Apprentice (Star Wars / Alex Rider Crossover) (BOOK 1)

Chapter Twenty-Two

Cracking Codes

Obi-Wan almost had it. With the Force to guide him, he was almost finished with the codes on Damar's datpad. Most likely no one else could have broken them. Like all over Jedi, he had been trained in code breaking. He had never been the best at at it, but he was still better than most. At times like this, his training came in really handy.

"There!" he announced, satisfied with his work. "Got it."

Tet jumped up. "Did you find the records?" he whispered excitedly, keeping his voice in check. He stood over Obi-Wan, trying to see the screen.

Obi-Wan angled it away from him. "Don't look. I don't want you to get killed."

Tet nodded and backed down. "I understand."

Obi-Wan scrolled through the holofiles of Jedi he had known. If the Empire had found these, they would have been disappointed. Most of them Obi-Wan knew were dead. Others had been rumored dead.

He searched for "YODA." The screen flashed "LOCATION UNKNOWN." Obi-Wan knew where Yoda was. He was safely exiled in the Dagobah system, hidden deep in the swamps. He typed in "ANAKIN SKYWALKER," and waited, holding his breath. The screen flashed, "DEAD." Apparently, Damar thought Vader had killed him. The less she knew, the better.

He searched his own name. It came up, "LOCATION UNKNOWN." The same with Ferus Olin. He typed in Alex's name and it came up, "MATCH NOT FOUND."

All of the Jedi that were known to be dead were listed as such in the system. None of them had known locations that would help the Empire. This list was useless to them.

He memorized what information he could use and took out his lightsaber. He ignited it and held the hilt above his head, blue blade pointing down. He touched the tip of it to the datapad and held it there. The datapad started melting from the heat. The datapad started melting from the heat. The hold grew, and soon the datapad was nothing more than a pile of twisted, melted metal.

Obi-Wan put his lightsaber away and looked at Tet, who was staring wide-eyed at what had been the datapad. "What was that for?" he asked.

"Self destruct."

Tet smiled. "Very clever."

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Alex was stunned. There was silence over the comm for a few seconds.

"Anakin Skywalker is Darth Vader?" he said when he finally found his voice.

"What?!" exclaimed Damar.

"How?"

Ferus sighed sadly. "He turned to the dark side. He got bitter at the Jedi, at Obi-Wan. He was good friends with Palpatine before the rise of the empire. Palpatine deceived him into accepting the Sith teachings. He was the one that Palpatine revealed his true identity to."

"Why didn't he kill him?" asked Damar.

"Palpatine wanted him as an apprentice, and Anakin was the Chosen One, the one who was supposed to bring balance to the Force. He was the best swordsman anyone had ever seen and he was a brilliant Jedi, but he was emotionally unstable. That made him fair game to Palpatine, and he was able to sway Anakin to the dark side easily."

"How?" Alex asked again.

"I'm not exactly sure. You'll have to ask Obi-Wan on that, Alex."

"So, he was deceived by Palpatine. When he discovered he had been tricked, why didn't he turn back?"

"It was too late. He is Darth Vader, and Palpatine is his master. From what I can gather, Palpatine saved his life after he and Obi-Wan had an intense lightsaber duel. Anakin was trying to kill his own Master. Obi-Wan wanted to protect Anakin from himself. That's why he wears that black suit. He doesn't think of himself of Anakin Skywalker. He tries to kill his memory of his own identity. But that is something he can never fully do."