Title: Momentum of Fate
Pairings: Just Anakin/Padmé at the moment. Though future chapters are showing a definite inclination towards Aayla Secura/Barriss Offee
Rating: PG-13
Place in Timeline: Begins mid-ROTS, and should progress right through to ROTJ
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Summary: AU. A minor difference changes the course of the future - Anakin has a different vision his first night back in Coruscant. But can he be saved, or will it merely change the nature of his fall into darkness?

Chapter One
Chapter Two

Chapter 3 - Grievous

Darth Sidious was angry – his plans were starting to go awry.

No, that was something of an understatement. Darth Sidious was in a towering genocidal fury, because the carefully-crafted schemes he’d been working on for most of his adult life were coming crashing down around his ears. Not only had that infuriating Skywalker boy failed to seek his help in ‘saving’ – and he used the word very loosely – Amidala, the senile fools on the Jedi Council had actually sent the insufferable brat to Utapau.

What the devil was going on?

He steepled his fingers and gazed thoughtfully into the distance. Fact One: Skywalker had no knowledge of the threat to his wife’s life. Fact Two: He had displayed a surprising loyalty to the Jedi Order. Fact Three: He was currently heading for Utapau with his old master to kill General Grievous. And with Grievous dead, the Senate would vote to end the war. Unless…

Sidious gave an evil smile. He knew exactly what to do.

XxXxXxX

“So, where to first?” Anakin asked brightly, looking down at the expanse of Utapau beneath them. Obi-Wan paused, listening to what the Force was telling him.

“There. That one,” he replied, sending the co-ordinates of the chosen city to Anakin’s flight computer; “We’ll start there.” He waited for and acknowledgement, a reply of any sort – even an objection would have been welcome as the silence dragged on – but there was only crackling static. “Anakin? Anakin, are you alright?”

“I’m fine, Master, it’s just…” Anakin’s voice was tense and strained; “I have the proverbial Bad Feeling about this.”
“’This’ being the mission, the city, or life in general?” Obi-Wan asked dryly.
Anakin gave a humourless laugh: “All three, I think.”

They brought their fighters down through the atmosphere of the planet. Anakin’s sense of apprehension diminished as he looked out at this new planet with interest. The thing he liked most about being a Jedi – aside from the Force powers, which he had to admit were pretty cool – was the sheer number of strange new worlds he saw. One of the things about him which hadn’t changed, and probably never would, was his basic curiosity. Many years ago in a scruffy slave-boy on Tatooine, it had manifested as an insatiable desire to take apart mechanical components to see if he could figure out how they worked – and, more importantly, how to put them back together again. Now it had just found a different outlet.

The two spacecraft descended almost vertically down the sinkhole around which the city was built, and touched down lightly on a landing platform. Seeing Obi-Wan climbing out of the cockpit, Anakin followed his old Master’s lead. As a ground crew hurried over to examine their vessels, they were greeted by the tall, dignified Administrator of the city.

“Greetings, young Jedi,” the Administrator said; “What brings you to our remote sanctuary?”
”Unfortunately, the war,” Obi-Wan replied.
”There is no war here unless you've brought it with you,” the alien replied a little sniffily, blissfully unaware of the deadly glare Anakin shot at him. Obi-Wan ignored the slight with characteristic diplomacy.
“With your kind permission, we should like some fuel and to use your city as a base as we search nearby systems for General Grievous.” Only the slightest stiffening and hiss of breath betrayed the Administrator. He gestured abruptly for the ground crew to refuel the ships before leaning in closer and lowering his voice.
“He is here! We are being held hostage. They are watching us.”
Anakin and Obi-Wan exchanged glances. “We understand,” Anakin said eventually.
”The tenth level...thousands of Battle Droids...“
Obi-Wan nodded; “Tell your people to take shelter. If you have warriors, now is the time.”

As the Administrator turned to leave again, the two Jedi returned to their ships, talking in low voices. They gave almost identical orders to their respective astro-droids before slinking unnoticed into the shadows. The ships flew off without them as they darted almost invisibly up a flight of stairs cut into the rock face.

