Mace Windu hung on to the corrugated hatch grip beside the gunship’s open troop bay with one hand, squinting into the wind that whipped his overcloak behind him. His other hand shaded his eyes against the glare from one of the orbital mirrors that concentrated the capital planet’s daylight. The mirror was slowly turning aside now, allowing a band of twilight to approach the gunship’s destination.
That destination, a kilometer-thick landing platform in the planet’s vast industrial zone, was marked with a steeply slanting tower of smoke and vapor that stretched from the planet’s surface to the uppermost reaches of the atmosphere, a tower that only now was beginning to spread and coil from its tiny source point to a horizon-spanning smear across the stratospheric winds.
The gunship roared over the bottomless canyons of durasteel and permacrete that formed the landscape of Coruscant, arrowing straight for the industrial zone without regard for the rigid traffic laws that governed flight on the galactic planet; until martial law was officially lifted by the Senate, the darkening skies
would be traveled only by Republic military craft, Jedi transports, and emergency vehicles.
The gunship qualified as all three.
Mace could see the ship now—what was left of it—resting on the scorched platform far ahead: a piece of a ship, a fragment less than a third of what once had been the Trade Federation flagship, still burning despite the gouts of fire-suppression foam raining down on it from five different ships and the emergency-support clone troops who surrounded it on the platform.
Mace shook his head. Skywalker again. The chosen one.
Who else could have brought in this hulk? Who else could have even come close?
The gunship swung into a hot landing, repulsors howling; Mace hopped out before it could settle, and gave the pilot an open-palm gesture to signal him to wait. The pilot, faceless within his helmet, responded with a closed fist.
Though, of course, the pilot wasn’t faceless at all. Under his armored helmet, that clone pilot had a face that Mace Windu remembered all too well.
That face would always remind him that he had once held Dooku within his grasp, and had let him slip away.
Across the platform, an escape pod hatch cycled open. Emergency crews scrambled with an escape slide, and a moment later the Supreme Chancellor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Anakin Skywalker were all on the deck beside the burning ship, closely followed by a somewhat battered R2 unit that lifted itself down on customized maneuvering rockets.
Mace strode swiftly out to meet them.
Palpatine’s robes were scorched and tattered at the hem, and he seemed weak; he leaned a bit on Skywalker’s shoulder as they moved away from the ship. On Skywalker’s other side, Master Kenobi seemed a touch the worse for wear himself: caked with dust and leaking a trickle of blood from a scalp wound.
Skywalker, by contrast, looked every bit the HoloNet hero he was supposed to be. He seemed to tower over his companions, as though he had somehow gotten even taller in the months since Mace had seen him last. His hair was tousled, his color was high, and his walk still had the grounded grace of a natural fighter, but there was something new in his physicality: in the way he moved his head, perhaps, or the way the weight of Palpatine’s arm on his shoulder seemed somehow to belong there ... or something less definable. Some new ease, new confidence. An aura of inner power.
Presence.
Skywalker was not the same young man the Council had sent off to the Outer Rim five standard months ago.
“Chancellor,” Mace said as he met them. “Are you well? Do you need medical attention?” He gestured over his shoulder at the waiting gunship. “I have a fully equipped field surgery—”
“No, no, no need,” Palpatine said, rather faintly. “Thank you, Master Windu, but I am well. Quite well, thanks to these
two.”
Mace nodded. “Master Kenobi? Anakin?”
“Never better,” Skywalker replied, looking as if he meant it, ad Kenobi only shrugged, with a slight wince as he touched his scalp wound.
“Only a bump on the head. That field surgery must be needed elsewhere.”
“It is.” Mace looked grim. “We don’t have even a preliminary estimate of civilian casualties.”
He waved off the gunship, and it roared away toward the countless fires that painted red the approach of night.
“A shuttle is on its way. Chancellor, we’ll have you on the Senate floor within the hour. The HoloNet has already been notified that you will want to make a statement.”
“I will. I will, indeed.” Palpatine touched Mace on the arm.
“You have always been of great value to me, Master Windu Thank you.”
