Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan was dreaming.

He was thirteen again, curled in his master’s bed, clutching a pillow and fighting nausea and a sharpening pain in his head. He remembered this: a stubborn fever after a particularly gruelling mission. He’d been almost incoherent and Qui-Gon, while assured by the healers that he didn’t need to sleep in the infirmary, was too wary and too worried to leave his fragile padawan alone.

“Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon’s baritone rumbled behind him from where Qui-Gon lay on the bed, propped up on an elbow to get a better look at his face. A cool hand reached over to touch Obi-Wan’s forehead. “How do you feel?”

“It hurts.” He groaned and curled in on himself. A tear escaped and he felt Qui-Gon gently brush it away as the older man shifted so he could draw Obi-Wan’s back to his chest and wrap his arm around him. “I know. I'm sorry. It will get better, you’ll see. In time. Right now is not forever.”

“I know. But it hurts.” A wave of pain moved through him and Obi-Wan shuddered.

“Hmm….Shh…” Qui-Gon vibrated wordless sounds of comfort. The pain was bad, but the physical closeness was nice, comforting… precious. It had been so long since he’d been in Qui-Gon’s arms. He gripped Qui-Gon’s hand in his and pulled it against his heart. A very young part of him was almost glad to be sick and enveloped in such a deep sense of safety that he never wanted to leave.

“Try to sleep, dear one.” Qui-Gon pressed his hand against Obi-Wan’s heart and Obi-Wan felt him send a small tendril of force energy for healing and sleep.

Except, Obi-Wan, was asleep already. Wasn’t he? He pressed his hand against Qui-Gon’s, feeling the roughness of his master’s skin. Something was off. He squeezed his eyes shut and opened them. Everything still felt like a dream. Fuzzy and unreal.

Fighting through pain and dream-logic, he struggled to orient himself. His heart rate sped up and he squirmed under Qui-Gon’s arm.

Qui-Gon could feel his distress building and tried to send calm through the force.

“Master?”

He felt Qui-Gon chuckle softly. “You haven’t called me that in years.”

Years?

It was then that he noticed, as he was holding Qui-Gon’s hand, that their hands, while not the same size, were not as far off as they should have been.
He touched his face. He had a beard?

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

“I—I don’t know. We were on a mission. I got sick?” Obi-Wan fumbled together pieces of knowledge.

“Hmm… Do you know where?”

“Um…. Kashyyk?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Toydaria?”

“No.”

“Do you remember how you hit your head?”

“Hit my head? No I have –“ OH SHIT. Clarity burst into his brain.
He’d been in a lightsaber fight. With General Grievous. And Ventress. And Qui-Gon. And Anakin.
He’d been thrown from the catwalk…..

He wasn’t thirteen. He was thirty-six. He was General Kenobi.

He was curled in Qui-Gon’s arms like a child, still gripping his hand.

To say he felt embarrassed was the understatement of the decade.

He bolted upright, head swimming and tried to get up. Qui-Gon tried to push him back down.

“No, Obi-Wan, you shouldn’t….”

Like hell he shouldn’t!

“Is being watched over by your old master such a hardship?”

Obi-Wan realized he’d spoken his invective aloud. Qui-Gon sounded…. Hurt?

He stood up, and promptly fell over. Qui-Gon’s strong arms caught him under his shoulders and lifted him back onto the bed.

He sprawled on his back, staring up at the weaving ceiling.

And Qui-Gon’s concerned face.

He felt ashamed of how eager he’d been for his master’s comfort and closeness. He was a general. He shouldn’t need....nursing… like a child.

He squeezed his eyes shut against the spinning world. Qui-Gon sighed wearily beside him.

“I’m sorry, Obi-Wan. I have no wish to upset you. I’ll take my leave.”

Obi-Wan said nothing. Just breathed and tried to calm his spinning thoughts. Was he so attached to his own invulnerability that he would let Qui-Gon think he was rejecting him?

He caught the other man’s hand just before he stepped away from the bed.

“No,” he said softly. “That's not it.” And he opened up his shields a fraction to let his embarrassment and frustration at himself seep out.

Qui-Gon’s eyes widened in understanding and his gaze softened. His smile was almost wistful. He sat back down on the mattress.

“Oh my dear Obi-Wan. Even sturdy oaks need water and sunlight. It has been a long war. And you are owed some comfort, are you not?”

Obi-Wan’s heart clenched. He hadn’t been held or comforted in a very long time.
He was tired, and in pain, and he was lonely.

“I’ve missed you, master,” he whispered, as he reached his arms around Qui-Gon’s waist and laid his head in his lap.

“And I you, padawan.” Qui-Gon bent forward placing a kiss on Ob-Wan’s head and ran his thumb along the patch of his hair where his braid used to be.

Something eased in Obi-Wan’s chest and he sobbed into his old master’s tunics. Qui-Gon stroked his hair and rocked him ever so slightly.

“My brave and brilliant Obi-Wan. Rest assured, you will be always be my padawan.” He chuckled softly, nostalgic. “Come now. Could this really be worse than--”

Obi-Wan’s groan cut him off, remembering the aftermath of Bant’s sixteen birthday party; Qui-Gon holding him up over the toilet…

Qui-Gon must have picked up his thought, because he laughed brightly. “I’d forgotten about that. I was confess I was thinking of the blue mullet you had in your fifteenth year. But yes, I suppose that was fairly gutting as well.”

Obi-Wan snorted. He’d forgotten Qui-Gon’s propensity for silly wordplay when they were alone. “Nothing is worse than that pun, my dear Master. “

“No, indeed. See, you are in good company. Dignity can be terribly overrated.”

“Except in front of the council.”

“Well.” Qui-Gon smirked. “Obviously.”

Obi-Wan shifted to look up at Qui-Gon grinning and smiled back. He breathed out and relaxed further into Qui-Gon’s arms. His last thought, as he drifted into a dreamless sleep, was that it was good to be home.

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan woke the next morning to sunlight streaming through the window and the sound of Qui-Gon washing dishes. His head was throbbing and he felt vaguely nauseated. He sat up gingerly.

As he looked around the room, he slowly processed that he wasn’t in his quarters. With a sharp flash of yesterday’s embarrassment, he realized that this was Qui-Gon’s bedroom. Qui-Gon's bed.

He forced himself to inhale slowly.

His lightsaber was on the bedside table, next to a small volume of poetry, a small plant, a delicate pair of reading glasses, and a nearly empty glass of water. A sudden pang of longing stole the air from his lungs.

He swallowed and squeezed his eyes shut. Force, but he was losing it.

What had Qui-Gon said? It's been a long war.

When had Qui-Gon become someone he’d been afraid to be close to?

He thought bitterly about the day he was given the rank of general.

He didn’t really have to ask himself why. It wasn’t just Qui-Gon. It was everyone. Even, and maybe especially Anakin.

General Kenobi was smooth. Confident. Sassy, even. He’d been his persona on the battlefield for so long it almost felt like he’d forgotten there was a person underneath.

Fuck, he was tired.

As if on cue, Qui-Gon knocked softly on the door and entered slowly, holding a mug of caff and a fresh set of clothes.

Eyes glinting and mouth quirked into a thoughtful smile, joy radiated off of him in waves.

“Caff and clothes. Or clothes and caff. Your choice.”

“Definitely caff,” Obi-Wan groaned, reaching for the cup.

Qui-Gon handed him the mug and laid the clothes on the bed.

Obi-Wan gripped the cup with both hands as the world spun slightly.

“Or not,” Qui-Gon said, plucking the mug from his hands. “Nausea?”

Obi-Wan gave him a tight smile and nodded.

“Come on, then,” Qui-Gon said, offering his arm.

Obi-Wan took it gratefully and hauled himself to his feet. They walked slowly to the kitchen, Obi-Wan leaning perhaps a fraction more heavily than necessary. Qui-Gon deposited him gently into a kitchen chair and took the cup to the counter, where he exchanged it for another and a small plate. Placing them in front of Obi-Wan, he took a seat beside him, where his own mug was waiting.

Tea and toast. Obi-Wan stared at them wanly.

“I suppose you can count yourself fortunate that you can’t really eat anything given the state of my cooking.“

Obi-Wan snorted and pressed the mug to his lips. The tea was strong and not too hot and achingly familiar.

“Mmmm. Tastes like waking up before dawn and recycled air and damp robes.” He was joking, but barely. His chest hurt.

Qui-Gon laughed and his smile reached his eyes. “Don’t forget muddy boots and burnt dinner.”

Obi-Wan smiled weakly. “Quite. And not to mention, being shot at and –"

They said “bacta” at the same time.

They locked eyes and Obi-Wan looked down at his plate a hair too sharply.

“How did I end up…?” He trailed off, gesturing to the room.

“In my quarters?”

Obi-Wan nodded. Qui-Gon shifted in his chair.

“You, uh, walked here.”

Obi-Wan gave Qui-Gon a quizzical look.

“You didn’t want to stay in the infirmary, but the healers didn’t want you stay alone. I was taking you home….”

Oh. Oh. “And I walked here," Obi-Wan finished.

“You did.”

“Huh.”

“Mmm," Qui-Gon hummed, as he sipped his tea.

Obi-Wan was faintly aware that he was blushing. He took another sip of his mug, hoping Qui-Gon would attribute his flush to the tea.

“You are always welcome here, you know.”

Tears prickled at Obi-Wan’s eyes. He nodded, throat tight.

“I know.”

Qui-Gon reached out and placed his fingers around Obi-Wan’s hand. Obi-Wan let go of the mug and curled his fingers into his former master’s hand.

Qui-Gon squeezed gently. Obi-Wan held his breath.

They sat there for a minute, looking at each other, until Qui-Gon broke the silence. He abruptly stared down at his mug.

“The healers said it could be a few days, even a week, until–“

“Yes,“ Obi-Wan blurted. “That is, I mean, if…”

Qui-Gon’s smile could have powered a small sun.

Chapter Text

The next two days passed slowly and quietly. Obi-Wan slept more than he was awake. Qui-Gon checked in on him between the irritating array of meetings that required his presence since his sudden and not-at-all-suspicious temple reassignment. Much to his relief, no one said anything about the fact that Obi-Wan’s was staying in his former master’s quarters.

At Obi-Wan’s medical appointment, Qui-Gon had loomed over the temple healer with such an air of gravity and concern that the man had taken one look at the council’s request for General Kenobi return to duty and had paled slightly. Obi-Wan, for his part, had sat rigidly on the examination table and, for the first time in at least a decade, had not tried to pressure the healer into allowing him to return to active duty immediately. In retrospect, Qui-Gon mused, it was likely Obi-Wan’s uncharacteristic behaviour, more than Qui-Gon’s solemn protectiveness, that had clinched the healer’s decision to place Obi-Wan on medical leave for a minimum of two weeks. He was ordered to rest and to visit the mind healers.

Meanwhile, Qui-Gon had been removed from his mission to Kamino with the barest veneer of an excuse. Qui-Gon could smell his grandmaster’s meddling, but in place of his usual frustration and protest, he felt nothing but gratitude. When he’d acquiesced calmly to the reassignment the previous evening, he’d seen more than a few eyes widen and eyebrows rise against the purple of Coruscant’s twilight. Some part of him wondered if he should have complained just for show, but he was too relieved and too moved by the opportunity to connect with Obi-Wan that he found he couldn’t bring himself to care. Besides, it had been months since he’d been recalled to the temple, and if he was really honest with himself, he was tired. Although not, he expected, nearly as tired as High General Obi-Wan Kenobi, who was, mercifully, now dozing on his couch, still in his sleep-pants, a datapad abandoned on his chest.

