Obi-Wan began his investigation by trying to identify the toxic dart that he had removed from the Clawdite's neck. After the a.n.a.lysis droids in the Jedi Archives failed to provide any useful information about the dart, he realized he would have to consult a different sort of expert.

Obi-Wan had kept in touch with Dexter Jettster over the years, and he was fortunate in that he did not have to go far to find the well-traveled Besalisk. Dexter was currently the proprietor and head cook at Dex's Diner in CoCo Town, a commercial district in the upper levels of Galactic City on Coruscant. Dexter greeted his old friend with a big hug. After they settled down in a diner booth that looked out on a busy street, Obi-Wan placed the dart on the table in front of Dexter.

"Well, whattaya know!" Dexter exclaimed as he picked up the dart. "I ain't seen one of these since I was prospectin' on Subterrel, beyond the Outer Rim."

"Can you tell me where it came from?"

"This baby belongs to them cloners. What you got here is a Kamino saberdart."

Obi-Wan had always been amazed by Dexter's powers of observation as well as his keen memory. He said, "I wonder why it didn't show up in the a.n.a.lysis archives."

Brushing his thick fingers along the dart's stabilizing fins, Dexter said, "It's these funny little cuts on the side that give it away. Those a.n.a.lysis droids only focus on symbols. Huh ! I should think that you Jedi would have more respect for the difference between knowledge and . . . " Dexter chuckled before he finished, " . . . wisdom."

Obi-Wan grinned and replied, "Well, if droids could think, there'd be none of us here, would there?" Taking the dart back from Dexter, he continued, "Kamino. I'm not familiar with it. Is it in the Republic?"

"No, no. It's beyond the Outer Rim. I'd say about, uh, twelve pa.r.s.ecs, outside the Rishi Maze. Should be easy to find. Even for those droids in your archives."

But Dexter was wrong about Kamino being easy to find. After Obi-Wan left Dex's Diner, he returned to the Jedi Archives and quickly ascertained that there were no records for Kamino at all. However, when he examined holographic star charts to find the location that Dexter had described, he did detect an apparently invisible source of gravity where a solar system should have been.

But solar systems don't just disappear. What happened to it?

Obi-Wan decided to consult Yoda. He found Yoda teaching a cla.s.s of young Jedi initiates. They were learning how to use the Force, testing their developing skills with lightsabers against hovering remotes. After Obi-Wan explained his dilemma about the missing solar system and planet to Yoda, Yoda encouraged him to display the holographic star chart on a map reader for the entire cla.s.s to see.

Obi-Wan placed a small, silver ball on the map reader, and a three-dimensional view of hundreds of stars filled the central area of the room. He pointed out the approximate location of the missing solar system. Yoda said, "Hmm. Gravity's silhouette remains, but the star and all the planets . . . disappeared they have." Facing his students, he asked, "How can this be? Hmm? "

It was one of Yoda's pupils, a little boy, who answered. "Master? Because someone erased it from the archive memory."

Obi-Wan smiled. The boy had arrived at the most logical solution, but it was one that Obi-Wan hadn't even entertained. Only a Jedi could have erased the memory. Who would have done such a thing? And why?

Obi-Wan used a Delta-7 starfighter to travel to the "missing" solar system, where he found the water-world of Kamino. He landed his starfighter on a rain-spattered platform close to the administrative center of Tipoca City, a cl.u.s.ter of enormous domed structures that were elevated by ma.s.sive stilts above the constantly stormy sea.

The Kaminoans were long-necked amphibians. Obi-Wan was surprised when he was told that Kamino's prime minister, Lama Su, had been expecting a Jedi to arrive. He was led to Lama Su, who revealed that ten years earlier, the Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas had commissioned the Kaminoans to produce, train, and outfit a clone army for the Republic. According to Lama Su, the Kaminoans had been waiting for the Jedi to take delivery of Sifo-Dyas's order ever since.

Obi-Wan found this information baffling. He recalled that Sifo-Dyas had been killed almost a decade ago, and could not imagine why Sifo-Dyas or any other Jedi would have made such an arrangement with the Kaminoans. Even if Sifo-Dyas had antic.i.p.ated the threat of the Separatist movement, he certainly didn't have the resources to finance a clone army! But Obi-Wan also sensed it was best to play along for the time being, and pretended that he had indeed arrived on Kamino to inspect the clones.

As Lama Su guided Obi-Wan on a tour of the vast, multi-level cloning facility, Obi-Wan saw thousands of clones. All of them appeared to be identical dark-haired human males, at various stages of growth up through age twenty. Lama Su explained that growth acceleration allowed the clones to mature faster while genetic modifications made them less independent than the original host, the man who had served as the clones' template.

