***Now edited, thanks to SerendipityAEY - check out her work for some awesome Obimance.

About this fic: Part-way through season 4 of Clone Wars, I'm surprised Obi-Wan wants to bother continuing with the war - every mission he's on seems to end up in disaster or serious injury. So here's my AU, taking off after episode 13 and the mission where he got beaten to a pulp numerous times, enslaved, humiliated, and (of course) almost killed.

Incoming in future chapters is Obi/OC, action-adventure, politics and Jedi lawyers :)

He woke, and he was still exhausted.

Obi-Wan sat up stiffly and looked around the room - he was in the Halls of Healing, back at the Temple on Coruscant for the first time in many months. Usually when he woke up here, he would feel better and be impatient to receive his next mission. But this time, he didn't feel better - he just felt exhausted.

Within seconds, a med droid and an assistant healer descended on him. The assistant, from the Medical Corp, pulled Obi-Wan's eyelid back and shone a light into it without explanation, while the droid ripped off the sections of tape on his arm and pulled out a drip.

"How long have I been here?" Obi-Wan asked, his voice scratchy. The assistant scribbled on his clipboard for a few seconds before glancing up at Obi-Wan as though only just noticing him.

"Not my department. Sign outs only."

Obi-Wan nodded, swinging his legs off the bed. The movement made him groan and put a hand on his ribs. "It still feels…"

"Yeah… They'll heal up soon. We need to free up the bed," the healer replied. "Sorry," he added as an afterthought.

"Right."

Obi-Wan stood carefully, his bare feet touching the cold floor. There was a plastic bag hanging from a hook beside his bed, containing all his clothes - with a sigh, he noticed they hadn't been cleaned. Carefully, he pulled on the ripped pants and smelly, stained undertunic, wincing when he had to bend over or lift his arm. The droid was already re-dressing the bed he'd been in, and shoved Obi-Wan aside as it whizzed past.

He carried his plastic bag to the front of the facility and signed his name off the list, then stepped out into the cavernous Temple hallway.

First stop was his quarters. He needed clean clothes. The turbolift took him up, and when he stepped inside the room which was now only semi-familiar, he dropped his bag and collapsed onto the bed, groaning at the impact to his ribs. He ran through the list of things he needed to do, while he lay there: find clean clothes, get his old gear repaired, service his lightsaber, eat - definitely need to eat - and deliver that datachip he could feel digging into his leg. One of the Jedi on the transfer vessel had passed it to him when he heard Obi-Wan was returning to the Temple for rehab - he could barely remember who it was, or what the message contained. He had been only semi-conscious, and had just shoved it in the pocket of his pants.

Okay, time to move - he needed to get all these things done before the imminent Council summons with his next mission. The thought made him more depressed than he could ever recall feeling, and he pulled the pillow under his head. In five minutes, he'd get up. He just needed to rest - just for a moment.

The next time he woke, it was dark. He rolled out of bed in panic and searched through his plastic bag until he found his belt, but to his relief, there were no calls to his comlink. The Council summons hadn't arrived yet, then. He stood up and flicked on the lights. His stomach was growling and it seemed to make his ribs hurt even more. He located some fresh clothes, and as he tugged his pants off he felt the little datachip in his pocket. He pulled it out and plugged it into his data terminal, stepping into the fresher while it booted up after long disuse.

He had to spend a few minutes peeling off tape and gauze patches before he could wash - they never seemed to end. It was evident the healers hadn't thought his injuries were bacta-tank-worthy, but he supposed there were plenty of others who needed the tanks worse than him.

When he stepped out, his terminal had loaded the document contained in the datachip. He sat down to read it while he struggled with his boots.

Please deliver to: Legal Dept, level 3 south Jedi Temple

Attn: Skylin Shaw

PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL

The following data was coded with a simple Jedi sequence, but he wasn't interested in prying into other people's business. He pocketed the chip and made his way down to level 3. In the hallway, he passed Mace Windu coming out of a side room.

"Kenobi! Good to see you up and about. Especially at this hour! I take it you're much recovered?"

"I - thank you, Master Windu," Obi-Wan hesitated. "Er - what is the time? I suppose I'm jetlagged."

"Just past 23 hundred. I should congratulate you on your success on Kadavo - a very complex mission."

"Yes, Master," Obi-Wan replied, feeling tireder by the second.

"I expect the Council will summon you in the morning to hear your report. Get some rest!"

Windu strode down the hall and Obi-Wan refrained from making a rude gesture at his back. It was easy for him to be so bright and energetic, holed up cosily here in the Temple ninety per cent of the time.

He continued down the hall to the south wing and searched for the 'Legal Dept' the message had described. He had actually never heard of it before. He passed a narrow hallway and saw an open door down the end, where a light was on. The closer he came to the doorway, the more litter lined the walls - boxes of flimsy files and datachips, piles of archive records, and immediately outside the door, four dense filing cabinets. One was labelled 'Traffic Offences'.

"Excuse me?" He knocked on the door as he stepped into an extremely messy office. It was roughly divided into four sections, with a large desk in each corner, and shelves lining the walls. The files on the shelves seemed to be in the midst of an invasion on the rest of the office, their ranks gradually making their way across the desks and floor into the centre. "Anyone here?" he called.