Qui-Gon gently plucked the pad off of Obi-Wan and placed it on the side table.

He smoothed his rumpled hair and contemplated his former padawan’s features. His reddish hair had started to grey at his temples and even his beard sported a few white strands. His face had lost the softness of youth years ago, and now he had creases on his brow and around his eyes. He looked every bit of his 36 years and then some.

Obi-Wan shifted under Qui-Gon’s gaze. His eyelashes fluttered as he drifted back to wakefulness, and he smiled faintly as he caught Qui-Gon staring at him.

“Hello there.”

Qui-Gon flushed faintly, but smiled back. Force, his padawan’s eyes were blue.

Obi-Wan sat up and shuffled back against the armrest, tucking his knees against his chest and wrapping his arms around them. He gestured to Qui-Gon to sit down. For a moment, Qui-Gon found himself breathless at countless memories of young Obi-Wan nestled into the couch in the same position, studying or reading, datapad balanced on his knees. So familiar and so far away. Not far away now, he chided himself. Stay in the moment.

He settled on the couch almost a foot away from Obi-Wan’s knees and watched something flick across Obi-Wan’s features. Carefully, he laid a hand atop Obi-Wan’s knee, forced his breath a little deeper into his lungs, and leaned back into the cushions slightly.

“How do you feel?” he asked gently.

Obi-Wan closed his eyes and drew in a breath, and let it out slowly. He rested his hand on top of Qui-Gon’s and the heat surprised the older man, as did a small nudge of ease through the force.

“Better, I think,” he said, blinking his eyes open. He took in another deeper breath and slid his knees into a lopsided half lotus, guiding Qui-Gon’s hand to rest on his shin and holding it there.

Qui-Gon shifted to face him, pushing his knee into the back of couch.

“How are you?” Obi-Wan asked, tightening his grip momentarily.

“Fine,” Qui-Gon answered automatically. He wasn’t the one who was injured.

Obi-Wan just looked at him and raised an eyebrow. It wasn’t a rebuke, but it definitely said ‘try again.’ Qui-Gon got the distinct feeling that he was being treated to a finely honed Anakin-wrangling technique.

He huffed out a breath in amusement. One did not shrink from the inquiring eyes of Master Kenobi.

“Worried,” he breathed.

“About?”

Qui-Gon widened his eyes and waved his hand at Obi-Wan, who realized the absurdity of his question and laughed.

“Right. Obviously.” He shook his head and gave a tight smile. “I’m okay. I’ll be okay.” He sounded like he was trying to convince himself as much as Qui-Gon.

Qui-Gon nodded, but the sight of Obi-Wan, with his darkened eyes and pale skin, sitting in wrinkled sleep clothes, made his throat tighten. He swallowed and turned his palm over to hold Obi-Wan’s hand. There was so much he longed to talk to Obi-Wan about but there was never time. Now there was time and he couldn’t find the words and didn't know where to start. The ever-widening gulf would take time to cross. They were here. They had weeks.

“So,” he said, squeezing Obi-Wan’s hand. “What shall we do to pass the time the council has so generously given us?”

Obi-Wan snorted and then gave him a questioning look. “Us? I know I’m on leave…”

“Apparently Rissa Mano is required on Kamino.”

“Interesting.”

“Indeed. I’ve been assigned to the temple, ostensibly to support the senior padawans. But there are only four of them and they’ve all seen plenty of front-line combat. In fact, there’s only one seminar scheduled. Otherwise I’m ‘on call’ if any of them need me while they prepare for their trials. “

“Mmmm…. I see. Yoda?”

“I thought so too. And Mace, I expect.”

“Were you very indignant?”

“Who? Me?” Qui-Gon said, in mock innocence.

“Very funny.” Obi-Wan used his free hand to smack Qui-Gon’s boot. Qui-Gon grinned.

“Not this time. I’m not so stubborn that I can’t accept a gift when it’s handed to me.”

Obi-Wan blushed and looked down at their clasped hands. He seemed as if he was about to say something, or ask something, but then decided against it. “Strange move for Yoda and Mace,” he observed. “Neither of them are particularly pleased with you right now.”

“No, I don’t expect so. But what else is new? To be fair, I don’t think they’re thinking about my benefit.”

“Ah,” Obi-Wan frowned, releasing Qui-Gon’s hand and straightening a fraction. He met Qui-Gon’s eyes. “I'm not sure how I feel about getting you pulled off a mission to, what? Take care of me?”

“Well, it’s not every day that High General Kenobi, Commander of the Third Army and the 212th Battalion of the Grand Army of the Republic is placed on medical leave,” he said, fighting a scowl.

Once Obi-Wan’s title—and everything it meant—had infuriated Qui-Gon, years ago when the war was new. Now, his anger had cooled, laden with resignation.

At his own fateful meeting with the council, he had told them in no uncertain terms to fuck their promotion, and that he wouldn’t send children in the form of men to their deaths in a war machine that the Jedi had no business operating. For a moment, it had even looked like Maverick Jinn would leave the order. It was only a careful heart to heart with Yoda that had convinced him to stay. Obi-Wan had silently stared at him whenever they’d run into each other, and otherwise assiduously avoided his former master until well after the council and Qui-Gon had come to a compromise.

They had never talked about it. The war. Their places in it. Every time Qui-Gon had tried, Obi-Wan had changed the subject or made his excuses, finding reasons reason to be elsewhere.

And then there stopped being time for talking about the war, or anything else.

“Hmm, and I suppose you have the dubious honour of being the only person who has managed to get me to sit still in the last few years?”

“Precisely. Under the circumstances, they can spare an old master to help The Negotiator convalesce.”

“Ugh,” Obi-Wan groaned. “Don’t call me that. Or general.”

Qui-Gon gritted his teeth against a wave of disappointment in himself. Obi-Wan had enough to deal with without his former master leaking his disdain at the Order.

“I’m sorry, Obi-Wan,” he said earnestly. “You know my—“

“Mockery? Sarcasm?” Obi-Wan interrupted sharply.

“Fair.”

“Is meant for the council? Yes, I know. But sometimes I think you forget I am on the council. “

A fact which never ceased to baffle Qui-Gon, though he knew it shouldn’t because Obi-Wan had never been anything but a consummate follower of rules.

“It’s not the same,” he protested.

“Isn’t it?” Obi-Wan’s eyes flashed, his voice suddenly hard. He stared past Qui-Gon at the shadows on the windowsill.

The air crackled. Qui-Gon became abruptly aware of the fact that Obi-Wan outranked him and had for years. He drew in a long breath and sighed, relenting.

“Forgive me, padawan. Perhaps, we should do as the healers say for once in our sorry lives and take a break from the war.”

“You brought it up,” Obi-Wan snapped, but there was little heat in it.

“I did,” he said, bowing his head. “And for that I take responsibility, and I do apologize.”

Obi-Wan stared at him for a moment, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. He nodded slowly.

“Thank you.” His shoulders sagged. “I don’t want to spend this time fighting. I know how you feel about the war. Force, the whole temple knows. I think the temples on Lothai and Ilum know.”

Qui-Gon blushed. “I am… not exactly subtle, I suppose,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck.

Obi-Wan snorted. “You can be. You just choose not to be when you have a bone to pick.”

“I know,” he said evenly, meeting Obi-Wan’s eyes.

“You have to understand, Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan said, his tone almost pleading, “that none of us like the war.” He ran a hand through his messy hair. “None of us want this war. We just have a different way of handling it.”

“I know,” Qui-Gon said, chagrined and still.

“Good,” Obi-Wan’s said firmly. “Because sometimes it feels like you forget we’re on the same side.”

Qui-Gon winced and felt himself take in a sharp breath. A cold blade of realization cut through him. He kept his face impassive and pulled his shields tight.

He’d thought, fool that he was, that the council had pulled him off duty for Obi-Wan’s benefit, to extend his sorely needed healing space that the two of them had spontaneously generated in the last few days. But as Obi-Wan spoke, he saw with vicious clarity a different motive and he almost hated them for it. Yoda knew—how could he not?—that there was no better way to get Qui-Gon to fall in line with the war effort. They were using Obi-Wan to get to him. Dear, idealistic Obi-Wan, who couldn’t even see it.

Those sith-damned gundark spawn. How dare they?

He clenched his jaw. Pause. Breathe. He promised himself that for Obi-Wan’s sake, he would wait to see if there was more evidence for this before laying into the council. The summons to the rank of general would come in a few days if he were right.

Across from him, Obi-Wan looked alarmed at whatever he was seeing on Qui-Gon’s face.

“Qui-Gon? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

“No, no. Obi-Wan,” he said, reassuringly. “It’s not what you said. I just…. It’s nothing.” He smiled gently at Obi-Wan, who smiled brightly in relief, banishing Qui-Gon’s thoughts of the council. “Let’s focus on the present and make sure you get your well-earned rest. You’re awake! And upright. What can I get you? Is there anything you’d like to do?”

“ Tea. And…. “ He looked embarrassed.

“What is it, Obi-Wan?”

“I am… having trouble reading. The words…” He waved his hand.

“Ah. Yes,” Qui-Gon said fondly. “I would be happy to read to you. But…”

“But?”

“It has to be something you enjoy.”

“What?”

“I won’t read mission briefs or research or comm messages,” Qui-Gon said, in his best ‘I’m-a-Jedi-Master-you-should-listen-to-me-for-your-own-good’ voice.

Obi-Wan stared at him, wide-eyed. “Well then what’s left?”

“You can choose poetry or prose,” he said solemnly.

“What?”

“Poetry or prose. Preferably something cheerful.” Qui-Gon smirked.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Try me,” Qui-Gon dared, eyes glinting.

“I could just get a padawan… or a droid.”

“You can try.”

Obi-Wan sputtered and threw up his hands. “You’re serious.”

“I am.”

“Well, okay. Fine. Um. Poetry.”

“Excellent. How about The Adventures of Parsifal?” Qui-Gon suggested, reaching for the datapad.

“Ugh. No. Too soon.”

“You were knighted over a decade ago!”

“Not me! Anakin!”

Qui-Gon snorted. “Ah. Fair.” He paused, thinking. “Prophecy of the Force Priestess?”

“No, thank you! I have enough world-ending on a daily basis.”

“Also fair. The Cattle Raid of Corellia?”

Obi-Wan grimaced. “If I’m going to listen to several thousand lines of battle poetry, they had better be fighting about something more interesting than a bull.”

“The Transmutations?”

“The idea of things turning into other things makes me queasy just to think about,” Obi-Wan said dismissively.

Qui-Gon narrowed his eyes. “This wouldn’t be an elaborate ruse to deter me?”

“What if I enjoy tactical briefings?” Obi-Wan protested.

“Nobody enjoys tactical briefings.” Qui-Gon took a minute to think. “I’ve got it! The Wanderings of Odysseus. You always liked that cyclops-evading sheep trick- sequence.”

Obi-Wan rolled his eyes. “When I was thirteen! And only because you refused to read the racy parts! I had to wait to hear about Circe from Quinlan!”

“In my defence, the translation had left them in the original Ithacan.”

“The old translation.”

“The only translation,” Qui-Gon said in mock indignation. “Besides, you can thank your grandmaster for that.”

