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Anakin really missed his arm. And his mom. And Padmé. It was a few days after the whole fiasco on Geonosis, so he was feeling pretty depressed. He’d get some leave in a week, and Padmé had decided to throw caution to the wind, go back to Naboo and marry him.
Don’t get him wrong, he absolutely was looking forward to marrying Padmé (oh wow he was going to be a husband!), but he wasn’t looking forward to the upcoming day. He’d gotten his cybernetic arm replacement, and he was severely annoyed (Jedi don’t hate) at this run-of-the mill cybernetic which would probably break in the next fight with Dooku. Obi-Wan had been very understanding of his moodiness lately (lately? Like the last six years weren’t moody?), and promised to help him look for some upgrades in some Cocotown shops.
Obi-Wan had specifically said, “Padawan, while I know you are looking forward to upgrading your new arm, you do remember that Dooku electrocuted you, right? I would like you to go to the Halls of Healing, first, so that they can check for nervous system damage from that.”
Anakin looked (and felt) nonplussed. “Can the healers actually do that?” he asked.
Obi-Wan Force signature changed, to hold a tinge of amusement. “Quinlan had a…shall we say, habit of licking power outlets when he was very young. He stated on numerous occasions, that ‘he liked how they tasted spicy’. I daresay that the healers have enough experience with electrical damage.”
Anakin was shocked. Not literally, of course, but the fact that Obi-Wan was giving him this priceless piece of blackmail against Master Vos. To be completely fair, it made sense for Master Vos, of all the Jedi, to have licked outlets. With that in mind (and Obi-Wan’s promise), he simply had to make a visit to verify the story.
“Yes, it seems that you do have some damage to your nervous system from your fight against Dooku. It’s not problematic now, and it is completely reversible.”
Anakin nodded. The healer he was speaking to was a Rodian Jedi, named Soont Tharuss, apparently an expert at healing electrical damage. Anakin decided to ask, “Are there any complications with it being from Force Lightning?”
Soont shook his head cautiously. “There shouldn’t be, physiologically speaking. I don’t know for certain, because we haven’t had experience with Sith throwing around lightning for centuries. The best I can recommend is to meditate with someone periodically and have them check for changes to your Force signature.”
Anakin frowned a bit at that. Meditation wasn’t his favorite activity, but he guessed if it helped, he could check in with Obi-Wan after he ran into any…Sith shenanigans. Especially if they involved lightning.
He bowed to Soont as he left. Finally, it was time to shop for those parts.
As it turns out, Master Vos did lick outlets in his youth. Aayla needed to know as soon as possible.
Nevermind Sith shenanigans, it was fragging PIRATES who electrocuted him this time.
Okay, so it was technically Sith shenanigans, but whatever, it was Hondo who did the shenanigans.
And then both him and Obi-Wan got put in a cell with Dooku, who they had come here to capture.
Ironic.
After that whole fiasco (another one) which included Jar-Jar, somehow (don’t ask him, he was too busy raising Dooku’s blood pressure with Obi-Wan), and the trip back to Coruscant, he headed to the Halls of Healing again, to meet with Master Soont.
Soont sighed as he saw Anakin enter. “Really? Again?”
Anakin frowned, and crossed his arms. “It was pirates this time. Normal electrocution, no Sith Lightning.”
“Knight Skywalker, most Jedi are in the Halls of Healing for electrocution maybe once or twice in their entire careers. You’ve been here twice in one year. I’m not sure if that’s concerning or remarkable. Perhaps both. If I didn’t know better, I would say someone is making you get electrocuted. Well, Skywalker, you know how this goes. Get on the table and I’ll examine you.”
He had a run in with some bounty hunters in the Senate. He got electrocuted, again.
Maybe he should make parts of his Jedi outfit out of some insulating material, that’d help a lot. He’d talk with Obi-Wan about it.
Also, he should talk with Yoda about learning some lightning deflection. What was the ability called? Tetanus? No, Tutanus? Tutaminis, right!
Anyway, off to the Temple healers, again.
That bomb on Malastare…didn’t, didn’t count. He insulated his arm specifically for that purpose. He wasn’t going to the Temple healers this time.
