Back in the Game (COMPLETE)

9.16.3

It was only the next morning when the Temple was finally still once again. Obi-Wan had walked with Yoda, surveying the wake of the destruction that had met them when they arrived. He had lost count of how many bodies he had seen on the ground, both clone and Jedi, all of whom were dead. They had already been searching for an hour, and still, no survivors had been found. Out of all of the people they had pulled out and laid to rest, none of them had been alive.

The only Jedi he had any hope for was the young Padawan, Caleb Dume. Obi-Wan had briefly met him during the battle to defend the Temple, and Caleb had warned him about a broadcast coming out from the Temple. It was leading all Jedi to it, instead of warning them away. At his suggestion, Obi-Wan had gotten to work recording a new message and using it to replace the original. Hopefully, there were still Jedi alive to receive it.

Yoda walked up to Obi-Wan who was finishing his work. "I have recalibrated the code, warning all surviving Jedi to stay away."

"For the clones to discover the recalibration, a long time it will take," he affirmed, and he watched as Obi-Wan shut down the calibrator. All they could do was hope the message would be heard. Yoda began to walk away, but Obi-Wan spoke up.

"Wait, Master, there is something I must know," he told the Grandmaster. Walking over to the side of the room, Obi-Wan opened up the database for the Temple.

Warning him, Yoda said, "If into the security recordings you go, only pain will you find."

Obi-Wan was insistent though. "I must know the truth, Master," he told him, searching through the files for anything that might bring him answers. There were too many questions, too many horrors with no explanation. There had to be something that would give him a clue.

All he saw was more of what he had already imagined had happened. Clones were charging through the Temple, firing at Jedi of all ages. From the eldest to the youngest, they all fell to the blue bolts raging across the holograms. There was no mercy, no justification, just the death he and Yoda had already felt happen hours ago.

Until one recording gave him hope. Barreling out of a room on the third floor, Obi-Wan saw Anakin defending his fellow Jedi, taking charge and pushing back the forces that threatened them. He shouted at them, yelling for them to escape, but a shudder in the footage made them all hesitate. After a moment, Anakin pushed everyone else out of view of the camera, right before falling through the floor.

He didn't bother to shut off the recording but ran in the direction of where Anakin had fallen. Though he heard Yoda calling for him, telling him not to run off, Obi-Wan didn't listen, didn't care. It didn't matter what the other Jedi was saying, he had to find Anakin.

It had occurred to him that Anakin was on Coruscant when the clones betrayed the Jedi, but not even in his greatest fears had he considered that Anakin might have joined the fallen in death. The possibility had him stumbling as he ran, frantically searching for where his apprentice had been lost.

When he finally turned the corner to the hall Anakin should have been in, Obi-Wan was greeted by a mountain of crumbled stone, and a gaping ceiling that suggested that as many as three or four floors had been destroyed. After gaping at the destruction for a moment, Obi-Wan ran to the base of the rubble, searching for any sign of Anakin. There had to something. His cloak, his lightsaber, anything. 

He found multiple of these, but none of them belonged to the Chosen One. Obi-Wan pulled even more Jedi out of the wreckage, those who had been trapped underneath and those who had been on the upper floors and fallen down. Every corpse he found only weakened his hope further, but he refused to give up. For every time Anakin had pulled him to safety, for every mission Anakin had salvaged at the last minute, Obi-Wan kept searching, believing that he could pull off one last miracle.