Obi-Wan looked puzzled. “How so?”

“When I was fifteen, he insisted on watching some kind of experimental art holovid. It turned out to have, well, a lot of humanoids of different genders and at least one sentient giant octopus. I vowed I would never put a padawan of mine through such an ordeal.”

Obi-Wan blinked, and then burst out laughing. “You…. And Master Dooku… tentacles...”

Qui-Gon chuckled, fairly pleased with himself.

“Gods above. That…. I’m so sorry.” He wiped tears out of his eyes, catching his breath. “That is… alarming,” Obi-Wan gasped.

“Yes, that’s one word for it,” Qui-Gon agreed, patting Obi-Wan on the leg as he got up from the couch. “Scarring is another.” He smiled down at Obi-Wan, offering his arm.

“Do you feel up to putting on the kettle while I hunt down the book?”

“Flimsi, Qui-Gon? Really?” Obi-Wan teased, taking his former master’s arm and prying himself off the couch and neatly, if unintentionally, into Qui-Gon’s arms.

Qui-Gon steadied him, one hand on Obi-Wan’s elbow, the other braced around his ribs.

For a moment they stood, eyes locked, chest to chest, jammed between the couch and the caff table.

Qui-Gon could feel the hard muscles of Obi-Wan’s powerful back through the thin shirt and see the pale curls and dark freckles of his chest.

He heard Obi-Wan’s breath hitch. Qui-Gon instinctively pulled him closer.

Pressed against him, Obi-Wan smiled up at him radiantly.

He swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. He felt warm and a little dizzy. He blinked, inhaled slowly, and tentatively smiled back. Force, it felt good to have Obi-Wan in his arms, alive and safe and happy. His heart ached.

This sith-damned war.

Obi-Wan must have caught the shadows his eyes because he tightened his arms around Qui-Gon and laid his head against his chest. Qui-Gon sighed and hugged him back.

“What can I say?” Qui-Gon said, placing a brief kiss to the top of Obi-Wan’s head. He squeezed Obi-Wan’s elbow, and, satisfied the other man wouldn’t fall over, stepped away to hunt for the volume.

“I like the way it smells,” he admitted, crouched in front of the shelf across from the couch.

“Of course you do, you sentimental fool,” Obi-Wan called from the kitchen.

“Yes, but I'm your sentimental fool,” Qui-Gon blurted before he could stop himself.

“That you are,” Obi-Wan laughed brightly, filling the kettle. “Sapir?”

“Always.”

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan stood in Qui-Gon’s kitchen, looking out over the familiar — no, unchanging— living room from behind the counter as he filled the kettle. The same faded blue couch sat across from bowing, wooden shelves, and the scuffed wooded caff table with its merciless corners. An ancient grey armchair and reading lamp were tucked in the far corner of the room, which ended in a plant-laden windowsill and the current pink-orange light of Coruscant’s dusk.

His mental fog of the past few days had thankfully begun to ebb and Obi-Wan felt a little more present and a little more focused than he had since before his injury.
The last few days had been a warm, gentle blur of pillows and sleep clothes and sunlight and tea.

And Qui-Gon.

Qui-Gon with his gentle laugh and his kind eyes. Qui-Gon, who never forgot the dash of honey in Obi-Wan’s tea. Qui-Gon who sang softly to his plants and to Obi-Wan when he thought he was sleeping. Qui-Gon, who, more than once, when the pain had flared, had folded him in his arms and said nothing about his tears or the misery he was sure he was leaking through his shields. Qui-Gon who had been tacitly sharing his bed for the past few days and, when Obi-Wan woke screaming, pulled him to his chest; his heartbeat against Obi-Wan’s ear felt like coming to ground.

Obi-Wan regarded Qui-Gon’s powerful frame, presently crouched in the service of hunting down the errant book, and marvelled not for the first time at the incongruity of Qui-Gon’s martial skill and his deeply gentle core.

He was grateful, the council and their machinations be damned, he was so fucking grateful to be close to Qui-Gon that the relief threatened to overwhelm him.

“I think it’s full, Obi-Wan.”

“Huh?” Obi-Wan blinked and looked down at overflowing kettle. “So, it is.” He turned off the water and wiped down the kettle with a dishcloth before setting it to boil on the stove.

“I’m not having any luck, I’m afraid,” Qui-Gon said, brow furrowed. “I could have sworn it was on the same shelf as The Oncoming Storm.” He paused to brush dust off his tunic.

“You still have that?” Obi-Wan asked, amused and touched.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Qui-Gon shrugged, giving up on the dust. “I’m going to check the bedroom. Tea is in the cupboard behind you.”

Obi-Wan laughed. “Yes, I know.” But Qui-Gon had already disappeared into his bedroom, just past the small eating area to the left. He could hear him muttering to himself, “Maybe I leant it to Mace? But he hates poetry.”

Qui-Gon, who bothered to keep trinkets like Obi-Wan’s model gunship from his padawan days.

Sentimental fool indeed.

Qui-Gon Jinn, Jedi Master, one of the most skilled duelists on the order—whether with a lightsaber or words— celebrated across the galaxy for his diplomacy, a veritable force of nature, was now, Obi-Wan surmised from the dull thump and slide of wood over carpet, digging around under the bed.

Obi-Wan smiled to himself as he started to pick through cluster of mismatched tins and pouches in Qui-Gon’s cupboard.

Force, he’d missed this. He’d missed quiet time, just the two of them. He’d missed the haphazard collection of ceramic mugs and jar of spoons and the way Qui-Gon always neglected to label anything claiming he could tell the teas by scent. The fact that he kept three different kinds of honey, but was almost always out of milk. The slightly ragged dishtowels and chipped stoneware he remembered from his youth.

In that moment, he found it almost physically painful how much he longed to be twenty-four again and still living with Qui-Gon in those best and brightest days of his apprenticeship, with its easy and comfortable intimacy. Intimacy that had been so disrupted in the past few years, thrown so starkly into relief by the closeness of the last couple of days.

He blamed the war. But that wasn’t new. He blamed the war for a lot of things.

He wanted Qui-Gon with him on the battlefield, on the bridge of The Negotiator, beside him in a duel— not just when their missions happened to coincide, but always.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust himself or felt like he needed Qui-Gon’s guidance: he knew that sweeping picture of military strategy wasn’t Qui-Gon’s strength, which lay in the moment, in complex negotiations, in reading a room, a conversation, or fight. It was that he’d never been in sync with anyone the way he had been with Qui-Gon and he missed that, missed him, desperately, especially these days when keeping his balance was a matter of grit and sheer determination.

They had lost so many Jedi, so many clones, so many civilians. Whole planets were devastated, systems impoverished, populations enslaved by the Separatists.

Dooku’s longstanding penchant for violence, once checked by the Order, had free reign and the resources of hundreds of allies. The scale of destruction and loss of sentient life were incomprehensible. Obi-Wan, Force help him, had had to stop trying to process the loss in terms of sentients and let the numbers roll over him as if they were game pieces.

He understood, to some extent, Qui-Gon’s position on the war, even if it infuriated him— or at least it had. People were dying and they had a duty, even if it was ugly and dirty and dark. Obi-Wan knew, especially now, what it was like to be facing endless darkness and violence, teetering on an abyss of despair. He would not condemn so many in the galaxy to that fate. And they knew Dooku had fallen. Fighting Dooku and Grievous was fighting the dark side. But maybe it was easier for Obi-Wan to dismiss his grandmaster’s words on Geonosis: “the Senate is controlled by a Sith lord, Darth Sidious.” He’d felt Dooku lying in the Force, trying to manipulate Qui-Gon. Qui-Gon had felt it too, but he’d also felt some truth and it was the truth that stuck, deepening Qui-Gon’s conviction that fighting for the Republic was too close to fighting for the Sith. In this war with no heroes and fewer victors, Qui-Gon had refused his commission and taken only protective missions, relief missions, refugee missions and anything and everything that promoted the clones’ rights.

Obi-Wan respected his work, he did (Force knew he was grateful that at least Qui-Gon had not left the Order with the rest of the Schism), but he also felt that Qui-Gon was splitting hairs and clinging to an illusion of clean hands and moral superiority that he had no claim to. But Qui-Gon was nothing if not stubborn and this had been the deal he’d struck with Yoda years ago. So Obi-Wan faced battle with Cody and Anakin and Ahsoka, but almost never with the one man he wished more than anything was by his side.

Obi-Wan had come to accept it, but he didn’t have to like it. And if he struggled to forgive Qui-Gon for his self-imposed absence (he refused to call it abandonment, no matter what his mind healer said), well then, that wasn’t new either. He’d learned long ago that Qui-Gon could be as immovable as the ice mountains of Hoth and so he’d decided he’d rather have peace between them, even if the cost was a repression of Obi-Wan’s feelings and the necessary ensuing distance.

And so the crack that they had repaired after Naboo had finally broken open again after a decade and had widened steadily, eroded by silence and time.

And yet here they were.

He was making tea in the one place he actually felt at home. Qui-Gon was here with him and on some kind of Council mandated sabbatical that he hadn’t fought. Because he wanted to be here with him.

Obi-Wan knew, on his better days, that the doubt, fear and shame of being unwanted by Qui-Gon almost twenty-five years ago had healed. But as an old injury under stress or when the rains came, the ache could flare anew. Qui-Gon’s presence was a balm for a pain perceptible primarily by its relief.

For the first time in a long time, he had hope.

The kettle started to whistle, a sputtering broken sound at first, then louder.
He was still staring at the cupboard, trying to pick a tea. He flicked the stove controls off and turned back to collection. He found a spiced sapir and twisted open the tin, inhaling the familiar and earthy scent.

He took out two ceramic mugs, blue-green and purple-black. He started to measure out tea leaves. Cody, he thought, would probably really like this tea. They only had the cheap stuff on The Negotiator. He should make a note to bring some with him when he headed back.

Halfway through preparing the second mug he realized that his hand was shaking. He stared at it for a moment, willing it to stop. His vision narrowed and the edges began to blur. There was pressure on his face and his chest burned.

He couldn't breathe.

He couldn’t breathe.

He couldn’t breathe.

He gripped the counter desperately, feeling a fuzziness spreading through his limbs. His head swam. He heard something clatter to the floor and then Qui-Gon was behind him, calling his name, hands against his sides holding him up.

“Breathe in, Obi-Wan. Come on. On a slow count. One, two, three, four. And out, one…”

He could hear Qui-Gon’s breathing and felt his beard brush his right ear, his body a solid warmth behind him.

He tried to pull air in through his nose and when that didn’t work, he opened his mouth. Qui-Gon was sending him calm through the force, but his shields were up and he couldn’t take it in. He couldn’t. He didn’t deserve…

The burning in his chest was unbearable and the room went dark as he slid to the floor, with Qui-Gon’s arms around him.

Chapter Text

When Obi-Wan drifted back to consciousness several hours later, he found himself back in Qui-Gon’s bed. The late afternoon sun was peaking through the drawn blinds and casting striped shadows on the blanket. Voices from the main living area carried through the mostly closed door.

“… vitals are fine…heart rate is a little high… nothing physical to account ...”

Qui-Gon rumbled disapprovingly, his voice too low to make out.

“Master Jinn, I hardly think—” The healer’s voice raised.

“… give him some time and space…. moment…welcome to leave instructions…way out.”

“But the mind healers…”

“… can wait.”

“Master Jinn!...against procedure…Master Che… council...”

