Star Wars fic: "Queen's Gambit" (24 & 25)

[bedlamsbard]

Queen's Gambit (261106 words) by bedlamsbard
Chapters: 26/?
Fandom: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Padmé Amidala, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Dooku (Star Wars), Palpatine | Darth Sidious, Mace Windu, Yoda, Bail Organa, Ahsoka Tano, Quinlan Vos, Barriss Offee, Plo Koon
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Parallel Universes
Series: Part 2 of Ouroboros
Summary:

Civil war threatens the galaxy. Hundreds of star systems have declared their intentions to leave the Republic and form a Confederacy of Independent Systems.

In the hopes of securing a quick peace, the Jedi Council has dispatched two Jedi to capture or kill the leaders of the separatist movement, Queen Amidala of Naboo and her lover, the former Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Into this period of conflict have come four refugees from another universe, fleeing a devastating massacre triggered by the death of Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, secretly the Sith lord Darth Sidious, at the hands of Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker…

*

I, uh, I forgot to post a DW notification for Chapter 24, so this is for both 24 and 25.

Adi Gallia stared at the empty cell with a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach, though that could have been caused by the still-active wards enclosing the high security cells. Trying to reach into the Force to get some sense of who had been here – besides Obi-Wan Kenobi, which she didn’t need the Force to tell her – was useless; the wards blurred all trace of whoever had come before her. Even a Kiffar’s psychometric abilities would be wasted, though that didn’t mean Adi wasn’t going to get Quinlan Vos down here to try.

She glanced at the two Temple Guards standing on either side of her, the same ones who had been on duty here last night. It was impossible to read their expressions through their concealing masks; without the Force, Adi had no idea what was going through their heads. The high security cells shouldn’t have been left unguarded at any point, and no Guard would leave their post. They couldn’t be bribed, they couldn’t be distracted, and they couldn’t be turned against the Order.

Or at least that was what everyone believed. That had been true since the days of the Old Republic. It should have been a universal truth of the Order.

And yet Obi-Wan Kenobi was still gone.

She turned at the sound of a step behind her and saw Mace Windu approaching down the narrow corridor, his face doing something complicated as he looked past her at the empty cell. “I came down to talk to Obi-Wan about something we heard from Naboo and saw that the Guards outside were gone,” he said. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know,” Adi admitted. “I came down to – I came down. The Guards were on duty when I came in, but he wasn’t here.” She gestured at the security panel. “Locks and ray shields are both engaged; there’s a dip in power about twelve hours ago that was probably someone deactivating them, but there’s no personal code attached.”

She hesitated, not wanting to say it, but Mace filled in for her, his voice bleak. “Someone on the High Council could have done that.”