“The Jedi are honored to serve the Senate, sir.” There might have been the slightest emphasis on the word Senate. Mace remained expressionless as he subtly moved his arm away from the Chancellor’s hand. He looked at Obi-Wan. “Is there anything else to report, Master Kenobi? What of General Grievous?”
“Count Dooku was there,” Skywalker interjected. He had a look on his face that Mace couldn’t decipher, proud yet wary—
even unhappy. “He’s dead now.”
“Dead?” He looked from Anakin to Obi-Wan and back again. “Is this true? You killed Count Dooku?”
“My young friend is too modest; he killed Count Dooku.” Smiling, Kenobi touched the lump on his head. “I was... taking a nap.”
“But ...” Mace blinked. Dooku was to the Separatists what Palpatine was to the Republic: the center of gravity binding together a spiral galaxy of special interests. With Dooku gone, the Confederacy of Independent Systems would no longer really be a confederacy at all. They’d fly to pieces within weeks.
Within days.
Mace said again, “But...”
And, in the end, he couldn’t think of a but.
This was all so astonishing that he very nearly—almost, but not quite—cracked a smile.
“That is,” he said, “the best news I’ve heard since...” He shook his head. “Since I can’t remember. Anakin—how did you do it?”
Inexplicably, young Skywalker looked distinctly uncomfortable; that newly confident presence of his collapsed as suddenly as an overloaded deflector, and instead of meeting Mace’s eyes, his gaze flicked to Palpatine. Somehow Mace didn’t think this was modesty. He looked to the Chancellor as well, his elation sinking, becoming puzzlement tinged with suspicion.
“It was... entirely extraordinary,” Palpatine said blandly, oblivious to Mace’s narrowing stare. “I know next to nothing of
swordplay, of course; to my amateur’s eye, it seemed that Count Dooku may have been ... a trace overconfident. Especially after having disposed of Master Kenobi so neatly.”
Obi-Wan flushed, just a bit—and Anakin flushed considerably more deeply.
“Perhaps young Anakin was simply more... highly motivated,” Palpatine said, turning a fond smile upon him. “After all, [Dooku was fighting only to slay an enemy; Anakin was fighting to save—if I may presume the honor—a friend.”
Mace’s scowl darkened. Fine words. Perhaps even true words, but he still didn’t like them.
No one on the Jedi Council had ever been comfortable with Skywalker’s close relationship with the Chancellor—they’d had more than one conversation about it with Obi-Wan while Skywalker had still been his Padawan—and Mace was less than happy to hear Palpatine speaking for a young Jedi who seemed unprepared to speak for himself. He said, “I’m sure the Council will be very interested in your full report, Anakin,” with just enough emphasis on full to get his point across.
Skywalker swallowed, and then, just as suddenly as it had collapsed, that aura of calm, centered confidence rebuilt itself around him. “Yes. Yes of course, Master Windu.”
“And we must report that Grievous escaped,” Obi-Wan said. “He is as cowardly as ever.”
Mace accepted this news with a nod. “But he is only a military commander. Without Dooku to hold the coal
ition together, these so-called independent systems will splinter, and they know it.” He looked straight into the Supreme Chancellor’s eyes. This is our best chance to sue for peace. We can end this war right now.”
And while Palpatine answered, Mace Windu reached into the Force.
To Mace’s Force perception, the world crystallized around them, becoming a gem of reality shot through with flaws and fault lines of possibility. This was Mace’s particular gift: to see how people and situations fit together in the Force, to find the shear planes that can cause them to break in useful ways, and to intuit what sort of strike would best make the cut. Though he could not consistently determine the significance of the structures he perceived—the darkening cloud upon the Force that had risen with the rebirth of the Sith made that harder and harder with each passing day—the presence of shatterpoints was always clear.
Mace had supported the training of Anakin Skywalker, though it ran counter to millennia of Jedi tradition, because from the structure of fault lines in the Force around him, he had been able to intuit the truth of Qui-Gon Jinn’s guess: that the young slave boy from Tatooine was in fact the prophesied chosen one, born to bring balance to the Force. He had argued for the elevation of Obi-Wan Kenobi to Mastership, and to give the training of the chosen one into the hands of this new, untested Master, because his unique perception had shown him powerful lines of destiny that bound their lives together, for good or ill. On the day of Palpatine’s election to the Chancellorship, he had seen that Palpatine was himself a shatterpoint of unimaginable significance: a man upon whom might depend the fate of the Republic itself.