There was the sputter of Qui-Gon’s suppressed laugh and “you do that” more loudly and in a somewhat acidic tone, followed by the sound of the healer snapping closed his case and the swish of the front door.

Obi-Wan opened his eyes to see Qui-Gon entering the bedroom. The older man looked weary and worried. His shoulders slumped and there were shadows in his eyes. Tendrils of hair escaped his characteristic half-tail and caught the sunlight in a kind of messy corona. His robes were wrinkled and slightly askew.

“Thanks,” Obi-Wan said softly, a little hoarse as Qui-Gon sat down on the bed beside him.

“You’re welcome.”

Qui-Gon reached up to brush an errant lock of hair off of Obi-Wan’s forehead. Obi-Wan smiled and leaned into the touch.

“How long was I out?”

“A few hours. Sorry about the healer.”

“Don’t be. I would have called for one too in your place,” Obi-Wan said, shuffling gracelessly upright as Qui-Gon shoved a pillow behind his back. “I…” Obi-Wan stopped, suddenly embarrassed.

Qui-Gon waited patiently. Obi-Wan stared at his hands.

“Obi-Wan?”

Obi-Wan shook his head. “A panic attack? In the safety of your kitchen?” He was unable to keep the disdain from his voice. “Of all the places.”

“Obi-Wan.” Qui-Gon was looking at him, head cocked to one side with a half smile, and warmth in his eyes.

“What?” he said, bristling against Qui-Gon’s compassion. It came out sharper than he intended. He sighed and closed his eyes. “Patience, my young padawan,” he muttered, imitating the lilt in Qui-Gon’s voice.

“Something like that.” Qui-Gon smiled again and took one of Obi-Wan’s hands in both of his. Instinctively they took a deep breath together.

“I hate this,” Obi-Wan said bitterly.

“I know. You’ll heal. It will take some time though.”

Obi-Wan snorted. “Yes, time we don’t have. Qui-Gon, this complicates things.”

“Perhaps,” Qui-Gon said evenly. “Perhaps not. Do you know what happened?”

“Not entirely. I was making tea. I felt fine. Good. Better than I had in days.”

“Anything else?”

Obi-Wan cast his mind back to the moment before the attack. “I remember feeling hopeful for the first time in a long, long time. Maybe even a little bit happy,” he said quietly, flushing.

Qui-Gon mouth quirked, as if he wanted to smile but restrained himself. He squeezed Obi-Wan’s hand and released it, sitting back. He closed his eyes and took another breath. Obi-Wan could feel a swirl of Qui-Gon’s presence through the Living Force.

“This upsets you,” Qui-Gon said finally. “You are not supposed to feel happy.”

“Not in the middle of a war, Qui-Gon.”

“Because others are suffering.” The ghost of a smile was gone and Qui-Gon spoke gravely.

Obi-Wan nodded, his throat tight. He had lost himself in relief — from danger, from pain, from loneliness, from the invisible hole Qui-Gon’s absence had left in his life. He had told himself that his men were in good hands with Kit Fisto; that the best thing he could do for the war effort was to heal; that he was one only one man and it was prideful and arrogant to think that everything was going to fall apart without him. And it had worked for a few days. Until the absolute luxury of where he was hit him in full force.

“Are you not suffering, Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon said in a low voice, careful and still, as if he worried Obi-Wan would bolt.

Obi-Wan groaned. “Yes. No. It’s not the same. I can’t even tell any more. The relief I’ve been feeling is—confusing.”

“And you feel guilty.”

“Yes.” Obi-Wan sighed.

Qui-Gon narrowed his eyes. “But there’s more than that. I sense a great deal of pain and turmoil in you.”

“No doubt,” Obi-Wan said bitterly, a little defeated, and a little annoyed.

“Obi-Wan, you are human, even if you try to forget it. And there are consequences to being in constant physical danger.”

Obi-Wan squared his shoulders and raised his chin. “I’m a Jedi,” he said simply, but with a more than a hint of defensiveness.

“Yes, I noticed,” Qui-Gon said with a sad smile. “So am I.” He paused. “So what?”

Obi-Wan blinked. He was too tired and too old for a lesson. “What’s your point, Qui-Gon?” he said, snapping the “t” and pinching the bridge of his nose.

Qui-Gon flinched and looked down. Obi-Wan’s heart twisted. He opened his mouth to apologize, but Qui-Gon spoke.

“We still have limits, Obi-Wan,” he said softly.

Obi-Wan stared at Qui-Gon, eyes wide. His temper flared and before he could stop himself, he blurted, “Limits, Qui-Gon? This coming from the man who took on a Sith by himself. I hardly think you’re one to talk about limits.”

This time Qui-Gon held his gaze. “That lesson, Obi-Wan, I’m afraid I didn’t learn until it was too late to teach it to you. As your master at least.” Qui-Gon’s voice was tight and his eyes shone. He swallowed and inhaled slowly. “But I did learn it, after Naboo.”

He didn’t say thanks to having been bedridden for three months, and then suffering through a year of recovery, two further years grounded to the temple, and the council refusing to let me train Anakin— but he didn’t need to. Obi-Wan realized in that moment that if any Jedi knew about limits, it was certainly Qui-Gon. As much as he was in full health now, Qui-Gon had had to spend half a decade reclaiming his body, while Obi-Wan had been running around the galaxy. Stars, he was being an ass. Good job Kenobi. Take your anger out on the man trying to help you. Classy.

“I’m sorry,” Obi-Wan said at last. “I don’t think it’s you I’m angry at.”

Qui-Gon nodded. “No, I didn’t think so," he said with a sigh. "Still, it’s a lesson I should have taught you— to sense your limits and accept them. To work within them, without shame or guilt.”

“Yes, well, I hardly think you could have learned that from Dooku,” Obi-Wan said, fondness softening his frustration.

Qui-Gon gave a bitter laugh. “No.”

Obi-Wan sighed heavily. “It’s more than that, Qui-Gon. You are right. It wasn’t guilt. I mean, there was guilt. But that was just the beginning.” His heart sank as he struggled to touch the memory of what happened. The relief he had been feeling here in Qui-Gon’s quarters had been dazzling— and the thought of giving it up, of going back, had rendered him frozen and breathless.

Obi-Wan pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them through the blanket. He rested his forehead on his knees and when he spoke, his voice was muffled. “I was afraid. Not just afraid, I was physically overwhelmed by my fear, unable to gain control of it, or release it into the force.”

“Even Jedi feel fear."

Obi-Wan raised his head, but looked out the window, trying to hide the sorrow and shame he knew Qui-Gon would see. “Not like this, Qui-Gon.”

“Yes, like this, Obi-Wan.” At the sound of his former master’s firm tone, Obi-Wan’s gaze snapped up to meet Qui-Gon’s.

“Emotion, yet peace,” Qui-Gon recited from the ancient Jedi Code. “And sometimes that peace is harder to reach, and we need some help to get there. There’s no shame in that,” he said softly, kindly.

“There is no emotion, there is peace. Fear is the path to the Dark Side,” Obi-Wan answered.

Qui-Gon frowned. “Do you really believe that?”

“It’s the Code Qui-Gon. It’s what I was taught.”

“Not by me. And that’s not what I asked.”

Obi-Wan inhaled sharply. “Odan-Urr’s revision of the Jedi Code has served the Order for the last 4,000 years. The fact that you— No! I’m not having a debate about the Urr text with you. Not again. Not now.”

“I’m not asking you to. I’m asking you, what do you believe?”

Obi-Wan fell silent, emotions roiling. He knew Qui-Gon was trying to help. The trouble was, these days he wasn’t sure what he believed, even now with his own padawan grown to knighthood and a grand-padawan well on her way. The more the war waged, the more he’d begun to find the Code’s approach to emotions and attachment restrictive and out of step with how most sentients—Jedi included—seemed to operate. It had occurred to him that Master Yoda, like Odan Urr had been, was almost a thousand years old. Discounting emotions and avoiding attachments was surely a necessity when one was expected to outlive generations of friends and colleagues. After forty years of arguing, Qui-Gon was still trying to prove to Yoda that Odan-Urr’s code was based on a mistranslation. He knew Qui-Gon’s arguments and could see the logic in them. But he was a council member and not inclined to push for doctrinal revision in the middle of the deadliest war the galaxy had seen in a thousand years.

His palms itched for his lightsaber. If only he were in any shape to spar, he and Qui-Gon could have this out on the training floor. He found himself longing for the force and electricity of direct confrontation. He had missed sparring with Qui-Gon, and now, with their quiet rhythm, long dormant, semi-restored, he wondered what it would be like.

“Padawan?”

Obi-Wan looked up at Qui-Gon and felt an unexpected sharp surge of frustration at the term of endearment. “First general, then Negotiator, now padawan. Am I never simply a man to you, Qui-Gon?” His choice of words and his tone—almost pleading—surprised him.

The word that came to mind as he watched Qui-Gon take in his words was retreat. With a jolt and catch of his breath, a flicker of something that looked like fear crossed his chiselled features. He blinked in surprise or confusion (or both), and swallowed thickly. Lifting his gaze upwards to stare at the wall past Obi-Wan’s head, he covered his bearded chin and his mouth with one giant hand, and sat, silent and still.

Obi-Wan held his breath, searching in the force for a sense of what had just engulfed Qui-Gon, but the other man’s shields were like duracrete: thick, dark and impenetrable.

“I think,” Qui-Gon said slowly—finally— “that you are all those things, Obi-Wan. And more. A friend, for instance.” He paused.

At “more,” Obi-Wan’s heart flipped over in his chest, and an old, long-buried heat slipped free and slid, twisting, downwards to settle low in his belly. “And?” he practically choked, air squeezed from his lungs.

“And that I have some meditating I need to do,” Qui-Gon breathed.

Obi-Wan stared at Qui-Gon, unable to speak and wondering what in the galaxy he could mean by that. He would certainly be meditating on it too. Later. And alone.

They looked at each other intensely for a moment until Qui-Gon broke the silence with an abrupt and welcome change of subject.

“But, for now, let me make us some tea, and then I believe we have a wanderer to see home,” Qui-Gon said with a slightly strained smile as he rose from the bed.

“You found the book?” Obi-Wan asked, surprised.

“I did. It had fallen behind the night stand.”

“I can’t promise to stay awake,” Obi-Wan admitted, suddenly exhausted.

“I’ll take that challenge,” said Qui-Gon, his cheerfulness still a tad stilted. As he headed into the kitchen, he started reciting with an exaggerated, posh Coruscanti accent: “Speak, Memory —of the cunning hero, the wanderer, thrown off course time and again, after he plundered Troy’s sacred heights. Speak of all the planets he saw, the sentients he met, his heart-sick suffering in hyperspace!”

Obi-Wan laughed and nestled back into the pillows, grateful and warm.

Chapter Text

It was late, well into the evening, when Qui-Gon finally sank into a meditation under his favourite tree in the Room of a Thousand Fountains and opened himself up to the turmoil of emotions brewing deep in his head and heart.

Obi-Wan…. kriffing Obi-Wan, calling forward heat and fear and need with one word:

“Am I never just a man to you, Qui-Gon.”

He hadn’t been able to breathe in that moment, desire slamming into him like transport.

He had noticed, of course he had noticed, that Obi-Wan had grown into a beautiful man, and, impossibly, more handsome with age. Authority and experience suited Obi-Wan and he had settled into his body with an assuredness that put Qui-Gon to shame sometimes. Steady. Determined. And brilliant. Strong in the force. Even now contemplating Obi-Wan’s features, he couldn't dwell...he couldn't. He was too old for that kind of lust. And it was Obi-Wan, his padawan.

