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Obi-Wan. He had to find Obi-Wan.
The door to the Temple had been ripped off the hinges, so Anakin gently stepped through, and fell into the remains.
The Temple was torn to pieces. It had never been the home Obi-Wan had wanted for him, and yet, a wave of crushing sadness threatened to bowl him over.
The walls he’d once thought apathetic seemed to echo with the screams of the dying, reminding him of his failures. His failure to be present when it mattered. His failure to be good.
It was the silence that pulled at him. The giggles of the younglings, the ones he’d carried between classes on his shoulders, gone. The lectures from Master Sinube that had droned for eons, the ones he’d begged to end, now a relic of a time before.
Anakin’s life had never been silent, and it felt like drowning.
He ignored his own harsh footsteps, the only sound amidst the all-consuming quiet, and focused on what he knew.
There’d been scattered reports, but he’d gleaned that Obi-Wan had been fighting near the lower hallways.
He followed in that direction. Anakin didn’t stop to check if the bodies littering the floor were alive, didn’t stop to check if he knew them. If he stopped, he would break into pieces.
Anakin kept moving. Obi-Wan’s name was a mantra in his mind, a focal point. He had to be alive, he had to.
The siege itself was a blur in Anakin’s memory, a gaping void in his mind. It worried Anakin, reminded him of the last time a lapse like that had happened. Tusken Raider bodies strewn around him, his mother’s dying breath—
He pushed the anxiety to the background. Nothing was more important than Obi-Wan’s safety.
Hallway 11 was full of carnage, the bodies of three Temple guards lay in mangled heaps. Anakin kept going, hoping beyond hope.
A sob ripped its way out of his throat. No, no, no.
Obi-Wan’s body lay in the center of the hallway, a gaping hole burned into his chest. Anakin couldn’t breathe. This wasn’t happening, this wasn’t real, it had to be a dream.
He staggered to Obi-Wan’s side, collapsing onto the floor. “Master!”
The blue eyes he once looked to for comfort stared listlessly at the ceiling. Anakin gagged.
“Master, please!” he wailed, the guttural response came instinctually, but the ache in his chest threatened to consume him whole. Anakin placed a shaking hand on Obi-Wan’s forehead, a loving gesture—
And he remembered.
He stepped over the clone’s body, ignoring how it still twitched. There was no room for mercy. Not in this building—not here.
The Jedi Council had never shown him mercy, had never shown him acceptance. They convicted his Padawan, passed him over for the rank he was owed, deceived him again and again. However hard he’d tried to be a model Jedi, to be skillful, unfeeling, unattached, they never respected him. A spike of rage twisted his heart and the lightsaber in his hand answered gladly.
The Force vibrated through him, and where once it had been oppressive, he now tasted only freedom. Power.
Anakin relished in the newfound control. The Jedi had called the Dark Side a stain of the mind, something to be rid of. Anakin smirked at their naivete.
The Dark Side’s calling had given him purpose, the inky tar eager to do his bidding. The Jedi were a hindrance, a willful barrier between him and his true destiny, and more importantly, his ability to do what he pleased. The crumbling stucco was only a reminder of people who never wanted him to be happy, to be able to protect what was rightfully his—his rank, his Padawan. His wife.
Three Temple guards barrelled around the corner, and Anakin felt something akin to pity rise in his chest. The lightsaber became an extension of his arm, and he was one with the Force.
His body worked on auto-pilot, slicing through them with ease. Their resistance was futile; he was the Chosen One and they were barely fleas.
Only when the carnage was over, the bodies sprawled on the floors of his adolescence, did the whispers abate. The Dark Side may have been a useful conduit, but it was loud.
With this hallway clear, he continued.
Anakin told himself that there was nothing to miss, nothing to grieve as the people he was tricked into caring for withered into smoke and ash. The Temple disintegrated and Anakin allowed himself to smile.
His mind hissed, warning him something was amiss. His instincts guided him through everything, and had guided him here, to fulfill his destiny. They’d never failed him, and so he listened, quieting his steps.
Because Hallway 11 was supposed to be empty.
Something in him recognized the presence before he turned, felt it in his blood, that familial tie he’d known his whole life.
“You’re not supposed to be here.”
Obi-Wan’s gaze lifted from the body he clutched to his chest. Anakin couldn’t be bothered to remember the Jedi’s name, some Knight that probably hated him, and so he just stared hard at Obi-Wan. His lightsaber still burned in his hand. Obi-Wan carefully, reverently, released the corpse back down to the blood-soaked carpet and stood. A few residual tears dripped lightly from his eyes.
“I said you’re not supposed to be here.”
“I heard you.” Obi-Wan’s voice was rough, the sound tearing a wound in the air. Why was he here? He was supposed to be on Utapau, caught in the metal claw of Grievous’ army, not making things harder for Anakin here at the Temple. But Obi-Wan had always made things harder for Anakin.
Anakin wondered if he was looking at two Jedi who hated him. He wondered if they were both about to be dead.
He seethed as Obi-Wan’s hands stayed by his side, not even attempting to fight back. Was Anakin not worth even that? “Get out of the way.”
“Why, Anakin?”
Anakin scoffed. What was there to say that Obi-Wan shouldn’t already know? Because they deserved it, because he had to, because the only Jedi left was a failure.
Footsteps scurried toward them, and Anakin tightened his hold on the saber. A young Jedi scrambled into the hallway behind Obi-Wan, blood splattered along the front of their tunic. Anakin let his lip curl, this one would be easy enough to handle.
“Master Kenobi, d-do you know where—”
Obi-Wan barely glanced at the obviously injured Jedi, keeping his gaze focused on Anakin. “Run.” Command laced his tone, no sign of his usual geniality.
