Fic: White Rabbits (Star Wars, 17/?)
Title: White Rabbits
Chapter: 17/?
Author: Diana Michelle (butterfly)
Warnings: Spoilers for Revenge of the Sith.
Pairing: Eventual Anakin/Obi-Wan.
Rating: PG/PG-13-ish.
Summary: On their way to the others, Obi-Wan and Anakin take a detour.
Disclaimer: Not Lucas, don't own a thing, not making any money.
Chapter Index
Chapter Seventeen -- Ancient History
Obi-Wan was reasonably certain that he was leading Anakin toward the cockpit of the ship. At least, Anakin hadn’t yet tried to correct him, and he took that as a good sign.
They’d stopped talking just moments ago and Obi-Wan still felt a great deal of contentment from his recent decisions. Anakin would make his own choices, and Obi-Wan was no longer his Master. All he could offer, and that all he should offer now, was his support and his unwavering faith that Anakin would, when empowered with the correct knowledge, make the right decisions.
All they needed was that information that everyone had clearly lacked the first time around.
Then they could simply arrange for this future to never come to pass.
And that would not be a hardship at all. He’d found… Anakin’s children to be pleasant enough, but they were hardly worth the fall of the Order and of the Republic.
Hardly worth Anakin falling to the dark side.
There had to be a reason that the Force had brought them here, a reason that this was possible. Preventing the ruination of the Jedi Order seemed reason enough. Perhaps this was even a necessary, though cruel, test for Anakin as the Chosen One.
“Master,” Anakin said, stopping abruptly and tilting his head as if listening for something. Communing with the Force, without a doubt. Anakin was so fierce, so intense, in his connection with the Force. That was part of what made it so easy for Obi-Wan to believe, during that first year, that Qui-Gon had been right, that this boy was the subject of the prophecy. Even as a child, Anakin had had a way of noticing the detailed twists and minute ripples in the Force, and with a concentration that had rivaled any Master that Obi-Wan had ever known.
Not that he’d dream of saying such a thing to Anakin. Even at the tender age of ten, the boy had had enough arrogance without Obi-Wan puffing him up.
“Yes, Anakin?” Obi-Wan asked, when it became clear that Anakin wasn’t going to say anything else without being prompted first.
“I’d like to make a slight detour,” Anakin said. “As you know, if we curve off to the left, we’ll reach the cockpit, but if we walk past that corridor and just go around the bend, we’ll run into Threepio.”
“I know that you’re fond of droids, but I don’t see how Threepio can possibly help us if his mind has been wiped, and it clearly has,” Obi-Wan said.
“He can help us, Master,” Anakin said, looking at Obi-Wan with wide eyes, with that trick of managing to give the impression that he was quite young and still looking up at Obi-Wan, despite having been the taller of the pair since before he’d turned seventeen.
“How?” Obi-Wan asked, folding his arms together and wondering just what Anakin had up his sleeve this time. Anakin grinned, toothy and happy.
“I can bring his memory back,” he said. Obi-Wan tried to hide his reaction, but Anakin’s smile only grew.
“I didn’t think that was possible,” Obi-Wan said. “That’s the whole point of a mind-wipe - to make the information not just inaccessible, but non-existent.”
“If being with the Jedi has taught me anything, it’s just how valuable knowledge can be,” Anakin said. He still clearly pleased at having surprised Obi-Wan, and for once Obi-Wan couldn’t blame him - if Anakin had really managed to pull it off, he’d done something that no one else ever had. At least not on record. “So, when I reacquired Threepio, I worked out a way to route his memory through every system that runs him. His conscious mind can be wiped, but the memory is still there in his subroutines, including his personality subroutines. He’s still acting like Threepio, so I know that I can bring his memory back. I can do that with Artoo and Arfour, as well.”
“Anakin, you really didn’t have the authority to tamper with R4,” Obi-Wan said, but it was a reflex, as part of him was still overwhelmed at the magnitude of what Anakin had accomplished. “The astromechs are the property of the Republic.”
“All I did was make him better,” Anakin said. “The Council can’t complain about that.”
“Anakin, the Council does not exist simply to bedevil you,” Obi-Wan said. Anakin just kept smiling at him, and Obi-Wan allowed himself to give in to the glow of pride that he felt for Anakin. “Still, I must admit that I am impressed. Shall we find out how well it worked?”
