earliest memory. She had taken special delight in the young Jedi students. She had turned a blind eye to their pranks. She had hidden sweets in their pockets. Her touch on the top of his head had felt like the most comforting thing in the world.

And then he had grown, and things at the Temple had become more serious. There were hard lessons to learn. Yaddle had been there, in a different way. There had been so many times when he had knocked respectfully on her door with a problem he did not want to trouble Yoda with. Obi-Wan realized how exceptional it was that a member of the Jedi Council had allowed herself to be so available to every student. Obi-Wan had not been the only one to seek her counsel, to look for comfort there.

He had lost something so precious. It had been a part of his life for so long he hadn’t seen it clearly. Yaddle had just been there, with her quiet wisdom. It was almost as bad as losing Yoda would be.

He gave Yoda the details quickly, knowing he would want to hear everything.

Yoda’s voice was liquid with sorrow. “Felt the Force move, I did. Know I did that she was gone. Prepared my transport for Mawan, I already have. Her work, we must carry on. May the Force be with us.”

They hadn’t slept since Coruscant, but there was no time for sleep. With Yaddle’s death, the fragile coalition she had formed threatened to fall apart. News of the bioweapon had spread, and the Mawans were close to panic. If Granta Omega had a weapon that devastating, who could say that he did not have another?

Within hours, the Senate went back on their pledge to send a security force and sent word that they would await further developments. They would not commit an army to an unstable situation.

Anakin dropped his head in his hands at this news. “Isn’t the instability the point? That’s why we need them!”

Obi-Wan sighed. “Yes, but if the security force is beaten by crimelords, the Senators are afraid it will look bad for them. Their image is more important than Mawan’s security.”

“What can we do?” Anakin asked.

“That’s the simple part. Present them with an easy win,” Obi-Wan answered. “The hard part is setting that up. Granta Omega has become our biggest problem.”

“He would be happy to hear that,” Anakin said.

They sat in a small office in the makeshift command center the Senate Provisional Committee had set up. Now that the power grid was functioning, they could monitor the streets through a system of security cams set up around the city. Many had been smashed, but some were still functioning, enough to give them a sense of what was going on. The streets were eerily quiet. Criminal activity had either retreated into buildings or gone underground. The sun was just rising, penetrating the gray with a blush of pink. Obi-Wan wished he felt as hopeful as the scene painted.