"Opening hours are over; come back in the morning," a voice emerged from the debris.

"Er -" Obi-Wan looked to his right, trying to see the being the voice came from. "I'm sorry, but I'm not likely to be planetside in the morning - I just need to deliver a message."

He received a groan in response. Following the sound, he stepped around an immense stack of folders on a desk until he finally located its source - a young human female, who was sitting with her knees drawn up and her face reflecting the blue light of her datapad.

"Hello there."

She slumped in disappointment. "I was hoping you wouldn't find me." She had untidy blonde hair and fair skin, and a slightly narrow face.

"Well, as a Jedi Master, my skills of detection are very impressive." The woman laughed, and he continued. "Would you happen to be Skylin Shaw?"

"I guess I would."

"Then I have a message for you." He dug the chip out of his pocket and passed it to her. She took it reluctantly.

"Who's it from?"

"Honestly, I can't remember."

With a somewhat pained expression, Skylin plugged the chip into her datapad and decrypted it quickly. Her eyes scanned the text for only a few seconds before she groaned loudly and pushed her chair back, grabbing a few used caf cups and stalking across to the garbage receptacle. She wore brown robes over her slight frame. "Big surprise - another WFC request for Skylin, the champion of tired Jedi. I'll just add that to my to-do list, shall I?" she indicated the pillar of files she had been hiding behind.

Obi-Wan was confused. "Pardon me - WFC?"

"Yeah." She squinted at him. "Have we met?"

"I don't believe so." He bowed. "Obi-Wan Kenobi. Pleased to meet you."

"Oh - you're on the Council?" she looked suddenly cowed. "I, uh - do you want me to disregard this request?"

Obi-Wan smiled hesitantly. "I don't even know what the request is."

"It's - " she glanced back at the screen, and he saw her eyes move over a section of text at the bottom. She relaxed. "Oh, I see now - sorry. I thought you were Windu loop."

Obi-Wan was baffled. "What's a Windu loop?"

The girl chuckled, and beckoned him around behind her desk. She sat back down and tilted the screen of her datapad so he could read the decoded message over her shoulder.

Dear Skylin,

I've heard of the work you've been doing for some of the Jedi I work with, and would like to request you take up my case as well. I have not returned to the Temple at all since the beginning of the wars, and I haven't received adequate treatment of a back injury which I received over a year ago in service, and I believe it is getting worse. I have also been having trouble sleeping for the last six months, for unrelated reasons. The Council has been unreceptive whenever I have requested a rotation off service, and I have requested it at least three times. If it is possible for you to take on my case, you should be able to contact me via the 42nd fleet for the next few weeks at least.

I am sending this message with Obi-Wan Kenobi, because I believe he will not report me if he reads this. I think we may be able to trust him, though he probably doesn't know it yet.

Thank you for helping us, Skylin - it means more than you will ever know.

She looked up at him when she sensed he had finished reading.

"…I don't understand. Why would I report this Jedi? He hasn't done anything wrong."

Skylin let out a breath. "I was hoping you'd say that." She spun her chair around to face him. "WFC means withdraw-from-combat. These files are all requests like this one, Jedi asking me to take their case to the Council."

Obi-Wan frowned. "But I've never heard of it."

"That's because they introduced a new code that requires all these types of matters to be heard by only two Council members currently at the Temple. Apparently it's to save Council time."

"But this is quite a serious matter," Obi-Wan gestured at the files. "Do your claims usually succeed?"

Skylin shrugged. "Once or twice. The Council's generally not interested in hearing their soldiers are tired." Suddenly her face fell. "You're not going to tell them I said all this, are you?"

"Well - why not? I would like to know why I haven't heard about it, if there are as many claims as you say."

"Because it's supposed to be kept quiet," she grimaced. "They don't want other Jedi knowing withdrawal is even an option - otherwise everyone would probably be doing it."

Obi-Wan frowned uneasily. "I see. Who is it that usually hears your cases?"

"Master Windu and Master Kolar." She scowled. "They're getting sick of me, though. I'm worried soon they'll refuse to hear my requests altogether, and then what'll I do with all these? They're counting on me to at least try."

Obi-Wan nodded. "Thank you for informing me of this situation. As I said, I expect I'll be dispatched in the morning, but I will attempt to raise this issue with the Council as soon as I can." Although his words were professional, his face betrayed his misery at the thought of another mission. Skylin looked up at him shrewdly for a moment before jumping to her feet.

"Here," she said, toeing the chair towards him. "Sit. I'll make you some tea."

He hesitated. "You're clearly very busy, I don't want to take up your time..."

Instead of replying, she grasped his arms and maneuvered him into the chair. "Relax," she instructed. "You look exhausted."

Obi-Wan struggled to respond. They were the first genuinely kind words he'd received since he'd returned home, and it made him feel slightly emotional. He watched as Skylin picked her way across the room to close the door, then back to a barely visible bench along one wall with a water dispenser and kettle. Finally, he said, "You know, I was not aware we even had a legal department."

Skylin grinned. "Well, 'course we do that on purpose, so no one ever notices how many speeding fines the Temple gets."