The Citadel, to put it bluntly, was a kriffing mess from the start. First, Ahsoka went on the mission, despite him telling her not to (although he was secretly proud of her for being an invaluable help, but it’s not like he’d ever admit that in public. Maybe he should tell her later, with Rex and the boys). He had to deal with Tarkin, who was a stuck up son-of-a-bantha, and Osi Sobek, who was an annoying creature to put it mildly. Then there was the fact that Master Piell died, so they kind of failed the mission, and to top it all off, the 501st lost Echo. (He’d grieve for him with Fives, Jesse, Hardcase and Rex, later. Don’t waste your water. Not now, at least)
And, naturally he got electrocuted again. So, off to see Soont again! Fun.
“Skywalker? Again? Why am I not surprised?” Soont said.
Anakin smiled sheepishly. “I keep getting into these situations, and there was an electromagnet, which attracted my prosthetic, and then I got electrocuted. This just happens to me!”
“Well, at least it’s normal electricity. If I see you again next week, my veins are going to burst, I swear to the Force.”
He was never going on an underwater mission again, ever. Strange kriffing giant jellyfish. Well, it wasn’t their fault, but still. Riff Tamson was a karking sleemo who could sleep with the fish (was it rude to call a Mon Cala a fish?), like he deserved. He was avoiding Mon Cala’s deep places for the foreseeable future. Not even Padmé could get him to go there again.
Time to see Soont again! At least it wasn’t in the same week.
How the kriff did Dooku even get on Naboo in the first place? Nevermind the fact that Grievous was there too, but also with four MagnaGuards? Somebody really dropped the ball in Republic Intelligence. He got electrocuted by their staffs, and then Dooku used Sith Lightning again. Ouch.
Soont was really helping him a lot. Maybe he could get him a gift? Or he could learn from him how to heal himself. Both? He’d need to ask Padmé what an appropriate gift was, though. Or maybe Obi-Wan would help.
Zygerria. An absolutely stupid decision to go on this mission. For one, it brought back his childhood trauma about slavery, and Ahsoka had to dress up like a slave (why was it her? She shouldn’t even be in this war!)
He got electrocuted by at least five whips (more than enough to cause permanent damage, Soont’s voice whispered). AND, and, Dooku hit him with some more Sith Lightning. He really should look into the tetanus ability.
Hopefully Soont wasn’t asleep. He kind of needed him to get healed.
Kriffing tentacled-ass bounty hunter. No, what hurt more was Obi-Wan faking his death (and him not being let in on it, but opsec was a thing he understood. not this time).
Not to mention, Dooku shocked him. Again. Maybe he should start a betting pool on who would electrocute him on the next mission.
Thank the Force that healthcare was free when being a Jedi.
Did he really get electrocuted on Mortis or was Mortis just a hallucination brought on by some deathsticks? Some questions would never be answered. He did a drug test, just to be safe.
Man, that was a weird dream. He met up with Yoda somehow (who he snuck out of the Temple Healing Halls with Artoo on a quest to Moraband? Korriban? Some Sith planet), decapitated Dooku, and then some strange sentient wearing a hood electrocuted him, because why not? Of course he’s dreaming about being electrocuted now. Just another normal day in his life.
This was what, the second time Admiral Trench didn’t go down with his ship? He became a half-cyborg spider? Force, he didn’t want to know how the Separatists got so good at cybernetic technology. (Grievous, probably)
Anyway, he stabbed him, and Wrecker blew up the ship, so this time Trench should be gone for good.
Echo was back, too. It really was heartbreaking, telling him about Fives’ death.
Thankfully, Anakin had enough braincells to rub together to remember the chips Fives mentioned, and he took a shuttle down to Kamino to investigate, under the guise of obtaining new shinies earlier in the war.
He pulled the Force around him, cloaking himself with the thought of I am but a grain of sand in the desert. Nothing is amiss, all is as it should be.
The Force responded.
What he eventually found in Lama Su’s office horrified him. A set of 150 orders, each taking away the clone trooper’s free will. Turning them against their commanders. Turning them into slaves. They already were, weren’t they? There was a reason Anakin filed so many MIA reports after battles, and why Obi-Wan did the same.