Qui-Gon took a deep breath and pressed his hands through the soft greenery to touch the harder earth beneath, as he tried to quell a rising sense of horror. He had known Obi-Wan since he was a boy of thirteen. Raised him, trained him, watched him grow up. He was like his father, surely.

But the answering look in Obi-Wan's eyes had not been the gaze of a son to a father. There had been longing there in his blue eyes, if dimmed by exhaustion and pain.

There had been longing there years ago— the sharp, unwieldy desire of a teenager and then a young man, carefully concealed behind Obi-Wan's shields and exemplary Jedi calm. But Qui-Gon was not blind or senseless. He'd known that Obi-Wan had wanted him, and he had been impressed by the young man's restraint and respect for the boundaries of the master-padawan bond. What had wrenched his heart was the occasional flicker of shame and sadness he picked up, despite Obi-Wan’s best efforts. He never wanted Obi-Wan to feel ashamed of his feelings, but he hadn’t had the words to tell him that, opting instead to ignore it. The younger man’s desire had been distracting, sometimes, like unwanted static or a background beeping noise— something he had, if not aggressively then certainly deliberately and thoroughly tuned out. Until it had disappeared—or he thought it had. Obi-Wan and Quinlan had spent a few years having some kind of liaison, and Qui-Gon had been happy for him and relieved. It was healthier for him to experience such things with someone his own age, and, more importantly, someone who wasn’t his master.

He had not desired Obi-Wan as a padawan. Of that he was certain. But now?

He imagined a world briefly where Obi-Wan had been apprenticed to someone else—maybe stationed out of another temple. What if he had met him only in the last few years, as a council member, and general? He pictured Obi-Wan in his council seat looking deceptively relaxed, ankle on his knee, chest broad and gaze level, with the high-collared robes he’d taken to wearing lately and his almost patrician beard.

Obi-Wan was shiny and smooth, polished. And socially impeccable. Where, Qui-Gon wondered idly, had he gotten that from? Qui-Gon had a quiet grace and raw physical prowess that alternately calmed and intimidated as he needed. His diplomacy relied on conviction and integrity. He showed his emotions a little or he didn’t, but there was rarely any artifice or charm. But Obi-Wan— Obi-Wan could have been a politician, his silver tongue as bright as his burnished hair. Few beings got to see behind Obi-Wan's walls and Qui-Gon considered himself deeply fortunate.

Qui-Gon sighed and leaned back against the asuka tree behind him. He looked up at wide, dark leaves and the blue blossoms that were almost navy in the dusky glow of the dimmed evening light cycle.

If he had met Obi-Wan as an adult, he mostly likely would have felt frustrated with his politics, and yet compelled by his mind, as well as thoroughly and impressively charmed.

But Obi-Wan had been his apprentice. Shame burned his face and stole his breath. He should have known that there was something more going on in their touches, their physical closeness these past few days. He had thought—well he hadn’t really— but reflecting on it now he supposed he had assumed they were both more than a little starved for touch and there was a safety and familiarity in their contact. It felt natural. and he had not questioned or examined it. With so much pain surrounding them, anything that that brought more ease just made sense.

How could he share his bed with Obi-Wan now? Now that he was awake to this unacceptable desire.

He took another deep breath, willing the fear constricting his heart to dissolve into the Force. The air was sweet with moisture and the smell of growing things. He looked out over the little meadow, grateful for the solitude.

Until he heard a rustle of leaves and robes behind him.

Please don’t be Yoda. Please don’t be Yoda. He had learned long ago that speaking to Yoda about relationships was profoundly unhelpful.

“Qui-Gon, my friend, what ails you? I can feel your turmoil from the east door.” The deep, smooth voice of Plo Koon was soothing, despite his desire to be alone. The Kel Door Master sank down under the tree beside Qui-Gon without waiting for an invitation.

“Hello Plo,”Qui-Gon sighed, resigned. “I was trying to meditate.”

“Hmm...” Plo rumbled. “I think trying is the key word there, my old friend.”

“You are not wrong, I’m afraid,” Qui-Gon admitted, leaning his back against the tree and resisting the urge to cover his face.

Plo placed a large clawed hand on Qui-Gon’s knee.

“I don’t know if I can talk about it yet. It’s too new.”

“Hmm…I have a sense, Qui-Gon, that this pain is anything but new.”

Qui-Gon turned to face Plo, eyebrows raised in alarm. “What..?”

“Ah! A lucky guess, based on the gravity, Qui-Gon. Never fear. Only those who know you well are likely to pick up anything more than the smallest ripple in the Force.”

“Well, that’s something, I suppose.”

“Obi-Wan?”

Qui-Gon bristled. “I thought I said I wasn’t ready to talk.”

“Time is a luxury, my friend. Every day, more and more.”

Qui-Gon frowned. “It shouldn’t be.”

“Maybe not, but that changes nothing. How is Obi-Wan doing?”

Qui-Gon sighed again. “Well enough, I think. The war is wearing on him. I am worried about him. I don’t know how long he can keep pushing himself without risking some permanent or severe damage.”

Plo nodded. “Is that what troubles you?”

“Some of it.”

“You are afraid to lose him?”

“Please Plo, I’m not in the mood for a lecture on attachment.”

“That’s good, because I’m not about to give you one.”

Qui-Gon snorted.

“I may be on the council, but that doesn’t mean I agree with Yoda on everything. Love is not attachment.” As he spoke, Plo squeezed Qui-Gon’s knee ever so slightly. At Qui-Gon’s quirked brow, Plo continued. “Remember that the Baren Do Sages trained me before I came to Coruscant. I know better than most the limitations of our Order.”

“And yet, you still sit on the Council,” Qui-Gon said warily.

“I admire your idealism, Qui-Gon. But I fear it will not serve you in the times ahead,” Plo replied.

Qui-Gon shivered at the note of foreboding in his friend’s tone. For several long moments, the two looked out over the green of the gardens in silence, before Qui-Gon took a breath and finally spoke. “It’s not my love for Obi-Wan, or my fear to lose him that troubles me, or, dare I say, my attachment to him.”

“Then what, old friend?”

Qui-Gon tried to speak but his shame was too great. He dropped his face into his hands.

Plo put his hand on Qui-Gon’s shoulder.

“You know that Micah and I…” Plo began, his voice kind.

“Micah wasn’t your padawan,” Qui-Gon sneered.

“Obi-Wan isn’t yours. And he hasn’t been for over a decade.”

“It’s wrong, Plo. I raised him. He’s like my son. How can I desire him this way?” The anger in his voice surprised him.

Plo sighed deeply, a low, rough sound through his mask. “He is not a child any more, Qui-Gon. And he has never been your son.”

“No,” Qui-Gon said, sadness and regret swallowing his anger. His throat tightened and his eyes burned. “Though there was a time I wished it with all my heart.”

“I know, my friend. You wouldn’t be the man I thought you were, if that were not so.”

Plo wrapped his robe-clad arm around the other Jedi Master, who stiffened for a moment, and then crumpled into his friend’s embrace, surrendering at last to his tears.

Chapter Text

Qui-Gon returned to his quarters exhausted and calmer, but still unresolved. He had surrendered to his feelings at least. He couldn’t help how he felt, but he could help what he did about it. Which was to say, nothing. Well, nothing, and relocate to the couch.

The lights were dimmed as he entered. Obi-Wan had left him a pot of tea, wrapped in a tea-cosy he vaguely recalled Obi-Wan had knit when Anakin was still a padawan. He must have dug it out of the back of a cupboard somewhere because Qui-Gon hadn’t seen it in years.

There was a note wishing him a calming meditation and bidding him to sleep well. The door to his bedroom was ajar, but the lights were out. Qui-Gon ducked in cautiously, not wanting to wake Obi-Wan, and grabbed a pillow and blanket from the closet.

He couldn’t quite bear to look at Obi-Wan, love and shame and disgust and desire a hopeless mass in his chest. He closed the door quietly and made up a makeshift bed on the old couch. Shedding his boots and the outer layers of his tunics, he stepped into the fresher to brush his teeth, staring the whole time at Obi-Wan’s toothbrush sitting in the same cup. His former padawan had left his obi and outer tunic hanging on the back of the door. Strands of Obi-wan’s red hair clung to the inside of the sink. He was thoroughly and intimately everywhere - just as he had been when he’d been Qui-Gon’s apprentice, but it was different now because Obi-Wan desired him and he desired Obi-Wan and this closeness wasn’t innocent any more. He couldn’t pretend that it was simple, platonic love. He spit out his toothpaste and all but fled the bathroom. He left the pot of tea untouched.

Settling onto the couch as best he could, he drifted into a fitful and troubled sleep.

A few hours later he woke to a bright light spilling out from the bedroom and the sound of Obi-Wan’s voice. Obi-Wan stood in the doorway, wrapped in a blanket, almost a silhouette in the dark.

 “Qui-Gon? What are you doing?” Surprise and confusion rang in Obi-Wan’s voice.

 Qui-Gon inhaled, his heart sore and guts twisting.“Go to back sleep Obi-Wan.”

 “Qui-Gon, this is ridiculous. You’ll be aching in the morning.”

 “I’m fine, Obi-Wan. I didn’t want to disturb you.”

“Well, I’m up now. Come to bed.”

 “I - I can’t,” Qui-Gon breathed.

 “ Qui-Gon ? What’s the matter?” There was a faint but unmistakable tremble in Obi-Wan’s voice now.

 “Nothing’s the matter. I just…”

 “Felt like sleeping on the couch?” Qui-Gon could practically hear Obi-Wan's arched eyebrow.

 “Yes?”

“Stop lying to me,” Obi-Wan said sternly, and strode across the room to sink down on his knees beside Qui-Gon's face.

 Qui-Gon sighed again, and covering his face with his hands, pleaded. “I’m sorry Obi-Wan. Please go back to bed. We’ll talk in the morning.”

 “Nothing’s changed Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan whispered, taking Qui-Gon's hands in his and lifting them from his face. “I’m still the same person I was this afternoon. So are you.”

 Qui-Gon couldn't look at him. “It’s not about you Obi-Wan. I felt it was better. To have some space.”

 “Space? What are you talking about? We’ve had years of space. I don’t want space,” Obi-Wan declared, alarmed.

 Qui-Gon closed his eyes and took a breath. His heart twisted. “Well, I do.”

 Obi-Wan jerked backwards as if he’d been hit, but still gripped Qui-Gons hands.

 “Why?” Obi-Wan’s voice was low and grave. “Why now?”

 “You know why, Obi-Wan.” The beginning sparks of anger hardened his tone. In one swift motion, Qui-Gon sat up and pulled his hands from Obi-Wan’s grasp.

 “No, I don't,” Obi-Wan protested, fighting to keep his voice calm. “I know I asked you a question that rattled you and you’ve been hiding from me ever since.”

 “Don’t make me say it, padawan,” Qui-Gon growled, sinking his head into his hands, elbows resting on his knees. Surely Obi-Wan knew. He had to.

 “Say what ?”

 Qui-Gon shook his head, overcome.

 Obi-Wan moved closer, but didn't touch him. The younger man took a deep breath and reached out through the force and tapped lightly on Qui-Gon's shields.

