"They're dead, you know." the Chancellor—no, Sidious—says as he enters the cell, switching the ray shield on behind him. "All of them. Your wife, your child, your Master, your padawan—I could have helped you save them. And now they're all gone."
Anakin doesn't look up. He doesn't want to give the man the satisfaction.
"I hope you're happy with your decisions, Anakin."
He can't take it anymore—he snaps his head up with an icy glare. "You're the reason they're dead."
"No. I acted on the will of the Senate. And as for the acts themselves, well. I killed none of them. It was your precious legion that did the deed. Childbirth that was to blame, for your wife. And Commander Cody who handled your dear late Master. I only did what had to be done to save the galaxy." He moves closer and Anakin scrambles backwards. This is the man who wanted him as his apprentice, as his slave—who manipulated him for ten years and cloned him when he decided that the rest of it wasn't enough—
It makes little difference. Sidious runs a hand over his cheek and Anakin wants to puke at the mockery of affection. "My dear boy," he says softly. "I trust you will make the right decision eventually."
And sick as it makes him feel, Anakin can't help but be slightly grateful that today is one of those days, where Sidious is playing pretend at being the kindly old grandfather figure from so long ago, rather than a day of rage and crackling lightning and holos of clone troopers reporting back successful terminations. Or a day of silence and darkness and no interaction with any living beings, not even a droid.
He'd lean into the contact if it had been coming from anyone but Sidious. Instead he's disgusted and terrified.
Sidious steps back. "Until next time then, my young apprentice."
He leaves Anakin alone in the cell with nothing but his ghosts and the crackling of the ray shield.
“The force feels-“ Ahsoka paused for a moment her eyebrow furrowed “different Master Kenobi,” she said to him as they approached the next room. After months of searching for his former Padawan, they had ended up in an assumed separatist stronghold on a moon of a planet without even a name on maps. They have breached the building far too easily for his taste and he can’t stop feeling disappointed, because he doubts that the separatist would hold Anakin in an unprotected facility like this one. Even so, the force felt strange and if they wouldn’t find him here, maybe they could find information.
“I feel it too Ahsoka,” he looked to Commander Cody on his right side and added, “We should be careful whatever is in the next room could very well be a trap.” The force didn’t felt like there was danger on the other side of the door, but something wasn’t quite right between the lack of droids or any living Separatist and the strange feeling that accompanied them as soon as they landed on the moon.
His Commander gave him a short nod and the rest of the men, half 212th and 501st, because Anakin's men were as eager to find him as he was and have been practically merged with the 212th, took cover on the left and right side of the door. Both Ahsoka and he enlightened their lightsabers, waiting for Rex to open the door. He couldn’t help but notice that Ahsoka was quieter compared to a few months ago when Anakin was still with them. He doubted her more reserved manner came from being technically his Padawan now even though they haven’t talked about it. He didn’t want to take on Ahsoka as his Padawan if there was still the chance of his own Padawan being out there and he knew that Ahsoka wouldn’t tolerate a new master as long as they haven’t found Anakin. As long as there is still a chance that he was alive.
He couldn’t be dead he reminded himself. He would know. He would have felt that. He knew how a severed bond felt like. The bond that he shared with Anakin was still there, even if he couldn’t feel anything from the other side. He shook his head. Now was not the moment for speculating.
The room in front of them was dark and quiet and gave the men the signal to follow after them. When they stepped in, he could make out a quiet humming noise that filled the room. Careful they moved further into the room, but nothing was moving. No droids or sentient beings attacked them. But he tightened his grip on his lightsaber, the strange feeling in the force was even stronger here. There were multiple metal tables in the middle of the room and the only major sources of light were from some from green stripes on the floor. The light from the lightsabers barely illuminated the walls of the rooms where he could make out some sort of blinking displays.
“I need some light on the left,” Ahsoka said, she was already standing closer to the wall and apparently a tank that was built inside of it, that he now could make out in the green shine of her lightsaber. As soon as the lights of the clone helmets hit the tank, she made a startled sound and then
“Anakin!”
Obi-Wan's heart began to beat faster in his chest as he rushed to Ahsoka and-
There was Anakin submerged in some form of liquid with various tubes connected to him.
“Kix-“he started but the medic of the 501st was already next to him. Ahsoka tapped on the panel next to the glass and the liquid - bacta maybe? – level decreased, the multiple tubes in Anakins body holding him up. Oh, what have they done to you Anakin? After a few torturous slow seconds, the glass moved aside. Obi-wan and Kix caught Anakin as the tubes automatically disconnected from the ports in Anakin’s skin and he fell forward. They gently laid him on the ground and Obi-wan kneeled on the left side of Anakin gripping his hand. Ahsoka fell on her knees next to him at Anakin’s head.
“Kix what is wrong with him?” she asked.
“He is probably sedated,” Kix said while putting a breathing mask over Anakin’s mouth.
Even though his former Padawan was laying before him he still couldn’t feel anything through their force bond. He could barely make out the presence of the man lying in front of him in the force, the presence was muted and distorted. He was probably drugged with force suppressants; he didn’t saw force cuffs or anything similar. His eyes wandered back to Anakin’s face and he pushed a still wet strand of hair from his forehead. He got a strange feeling the longer he looked at his face. But the relief of having his former Padawan with him again was stronger, that he didn’t dwell on it.
“Sir I really think you should see that.” A concerned voice broke him from his thoughts and he tore his eyes from Anakin giving the lax hand a quick squeeze. There was no squeeze back. A few clone troopers had ventured to the tanks that are in the rest of the room and he noticed that they have found a way to power the lights on. The walls had more tanks built inside of them.
He could make out more floating bodies in the tanks behind the men and-
They weren’t just more people in the tanks. They were all the same person and every single of them had the same face that they were searching for, for months. All of them looked like Anakin Skywalker.
He looked back on Anakin in front of him and then he realized why he had a strange feeling when he looked at him. Instead of the scar that went over his eye and eyebrow was smooth unblemished skin and instead of holding the right hand of Anakin, that really shouldn’t be there because Dooku had cut that one off on Geonosis, he was holding an arm made out of flesh in place of the mechno-arm that should be there instead.
The man laying in front of him wasn’t Anakin. Not his Anakin.
“Kriff what is that,” Ahsoka said and moved to Rex who was standing in front of another tank with somebody looking like Anakin floating inside.
“I don’t think they are alive.” Coric’s somber voice came from one of the tanks next to where they are kneeling. The medic looked up from the panel he was studying and said “There is no brain activity they are just bodies. Technically they're dead.”
Obi-Wan had to swallow as he looked around the room where there were at least a hundred tanks with Anakin’s body floating in them.
“But why?” Ahsoka said and looked at him with wide eyes. He didn’t know what to say, he didn’t know if he wants to know the answer to that. Looking at the middle of the room which clearly resembled a laboratory. A growing sense of dread settled in.
“And where is Anakin.” She added. He looked back at the hand he still held in his own letting it go. It fell lifeless to the ground. How deeply he wished to know the answer to that.
