Under The Cover Of Darkness

Chapter 12

The Jedi Temple did not have prison uniforms. Generally, all they did was thoroughly search the clothing of their prisoners and either let them keep them, or switch to spare—clean—tunics. Part of the efforts to keep Obi-Wan comfortable had included allowing his own tunics to be brought to him.

Fortunately, thanks to Ahsoka, Obi-Wan managed to escape without setting off any alarms. Unfortunately, by the time he makes his way out of the crawlspace, out of the areas of the Old Temple, and into a deserted corridor of the new one, he and his tunics ended up rather dusty.

He had the advantage that the Council hadn't wanted anyone to know that he had been possessed by what they had quite reasonably taken for a Sith, and thus only the Council, Ahsoka and Anakin, and the members of the Temple Guard knew he should be in a cell rather than walking the halls. That still left enough people, however, that he'd need a hooded cloak to make his way around. Which, conveniently, gave him an excuse to indulge what he could acknowledge was a hedonistic desire to be in a clean Force-damned robe, as well as quickly shove some things in a small bag. Including, thanks to the Council's deference to his comfort, mixed with their unadmitted terror of what had happened to him, his lightsaber.

In control of his own body—since, as Ben had pointed out, it was rightly his, and also Obi-Wan was more familiar with the layout of the Temple—Obi-Wan made his Temple quarters his first stop, changed into fresh tunics, grabbed a hooded cloak, and made his way toward the cell complex that held Luke and Mara.

A complication: the guards in front of Luke and Mara's cells and in the attached interrogation complex did know that he was supposed to be imprisoned.

But Obi-Wan hadn't been made the youngest Councilor in centuries for nothing.

The corridor approaching the cell complex was narrow and empty: an easily defended bottleneck with full visibility. He kept the hood of his cloak up as he walked up to them, ignoring calls for him to halt.

Before they could escalate to sounding the alarm, Obi-Wan used the Force—his first major Force use in days, aside from the ceiling of his cell, it felt like he was awake again after years asleep—to pin them in place, unmoving. The guards couldn't reach for their weapons, nor for their comms to alert anyone.

They might have broadcast their distress through the Force, but the next second Obi-Wan employed his sense of the anatomy of the guards under their masks—both human or near-human enough for this to work—and pinched each of their carotid arteries shut.

He didn't like to do it; such use of the Force had always felt far too Gray to him, too close to a Force choke. But attempting to influence the mind of someone as powerful and well-trained as the Temple Guards would have had to be flat-out Dark to succeed.

Blockage of the carotid arteries caused quick unconsciousness in most near-human species—and indeed, both of the guards sagged in his grip after approximately fifteen seconds, and he dropped them immediately. He had no desire to cause either permanent damage, and as he approached them, bent down to send a brief pulse of Force healing through each. Nothing complicated, and certainly not enough to wake them up, but enough to support their brains attempts to heal and ensure they would make complete recoveries.

Then all Obi-Wan had to do was swipe the access card for the cells from the belt of one of the guards, open the door, and walk in.

The cells were part of a prison and interrogation complex, and at the end of the hall were two more guards, positioned directly outside of the door to the cells. Obi-Wan repeated the process with displeasure—he could do what needed to be done, but the thought of attacking his fellow Jedi in the Jedi Temple, especially after having heard what happened to the Jedi, especially having spent the better part of a week thinking he would Fall...