Now he saw the three men together, and the intricate lattice of fault lines and stress fractures that bound them each to the other was so staggeringly powerful that its structure was beyond calculation.
Anakin was somehow a pivot point, the fulcrum of a lever with Obi-Wan on one side, Palpatine on the other, and the galaxy in the balance, but the dark cloud on the Force prevented his perception from reaching into the future for so much as a hint
of where this might lead. The balance was already so delicate that he could not guess the outcome of any given shift: the slightest tip in any direction would generate chaotic oscillation. Anything could happen. Anything at all.
And the lattice of fault lines that bound all three of them to each other stank of the dark side.
He lifted his head and looked to the sky, picking out the dropping star of the Jedi shuttle as it swung toward them through the darkening afternoon.
“I’m afraid peace is out of the question while Grievous is at large,” the Chancellor was saying sadly. “Dooku was the only check on Grievous’s monstrous lust for slaughter; with Dooku gone, the general has been unleashed to rampage across the galaxy. I’m afraid that, far from being over, this war is about to get a very great deal worse.”
“And what of the Sith?” Obi-Wan said. “Dooku’s death should have at least begun the weakening of the darkness, but instead it feels stronger than ever. I fear Master Yoda’s intuition is correct: that Dooku was merely the apprentice to the Sith Lord, not the Master.”
Mace started walking toward the small-craft dock where the Jedi shuttle would land, and the others fell in with him.
“The Sith Lord, if one still exists, will reveal himself in time. They always do.” He hoped Obi-Wan would take the hint and shut up about it; Mace had no desire to speak openly of the investigation in front of the Supreme Chancellor. The less Palpatine knew, the better.
“A more interesting puzzle is Grievous,” he said. “He had you at his mercy, Chancellor, and mercy is not numbered among his virtues. Though we all rejoice that he spared you, I cannot help but wonder why.”
Palpatine spread his hands. “I can only assume the Separatists preferred to have me as a hostage rather than as a martyr Though it is of course impossible to say; it may merely have been a whim of the general. He is notoriously erratic.”
“Perhaps the Separatist leadership can restrain him, in exchange for certain ...” Mace let his gaze drift casually to a point somewhere above the Chancellor’s head. “... considerations.”
“Absolutely not.” Palpatine drew himself up, straightening his robes. “A negotiated peace would be a recognition of the
CIS as the legitimate government of the rebellious systems
tantamount to losing the war! No, Master Windu, this war can end only one way. Unconditional surrender. And while Grievous lives, that will never happen.”
“Very well,” Mace said. “Then the Jedi will make the capture of General Grievous our particular task.” He glanced at Anakin and Obi-Wan, then back to Palpatine. He leaned close to the Chancellor and his voice went low and final, with a buried intensity that hinted—just the slightest bit—of suspicion, and warning. “This war has gone on far too long already. We will find him, and this war will end.”
“I have no doubt of it.” Palpatine strolled along, seemingly oblivious. “But we should never underestimate the deviousness of the Separatists. It is possible that even the war itself has been only one further move,” he said with elegant, understated precision, “in some greater game.”
As the Jedi shuttle swung toward the Chancellor’s private landing platform at the Senate Offices, Obi-Wan watched Anakin pretending not to stare out the window. On the platform was a small welcome-contingent of Senators, and Anakin was trying desperately to look as if he wasn’t searching that little crowd hungrily for a particular face. The pretense was a waste of time; Anakin radiated excitement so powerfully in the Force that Obi-Wan could practically hear the thunder of his heartbeat.
Obi-Wan gave a silent sigh. He had entirely too good an idea whose face his former Padawan was so hoping to see.
When the shuttle touched down, Master Windu caught his from beyond Anakin’s shoulder. The Korun Master made a nearly invisible gesture, to which Obi-Wan did not visibly respond; but when Palpatine and Anakin and R2 all debarked toward the crowd of well-wishers, Obi-Wan stayed behind.
Anakin stopped on the landing deck, looking back at Obi-Wan. “You coming?”