But it was Order 66 that worried him the most.
Kriff, he needed to tell the Council. Fives really was on the money.
Or, alternatively, instead of the entire Council, he could tell Obi-Wan. He was way out of his depth here. He needed help. And advice.
He got back to the Resolute, no problem, and told Rex that he’d be in his office, and nobody was to disturb him for two hours unless the Separatists were launching an attack on Coruscant or something equally bad.
He turned on the long-range comm, and put in a line for Obi-Wan.
“Master? I need to talk to you, I found something big. And I know I’ll need to share it with the entire Council, but I wanted your advice first.”
Obi-Wan stroked his beard and said, “Well Anakin, this does seem urgent. What have you found?”
Everything came spilling out, from Fives’ discovery, his death, and what he’d found on Kamino, specifically Order 66.
Obi-Wan stroked his beard. “It is a good plan, from a strategic point of view. Engineer a war, with the Jedi leading the clone army. Have them build trust with the clones. Then, activate the order, and most of the Jedi would be dead, leaving the galaxy for the Sith.”
Anakin sighed. Only Obi-Wan could be like this. “Sure, whatever, but that’s not the point! How am I supposed to tell the Council?”
Obi-Wan shrugged. “As far as I am concerned, there isn't much else to tell them besides the facts you have found. I could, of course, call an emergency meeting, but I feel as if you need some time to gather your thoughts. You really have done well to find this, you know.”
Anakin couldn’t help but smile.
So, Anakin gave his report to the Council on what he’d found.
Most of the Council was in varying states of shock.
“Troubling, this is. Trust our troopers, we do.” That was Yoda, naturally. Although sometimes Shaak Ti would mimic him, but that was happening less and less as the war continued.
Anakin noticed that Mace’s forehead vein was throbbing. Shouldn’t he be on a blood pressure reducer by now?
Mace put his head in his hands, blocking Anakin’s view of The Vein (as Ahsoka used to call it. She also called him Lightning Rod on a number of occasions. He missed her.)
Going from there, the Council decided to discreetly inform the medics of their troops. Anakin had built a chip scanner a long time ago, and it should work for these chips, too. Although he wasn’t certain it would work, apparently the medics loved it. It deactivated the chip in question, and the medics could operate on it safely, with a lot less recovery time, and with local anesthesia.
So, most troops were dechipped by the Skako Minor campaign. And then, he met Ahsoka in the siege of Mandalore. He should have told her he missed her. He should have told her that Padmé was nearly ready to adopt her. He should have done better as her master. He should have checked in on her- oh wait, he did.
Anyway, then Grievous attacked Coruscant, kidnapped the Chancellor, and it was up to him and Obi-Wan to rescue him. They got on board, messed around with the elevators, and he chopped Dooku’s hands off. Revenge is a dish best served with lightsabers.
Palpatine told him to kill Dooku. He certainly wanted to, and Dooku could still probably use the Force-wait, if Anakin himself couldn’t use the Force when knocked out, then Dooku couldn’t either! So, he slammed the hilt of his lightsaber onto Dooku’s head and knocked him out. He needed to get Obi-Wan and Palpatine out of this mess, and if Dooku escaped, then he was still missing his hands (and his lightsaber. Anakin was totally taking that for a trophy. Maybe he should cut off Dooku’s legs, for good measure.) But the core part of this whole fiasco is he didn't kill an unarmed (unhanded, really) prisoner. Just...well, made sure he wasn't going to be a threat for the time.
Anyway, they tried to outstupid Grievous off the ship, but Grievous was too stupid for them to outstupid him, and they got caught by ray shields, and were brought to the bridge. Fun. He wasn’t getting electrocuted yet, thankfully.
Grievous was hunched over, and therefore shorter than he expected. He said that out loud, didn’t he? He sensed Obi-Wan feeling pride but mostly exasperation at that.
Man, he had some bad memories with MagnaGuards, but these must have been fresh off the droid factory, because they sucked. Thank goodness for Artoo. Wait, where was Grievous going? Outside??? But space! Apparently he could survive a vacuum. Anakin wasn't going to question it too much.