"And who was the original host?" Obi-Wan asked.

"A bounty hunter called Jango Fett," Lama Su replied.

Believing that he was closing in on the man who'd fired the saberdart on Coruscant, Obi-Wan asked casually, "And where is this bounty hunter now?"

"Oh, we keep him here."

Obi-Wan readily accepted the offer to meet Jango Fett. Although he knew it was highly probable that Fett was the same bounty hunter behind the attempted a.s.sa.s.sinations on Coruscant, he did not believe he would require any reinforcements.

A few standard days after his first encounter with Jango Fett, and many light-years away from Kamino, Obi-Wan found himself suspended in the air, trapped within a force field chamber of a droid factory on the planet Geonosis. He thought, Now would be a good time for some reinforcements to arrive!

On Kamino, Obi-Wan had met Jango Fett as well as the man's "son," an unmodified ten-year-old clone named Boba. Obi-Wan had quickly determined that Fett was indeed the armored bounty hunter he'd seen on Coruscant, but had been unable to stop the Fetts from escaping Kamino. Fortunately, he had secured a tracer beacon onto Fett's starship, a Kuat Systems Firespray-cla.s.s interceptor, which enabled him to follow the ship to Geonosis.

A red, rocky planet ringed by asteroids, Geonosis was inhabited by the semi-insectoid Geonosians. Obi-Wan had stealthily infiltrated a towering Geonosian hive to discover the Separatist leader Count Dooku engaged in a secret meeting with officials from various worlds. He learned that the Neimoidian Trade Federation was behind the a.s.sa.s.sination attempts on Padme Amidala, and that the Commerce Guilds and the Corporate Alliance had pledged their armies to Dooku. He had also learned that the Trade Federation would soon take delivery of a ma.s.sive droid army from a Geonosian factory. He had even managed to send a transmission with most of this information to Anakin, who - for reasons unknown to Obi-Wan - had left Naboo and gone to Tatooine.

But then Obi-Wan had been attacked by droids and was captured.

Now, suspended in a force field with energy binders wrapped around his wrists and ankles, Obi-Wan wondered if Anakin had managed to relay his transmission to the Jedi Council. As he hung in the air of the hive chamber, all he could do was wait.

Little did he know that within a few short hours, the Jedi would arrive with clone troops from Kamino, and the Clone Wars would begin.

INTERLUDE.

Ben Ken.o.bi had told Luke Skywalker that he had served with Luke's father, Anakin, during the Clone Wars, so when Luke finally found an entry about the Clone Wars in Ben's journal, he became so excited he almost forgot about the furnace he had set up inside Ben's hut. He was using the furnace to create the gem for his new lightsaber, and really couldn't hurry the process, so he had been reading Ben's journal while waiting for the furnace to reach its full temperature.

Luke's knowledge of the Clone Wars was relatively limited. Most of the "facts" came from old datatapes, but only those that had been authorized by the Empire. Still, he knew that the Jedi Knights had led clone armies on behalf of the Galactic Republic against the Confederacy of Independent Systems. In the end, the Confederacy lost, the Jedi were accused of attempting to take over the Republic, and the Republic's leader, Palpatine, was proclaimed Emperor. According to Ben, it was Darth Vader who helped the Empire hunt down and destroy the Jedi.

After checking the furnace, Luke returned his attention to the journal and the entry he had found, and started reading it from the beginning. Ben had made a notation that indicated the entry was almost twenty years old.

Officially, the Clone Wars began at the Battle of Geonosis, for it was there that the Jedi Knights first utilized the clone troops that had been commissioned to fight on behalf of the Republic against the Separatists' droid militia. Although the Separatists were defeated at Geonosis, they quickly regrouped as the Confederacy of Independent Systems. The galaxy plunged into a civil war that would last over three terrible years.

My fellow Jedi and I were conscripted as generals for the Grand Army of the Republic. Like the worlds of the Republic, the Jedi were also soon divided, as some refused to fight and abandoned the Jedi Order.

Unofficially, the Clone Wars began at least ten years before the Battle of Geonosis, when - I eventually realized - the Sith Lords began taking measures to ensure that the Republic would one day have reason to require an army. The Sith Lords engineered every aspect of the Clone Wars, controlling both the Republic and the Confederacy and pitting them against each other, all in an effort to annihilate the Republic and the Jedi Order and claim galactic conquest.

If my words sound like the ravings of a paranoid, crazy hermit, consider the fact that the Sith Lord Darth Vader serves the Emperor, and the Jedi are all but gone.