“I haven’t the courage for politics,” Obi-Wan said, showing his usual trace of a smile. “I’ll brief the Council.” “Shouldn’t I be there, too?”
“No need. This isn’t the formal report. Besides—” Obi-Wan nodded toward the clot of HoloNet crews clogging the pedestrian gangway. “—someone has to be the poster boy.” Anakin looked pained. “Poster man.”
“Quite right, quite right,” Obi-Wan said with a gentle chuckle. “Go meet your public, Poster Man.”
“Wait a minute—this whole operation was your idea. You planned it. You led the rescue. It’s your turn to take the bows.” “You won’t get out of it that easily, my young friend. Without you, I wouldn’t even have made it to the flagship. You killed Count Dooku, and single-handedly rescued the Chancellor... all while, I might be forgiven for adding, carrying some old broken-down Jedi Master unconscious on your back. Not to mention making a landing that will be the standard of Impossible in every flight manual for the next thousand years.” “Only because of your training, Master—” “That’s just an excuse. You’re the hero. Go spend your glorious day surrounded by—” Obi-Wan allowed himself a slightly disparaging cough. “—politicians.”
‘Come on, Master—you owe me. And not just for saving your skin for the tenth time—”
“Ninth time. Cato Neimoidia doesn’t count; it was your fault in the first place.” Obi-Wan waved him off. “See you at the Outer Rim briefing in the morning.”
“Well ... all right. Just this once.” Anakin laughed and waved, and then headed briskly off to catch up with Palpatine as the Chancellor waded into the Senators with the smooth-as-oiled-transparisteel ease of the lifelong politician.
The hatch cycled shut, the shuttle lifted off, and Obi-Wan’s smile faded as he turned to Mace Windu. “You wanted to speak with me.”
Windu moved close to Obi-Wan’s position by the
window, nodding out at the scene on the landing platform. “It’s Anakin. I don’t like his relationship with Palpatine.”
“We’ve had this conversation before.”
“There is something between them. Something new. I could see it in the Force.” Mace’s voice was flat and grim. “It felt powerful. And incredibly dangerous.”
Obi-Wan spread his hands. “I trust Anakin with my life.”
“I know you do. I only wish we could trust the Chancellor with Anakin’s.”
“Yes,” Obi-Wan said, frowning. “Palpatine’s policies are ... sometimes questionable. But he dotes on Anakin like a kindly old uncle on his favorite nephew.”
Mace stared out the window. “The Chancellor loves power. If he has any other passion, I have not seen it.”
Obi-Wan shook his head with a trace of disbelief. “I recall that not so long ago, you were something of an admirer of his.”
“Things,” Mace Windu said grimly, “change.”
Flying over a landscape pocked with smoldering wreckage where once tall buildings filled with living beings had gleamed in the sun, toward a Temple filled with memories of so many, man)’ Jedi who would never return from this war, Obi-Wan could not disagree.
After a moment, he said, “What would you have me do?” “I am not certain. You know my power; I cannot always interpret what I’ve seen. Be alert. Be mindful of Anakin, and be careful of Palpatine. He is not to be trusted, and his influence on
Anakin is dangerous.”
“But Anakin is the chosen one—”
“All the more reason to fear an outsider’s influence. We have circumstantial evidence that traces Sidious to Palpatine’s inner
circle.”
Suddenly Obi-Wan had difficulty breathing. “Are you certain?”
Mace shook his head. “Nothing is certain. But this raid—the capture of Palpatine had to be an inside job. And the timing... we were closing in on him, Master Kenobi! The information you and Anakin discovered—we had traced the Sith Lord to an abandoned factory in The Works, not far from where Anakin landed the cruiser. When the attack began, we were tracking him through the downlevel tunnels.” Mace stared out the viewport at a vast residential complex that dominated the skyline to the west. “The trail led to the sub-basement of Five Hundred Republica.” Five Hundred Republica was the most exclusive address on the planet. Its inhabitants included only the incredibly wealthy or the incredibly powerful, from Raith Sienar of the Sienar Systems conglomerate to Palpatine himself. Obi-Wan could only say, “Oh.”
Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith Page 13