Ventress holds the stone aloft, mockingly examining its facets in the warm light of the throne room. She grins at him, lax and animalistic.
“It’s a beautiful thing, isn’t it, Kenobi?” she drawls, careful not to let any exposed skin brush it as she sets it down. “Beautiful and potentially deadly.”
“Not so different from yourself, then,” he responds, half his mind on the conversation and half on the battle raging below them, surrounding the thin spire supporting the throne room. In the Mynda sunset, the 212th’s armor gleams.
Ventress scoffs. “Kenobi. Always the flatterer.” Her hand goes to her lightsaber. “It won’t get you what you want.”
“That stone won’t win you Dooku’s approval,” Obi-Wan warns, pulling his mind back from the battlefield and into the room and the woman before him. “Leave it alone, Ventress, and we’ll both get out of here much easier.”
He’s not lying. The tower doesn’t want to give the stone up; it’s willing to fight them until the bitter end to keep its treasure safe. Sometimes, a particularly Forceful object will form a bond with the place it is crafted and used in. This is one such case.
Ventress takes a half-step forward. “You have no idea what you’re in the presence of, Kenobi. This could–”
Obi-Wan never finds out the significance of the stone, because at that moment, a wayward missile collides with the tower, sending the throne room rocking in a rather nauseating fashion. Ventress is knocked to the ground and goes skidding towards Obi-Wan, who manages to stay on his feet only by virtue of his position near the wall. The floor tilts nearly to forty-five degrees.
Something flashes in the Force and in the light. The stone has come off its pedestal, crashing to the floor and sliding with them. Ventress makes a grab for it, but Obi-Wan is in a better position. He closes his hand around it and the world falls away.
Night is coming fast, Cody thinks as he rolls under a volley of shots. They’re losing ground fast; every shot from the tanks pushes them further and further from the tower. He’s losing too many men.
Cody jumps to his feet and takes aim at an approaching B-1. It explodes in a burst of sparks. Cody blinks.
Sunlight, liquid-warm on his bare forearms, cascades down through the trees. Somewhere, Cody hears running water. In front of him lies a grassy field, and he follows the pine-needle-soft footpath to the edge of the woods.
As he steps into the grass, the world ripples ever so slightly. The field is smaller than he thought, and dotted with a sort of wildflowers Cody’s never seen before. A few meters away, General Kenobi’s bunk sits beside a bush. The blankets are rumpled, just like they were the day Cody fell asleep there, exhausted by a local virus and endless stacks of paperwork.
The General himself is standing in the center of the field, eyes on a distant mountain. The peak is sharp and snowcapped.
“Obi-Wan,” Cody calls.
Obi-Wan turns around. “Ah. Cody. I’ve been waiting for you, my dear. Come, sit.” Obi-Wan gestures to the freighter bench next to him.
Cody approaches and sits, just close enough to feel the heat of Obi-Wan’s thigh on his own. “Where are we?” Cody asks.
Obi-Wan hums. “Somewhere secluded, I suppose. Cody, listen to me. We don’t have much time here.”
“Why? Where else would we be?” A gentle breeze ruffles Obi-Wan’s hair. Cody wants to run his hands through it. He smells like sweat and smoke.
A hand finds Cody’s thigh, warm and steady. Across the field, there is a staircase. “It doesn’t matter,” Obi-Wan says. “I need you to take this for me.” Obi-Wan takes Cody’s hands in his own, turning to face him fully. Cody tears his gaze from Obi-Wan’s eyes when he presses his lightsaber into Cody’s hands.
“Obi-Wan, I can’t–”
“Nonsense, love. You can. It wants you to.” Obi-Wan wraps his hands around Cody’s, pressing his fingers closed around the cool hilt of the ‘saber. “I’ll be back for you.”
“Obi-Wan, wait–”
“Commander!”
Cody snaps back to himself and realizes three things in quick succession.
One: He is standing stock-still in the middle of an active warzone.
Two: The droids have pushed forward in the time he’d been out. Ghost is about to be overrun.
Three: Obi-Wan’s lightsaber is still in his hand.
Once, when Cody’s batch had been seven standard, Prime had spent a fortnight drilling them in armed, close range combat. They’d used, among other things, pikes, staffs, batons, and, most notably, vibroswords. Cody knows how to handle something like a lightsaber. He ignites it.
Cody has felt all manner of battle rushes before. He knows what it is to lose yourself to anger, to grief, to pain, to desperation, to that racing calm Obi-Wan calls battle meditation.
This is more.
The ‘saber flows with him, follows as he sinks right into the soul of the battle and deflects a blaster bolt. Fucking hell, but he could get used to this.
“Commander, what the fuck?” yells the same voice that brought him back to himself. Boil.
“Don’t worry about it, Boil.” He bats another bolt aside and turns to face the coming army. “Ghost! OYA!”
“OYA!”
“Commander!”
Cody looks up to see General Kenobi making his way across the dormant battlefield, favoring his left side and covered in ash. The tower had gone about as well as it looked, then.
“Sir,” Cody responds. “I have your lightsaber.”
Obi-Wan comes to a stop in front of him, hair a mess and robes torn in a dozen places. He’s grinning ear to ear and holding a small object wrapped in cloth. “Ah, yes, of course. Speaking of that, Commander, I have something to show you.”