Luke was disappointed that the entry ended there. While he set the book aside and checked on the furnace again, he wondered why Ben hadn't written more about the Clone Wars. It never occurred to him that Ben might have sometimes wished he couldn't remember the Clone Wars at all.

CHAPTER FIVE.

Clone Commander Cody shouted, "Incoming!"

Jedi General Obi-Wan Ken.o.bi already heard the deadly crescendo of approaching missiles. His division of the Republic Grand Army, the 7th Sky Corps, had just gained ground at a public park in a city square. They were on Farquar III, a planet that had recently allied with the Confederacy of Independent Systems.

Cody's helmeted head turned to see Obi-Wan's hand signal: right hand extended, two fingers aimed at the sky, followed by a swift chop in the direction from which the missiles were fired.

Cody swung his gaze up at the armored clone troopers who were positioned on the wide roof of the building behind him and Ken.o.bi. Holding his blaster rifle in his right hand, Cody signaled with his left to the anti-missile unit to train their laser cannons at the incoming missiles, and then directed a second unit to target and fire at their attackers.

The first unit calculated the speed and approach of the missiles as they raised their cannons. The second unit did the same as they bounced a signal off two air-borne Republic dropships to pinpoint their enemy's position.

The incoming missiles - seven total - entered visual range. Both of Ken.o.bi's anti-missile units fired at their respective targets. A moment later there were five simultaneous explosions overhead. The first unit had missed two missiles.

Obi-Wan dived for cover behind a statue of a poet he had never heard of and threw his gloved hands over his ears. One of the enemy missiles took out Obi-Wan's second anti-missile unit, while the other missile struck an adjacent apartment building. Fragments of missiles, ferrocrete, and clone armor sprayed past Obi-Wan's position.

Uncovering his ears and springing to his feet, Obi-Wan heard a ripple of distant explosions, and hoped his now-decimated second unit had hit their enemy target. Turning to Cody, he shouted, "Status!"

"Scored and burned!" Cody shouted back, but before Obi-Wan could issue his next command, a squad of battle droids marched out of an alley and lurched toward the park. Obi-Wan activated his lightsaber. The droids opened fire, launching a hail of crimson energy bolts into the city square where the 7th Sky Corps had landed less than three minutes earlier.

The Republic's objective was to destroy a Trade Federation-financed droid factory. Unfortunately, the Confederacy had somehow antic.i.p.ated the Republic Army's arrival. Even worse, during their descent to Farquar III, Obi-Wan had become separated from Anakin as well as Jedi General T'Teknulp, who led their reinforcements.

Obi-Wan leapt away from the statue, rolled across a plot of rubble, and came up standing to swing his lightsaber at the fired energy bolts. His blade became nothing more than a blur as he batted away, smacking the bolts back at the approaching droids, cutting them down with their own barrage. But another squad of droids was close behind, marching forward from the same alley.

Obi-Wan thought, not for the first time, Where are Anakin and T'Teknulp?!

"Sir!" Cody cried out from behind, jolting Obi-Wan's attention back to the latest round of battle droids, jus t as they opened fire. Again, Obi-Wan's blade swept and smacked at the energy bolts, sending them back at the droids. He was still swinging at the bolts when six large wheel-like droids rolled out from the alley and spun toward Obi-Wan's position.

Droidekas!

Bouncing over rubble and the remains of the fallen battle droids, the droidekas whipped around to arrange themselves in a circular formation on the ground, then rapidly transformed, activating their spherical deflector shields as they unfolded their double-barreled blaster-cannon arms and dug their tripod foot claws into the street.

The droidekas opened fire into the square. Knowing that neither his lightsaber nor blaster bolts would penetrate the droids' shields, Obi-Wan swung at the incoming bolts, batting them so that they exploded into the ground at the droids' perimeter. The clone troops followed their general's lead, training their DC-15 blaster rifles at the areas of ground around and between the droidekas. The clone troops maintained fire, hammering at the ground as crimson laser bolts whizzed past them and glanced off their armor, while on the roof behind them, the surviving anti-missile unit reloaded their cannons and waited for their general's order.

Obi-Wan hoped to blast the ground out from under the droids and send them crashing below street level. Over the roar of blasters, he angled his arm to the anti-missile team and shouted "Fire!"

Responding with hair-trigger efficiency, the anti-missile team fired their cannons. Four missiles streaked down between the droidekas. The missiles detonated on impact, but instead of tearing a wide hole in the ground, the explosion merely sent ferrocrete flying and knocked the shielded droids away from each other. Launched off their feet but safely contained within their spherical shields, the droids rebounded off the walls of the surrounding buildings like toy bouncing b.a.l.l.s, only to roll back to the scorched, battered surface of the street and rea.s.sume their deadly circle. The droidekas began firing again.