“Tenth level?” Anakin asked quietly.
“Up there,” Obi-Wan said, pointing; “Though how we’re supposed to get up there I’m not so sure…”
“The rock face is rough,” Anakin observed; “It shouldn’t be too hard to climb.” Obi-Wan eyed his former padawan dubiously, but he couldn’t come up with anything better. He nodded curtly and Anakin grinned.

Anakin closed his eyes and concentrated on the Force, doing his best to radiate a sense of ‘I’m not here’. He felt Obi-Wan doing the same beside him. Prepared, invisible to the untrained eye, they began the long climb. The rock face was indeed rough. It should have been easy to climb, but it had a tendency to crumble at inopportune moments, so every handhold had to be tested before any weight was trusted to it. Somehow they made it to the tenth level without any major mishaps. Carefully the two Jedi crept out along a metal beam far above where Grievous was ranting at the Separatist leaders about something or other.

“So now what, do we just drop down and start fighting?” Anakin said sarcastically, and very nearly experienced a premature heart attack as Obi-Wan nodded slowly and replied; “Yes, that might work.”
“Master, that’s the sort of plan I’d come up with!” Anakin protested. Wait a minute, possibly not the best argument…

By this point it was too late, as Obi-Wan was already in he process of jumping off the beam. Anakin sighed. Honestly, his master was behaving like…well, like him. Which was extremely unfair, since it was Anakin’s job to behave like Anakin. Forcibly bringing his wandering mind back to the subject in hand, he vaulted off of the beam and landed beside Obi-Wan.

“Hello there!” Obi-Wan said brightly.
Grievous whirled furiously: “Kenobi and Skywalker,” he spat; “A bold move. But a useless one – surely you realise you are doomed. Destroy them!”

There was a cacophony of guns being cocked all around them and oh Sith that was a lot of battle droids. Anakin was quite sure there hadn’t been that many before they’d jumped down. Oh well, too late for that now. He and Obi-Wan ignited their lightsabers and dropped into fighting stances as Grievous’ elite guards advanced on them, electric staffs crackling. Obi-Wan gestured, and a large fixture fell off the ceiling, crushing them. He casually beheaded one which was still struggling as the two Jedi walked past on their way to where Grievous stood. Hundreds of battle droids leveled their guns at them, but Grievous had other plans. “Back away!” he snarled, “I will deal with this Jedi slime myself.”

“Your move,” Obi-Wan told the cyborg cheerily.
“You fools,” Grievous sneered, shrugging off his cloak; “I have been trained in your Jedi arts by Count Dooku!”
“Yeah, and look what happened to him,” Anakin smirked. Grievous snarled at him and sprouted an extra pair of arms, igniting not two but four lightsabers. He advanced on them, striking up sparks as he came. The battle began with blaster-fire flying everywhere. The Clones had finally arrived.

Grievous was good, there was no denying that. But he was no match for two fully-trained Jedi. The battle was intense, violent, a deadly dance of glowing blades. It was also very short. They got their breath back as the Clones mopped up the remnants of the droid army.

“Well, it’s over,” Anakin said, prodding the corpse with his foot.
“We should get back to Coruscant as quickly as possible,” Obi-Wan said; “Cody should have sent word back by now that we’ve killed Grievous.” Anakin nodded wearily, and they began the walk back to where the Clones had landed their ships. He couldn’t help but smile. The war was all but over: he could go back to Coruscant and be with Padmé without being constantly called out all over the galaxy…

Blaster fire…pain…death… Clone troopers marching into the Temple, killing all in their path. Clone troopers gunning down their Jedi commanders. Beacons of life winking out one by one. And Palpatine, his face twisted in evil glee, presiding over it all. “Execute Order Sixty-six.”

Anakin cried out in pain at the horrible intensity with which the vision hit him. He stumbled, sagging against the nearest wall for support, holding his head. Through the chaos of screams and gunshots roaring in his ears, a worried voice got through to him, a sudden reassuring presence as strong hands gripped his shoulders: “Anakin! Anakin, what’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

He clutched at his master’s arms like a drowning man would a rope. He shook his head desperately; “No, no, it’s not me, it’s everyone else! Something awful is about to happen…they’re all going to die! We’ve been betrayed…”

“Anakin, calm down, you’re babbling,” Obi-Wan said patiently, soothingly, drawing the younger Jedi back from the brink of complete panic. But when Anakin looked up at him with a sudden dreadful clarity in those bright blue eyes, what he said next almost sent him over the edge himself.