Oh, they needed to land this ship, Grievous launched all the escape pods. Now this was podracing - not really, it wasn’t racing and-maybe he should stop thinking weird thoughts while crashing. Although there was one thing...
Did Dooku ever wake up? He reached out with the Force, and it had lightened a little bit. Maybe he was dead. He just got left in that tower, and-oh, that’s why, a B-2 droid fell on his head when the ship started to nosedive. A fitting end. (Anakin swears he didn't kill Dooku. Everyone rolls their eyes at this.)
Oh, they just lost half the ship. That certainly wasn’t good. Thankfully the battle was mostly over, and some of the Venators nearby had tractor beamed the back half - they were going to pull it up into an ad-hoc scrapyard nearby.
They landed- crash landed, but a landing was a landing. The Chancellor looked shaken, but alive, so he counted that as a win.
Oh no, Obi-Wan abandoned him, what was he going to do- Padmé? PADMÉ!
Time to search the holonet for dad jokes, he thought to himself. He grinned. Padmé was having children! From him! Oh, they were going to make Obi-Wan turn grey, weren’t they? Obi-Wan would definitely be their uncle. Ahsoka would want to be part of their family, too. Maybe even Yoda. Yoda was never cooking for his kids, though.
Was Force sensitivity genetic? He had a bad feeling about this.
So, he was having some more weird dreams about Padmé dying in childbirth this time, which was nuts. For one, she was a Senator, and therefore rich, and could therefore afford the best healthcare (he was still worried, though). For another, he did end up learning the Force Healing technique from Soont and the Tutaminis from Yoda. So, in an emergency, he was still covered. But he wasn't going to let it get that bad! He had standards!
And now the Chancellor was telling him about a Sith Lord named Plagueis who could save people from dying. Clearly, not suspicious at all. Anakin had played along (who knows, he could get a new technique out of this - whatever it was) but he still had a lot of concerns. Concerns which he took to Obi-Wan, because, well…Obi-Wan was great at giving second opinions.
Obi-Wan looked very concerned. “Are you certain that Supreme Chancellor Palpatine told you about this?”
Anakin felt about as confused as he looked, because Kenobiwan clarified immediately. “Anakin, we do not have any records of this Sith Lord in the Archives - we know of just about every Sith from before Darth Bane’s time because they were...well, less than subtle. We do also know about Bane, thanks to the ExplorCorps and Yoda finding his tomb. So if Palpatine is referencing this Sith which we have never heard of before, then clearly he must be connected to the Sith, somehow.”
That made…an unfortunate amount of sense. He didn’t know that there were records of the Sith in the Archives, and he said as much.
Obi-Wan replied, “Anakin, those records are accessible by Council members only, and those they grant access to under strict supervision. We can both take a second look, to verify this before we tell this to the rest of the Council. I could be wrong, you know. It’s been some time since I researched the Sith.”
So, they meticulously combed through the Archives, using Kenobi’s access key. No mentions of Darth Plagueis.
Time to tell the Council.
So, when the Council (and him) went to ask Palpatine about this, they certainly weren’t expecting him to pull out a red lightsaber from nowhere and spin like a centrifuge. Agen Kolar, Saesee Tiin and Kit Fisto almost went down immediately, but were saved by timely intervention by Yoda and Obi-Wan. Mace Windu and himself went on the offensive, with Yoda trying to outspin Palpatine, and Obi-Wan defending against Palpatine’s strikes, absorbing pressure that would have killed some other masters.
He finally landed the killing blow, and thank goodness he had hacked the security cams beforehand to record the entire conversation, because Palpatine clearly wasn’t trying to have a civil conversation. Oh, and the Force felt strange. A lot Lighter, for one.
Oh, and there was still Grievous to deal with. At least Obi-Wan volunteered for that mission.
Oh, he was going to be promoted to master now...wait, what?
Wait a second, the Council knew the entire time about him and Padmé being married? And they were okay with it?
Wait, twins?! Oh, he was so not ready for this.