 “Whatever it is, let me help. We have to talk about this Qui-Gon.”

He knew Obi-Wan was right, but he was too ashamed to speak - too ashamed and too afraid to look at the man he loved more than he ever could have imagined and tell him how he had betrayed him.

 “Please. I’ve only just found you again. I can’t bear this distance between us. Not again. Not now, when every day could be our last.”

 At that, Qui-Gon’s head jerked up, and he looked into Obi-Wan’s eyes, shining with unshed tears. Force, there was so much love there. So much love he could barely breathe. Love and sorrow. Loneliness. Grief. And fear, bordering on hurt. His heart cracked. How could he leave his Obi-Wan alone in this? Anger and fear and shame fled and his shields crumbled as he reached for Obi-Wan’s face. The other man’s beard soft was against his hands and he pulled him forward and pressed his forehead to Obi-Wan's. On his face Qui-Gon felt the faint rush of air of Obi-Wan’s gasp and his hands were soon damp with Obi-Wan’s tears.

 “I love you too, Obi-Wan whispered, almost too soft to hear, but then Qui-Gon was enveloped in Obi-Wan's feelings, warm and bright and staggering in their depth.

 Qui-Gon began to weep. Sixty years of loneliness and duty, reaching for connection and being told he was asking for too much, that he was risking attachment, that he was flirting with the dark. It didn’t matter that he didn’t believe it any more, some dark and buried part of him still felt the shame of his childhood conditioning.  And what he believed about love mattered little if everyone else around him held back. He had been parched and wasting away and here was Obi-Wan, who was in every other way the perfect Jedi, drenching him in this forbidden feeling, saying it out loud. He was humbled and stricken by his padawan’s bravery.

 Obi-Wan pulled him into his arms and Qui-Gon wept, clutching at his padawan’s tunic and sobbing as if his heart would break. Obi-Wan smoothed the tangled mess of Qui-Gon’s hair and pressed a kiss against the top of his head. When he spoke, he pressed words into Qui-Gon’s hair through his own tears, but his voice was steady with conviction.

 “In my meditation, I found this: nothing evil can come from love. Not truly. This is one emotion I will not give to the Force. It is for you. I give it to you.”

 “Obi-Wan,”  Qui-Gon’s voice cracked, hoarse and quivering. “I have never said it. Because the council…after Xanatos.”

 “I know. And I don’t think i needed you to say it. I felt it all the same.”

 “Why now?” Qui-Gon whispered.

 “Because I could not let you think this thing between us evil or wrong.”

 “Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon began, sitting back to look his former padawan in the eyes. “It is not the love I fight. But there are… different kinds of love and some of them… part of what I feel for you is a betrayal. Once I had a father’s love for you and now…”

“It has changed.”

 “To my great shame, yes.” Qui-Gon looked down at his hands.

 “I still feel it there. And I feel other kinds of love too. And desires to express that love…” Obi-Wan tipped Qui-Gon’s chin up to look him in the eyes, but Qui-Gon couldn’t bear to see the hope burning in Obi-Wan’s gaze. He closed his eyes and took a slow, deep breath. When Obi-Wan moved his hand to cup the side of his face, Qui-Gon carefully took his hand in his and removed it. He opened his eyes, took both of Obi-Wan’s hands in his and forced himself to meet Obi-Wan’s gaze.

 “It is wrong, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon said gravely. “I cannot defile our relationship with this. I must process it and release it… before we can be so close again.”

 “Why?” Obi-Wan cried, dismayed, his resolve shattering. “How can you hate and cast aside what I have wanted and hoped for for twenty years?”

 “I am sorry, Obi-Wan. I am so sorry.” He bowed his head to their joined hands in supplication.

 “I don’t understand,” Obi-Wan said, almost to himself. He sounded far away and sad. “I haven’t been your padawan for over a decade. I outrank you. What is so wrong?”

 “It’s not just about power. There’s history and...”

 “What does the Force tell you?” Obi-Wan asked suddenly, hope brightening his voice.

 “I… cannot tell. The Living Force is silent to me on this.” It was true, not that Qui-Gon understood why, but he felt nothing but static and emptiness when he tried to ask the Force’s guidance.

“Hmm…” This time Obi-Wan took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He pried his hands gently from Qui-Gon’s and shifted into a lotus position. The room was utterly silent except for the distant hum of the speeders in the dark.

 Qui-Gon joined him in a meditation pose and tried again to read the Force, but he could discern nothing but his own turmoil and profound guilt at the pain and despair he had seen in his padawan’s features moments before.

 As he meditated, Obi-Wan’s face took on a serenity that Qui-Gon found himself envying. At last, the younger Master spoke. “Perhaps, Qui-Gon, you are not listening. I feel it and it sings.” He blinked his eyes open and extended his hand once more. “Let me help you. Let us search together.”

 Qui-Gon swallowed, trying to ease the tightness in his throat. “I am not ready, Obi-Wan,” he said softly, voice full of regret.

 “I understand,” Obi-Wan replied. He sighed. “I should go. You needn’t ruin your back.  And, I think maybe you want to be alone, as much as it grieves me.”

“Want is not the word I would use, but yes. I think I need some time.”

 “I have waited twenty years. I can wait a while longer.” Obi-Wan’s smile was wistful and his eyes full of love. He slowly rose to his feet.

 “Don’t get your hopes up Obi-Wan. Please. I am… resolved on this.”

 “I will tend to my heart, Qui-Gon, and leave you to tend yours. I only ask that you to search the Force and your feelings. I trust you. And I love you. Nothing will ever change that.” He squeezed Qui-Gon’s shoulder gently.

 Qui-Gon nodded, unable to speak through his tears of gratitude and regret. He did not deserve this shining man and his generous heart.

Obi-Wan turned to go and, for a moment Qui-Gon nearly pulled him back, feeling his heart rend watching Obi-Wan walk away.

Obi-Wan turned back and smiled a bright and sad smile. “Time to see how much of Anakin's stuff has made it back into my quarters. For all I know, there will be half an X-wing in my living room.”

Qui-Gon barked a laugh, his throat catching.

“I'll see you tomorrow, Qui-Gon.”

Qui-Gon nodded. “And I, you, Obi-Wan.”

Qui-Gon slept on the sofa because his bed smelled of Obi-Wan.

Across the temple, Obi-Wan pitched himself onto his cold and empty bed and cried like he hadn’t cried since he was thirteen and headed for Bandomeer.

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan didn’t know how he made it back to his quarters. He drifted through the corridors, numb and unseeing.

If he’d had the wherewithal to notice, he’d have thanked the Force that no one was around at this late hour to see General Kenobi with his robe sliding off his left shoulder and the fingers of his right hand trailing absently along the walls where the colour changed from cream to a burnt orange.

One foot in front of the other. Keep breathing.

He came to his quarters and entered his code on autopilot. The door swished open to reveal a dark and cold, almost empty apartment.

Desolate.

The second he stepped inside his quarters, the pain hit him like a landslide. He let out a choked sob and nearly doubled over.

He was a Jedi master, sithdammit. He would control…. He wasn’t going to…

He had to, he had to... His boots. He needed to get his boots off. Fuck. He lost his balance and caught himself on the wall.

He took a deep breath and managed to sit on a kitchen chair and pull his boots off with trembling hands.

It took all of his willpower to resist hurling them against the wall.

He forced himself to stand up and take another deep breath. He clenched his fists. Every part of him was thrumming with a cold, urgent energy.

He knew he was safe in the Temple, safer than anywhere else in the galaxy, but he felt like he was waiting for blaster fire, a canon, a lightsaber, a Zygerrian whip.

The world spun slightly. He gripped the table and waved all the lights on with the Force.

He gritted his teeth and tried to straighten, but there was a burning, twisting, squeeze in his gut that kept him half bent over.

He moved to the sink and turned on the water. The sound was grounding. It gave him something to focus on. He took another breath, opened the nearest cupboard and retrieved a dusty glass and filled it.

He drank slowly through pressed lips. The squeezing pain had crept higher and the waiting was getting worse. He felt a pressure on his face and shoulders, as if someone had turned up the gravity.

There is no emotion, there is peace.

There is no emotion, there is peace.

There is no emotion, there is peace.

Bantha shit.

There most definitely is emotion, you kriffing troll, he shouted at the Yoda in his head, who sat there placidly on a meditation cushion.

Weakness this is, young padawan.

Attachment.

Leads to hurt, hurt leads to anger, anger leads to the Dark.

He had never felt this lost before.

Careful, Obi-Wan, you must be with your Master. No passion there is, only serenity.

Bantha shit.

The cold, urgent energy was building. He welcomed it, pulled on it, drew it in.

Anger.

He had twenty years of proof that there was passion. And in his meditation, in his meditation he had felt the Light surrounding him. He had felt in his bones that the love, the joy, the passion he had for Qui-Gon was not a path to the Dark. It was the opposite. It felt holy. And he had drawn on that knowledge, that feeling to center himself. In that moment he loved Qui-Gon so much that it didn’t matter if Qui-Gon didn’t want him physically.

Qui-Gon loved him back. Qui-Gon loved him.

Qui-Gon wanted him. He had felt that too. Flashes of lust, plain and simple, and scattered images of Obi-Wan shirtless, his hair mussed, Obi-Wan winking, Obi-Wan sitting in the council chamber with the sun at his back. Obi-Wan bending over to take off his boots.

He had felt Qui-Gon’s desire to lean into him, to let his hands linger, to press him up against a wall and kiss him.

And he had felt Qui-Gon’s fear and shame and disgust, revulsion, at all of these things.

At the end of it all, that was the worst part, wasn’t it? That was the part that Obi-Wan couldn’t bear. The part that hurt him and infuriated him. Not just the rejection on principle (leave it to Qui-Gon to shirk the rules he was supposed to follow and have another set of his own personal rules that he did), but his disgust.

He tried to tell himself what he knew to be true: that Qui-Gon’s revulsion was for himself , not Obi-Wan. But it hurt, oh it hurt, in deep, wordless, humiliating ways and dredged up old feelings and ancient fears.

He doesn’t want me. He never wanted me. And it’s my fault. I am broken, worthless, tainted by the Dark. Bad.

How could he endure this?

See how you cause the suffering of others ? The Zygerrian captain cackled. You are evil, Kenobi. Even the other Jedi have abandoned you. No one is coming. Death is too kind for you.

You will suffer because you deserve to suffer.

Tempt your master you will not, padawan. Close enough to the Dark he has tread already.

Frivolous and dangerous, these feelings of yours are. Speak them do not.

But he had. He had dared to. And the Light had sung.

And Qui-Gon had not felt it.  

He retched into the sink, sputtering and heaving til all of the water was gone.

He was grateful for the searing pain in his nostrils, pulling him back into his body, into his temple quarters, into the present day. His vision cleared. He swallowed and filled the glass again before stumbling into his bedroom. He put the glass down carefully and collapsed onto his bed.

He dragged a cold pillow to his chest, curled around it, and whispered to himself in the dark...

My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi. I was born on the planet Stewjon. I came to the temple at six months old. I never knew my mother. I never knew my father. I never knew my brothers and sisters. I never saw the family home except in holos.

My whole life has been in the Temple. I slept in dormitories with my crechemates. When I was three or four, sometimes we huddled together in a single bed, when the crechemasters weren’t looking. Bant cried against my chest while I held her. She cried into my hair when she held me. Garen held my hand in the dark. We had stopped by the time we were six.