“Chancellor Palpatine is about to order the Clones to wipe out the Jedi. We’re all going to die.”

Chapter 4 - Remembering Jabiim

Obi-Wan gaped in a manner most unbecoming of a Jedi Master; “What? Why? Anakin, that doesn’t make sense!”
Anakin stared at the ground for a long moment, his mind working furiously; “Palpatine wants control of the Senate,” he said slowly; “But the only reason he’s stayed in office this long is because of the war. With Grievous dead, the war is over. He has no excuse to stay in power…”
“But with the Jedi out of the way, no-one would be strong enough to remove him,” Obi-Wan finished grimly; “Of course. It’s true what Dooku said then – the Chancellor must be under the control of the Sith Lord.”
“No, that doesn’t make sense either,” Anakin said absently, concentrating on the memory of his vision; “When I saw Palpatine…he wasn’t being forced to destroy the Jedi. If anything he was enjoying it.”
“You realise what you’re saying, Anakin. If Palpatine isn’t being controlled by the Sith Lord…”
“He is the Sith Lord. Yes, I know.”
Obi-Wan stared at him: “So what do we do?”
“I need to get to my ship,” Anakin said suddenly, and took off at a dead run.

By the time Obi-Wan caught up, Anakin was already perched on the wing of his fighter, doing something complicated to the transmitter. R2 bleeped something at him, and he frowned. “Blast, still out of range?” he muttered, and turned to pry off a panel next to the engines. Some creative rewiring apparently satisfied him, and he glanced over at the eccentric little astro-droid; “Now?” More bleeping; “Good.”

“Anakin, what are you doing?” Obi-Wan said, almost crying with exasperation; “This is a crisis – it’s no time for you to be tinkering with your ship!”
“You know, there’s a very interesting device – sort of a distress beacon – in the Temple,” Anakin said, completely ignoring him. He hopped into the cockpit and started pressing buttons rapidly; “It has the frequency of every single Jedi comlink, and in times of crisis it can transmit a coded message directly to all of them, no matter how far away they are. Now, if you happened to send a message directly to it with the proper access codes, it would retransmit it immediately. Ordinarily it would be very difficult to get a message to Coruscant from this far out, but I’ve boosted the transmitter. What do you think?”

Here he gestured towards the screen, and Obi-Wan climbed onto the wing of the ship to get a better look. The message was surrounded by a string of incomprehensible machine-code which Anakin assured him meant the beacon would think his message was genuine, but the important part boiled down to three sentences: Palpatine is a Sith. Clones are now a threat. Seek shelter immediately.

“How in the world do you know all this?” Obi-Wan asked suspiciously.
“Trade secret, master. Shall I send it?”
“Yes.”

XxXxXxX

Felucia was an odd planet. Admittedly there were many strange things in the galaxy, but Aayla Secura still felt on some instinctive level that mushrooms should not be eighteen feet tall. And as for the wildlife… Her comlink beeped and she glanced down at it absently. The text-message symbol was flashing. She pressed a couple of buttons and froze as the message scrolled across the screen, panic sweeping through her: Palpatine is a Sith. Clones are now a threat. Seek shelter immediately.

Slowly she raised her eyes to confirm that yes, she was still surrounded by Clone troopers armed to the teeth with the best and most lethal technology the Republic had to offer. Oh, kreth.

“Aayla?” someone said softly. She looked up to see Barriss Offee staring at her own comlink with a look of quiet horror; “Is this genuine?”
Aayla looked again at the highly-trained Clone army all around them. “I really hope not,” she murmured.

XxXxXxX

Ki-Adi-Mundi skidded to a halt and set his back against a wall, panting for breath. The battle of Mygeeto was at its fiercest; droids and clones being destroyed all around him, and the Cerean Jedi was exhausted. Taking advantage of the brief respite, he lifted the comlink which had been beeping insistently at him. The message he read there made his blood run cold: Palpatine is a Sith. Clones are now a threat. Seek shelter immediately.

“Are you alright, sir?” one of the clones asked him. The Jedi stared back with a growing sense of fear.
“Yes, I…I’m fine,” he managed. For now.