“If that’s what you’d like, Master,” Anakin said, apparently willing enough to play indifferent now that he’d made his point.
And there Threepio was, tucked away, muttering to himself about that Han Solo character. Another marvel to Obi-Wan was how easily Anakin sensed droids - Obi-Wan could but it was profoundly different, and far more difficult, than sensing lifeforms. To Obi-Wan, droids buzzed like unpleasant but unobtrusive insects, and didn’t feel at all like the clean and soft pulses and purrs of people.
“Threepio,” Anakin said gently.
“Master… Anakin, was it?” Threepio asked. “How might I be of service?”
“I’d just like to take a look at some of your systems,” Anakin said, still speaking in that soft, beguiling tone. “You saw how careful I was with the engine earlier, so you know that I won’t damage anything.”
Threepio stared at Anakin for a moment, and if Obi-Wan didn’t know better, he’d swear that the droid was thinking the matter over and not just analyzing the data.
“Perhaps I should ask Master Luke first,” Threepio said.
“I know Artoo,” Anakin said. “And you mentioned earlier that you know Obi-Wan. You can trust me.”
Threepio turned towards Obi-Wan for a moment, and Obi-Wan gave it a game smile.
“Well, I suppose that it's all right,” Threepio said. “Master Luke trusted Obi-Wan Kenobi, very much. Would you like me to shut off?”
“You might want to,” Anakin said, moving forward and kneeling down in front of Threepio. “I’m going to open up your chest.”
“Oh, yes, I believe that I’d like to avoid seeing that,” Threepio said. The lights of his eyes flicked out.
Obi-Wan grimaced. The droids that Anakin spent a lot of time with always seemed to have a more… life-like quality than the other droids that Obi-Wan had encountered. He usually just blamed that on Anakin’s sheer brilliance with machines, but sometimes, he did wonder if something else was at work.
So, seeing Threepio taken apart felt oddly like watching an acquaintance being tended to in a medlab, despite Obi-Wan’s knowledge that Threepio did not have a connection to the Force.
Anakin was muttering to himself - he had a tendency towards that. Anakin liked to say what he was doing, liked keep the people around him updated on his progress, and just enjoyed to chatter on meaninglessly if there was nothing interesting to say.
Obi-Wan had gotten far too used to that tendency. On the few occasions in the last twelve years when he’d worked with other Jedi, he’d felt the weight of the silence as if it were a fault, and not the blessing of a shared wordless connection to the Force.
“Did you notice the leg?” Anakin asked, his voice suddenly louder, and Obi-Wan got the impression that Anakin wanted him to answer.
“Ah, the bottom half of the right one is silver,” Obi-Wan managed, after a moment. Anakin glanced back over his shoulder, with a sly smile.
“You only just noticed that,” Anakin said. Obi-Wan opened his mouth, took a long, hard look at the smugness on Anakin’s face, and then closed his mouth and gave an easy shrug.
“You’re absolutely right,” Obi-Wan said. “I hadn’t noticed before. I did recognize that it was Threepio.”
“And you’d like some credit for that, I suppose,” Anakin teased, turning back to what he was doing. “I’d say that it was replaced around ten years ago, give or take about a year. Judging from the way it was fitted, I’d also wager than the leg was burned off, not sheared or torn. Likely with a laser saw.”
“Hmm,” Obi-Wan said, trying to see just how Anakin could get all that from the way the joints were fitted together.
“And… there, we’re done,” Anakin said, gracefully standing up again and then turning Threepio back on.
A moment passed, and then Threepio’s eyes lit up again.
“Master Anakin?” This time, Threepio’s uncertainty sounded as if it stemmed from something greater than not being sure of a name. “I’m… experiencing a bit of confusion.”
“It’ll be all right,” Anakin soothed, rubbing his hand over Threepio’s arm, gloved metal over gilded. Obi-Wan shifted uncomfortably. “Just tell me what you remember.”
“Master Luke wanted me to go on a fact-finding mission with him,” Threepio said. “He wanted to find out more about his father… who is… you, sir, I do believe.”
“Yes, I know,” Anakin said. “What else? What was the last thing that happened before the confusion?”
