Clonebi-Wan AU part 4
Anakin knew that the council would come looking for him eventually. They kept him on a tight leash, and every day it got tighter. Some days he thought it was a noose, instead, choking the life out of him, holding him back. Even so, his missions with Obi-Wan went haywire so often that he'd expected them to wait at least another week before sending someone to find them.
(...how many of those missions had been purposefully sabotaged by the impostor?)
"General Skywalker," Rex said from the entrance of the command tent, which was now serving as an interrogation room. His voice was slightly unsteady, and he was trying not to look at the fake slumped on its bloody knees at Anakin's feet. He must have felt uneasy that an enemy had slipped so seamlessly into their midst; it still mimicked Obi-Wan so uncannily that it had even given Anakin pause, at first. Now every sigh, every flinch, every word spoken in that stolen voice, just fueled his rage.
"What?" he snapped, panting from exertion.
"General Windu and General Vos are here. Cody's with them now, but he's not aware of the full extent of what you've been-- of the situation, I mean. They're asking where G-General Kenobi is." Rex's gaze skipped over the fake when he said the name, as if a part of him still thought the meat droid was anything like the closest thing that Anakin had to a father.
"That's what I've been trying to find out," Anakin said, aiming a kick at its jaw, where its beard was matted with blood. The familiar groan of pain that resulted made his teeth clench. "Hear that, sleemo? With two other Jedi around, I can just mind trick it out of you."
It wisely stayed silent. It had even stopped lying about its loyalty to the Republic, after Anakin made it regret it.
"C'mon, Rex, show me where they are," Anakin ordered, turning on his heel and emerging from the dark, close air of the tent to harsh starlight. The troopers flanking the entrance stiffened at the sight of him, as they often did after an interrogation.
"Sir, shouldn't you... clean up, before you see them?" Rex asked. Anakin paused, looked down at himself, and clicked his tongue in annoyance. He wiped the blood from his hands with an oil rag he kept for R2, gave his face a rough swipe where he'd felt a bit splatter earlier, and absently commended himself for having the foresight to wear black.
Rex was vibrating with nervous energy as he led him through the encampment, which had fallen into a disarray unheard of in the GAR. Restless 212th clones watched their every move as they approached the landing site. There was no 501st blue mingled with their gold, which was unusual on a joint mission--Anakin's men kept to their side of the camp, which was between the 212th and the command tent, and the other battalion rebuffed any attempts to bridge the gap.
From a distance, Anakin could already tell that neither of the other Jedi would listen to him. Windu was frowning thunderously, planted like a mountain with his arms crossed, whereas Vos was pacing back and forth like an agitated Lothwolf. Even Cody glowered at him, brow furrowed and scar pulled tight. There was no love lost between Anakin and any of them--he and Windu never saw eye-to-eye, and he didn't like it when Cody got uppity and criticized his tactics to Obi-Wan. Vos, however, was the worst of the lot; he hated how the man thought he was Obi-Wan's keeper, even though they clearly disliked each other. Obi-Wan was always a little cautious around Vos, wary and watchful, and no matter how Vos playacted at friendliness there was always anger in his eyes when he looked at him. Obi-Wan was the only person he never touched--even Anakin hadn't been able to escape a noogie or two as a padawan.
He'd pestered Obi-Wan about what happened between the two of them, why Vos was always around even though neither of them wanted him there. Obi-Wan would clam up, in that subtle way of his, redirecting him to more comfortable topics, and eventually Anakin stopped caring enough to ask. But his dislike of Vos stayed.
"Where is he?" Vos demanded, as soon as he caught sight of him. Anakin's lip curled.
"I don't know yet," he admitted, "But I'll find out."
"Skywalker, the report the Council received indicated that you've been torturing Master Kenobi, to the point that the troopers fear for his life. Now I'll ask you again: where is he?" Windu said, hand curling around his lightsaber hilt. Cody's head snapped up, and for a second Anakin wondered if he'd launch himself at him the way he did at Grievous.
"What report?" Anakin gritted out. Had one of his men betrayed him? The information about Obi-Wan being replaced by an impostor was need-to-know, but Anakin's interrogations were hardly quiet. Hell, maybe a 212th boy had heard what was going on and gotten the wrong idea. The situation didn't look great without context, even Anakin could admit that.