XxXxXxX

When her comlink first beeped, Luminara Unduli didn’t even notice. Battle was raging fiercely not far away as the Separatists and the Republic fought for control of Kashyyyk and she was busy healing the wounded. Her comlink beeped again, and she subconsciously registered it as she healed a blaster burn in a Clone trooper’s leg.

By the time the thus-far ignored comlink had come to her full attention, she was tired and irritable with no patience for whoever was trying to contact her. She switched it off and moved on to the next patient.

After all, how important could it be?

XxXxXxX

Mace Windu gaped at the message he had just received, completely at a loss about what to make of it. He knew Palpatine was manipulative and untrustworthy, but…a Sith?

But then again, the more he thought about it the more sense it made. The blockade of Naboo apparently arranged by the Sith Lord had resulted in Palpatine becoming Chancellor. The Separatist forces knowing exactly where to find him. Every seeming coincidence he brought to mind seemed to add support to this theory. But the idea that the Republic had been under the sway of a Sith Lord for thirteen years…it was too horrible to contemplate. If Palpatine was the Sith Lord, something would have to be done immediately.

For the first time in his life, Mace Windu desperately hoped he was wrong.

XxXxXxX

All over the galaxy, from Alderaan to Zabrak, similar scenes played out. Shell-shocked Jedi slowly began to realise just how hopelessly surrounded by Clones they were, while those who had lost or ignored their comlinks carried on in blissful ignorance of the fate that awaited them.

“We’ve done all we can,” Obi-Wan said; “Come on, Anakin, we need to get back to Coruscant and explain ourselves to the Council in person.” Despite the seriousness of the situation, he couldn’t help but smile faintly; “I’m sure Master Windu will be thrilled to hear you’ve bypassed the Temple’s security measures again.”
“It’s their own fault for not having better security,” Anakin shrugged. He fired up his engine and the cockpit sealed with a pneumatic hiss.
“I doubt they’ll see it that way,” Obi-Wan said from his own fighter, the conversation continuing over the comlink. He pressed another button; “Cody, we’re needed back on Coruscant. Can you handle things here?”
“No problem,” Cody replied; “Take care of yourself.”
Obi-Wan swallowed an inexplicable lump in his throat; “Goodbye.”

The two small ships lifted off the landing pad and rose into the clear skies over Utapau. Obi-Wan wasn’t sure what season it was on Utapau, but it was hotter than the height of a Coruscanti summer. He wondered what high summer on Tatooine was like… unpleasant, probably. His flight computer fed out a series of possible hyperspace trajectories, and he picked one that would bring them out at the very edge of the system. “Use these co-ordinates, Anakin,” he said, sending them over; “If it all kicks off while we’re in hyperspace, we don’t want to come out right in the middle of a battle.”

Anakin made a vague noise of agreement over the comlink. There was a faint, rhythmic tapping, and Obi-Wan knew than Anakin was drumming his fingers on the console. After a while the drumming stopped and he said quietly; “This feels like Jabiim.”

Obi-Wan suddenly felt very cold. Jabiim…Jabiim had been a nightmare.

Jabiim was a dreary, rain-soaked world over which they had fought bitterly earlier in the war. Dozens of Jedi and tens of thousands of Clones had died defending Jabiim from the Separatists. Obi-Wan had been captured by Asajj Ventress and declared missing in action, presumed dead. With commanders dropping like flies, leadership of the hopelessly outnumbered Republic forces had fallen to Anakin.

Obi-Wan could only imagine how Anakin – then only a padawan – had felt, leading a massively outmanned and outgunned force into a battle they couldn’t possibly hope to win, standing in a trench knee-deep in mud and blood and filthy water, believing his Master dead. He had never spoken of it again, but for months afterwards he had been plagued by nightmares of that desperate last stand. He had truly believed he was going to die there.

Jabiim had fallen. And Anakin was the only Jedi to make it out alive.

“We won’t let that happen, Anakin,” Obi-Wan promised; “This won’t be another Jabiim. This time we’ll win.”

“I hope so,” Anakin said, and his fighter sped up to link with a booster ring. Obi-Wan followed at a more sedate pace, and gave a weary sigh as the stars blurred into the dancing blue lights of hyperspace. He could promise all he liked that this wouldn’t be another Jabiim…but frankly he wasn’t so sure himself.