“Senator Organa ordered that my mind be wiped!” Threepio said, in a tone of great shock. Obi-Wan winced despite himself. “And… Master Anakin, I’m afraid that I must inform you that Mistress Padmé has died.”
This time, it was Anakin who winced, though he seemed to rally himself quickly enough. “Do you know exactly how that happened, Threepio?”
“In childbirth,” Threepio said, after a moment of consideration.
“Having them killed her,” Anakin whispered and Obi-Wan only barely resisted reaching out to comfort him.
“I’m not entirely sure that that’s the best way to look at the situation,” Threepio said.
“Yet not without its truth,” Obi-Wan said. Was this was what they had come here to discover? If so, perhaps Anakin’s attachment to Padmé could be useful in the end. No matter how much Anakin might grown to like his children in the time they had spent here, Obi-Wan was certain that Anakin could not possibly care more for them than he did Padmé.
“We can’t let it happen,” Anakin said, hoarsely. “We have to go back and stop it from happening.”
“I agree,” Obi-Wan said, very carefully resting a hand on Anakin’s shoulder, feeling the tenseness of the muscles and how they relaxed, ever so slightly, at the continuation of Obi-Wan’s touch.
“But we need to know more,” Anakin said, stepping back and away from Threepio, towards Obi-Wan. “What else do I need to know, Threepio?”
“It’s a rather long story, sir,” Threepio said.
“Believe me when I say that we are very interested,” Obi-Wan said. Anakin flashed a quick smile at Obi-Wan, eyes soft and grateful. “Start with… our return from the Hargoeth mission.”
“That’s a rather memorable one, actually,” Threepio said. “Master Anakin was most displeased about that mission, and I can remember him complaining to Mistress Padmé that the Council was not taking his concerns seriously enough at all, despite Master Kenobi being rather badly injured…”
“Injured?” Anakin asked. “Injured how?”
“You didn’t say,” Threepio said. “And as the Chancellor decided in the end that Hargoeth wasn’t worth expending any more resources on, the subject became moot, though you and Mistress Padmé discussed it for over three weeks. Then there was a problem in the Outer Rim, and you and Master Kenobi were sent to deal with it…”
~end chapter seventeen~
Chapter: 17/?
Author: Diana Michelle (butterfly)
Warnings: Spoilers for Revenge of the Sith.
Pairing: Eventual Anakin/Obi-Wan.
Rating: PG/PG-13-ish.
Summary: On their way to the others, Obi-Wan and Anakin take a detour.
Disclaimer: Not Lucas, don't own a thing, not making any money.
Chapter Index
Chapter Seventeen -- Ancient History
Obi-Wan was reasonably certain that he was leading Anakin toward the cockpit of the ship. At least, Anakin hadn’t yet tried to correct him, and he took that as a good sign.
They’d stopped talking just moments ago and Obi-Wan still felt a great deal of contentment from his recent decisions. Anakin would make his own choices, and Obi-Wan was no longer his Master. All he could offer, and that all he should offer now, was his support and his unwavering faith that Anakin would, when empowered with the correct knowledge, make the right decisions.
All they needed was that information that everyone had clearly lacked the first time around.
Then they could simply arrange for this future to never come to pass.
And that would not be a hardship at all. He’d found… Anakin’s children to be pleasant enough, but they were hardly worth the fall of the Order and of the Republic.
Hardly worth Anakin falling to the dark side.
There had to be a reason that the Force had brought them here, a reason that this was possible. Preventing the ruination of the Jedi Order seemed reason enough. Perhaps this was even a necessary, though cruel, test for Anakin as the Chosen One.
“Master,” Anakin said, stopping abruptly and tilting his head as if listening for something. Communing with the Force, without a doubt. Anakin was so fierce, so intense, in his connection with the Force. That was part of what made it so easy for Obi-Wan to believe, during that first year, that Qui-Gon had been right, that this boy was the subject of the prophecy. Even as a child, Anakin had had a way of noticing the detailed twists and minute ripples in the Force, and with a concentration that had rivaled any Master that Obi-Wan had ever known.
Not that he’d dream of saying such a thing to Anakin. Even at the tender age of ten, the boy had had enough arrogance without Obi-Wan puffing him up.
