Less than twenty minutes later, Anakin entered into the apartment he shared with his wife carrying his precious burden. Padme had been sitting on the couch, but upon seeing Vader enter and seeing the person in his arms, she arose as quickly as she was able from her seat.

"Anakin, what has happened? I was in the Senate when Chancellor Palpatine told us horrible things about the Jedi!" Anakin's wife met Anakin halfway and raised her hand to his cheek. "He stated that they were trying to overthrow the Republic and then my fellow Senators voted to make him the Emperor."

Anakin did not answer. He wanted to observe how his wife treated his former Master. He did not know whether Palpatine's words were enough to have turned his wife. Plus he had to ensure that his friend was safe within these walls.

He got his answer when Padme glanced down and tenderly ran her hand down the side of the former Jedi Master's face. "Is he alright? Was he attacked by his clone troopers? I've heard reports that Palpatine has turned the troops against their Jedi. I don't know how it possibly could have happened. They seemed so loyal."

"He will be alright. He was shot, but he was merely stunned. I'm more concerned about what happened before he returned to Coruscant. He was unable to tell me what happened to him while he was off planet and before I met him in the Temple." Anakin stated, the Dark Side assisting him with omitting information and twisting the truth.

"Oh goodness. Place him on the couch. I believe I have a first aid kit around here." Padme worried replied as she directed Vader to place his former master on the couch as she busied herself with finding the First Aid kit.

"All I need is some bacta to assist him, Padme." Anakin stated as he laid his master on the couch. "I will also need time to ease him into a healing trance. He has suffered a lot of trauma in the last few days."

Anakin arranged Obi-Wan's form into a comfortable position while the young Sith ensured that he would be able to treat all of the wounds on the soon-to-be-former Jedi Master's body. His wife soon returned to Vader carrying the First Aid kit and a vial of bacta for the fallen Jedi to tend to Obi-Wan.

Anakin graciously accepted the kit she handed him and quickly began attending to his friend and brother's wounds. As soon as the bacta was applied, the former Jedi decided he needed to bandage his friend's now bacta covered wounds and injuries.

'It would probably be wise for me to get him into a bacta tank as soon as I can safely secure one in the Temple.' Vader thought to himself as he wrapped and taped the bandages onto the soon-to-be-former Jedi.

He was just preparing to assist Obi-Wan's mind into a Force induced healing trance when Padme spoke.

'Obviously, she did not understand when I asked her to give me time to place Obi-Wan into a healing trance.' Anakin thought irritably.

"Anakin… what will happen now? What should we do?" Padme's concerned voice caused the Sith to look over at his very pregnant wife who had started this whole mess with her insistence that she was fine with being cared for by her handmaidens and a medi-droid who didn't specialize in pre-natal care.

'If she had only listened to me when I told her about my dreams and my concerns, perhaps we could have spared a few more lives and Obi-Wan could have been convinced to leave the corrupt order with me and the holocrons without a clone trooper having to shoot him in the back.'

"Do? We will assist Obi-Wan in healing and prepare for your upcoming birth. Obi-Wan and I will work with allies to take down Palpatine once Master is well." Anakin managed to state without allowing his annoyance to enter into his voice.

'Obi-Wan would be so proud…'

"I mean is there somewhere we can meet with the remaining Jedi knights and the Council? A contingency plan that the Jedi had in case this was ever to occur?"

"Padme… There isn't any Jedi left."

'Well, at least not for long… The little ones are no longer Jedi and surely with Obi-Wan's help, we can turn any remaining Padawan's whose Masters cared enough to help them escape.'

"Of course there is! There has to be. There is already murmuring around the Senate that a Rebellion is being formed. Surely the remaining Jedi will be drawn to it." Padme exclaimed as she moved to sit as close to Anakin as possible without disturbing Obi-Wan's prone form and placed her dainty hand on top of her husband's calloused one.

"Padme, we aren't joining any rebellions and even if there were any Council members outside of Obi-Wan and myself still living, I'd never permit us to join with them." Vader bit out. "Not after the Council encouraged Obi-Wan to go after Grievous alone. If there is any justice in the Universe, all those old fools have been killed for what they have done."

"Anakin, it is bad form to slander the dead, no matter how angry and distressed you are…" Padme appeared to be in shock from Vader words. "I'm sure the Council believed Obi-Wan was the best person to go after Grievous."

"They did not care about his safety as long as they made sure that they had separated him from me." Vader bit out as he removed his hand from Padme's and turned back to Obi-Wan.

Carefully and as gently as he could, the young Sith peeled back the burnt, dirty, and stained clothing hiding his former Master's injuries in preparation for placing the older man into a healing trance. He had already lain out the equipment he would need to assist the Force in healing Obi-Wan. "They knew I would be able to protect him. They must have wanted him to die."

"Anakin, what are you talking about?"

"Palpatine was right in one regard, the Jedi were trying to take over. They made peace keepers into soldiers."Anakin practically snarled before he had to struggle with himself to regain a sense of calm.

He needed to be calm if he wanted to help his former Master. If Vader could not calm his rage, he would be unable to assist Obi-Wan's body into a healing trance. Slowly he took deep breaths in and out, like a much younger Obi-Wan had taught him to do when Anakin had first come under the young knight's tutelage. "Obi-Wan is a negotiator. He never should have been made to fight in a war."