I haven’t seen Bant in two years. I haven’t seen Garen in four. I have never told them that I love them, but I do.

Qui-Gon took me as a padawan when I was thirteen. He became the centre of my universe. I cried against his chest and he stroked my hair and told me it was okay to cry. It was hard to believe him, but I did.

I fell in love with him when I was sixteen. I never told anyone but Yoda. He told me never to tell, lest Qui-Gon go further into the Dark.

Qui-Gon pretended he didn’t know. He was never afraid to be close to me.

Now he is.

And he is right to be.

Because I want to crawl on top of him and touch him. I want to press my lips to his and slide my tongue into his mouth. I want to put my hands in his hair and pull. I want to feel chest hair against my beard as I kiss him. I want to grip our cocks together and stroke until we are gasping into each others mouths and he roars my name. I want him inside me, pounding, and I want to look into his eyes. I want to rake my nails down his back while I ride him. I want to come with the taste of his cum in my mouth.

I want everything with him.

Now I am alone, in the dark, crying into an old pillow in middle of a war. I haven’t gone a week without being shot at, attacked, nearly blown up, or shot down in two years. I have been imprisoned and tortured. I have watched my friends die. I have watched the Order distort itself and felt the Dark coming.

And this is what breaks me.

I cannot withstand this. I cannot withstand this. I cannot withstand this.

There is no passion, there is serenity.

There is no passion, there is serenity.

There is no passion…

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan was dreaming.

He was fighting Maul again on Naboo, was stabbed through the gut and falling as a yellow-eyed Qui-Gon laughed from the precipice.

He was shackled and whipped by his Zygerrian master, who twisted a knife into Qui-Gon’s eye as he screamed.

He was banished back to Bandomeer, as a thirty-six year old master and general, condemned by Yoda and the Council to a pit of draigons. Qui-Gon wept and fell to his knees as Dooku restrained him.

“Master, MASTER,” Obi-Wan screamed, as the creatures bit and clawed him. He couldn’t use the Force. He didn’t have his lightsaber. They hissed and gnawed and batted their filthy wings, blocking his sight. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see Qui-Gon any more.

Then Qui-Gon was holding him down in the mud as he fought for air. “It’s better this way,” his Master said, voice cold. “You will fail. I should train him.”

On a fiery, red planet, Anakin was screaming “I hate you”, while sulfur and heat burned his lungs.

“You will fail, Kenobi. You will fail and the galaxy will burn,” Yoda spoke in a voice not his own.

He woke, screaming, and heaved ragged breaths into his pillow. He reached across the bed, catching cold, empty sheets with a damp palm. Where was Qui-Gon? Last time his nightmares…

Oh.

He was in his quarters, alone.

Memories of his conversation with Qui-Gon surfaced slowly, like dark waves encroaching on a beach.

His heart, broken, mended and broken anew.

The pain in his chest and head was overwhelming, breaking him down, dissolving him. He felt like he could float away, into his mind, into the Force. Just. Stop. He could not longer parse physical sensation from other kinds of anguish.

Time seemed to lose all meaning. The galaxy shrank to four grey walls and his empty bed. He laid there, thoughts spinning, at the edge between sleeping and wakefulness, fighting.

At times, he felt his old despair and shame. At times, he railed against the injustice of being judged, rejected, assaulted, broken. He spoke to himself. He spoke with spectres of Yoda or Qui-Gon or Anakin or Cody, Bail Organa, or the nameless Zygerrian captain, Dooku, Xanatos. Somewhere at the bottom of the pit of his own worthlessness, he was reminded of Zigoola: not the call of the Dark, but his hopelessness and fear.

In the end, it was his anger that gave him purchase to climb out. At some point, hours later, after drifting in and out of dark dreams, he found his anger again, waiting for him at the edge of his mind.

Many Jedi split hairs, claiming love was not attachment, but awake as he was now to the full force of his love for Qui-Gon and the depth of his loss of control, he could not deny the rather extravagant degree to which he had broke the Code.

And for the first time in his life, he didn't care.

Mired in his own failures to contain and release his feelings, contain and release his attachment, he looked at himself and his world and felt a surge of fury at the stupidity of a rule that cut Jedi, cut him, off from the greatest source of Light.

As the sun began to lighten the sky, turning black to purple, he remembered something he had realized on Zigoola and had forgotten.

Yoda was Wrong, had been, wrong. Qui-Gon's attachments didn't pull him into the Dark, they anchored him in the Light. He had felt it the truth of that in the Sith wasteland and he had felt it last night in Qui-Gon’s living room.

He knew Qui-Gon better than any living soul and he would not let his fear and his old pain and shame erase what he knew and had felt for the last twenty years: Qui-Gon loved him. If there was anything in the universe he could count on, it was that truth.

Qui-Gon's refusal had been gutting, heartbreaking, devastating. But the torrent of emotions that was drowning him was old: he was not thirteen years old, or eighteen, or twenty-five, nor had he just returned from Zigoola or Zygerria. And Qui-Gon was not right, he was just Qui-Gon: wise, kind, beautiful, steady, calm, but also human, flawed, afraid, unsure, at times selfish, at times callous.

Perhaps Qui-Gon would see, in time. Perhaps not. All things were possible in the Force.

Obi-Wan focused on breathing through his tears and told himself that all he had to do was wait. And while patience was not in Obi-Wan’s nature (contrary to the opinions of most who knew him), he could wait.

He swallowed, squeezed his eyes shut and let his sorrow and disappointment wash over him.

His last thought, before he slipped into sleep once more, was that there was a kind of freedom in surrender. He hoped he would find peace there too.

-

Qui-Gon woke with a start. He was alone on the couch in his quarters. The chrono on the shelf across from him told him that several hours had passed since Obi-Wan had left.

Something was wrong. He felt wrong. Regret and a vague sense of doom pounded in his chest.

He sighed heavily, remembering Obi-Wan's hope and hurt.

What had he been thinking?

He should have asked Obi-Wan to stay. It wasn’t like Obi-Wan had asked him to have sex. The bed was large enough. They were still friends. What harm was there in it, really? He loved Obi-Wan, trusted him.

It was himself he was afraid of, himself he didn’t trust.

He was afraid of his feelings, of his body and how it might betray him. Would his touch linger too long? Would his eyes show his desire? Would he, Force forbid, get an erection?

Now that he was aware of these feelings, he couldn’t seem to turn them off or repress them or give them into the Force. He was mired in them. And no amount of reassurance from Plo or Obi-Wan himself could convince him that they were acceptable or appropriate or ….

He had hurt Obi-Wan so much already. He had wanted to protect him from this, from himself. But was that right? Or fair? Or possible?

Was it himself he was protecting?

Had his insistence on space succeeded in doing anything but abandoning Obi-Wan a second... no, a third time?

He couldn't bear the thought. He groaned aloud and sat up, wincing at the pain in his shoulders and back. Obi-Wan was right. He was too old for the couch.

The glow of early dawn had already started to brighten his windows when he pulled on his boots and ran his fingers through his tangled mess of hair and set out, heart heavy.

The halls were quiet, as they tended to be at this time, so no one saw him heading down the corridors with dark eyes and wrinkled tunics. He wouldn’t have cared if they did because all of his thoughts were on Obi-Wan. Bright, serene, grounded Obi-Wan who had left his quarters with the crack of a joke and a promise to see him tomorrow.

Oh, but Obi-Wan’s Jedi facade was so convincing. It pained him to think that Obi-Wan used it on him, and pained him even more to think that it had worked. He would know soon enough, he supposed.

Finally, finally, he arrived at Obi-Wan’s quarters. He punched in the security code and stepped inside. The other man’s shields faltering: he could feel Obi-Wan’s distress in the Force. I caused this, he thought in horror, not alone, but I caused this.

He took a deep, steadying breath and opened the bedroom door. Obi-Wan was curled on his side, clutching a pillow and heaving ragged breaths in his sleep. He could tell easily now when Obi-Wan was having nightmares, after nearly a week of sharing a bed.

He looked so young, even with the beard and grey at his temples, hardly visible now in the dim light. Qui-Gon sat on the edge of the bed and brushed his hand against Obi-Wan’s cheek.

“Obi-Wan?” he said softly. “You’re dreaming. Wake up. I’m here.”

Chapter Text

“Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon whispered. “You’re dreaming. Wake up. I’m here.”

Obi-Wan heard Qui-Gon's voice pierce through his bloody nightmare and woke, gasping. Relief flooded him as he inhaled the slightly stale recycled air of the Temple, with its hints of dust and plasteel.

He looked up at Qui-Gon, saw his shadowed eyes and lips pressed together. Qui-Gon’s hand on was his cheek, cool and steady, pulling him into awareness and anchoring him to the world.

Instinct found him sliding his own hand over Qui-Gon's, taking in the familiar roughness and shape with an ache in his chest. He felt his eyes sting and his throat tighten, and this time gave into his tears quietly, eyes closed and breath smooth.

“Oh Obi-Wan.” Qui-Gon's voice was a deep rumble in his chest, heavy with emotion.

Qui-Gon settled on the bed beside him, regret and worry written in his features. With trembling hands, he took the pillow out from Obi-Wan's hands and placed it aside and then shifted into the emptied space, arms open.

Obi-Wan gave a small, sad smile, and Qui-Gon closed the distance between them instantly, slipping his strong arms around Obi-Wan, pulling him flush against his chest, tucking his chin in the hollow between his shoulder and jaw, one large hand protectively cradling the back of his head.

In the whole galaxy, there had never been - and he suspected there never would be - a place he felt more safe than in Qui-Gon's arms. He breathed in the smell of Qui-Gon's skin and the sour tang of sweaty, slept-in tunics and felt the pounding of his heart settle and the knot of fear in his gut start to loosen.

“I’m so sorry, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon breathed. “I never should have…” his words ended in a sob that Obi-Wan felt more than heard. His master's arms tightened around him and yet there was more air, not less when Obi-Wan exhaled in sympathy.

“I love you, Obi-Wan. I love you and I have never wanted to hurt you. Never. We will come through this together. Not apart. I am so sorry.”

Obi-Wan wanted to speak, wanted to tell Qui-Gon that it was alright, that he understood, but his voice wouldn't work. He coughed, swallowed, and still the words wouldn't come. He opened up his shields a fraction more, longing for their old training bond. Some things were so much easier without words.

Qui-Gon's presence in the Force was like cold water after burning in the desert. The sharp agony of the last few hours seemed to bubble and hiss in waves under Qui-Gon's touch, as if he were putting out fire and drawing poison at the same time. Once, not so long ago, he would have fought this. Now, he slipped his arms around Qui-Gon's waist, fisted his hands in the loose fabric of his tunics and wept silently.

Qui-Gon breathed slow, deep breaths against Obi-Wan's ear, smoothed his hair, ran his hand up and down along his tense back. Slowly Obi-Wan became vaguely aware of a physical pain in his joints and muscles, mental fog and heat. Something was wrong. He was awake, but everything was so fuzzy. He felt himself start to drift back to sleep when Qui-Gon's concerned rumble called him back to wakefulness.

"Obi-Wan? Obi-Wan, you're much too warm. I think…" Qui-Gon's voice was urgent as he rested the back of his hand against Obi-Wan's forehead.

"Mhmm...uhhh," Obi-Wan groaned in response, his brain and vocal cords uncooperative.