That didn't go well!

Two clone troopers were hit and went down on either side of Obi-Wan. Wondering what had become of Anakin and their reinforcements, Obi-Wan snapped the comlink from his belt as he ducked behind a wide pylon at the park's entrance gate. He used the established code names for the mission as he said into the comlink, "Kay Six to Tee Eight ! Kay Six to Tee Eight!"

"Tee Eight here!" a strangely jovial and high, squeaking voice answered from the comlink. It was General T'Teknulp, a Chadra-Fan Jedi, who always sounded happy no matter what the circ.u.mstances. T'Teknulp continued, "Wild greeting ! See you in minus five! Tee Eight out!"

Obi-Wan flicked off his comlink. Wild greeting meant T'Teknulp's division had encountered enemy forces in planetary orbit, but Obi-Wan couldn't worry too much about that. T'Teknulp had dealt with more than a few wild greetings in recent weeks, and had not once been injured. If T'Teknulp said he would be at Obi-Wan's position in less than five minutes, as he had indicated via the comlink, then Obi-Wan trusted T'Teknulp would arrive within five minutes. What worried Obi-Wan was that he doubted his own division could survive for even one more minute.

And then he glanced up and saw Anakin.

Anakin was standing in the open hatch of a Republic gunship that was coming in low and fast from the south. Smoke billowed out from the gunship's left stabilizer. His ship has been hit! Another enemy missile suddenly appeared in the sky, traveling fast from the city's business district. Obi-Wan's eyes went wide as the missile struck the side of Anakin's gunship.

"Anakin!"

The gunship erupted but Anakin had already leapt away from it. As the shattered gunship spiraled downward, Obi-Wan kept his eyes on his apprentice, watching Anakin's form as he rotated in midair, activated his own lightsaber, and landed on his feet on the roof of a building that adjoined a theater. The ruptured gunship fell sideways and crashed onto a water fountain, killing the vehicle's clone pilot instantly. A split-second after the crash, the gunship exploded, and the power of the blast nearly knocked Obi-Wan off his feet.

The droidekas. .h.i.t two more clone troopers. Obi-Wan was planning his next move when he saw Anakin run and leap from his landing point to the rooftop of the neighboring theater.

An immense, eight-meter-wide octagonal marquee was affixed to the theater's outer wall above the main entrance, which overlooked the droidekas. As Anakin jumpe d over the edge of the roof with his lightsaber extended, Obi-Wan - once again batting at the droidekas' fired bolts - realized that Anakin was going for the marquee's structural supports.

Three more clone troopers went down.

Obi-Wan moved quickly. Darting away from his position, he ran fast, weaving back and forth across the park, drawing the droidekas' fire. Lightsaber extended, he continued batting at the energy bolts as he ran, but now, his only intention was to keep the droids occupied and distract them from Anakin's action outside the theater.

Anakin had landed on a window ledge. He gripped his lightsaber in his right hand, and Obi-Wan was glad for the fact that his apprentice had adjusted so well to the prosthetic that had replaced the right arm he'd lost to Count Dooku on Geonosis. Balancing on the ledge, Anakin brought his blade through two of the marquee's thick plastoid anchors. There was an ugly cracking sound as the enormous marquee tilted away from the building. Anakin leapt fast for another ledge and repeated the action with his lightsaber on more anchors. The marquee began to fall to the street below.

The droidekas were still firing at Obi-Wan when the marquee came crashing down on top of them. Although the droids' deflector shields were invulnerable to energy weapons, they could not repel the crushing force of the heavy marquee. The six droids were smashed flat. At the moment of impact, the clone troops stopped firing. Except for the whooshing sound of the fires that burned amidst the wreckage in the city square, the area was silent.

Anakin scrambled down the side of the theater and landed on top of the fallen marquee just as Obi-Wan arrived beside him. Both had deactivated their lightsabers. Catching his breath, Obi-Wan said, "Well done, Padawan."

Anakin gestured to the marquee beneath them and said, "I'd say it was a smashing performance."

Despite all the destruction and carnage, Obi-Wan couldn't help grinning. But he wagged a finger in mock reproach and said, "Points off for puns."

Anakin scanned the area and said, "Where's T'Teknulp? He was right behind my gunship."

"He had a 'wild greeting,' but he's on his way." Seeing Commander Cody approach, Obi-Wan said, "Cody, inform General T'Teknulp he needn't hurry on our account."