"The Chancellor recently uncovered that Obi-Wan was replaced with a cloned impostor, and he asked me to subdue it. I've been interrogating it to find out where Obi-Wan is. I'm not sure how much military intelligence has been compromised or who it's working for, but--"
Vos cut him off by grabbing his collar, ashen-faced, and growled, "You karking idiot, what the kriff were you thinking--"
Anakin shoved him off, itching for a fight, but Vos's attention had switched to his hands, smeared with tacky blood from Anakin's soiled tunic. He looked like he was going to be sick.
Anakin abruptly remembered that Vos was psychometric.
Cody and Windu were staring at the blood, but Vos looked back up, his expression hard. "Where is he, Skywalker."
"Vos--" Windu began, and was soundly ignored.
"Blondie," Vos said, pointing at Rex with stained fingers. "You reported this, right? Take me to him. Now."
"Rex," Anakin barked. Of all his men, Rex had betrayed him? Rex, who had heard the meat droid's lies about Obi-Wan being dead? Rex, who should understand why Anakin had to do this?
Maybe the Chancellor had been right. Maybe he should have just told them that Obi-Wan was a traitor. After all, the troopers might have turned on him in favor of the meat droid, if they learned it was another clone. But he'd thought he could trust Rex.
He'd thought wrong.
Rex hesitated, glancing at him, and then at Cody. He firmed his jaw and nodded to Vos. "Follow me."
Then they were racing across the camp, Cody at their heels. Anakin made to give chase, but Windu's hand clamping around his arm stopped him.
"Finish your report first," he said. "You can start why you're covered in a POW's blood, spy or otherwise, and finish with why you chose to act on the Chancellor's unsubstantiated claims instead of informing the council."
Anakin ripped away, spitting, "You can kriffing wait." And then he was running, fury a burning star in his chest. He was going to make Rex regret this after he was done with the first meat droid.
He reached the tent in time to see Vos cut the impostor loose. Cody stood stock still in the entrance, hand flexing on his still-holstered blaster. Rex was crouched by the central pole the fake had been tied to, murmuring softly, helping it slide down and rest on its side. Vos hesitated, then deliberately set his hands against its back to support it.
Windu arrived last, and let out a curse at the sight of the fake. Anakin was beginning to realize that his interrogations might have been a little excessive, and for a second he saw the scene with fresh eyes.
Against his will, he remembered how his mother had looked, when she died in his arms.
The star of wrath in his chest went supernova. How dare that thing make him think of the most painful moment of his life. That had been Obi-Wan's fault for holding him back, keeping him too weak to save his mother for the sake of his own jealousy of Anakin's power, just like this situation was his fault for being taken and replaced without any warning and leaving Anakin to clean up his mess, just like so many of the other things that had gone wrong for him since he became a Jedi. Anakin abruptly wanted to hurt the thing wearing Obi-Wan's face so much that he couldn't breathe.
"Not another step," Windu said, voice like ice, and then Cody was planting himself between Anakin and the bloody, broken, wheezing thing on the ground, blaster in hand and teeth bared.
"Hey, you," Vos was saying frantically, "You good? Can you hear me? Kark, he's burning up." He looked to the two 501st guards who were gaping into the tent. "One of you get a kriffing medic before you need one yourselves."
They bolted.
"I am..." croaked the thing, eyes hazy blue slits in the bloody mess that had been Obi-Wan's face, "Loyal... to the Republic."
"We know, General Kenobi," Rex soothed.
"Don't call it that," Anakin raged, something close to panic filling his lungs instead of air. He didn't want to see a thing he'd destroyed with his bare hands respond to that name, even though a dark, resentful part of him had imagined it was Obi-Wan, when he hit it, sometimes hard enough to damage the circuitry in his prosthetic limb. "It's not Obi-Wan, it's a clone, a flesh droid, it replaced him, it said he was dead--"
"I know!" Vos yelled, rounding on him. His hands were gentle on the thing, though it looked like it hurt him to touch it.
"...Explain," said Windu, voice tense.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi died when he was thirteen years old," Vos said, the words bursting from him like they'd been dammed up inside him, straining to get out. "This is all that's left of him." His glare shifted from Windu to Anakin, sharp enough to gut him and filled with darkness, with hatred. "He's the only one you've ever known. And you did this to him."
Just like that, the supernova inside of him collapsed into a black hole, warping his galaxy into something unrecognizable. Not even Light could escape.