"I agree with you that the Jedi should have never been involved in this war. Negotiations should have been attempted instead of the Chancellor insisting that we go to war with the Separatists. I understand that Palpatine is your friend, but what he did was wrong." Padme affirmed gently before she paused, as if she was attempting to regain her thoughts.

Then his wife asked the question that Vader had hoped she would not dare to utter. "Anakin, where is this hatred towards the Council coming from? What is going on?"

"Palpatine did what he believed was necessary. The Separatists needed to be destroyed." Anakin stated in an off handed manner. "The same way the Jedi needed to be destroyed. Both were trying to overthrow the Republic."

"Anakin what are you saying?" Padme asked as she appeared to unconsciously draw herself and her pregnant belly away from Vader.

"Padme, it is simple. The Jedi needed to die."

When Obi-Wan awoke, he had no idea where he was at as he was staring a foreign ceiling in a room he did not recognize in the slightest and on a bed that was way too rich to ever reside in the Temple. The only two familiar things in the foreign room were the smell of a perfume Obi-Wan could not quite place and the smell of oily, dirty hair.

Turning his head to the side, Kenobi caught sight of the origin of the second smell. There was Anakin. Or at least, the being formerly known as Anakin.

"Good to see you awake Obi-Wan." The young man stated in a pleasant tone. The Jedi could not detect any trace of deception or falsehood in the 23-year-old's words.

"One would think that you would have no interest in seeing me wake." Obi-Wan retorted from his position on the overly soft bed.

The boy had the audacity to pretend to look offended.

"Obi-Wan, how dare you!" The being formerly known as Anakin replied as he dramatically placed his flesh hand across his forehead and feint being shocked. "You know your life is of utter importance to me."

'Does becoming a Sith mean that one became overly dramatic?' Obi-Wan asked himself as he watched the scene in front of him. 'Or is it just with Anakin?'

"Forgive me, but one must draw conclusions from the evidence lain before them."

"Well let me assist you in identifying evidence to the contrary." Anakin seemed to chirp as he began to busy himself with tidying the area around Obi-Wan. "As one, you are alive and two, you will have noticed that I have cared for your wounds while you were unconscious."

"I thought that you considered compassion to be a flaw." Obi-Wan queried, wondering what had happened to the Sith that had fought him in the Temple. That Sith had been eager to kill his former Master… or at least that is what had appeared to be the case.

'Obviously not.' Obi-Wan thought to himself with an internal sigh as he struggled to figure out a way out of the current mess he was in. 'Normally this would be when Anakin would assist me. It appears the Council was right when they said I was too dependent on him.'

The Sith apparently had decided to ignore the Jedi Master's comments because the man just continued to gather up discarded items that needed to be thrown away and items that, Obi-Wan could only assume, the being would be utilizing in the future.

So the Soresu Master decided to try again. "Tending my wounds is an act of compassion that I would never suspect a Sith would be willing to perform."

Anakin had been bending down when Obi-Wan started his new line of questioning. When the younger human straightened himself back up, Obi-Wan could see that there was a smile on his former Padawan's face. "You are mine Obi-Wan. Compassion for you is never a flaw."

"I belong to the Republic and the Jedi, Anakin." Obi-Wan stated softly, tears filling his eyes as the older man tried desperately to stop them from running over his eyelids. "I belong to the Code, Democracy, and, most importantly, the Force."

"Oh Obi-Wan…." Anakin sighed as he sat down on the bed on which Obi-Wan laid. "How naïve you are to believe that you belong to a decaying set of systems that lost their way millennia ago. But it is alright, my dear friend. Our Masters and Mistresses will help us both overcome the brainwashing we received from our former manipulators."

"Anakin… while the Republic is broken, it does not mean that it cannot be fixed." Obi-Wan whispered to his former friend. "The same goes for the Jedi. Changes could have been made. Plo and I were trying to do it, even if I was uncertain what repercussion it would have on the Jedi in the future. Now you have destroyed it with one blow."

Then, Obi-Wan's mind finally registered the last part of what his former Padawan had said. "What Masters and Mistresses, Anakin? How many Sith Lords are running around this galaxy?"

"The Council would never have allowed for change to occur, my friend. They were too set in their ways and were unwilling to give up the power the held over the younger generations." Anakin's eyes flashed golden and Obi-Wan flinched.

Anakin must have realized that he what had happened, because moments later, Obi-Wan, for lack of a better term, was being cuddled by the same Sith who hours (days?) before had been attempting to kill him. Now the same Sith had his nose buried in Obi-Wan's neck.

"Anakin, why did you do this? Who are these Masters and Mistresses you speak of? Why would you kill my family?"

Obi-Wan could feel the Sith's hot breath on his neck and smell the thick smell of the boy's dirty curly

hair.

"Oh Obi…" Anakin muttered into his neck. "I already told you that the Jedi were corrupt. They were never your family, merely you captors."

The man gently nuzzled Obi-Wan's neck before the other human raised his head to meet Obi-Wan face to face.

Blue eyes met blue eyes at that moment.

"As for our Masters and Mistresses… Obi-Wan, you already know who they are. You have guarded their vault for the majority of your life."

Obi-Wan felt his stomach drop.

'Frip.'

End of Part One