Cody removed his helmet. By now, Obi-Wan was so familiar with Cody that he no longer thought any-thing of the fact that the clone's features were identical to Jango Fett's . Cody replied, "Sorry, sir. Just received word from the fleet. General T'Teknulp and his division didn't make it."

Obi-Wan was stunned. He lowered his gaze to the ground, then looked up to face Anakin, who was equally staggered by Cody's report. Anakin shook his head and said, "He . . . T'Teknulp . . . he was right behind me."

Cody's eyes flicked from Anakin back to Obi-Wan, then he said, "Orders, sir?"

Obi-Wan thought of all the Jedi who had already died since the Battle of Geonosis. He hoped it wouldn't be long before he and Anakin tracked down Count Dooku and General Grievous, who always seemed three steps ahead of the Jedi.

"Let's get moving," Obi-Wan answered grimly. "We have a droid factory to blow up. "

During the Clone Wars, Obi-Wan noticed that Anakin was becoming more focused as a Jedi. One reason for Anakin's change in behavior was that he no longer suffered from nightmares about his mother dying. However, the reason for this was most tragic.

Just before the Battle of Geonosis, Anakin's recurring nightmares had prompted him to disobey orders and travel with Padme Amidala from Naboo to Tatooine. On the sand planet, Anakin learned that his mother had been freed from her Toydarian owner several years earlier, and that she had married a moisture farmer named Cliegg Lars. The farmer and his family informed Anakin that Shmi had been abducted by the violent, nomadic Tusken Raiders.

Anakin had been unable to save his mother, but recovered her dead body from the Tusken Raiders' camp and buried her at the Lars homestead. When he left Tatooine, he took C-3PO, a protocol droid that he had constructed in childhood.

Although Obi-Wan had never really known his own family, he did have sympathy for Anakin's loss. And as Anakin's powers grew stronger, Obi-Wan began to believe that his Padawan may have been transformed by the tragedy for the better.

INTERLUDE.

Reading Ben Ken.o.bi's journal, Luke Skywalker found another entry that mentioned the Clone Wars. It also mentioned Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader. Ben had written the entry after the shorter one about the Clone Wars.

Two days ago, on one of my walks, I came across the twisted, withered husk of a short desert plant that had grown in the shadows of a dusty rock formation. Yesterday, I pa.s.sed the same plant again and noticed it had flowered small white petals, flecked with dark grey. This morning, I was surprised to find the entire plant had vanished. Even though I knew some creature had probably eaten it, I felt a sense of loss that surprised me. And I thought of Asajj Ventress.

I've already written instructions for how to build a lightsaber. Now, I find myself compelled to write something of the enemies who use them.

From what I remember from the history databooks, the Sith have wielded lightsabers for at least four thousand years. They were long believed to have been extinct until just sixteen years ago, when my Master and I dueled with an Iridonian Zabrak who used a double-bladed lightsaber. This Sith killed my Master, and then I killed him in self-defense.

Ten years later, my apprentice Anakin Skywalker and I dueled Count Dooku at the Battle of Geonosis. The leader of the Separatist movement, Dooku was a former Jedi Master who - we realized too late - had turned to the dark side. This was most unfortunate, not only because Dooku had been a revered Jedi, but also because he was a master swordsman. Dooku escaped at the Battle of Geonosis, but not before he informed me that a Sith Lord was manipulating the Galactic Senate. Three devastating years later - after Anakin defeated Dooku in orbit above Coruscant - I would learn that he was telling the truth. The Sith Lord was Supreme Chancellor Palpatine.

Soon after the Battle of Geonosis, Anakin and I had our first encounter with Asajj Ventress. She was a humanoid, hairless with pale skin, who wielded two lightsabers simultaneously. These lightsabers could also be joined at the handles to create a double-bladed weapon. Before she attacked, she told me that she had emerged from misery and suffering, only to find the Jedi she had once worshipped were nothing but "weak, misguided fools." She added that she agreed with Count Dooku, that the galaxy was in need of a Jedi purge.

Asajj Ventress escaped that day, but not before she killed one Jedi and maimed his apprentice. It was obvious by her technique that she had received training from Dooku. Over the course of the Clone Wars, Anakin and I had faced off against Ventress on other worlds. But despite all her fury and murderous inclinations, I always sensed something within her that distinguished her from the Sith Lords : an underlying fear. Mostly, it was a fear of being alone. And I sensed that there was some good in her, some part that had not been corrupted by Dooku. Where the Sith Lords were unquestionably evil, Ventress was simply a slave to the dark side.