“Yes, Anakin?” Obi-Wan asked, when it became clear that Anakin wasn’t going to say anything else without being prompted first.
“I’d like to make a slight detour,” Anakin said. “As you know, if we curve off to the left, we’ll reach the cockpit, but if we walk past that corridor and just go around the bend, we’ll run into Threepio.”
“I know that you’re fond of droids, but I don’t see how Threepio can possibly help us if his mind has been wiped, and it clearly has,” Obi-Wan said.
“He can help us, Master,” Anakin said, looking at Obi-Wan with wide eyes, with that trick of managing to give the impression that he was quite young and still looking up at Obi-Wan, despite having been the taller of the pair since before he’d turned seventeen.
“How?” Obi-Wan asked, folding his arms together and wondering just what Anakin had up his sleeve this time. Anakin grinned, toothy and happy.
“I can bring his memory back,” he said. Obi-Wan tried to hide his reaction, but Anakin’s smile only grew.
“I didn’t think that was possible,” Obi-Wan said. “That’s the whole point of a mind-wipe - to make the information not just inaccessible, but non-existent.”
“If being with the Jedi has taught me anything, it’s just how valuable knowledge can be,” Anakin said. He still clearly pleased at having surprised Obi-Wan, and for once Obi-Wan couldn’t blame him - if Anakin had really managed to pull it off, he’d done something that no one else ever had. At least not on record. “So, when I reacquired Threepio, I worked out a way to route his memory through every system that runs him. His conscious mind can be wiped, but the memory is still there in his subroutines, including his personality subroutines. He’s still acting like Threepio, so I know that I can bring his memory back. I can do that with Artoo and Arfour, as well.”
“Anakin, you really didn’t have the authority to tamper with R4,” Obi-Wan said, but it was a reflex, as part of him was still overwhelmed at the magnitude of what Anakin had accomplished. “The astromechs are the property of the Republic.”
“All I did was make him better,” Anakin said. “The Council can’t complain about that.”
“Anakin, the Council does not exist simply to bedevil you,” Obi-Wan said. Anakin just kept smiling at him, and Obi-Wan allowed himself to give in to the glow of pride that he felt for Anakin. “Still, I must admit that I am impressed. Shall we find out how well it worked?”
“If that’s what you’d like, Master,” Anakin said, apparently willing enough to play indifferent now that he’d made his point.
And there Threepio was, tucked away, muttering to himself about that Han Solo character. Another marvel to Obi-Wan was how easily Anakin sensed droids - Obi-Wan could but it was profoundly different, and far more difficult, than sensing lifeforms. To Obi-Wan, droids buzzed like unpleasant but unobtrusive insects, and didn’t feel at all like the clean and soft pulses and purrs of people.
“Threepio,” Anakin said gently.
“Master… Anakin, was it?” Threepio asked. “How might I be of service?”
“I’d just like to take a look at some of your systems,” Anakin said, still speaking in that soft, beguiling tone. “You saw how careful I was with the engine earlier, so you know that I won’t damage anything.”
Threepio stared at Anakin for a moment, and if Obi-Wan didn’t know better, he’d swear that the droid was thinking the matter over and not just analyzing the data.
“Perhaps I should ask Master Luke first,” Threepio said.
“I know Artoo,” Anakin said. “And you mentioned earlier that you know Obi-Wan. You can trust me.”
Threepio turned towards Obi-Wan for a moment, and Obi-Wan gave it a game smile.
“Well, I suppose that it's all right,” Threepio said. “Master Luke trusted Obi-Wan Kenobi, very much. Would you like me to shut off?”
“You might want to,” Anakin said, moving forward and kneeling down in front of Threepio. “I’m going to open up your chest.”
“Oh, yes, I believe that I’d like to avoid seeing that,” Threepio said. The lights of his eyes flicked out.
Obi-Wan grimaced. The droids that Anakin spent a lot of time with always seemed to have a more… life-like quality than the other droids that Obi-Wan had encountered. He usually just blamed that on Anakin’s sheer brilliance with machines, but sometimes, he did wonder if something else was at work.
So, seeing Threepio taken apart felt oddly like watching an acquaintance being tended to in a medlab, despite Obi-Wan’s knowledge that Threepio did not have a connection to the Force.