The Jedi stuttered and then met Anakin’s stare, taking him in. Obi-Wan pushed himself between them, blocking the line of sight. His hand finally hovered over his saber.
Anakin was flattered, truly, to be seen as this much of a threat. To be seen for what he was.
“Run.”
The Jedi didn’t hesitate, limping off again. Anakin would have to find that one later.
Obi-Wan looked back over his shoulder at the end of the hallway behind him. The Council Chambers. “I know what’s down there. I know what you’ve done.” He gestured miserably around to the bodies strewn below them. “What I don’t understand is why.”
“That doesn’t surprise me,” Anakin laughed bitterly. “You’ve never understood me, or the Dark Side. You could never understand what it means to have power, to be a true leader, to do what needs to be done.”
At that, Obi-Wan’s eyes widened. “And this is what needs to be done? Killing the Jedi?”
“Yes,” Anakin snapped. “The Jedi were weak, vulnerable to corruption. The time has come for a new Order. Your precious Council has seen to that.”
Obi-Wan straightened, a cracked look in his eyes. He was silent for a long time. Anakin leaned harder on the Dark Side, on that smoky power that kept him from backing down. Obi-Wan’s gaze fell. “I see.”
The heavy tendrils blanketing his mind urged him on, Kill him. Kill the Master. He will only hold you back.
Anakin’s hand tightened on his saber, itching for violence. Only the dark circles under Obi-Wan’s eyes, the droop in the Great Negotiator’s shoulders made him pause.
Wild desperation colored Obi-Wan’s tone, “What about Padme?”
Anakin saw red. How dare he bring Padme into this? As if this wasn’t for her.
“I am protecting Padme.” He knew his eyes were flashing gold, saw it in the way Obi-Wan cringed from his gaze. Good.
“Anakin, wait! Please. Stop and think—”
Obi-Wan edged back toward the body, moving away from Anakin. An unbidden smile came to Anakin’s lips because the other man should be fearful. Anakin had finally been given the powerful hand, the one he was owed, and Obi-Wan’s unease tasted like victory.
“I am thinking, Master. ” He spat the word out like it burned him. And perhaps it had.
“For once in my life, I have a true purpose. And if I have to raze this Temple to the ground to see it through,” he huffed out a mocking laugh, “then so be it.”
Obi-Wan’s eyes widened, his discomfort increasing as he took Anakin in fully. The rage he could feel writhing under his skin, the dark resolve of his stance, the contemptuous smirk.
“I finally understand my full potential, who I’m supposed to be.” He gave Obi-Wan a condescending, pitying look. “Don’t you recognize me?"
The words struck home. Obi-Wan wilted, collapsed into himself like a dying star. A sadistic glee ran through Anakin’s veins, borne from wounding his master with his own preferred weapon. Words.
Anakin stalked toward him like a predator, anticipating the fight. At last, the Padawan would best the Master.
Obi-Wan rose slowly, with feline grace. There was no visible sign of his previous grief. Now only the man who killed Maul stared back, hard and unyielding.
A thrill shot up Anakin’s spine.
Finally, a real challenge.
The glint in Obi-Wan’s eyes was no stranger to Anakin, and he could feel his body shift accordingly. His back straightened into a fighting stance. This was it.
“I won’t fight you.”
Anakin struck before Obi-Wan could speak again. The full power of the Force fueled his veins, and Anakin freed himself at last. He banished his last shackle to the Jedi, the fighting styles that contained him, that threatened to control him. Anakin gathered as much anger—all of the hate, the frustration, the pure rage he’d kept locked away—and launched himself at Obi-Wan. He purposely left himself open, dared Obi-Wan to strike down his student with a glee that beat Obi-Wan back more fiercely than his lightsaber ever could.
Blue against blue—blue against gold—and Obi-Wan stayed, comfortably, on the defensive. Anakin grit his teeth. Soresu had always been Obi-Wan’s forte; he pulled Anakin forward, forward, forward, welcomed his assault like a dear friend, then swept down and left, until Anakin hit the floor with a thud. It was an aggravating, pretentious way to win. Perfectly befitting his old Master.
He refused to attack. Anakin’s nerves grated against the realization and the Dark Side sung alongside his rage.
“I won’t fight you.”
“I heard you the first time, old man.”
Anakin threw his body into his strike, colliding with Obi-Wan like a cyclone. He struck hard, the blow reverberating down his arm, but Obi-Wan parried the hit with ease. He sidestepped the next, turning faster than Anakin had anticipated. His vision tunnelled, single-minded precision honing it like a knife.
“Fight me!”
Obi-Wan dodged and ducked, refusing to engage.
Anakin’s ire grew as he felt something deep inside his chest twist and shatter. Any mercy he may have been willing to bestow was torn away, searing rage swiftly taking its place. He crushed the last chance for recovery, for rational thought, for humanity under his heel and the uncoiled, sweeping wave of anger was close enough to happiness that Anakin let it take over. Red cut through flesh with surprising ease, suddenly ending the heartache—heart beat—that Anakin despised so deeply.
Obi-Wan fell to the floor, limp. Anakin restrained himself from going to his Master’s side, and hated that a part of him wanted to. He was no longer the Padawan relying on Obi-Wan, his ever-present companion.
Anakin’s heaving breaths were too loud in his ears. The sudden quiet pressed into him, an unwanted intruder.
He had done it.
Obi-Wan was dead. Anakin had bested his Master. He was free.
Anakin looked down at Obi-Wan’s body and felt doubt ripple through him. He wondered if winning was supposed to feel like this? An empty cavern cracking open in his chest.
Obi-Wan wasn’t here to ask—he ripped his gaze from the body—so Anakin looked inward. Asked the Dark Side’s sentient hold.
The Dark curled around him like a cat, tugged him closer in its grip—
Swallowed him whole.