Anakin was muttering to himself - he had a tendency towards that. Anakin liked to say what he was doing, liked keep the people around him updated on his progress, and just enjoyed to chatter on meaninglessly if there was nothing interesting to say.
Obi-Wan had gotten far too used to that tendency. On the few occasions in the last twelve years when he’d worked with other Jedi, he’d felt the weight of the silence as if it were a fault, and not the blessing of a shared wordless connection to the Force.
“Did you notice the leg?” Anakin asked, his voice suddenly louder, and Obi-Wan got the impression that Anakin wanted him to answer.
“Ah, the bottom half of the right one is silver,” Obi-Wan managed, after a moment. Anakin glanced back over his shoulder, with a sly smile.
“You only just noticed that,” Anakin said. Obi-Wan opened his mouth, took a long, hard look at the smugness on Anakin’s face, and then closed his mouth and gave an easy shrug.
“You’re absolutely right,” Obi-Wan said. “I hadn’t noticed before. I did recognize that it was Threepio.”
“And you’d like some credit for that, I suppose,” Anakin teased, turning back to what he was doing. “I’d say that it was replaced around ten years ago, give or take about a year. Judging from the way it was fitted, I’d also wager than the leg was burned off, not sheared or torn. Likely with a laser saw.”
“Hmm,” Obi-Wan said, trying to see just how Anakin could get all that from the way the joints were fitted together.
“And… there, we’re done,” Anakin said, gracefully standing up again and then turning Threepio back on.
A moment passed, and then Threepio’s eyes lit up again.
“Master Anakin?” This time, Threepio’s uncertainty sounded as if it stemmed from something greater than not being sure of a name. “I’m… experiencing a bit of confusion.”
“It’ll be all right,” Anakin soothed, rubbing his hand over Threepio’s arm, gloved metal over gilded. Obi-Wan shifted uncomfortably. “Just tell me what you remember.”
“Master Luke wanted me to go on a fact-finding mission with him,” Threepio said. “He wanted to find out more about his father… who is… you, sir, I do believe.”
“Yes, I know,” Anakin said. “What else? What was the last thing that happened before the confusion?”
“Senator Organa ordered that my mind be wiped!” Threepio said, in a tone of great shock. Obi-Wan winced despite himself. “And… Master Anakin, I’m afraid that I must inform you that Mistress Padmé has died.”
This time, it was Anakin who winced, though he seemed to rally himself quickly enough. “Do you know exactly how that happened, Threepio?”
“In childbirth,” Threepio said, after a moment of consideration.
“Having them killed her,” Anakin whispered and Obi-Wan only barely resisted reaching out to comfort him.
“I’m not entirely sure that that’s the best way to look at the situation,” Threepio said.
“Yet not without its truth,” Obi-Wan said. Was this was what they had come here to discover? If so, perhaps Anakin’s attachment to Padmé could be useful in the end. No matter how much Anakin might grown to like his children in the time they had spent here, Obi-Wan was certain that Anakin could not possibly care more for them than he did Padmé.
“We can’t let it happen,” Anakin said, hoarsely. “We have to go back and stop it from happening.”
“I agree,” Obi-Wan said, very carefully resting a hand on Anakin’s shoulder, feeling the tenseness of the muscles and how they relaxed, ever so slightly, at the continuation of Obi-Wan’s touch.
“But we need to know more,” Anakin said, stepping back and away from Threepio, towards Obi-Wan. “What else do I need to know, Threepio?”
“It’s a rather long story, sir,” Threepio said.
“Believe me when I say that we are very interested,” Obi-Wan said. Anakin flashed a quick smile at Obi-Wan, eyes soft and grateful. “Start with… our return from the Hargoeth mission.”
“That’s a rather memorable one, actually,” Threepio said. “Master Anakin was most displeased about that mission, and I can remember him complaining to Mistress Padmé that the Council was not taking his concerns seriously enough at all, despite Master Kenobi being rather badly injured…”
“Injured?” Anakin asked. “Injured how?”
“You didn’t say,” Threepio said. “And as the Chancellor decided in the end that Hargoeth wasn’t worth expending any more resources on, the subject became moot, though you and Mistress Padmé discussed it for over three weeks. Then there was a problem in the Outer Rim, and you and Master Kenobi were sent to deal with it…”
~end chapter seventeen~