Qui-Gon gripped his chin and looked him in the eyes, but Obi-Wan felt his gaze roll away and his eyelids droop. He wanted to look into Qui-Gon's blue eyes. He loved Qui-Gon's eyes. He...just...couldn't….

"You have a fever, Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon said firmly. "With your head injury…" Obi-Wan heard himself moan as Qui-Gon began to detangle himself from Obi-Wan, though in discomfort or regret, he couldn't say. Qui-Gon took both his hands and tried to look him in the eyes again, but his own eyes wouldn't stay open.

"I'm taking you to the healers. Now." Qui-Gon's voice was stern, but even in his dazed state Obi-Wan could hear his master's alarm.

The next thing he knew he was lifted from the bed, one arm under his knees, the other across his back. Part of him protested inwardly, thinking Qui-Gon was overreacting. At most, he should call a med droid, or a healer. There was no need for…. this. Another part could barely breathe in some strange admixture of wonder and disavowed delight. Qui-Gon was carrying him to the Halls of Healing. Force, but the man was tall and built.

The hallways blurred around him, even the dimmed nighttime light was bracing. He took a shallow breath and tried to release his pain to the Force and will the burning and building nausea to settle. He shivered against Qui-Gon chest and felt his arms tighten around him.

"Shhh… I've got you, padawan. I've got you." Obi-Wan didn't need to see Qui-Gon's face to know there were tears in his eyes. He let out a slow breath, turned his cheek into the musty tunics of Qui-Gon's shoulder and let the thrill of Qui-Gon's strength overwhelm him.

Chapter Text

Qui-Gon paced the small courtyard attached to healers’ ward. The ancient flagstone weathered his anxious strides with immutable patience. How many masters had beaten worried footsteps into the rock over the centuries? he mused, deflecting the rock’s quiet censure. Should we be like the stone, unyielding and steady?

His heart fluttered a distinct and unwavering no, as it had each time he had wound circles around the uneti tree and counted its white flowers to stem the tide of his feeling while Obi-Wan lay in unconscious in an infirmary bed.

He had never been good at weathering Obi-Wan’s jeopardy.

Vokara Che had assured him, as she had banished him, that there was nothing more he could do.

But wait.

And waiting hurt like a physical pain in his chest and stomach. The air seemed to buzz and his gaze narrowed to the sight of his hand resting on the rough bark of the uneti tree he didn’t remember touching.

He wasn’t in danger, but he felt his himself braced for a fight. He took a deep breath and tried to still the trembling in his veins.

Obi-Wan was going to be fine.

This time. Here. But what about next time? Out there.

In the flood of mission reports and campaign briefings, It was easy to forget how General Kenobi was made of flesh and blood. He didn’t worry in the same way, it wasn’t present in his breath and in his body, how close he was to losing Obi-Wan every single damned day of this war.

He felt this small respite, these stolen, magical days and all of the revelations they had brought, bending him out of shape.

His life divided into before and after Obi-Wan Kenobi told him he loved him.

Unbidden, the image of Obi-Wan looking up at him, tear-bright eyes in the darkened living room.

A throbbing in his heart, warm, soft, like a speck of sunlight, winked into existence. He caught himself on the tree as his knees went weak with the intensity. Joy, now so foreign to his body and mind, was experienced with a sharpness akin to pain.

Joy, love and something more.

What does the Force tell you?.

The bark under his hand seemed to pulse and when he looked up, the white uneti blossoms shifted in a non-existent breeze.

Qui-Gon drew in a long breath and stepped off the flagstone path onto the soft earth and green groundcover beneath the tree. A sense of wonder overtook him as he reached up to touch one of the flowers. Surely it was only his imagination that it was blooming wider. He had hardly been the pinnacle of observant when he entered the courtyard.

As soon as his fingers brushed the silky petals, the flower slipped from its branch and he caught it without thinking. With furrowed brows, he regarded the small blossom and felt its tiny force signature pulsing. Still very much alive. And this time he could see its petals curling back, opening, revealing the hidden yellow stamen and purple core. A smile tugged at his lips and he reached for the Force. Perhaps...perhaps Obi-Wan was right and the Living Force was speaking and he wasn’t listening.

“What are you trying to tell me?” he whispered over the flower.

A glimmer of Light, with an almost sonorous quality.

I feel it and it sings, Obi-Wan’s voice resounded in his head.

He couldn’t….
He didn’t dare consider...

The song and light began to waver, static and shadow overtaking his connection to the Force.

Stop.
Feel. Don’t think.

He called up the image of Obi-Wan smiling up at him and reached again. He felt the static begin to clear and the currents of the Living Force beckoned. He was about to slip into a deeper meditation, when he heard the tell-tale sounds of tapping of a gimer stick on stone, accompanied by the rustle of robes.

He straightened instinctively and closed his eyes to buy himself a few more breaths.

“Indulgent, this is, padawan of my padawan,” Yoda said with a thwack of his stick against Qui-Gon’s boot.

“Hmmm?” Qui-Gon responded, eyes still closed.

“Fooling me you are not!” Yoda’s voice was limited in volume, but sadly not in pitch. Qui-Gon winced and suppressed an instinct to cover his ears.

He opened his eyes and looked down, “Oh, Master Yoda. My apologies. I didn’t expect you.”

“Looking for you is Padawan Dagren,” Yoda said, his disapproval radiating in the Force and his harshly furrowed brows.

“Have they? How unfortunate that I’m indisposed. Surely there is another master who can attend to their questions,” Qui-Gon answered evenly.

“Assigned you have been.”

“I will convey my apologies and refer them to Master Koon,” Qui-Gon said. He gave a shallow bow, in a vain attempt to close the conversation.

Yoda didn’t move, though his jaw set momentarily.

“Nursemaid, you are not.”

“No, indeed.”

“Survive Obi-Wan will, without your presence. Indeed thrive more he may.”

A jolt of surprise and hurt ran through him. His felt his eyes widen involuntarily. That was a low blow, even for Yoda, whose penchant for the guilt trip Qui-Gon found ever more grating as the years went on.

“Better for him to be with healers. Clear that is,” Yoda continued.

Qui-Gon drew in a sharp breath and narrowed his eyes at the diminutive master. “With respect, Master, was it not the council who…”

“Assigned to senior padawans you were, Qui-Gon. Padawan no longer is Master Kenobi.”

He shook his head. “But, I thought—?”

“No ‘buts.’ Assumed you did. Hmmm…yes. See what you wanted, you did. As often you do.” Another thwack. “Better than that did Dooku teach you. Less skilled at self-justification you should be, Qui-Gon Jinn,” Yoda reproved.

He fought another wince as he cast his mind over his last Council meeting. Yoda was correct, in a sense. He had assumed the Council was giving him leave to tend to Obi-Wan. There had been no official directive. Was he seeing things that weren’t there? Was Rissa Mano needed on Kamino? Surely the senior padawans weren’t actually in need of his guidance. Not one of them had commed him.

“Tolerated your stubbornness and criticism long enough the Council has. Knight Mano, a better fit she is. Requested by Shaak Ti, she was.“

He stared at the wizened master.

Oh.
He was being punished.

He hadn’t even noticed, so focused he had been on Obi-Wan.

“Difficult enough Master Kenobi’s life is without your interference. Disapproved I did of the healer’s report. Lenient Master Koon and Master Gallia are. Quorum we did not have, but too small a matter to postpone. Meditate you will, on selfishness. Hrumph.”

Qui-Gon stood stunned, speechless.

“Summoned before the council you have been,” Yoda said sternly. “A datapad you have. Check it you will.”

All he could do was blink in response as the ancient master turned with a huff and shuffled his way out of the courtyard.

When he looked back down at the flower in his hand, he found it wilted, its petals turned limp and translucent.

Chapter Text

When Obi-Wan drifted awake, the first thing he was aware of, even before he opened his eyes, was pain. An ache pulsed between his shoulders. His ears were pounding. Even his jaw was tight from clenching against the fire running circuits through his limbs.

He could tell from a distant beeping, the pinching IV in his hand, the unfortunate mattress, and the smell of chemical sterility that he was in the infirmary. His dawning discomfort was made abruptly worse by the tension erupting through his body at the sounds of shouting from the next room.

“I don’t care! You should have been there” Anakin yelled, followed by a low baritone that could only be Qui-Gon.

Even though his Force sense was dulled by the drugs in his system, Anakin’s anger and Qui-Gon’s guilt were unmistakable. Another baritone rumble, and then abruptly they switched emotions. Whatever Qui-Gon had said to Anakin hit its mark.

The sinking feeling in his chest deepened. He hated when they fought. Like two silka beads on a string, his master and his padawan. He groaned inwardly. He didn't have to hear their words to surmise that they were fighting about him. Fondness and frustration twined together in his aching chest.

“Much to learn still they have, your master and your padawan.”

Obi-Wan blinked in surprise and shifted his head in the direction of the voice. When was the last time Yoda had graced his bedside in the healer's ward? He tried to hide his alarm as he scanned his shields, but the heart monitor started beeping almost immediately. Shit.

“Yes master,” he croaked blandly, desperately trying to quell his agitation. The monitor beeped faster.

Yoda fixed him in a knowing look and raised an eyebrow, but whatever chastisement lurked on his lips was overtaken by the sound of Anakin bursting through the door to his bedside.

“Master! You’re awake! Are you ...? Should we call master Che?”

Anakin looked harried, rumpled, the waves of his hair especially unruly and his leather tabards in need of polishing. In the face of Anakin’s distress, he felt himself instinctively snap into calm, peace, steady. All of the trembling in his body was swallowed into a hold in his core, and he let out a low breath. He hated when Anakin had to see him like this: weak, vulnerable. He tried to keep such aspects of himself from his former padawan, even if the war challenged that all the time.

“I’m fine Anakin,” he said, patting Anakin’s arm. “Just a little tired.” He smiled weakly and looked up at his padawan’s red eyes. Few things could unbalance Anakin like Obi-Wan in danger. He had hoped he would outgrow it, but even now, a threat to his friends was a lightning rod to the younger man’s fear… or anger. They were all strained to their limits by this war. He couldn’t bring himself to censure him.

He looked past Anakin to see Qui-Gon standing silent in the doorway, worry written into every line on his brow, the creases at his eyes, the edges of his frown. He looked exhausted, his greying hair blanched in the harsh fluorescent lights.

Breathe, he told himself, trying to quell the rising flutter in his heart and flush on his face. Force, Qui-Gon was a striking man, even rumpled as he was now.

“Contain yourself you must, young Skywalker,” Yoda chirped from his chair.

Anakin’s shoulders slumped. Qui-Gon had apparently worn the fight out of him. “I’m sorry Master.” He bowed his head in Yoda’s direction.

Anger flashed in Qui-Gon’s eyes, and Obi-Wan watched his master’s hands curl into fists for a second before he crossed his arms across his chest.

“And you, Master Jinn,” Yoda said, hopping down from his chair. “See I do your lack of restraint. Different from your grand-padawan, but dangerous just the same. A struggle for your lineage it is.”

Qui-Gon’s nostrils flared and his jaw clenched. Yoda crossed the room until he stood looking up at Qui-Gon. They stared at each other for a moment -- or rather Yoda stared and Qui-Gon glowered, until Yoda tapped Qui-Gon’s boot with his gimer stick for him to move out of the way.

“And yours, Master,” Qui-Gon growled under his breath as Yoda disappeared through the doorway.

Beside him, Obi-Wan heard Anakin let out a breath in sync with his own exhale. The younger man slid into the now vacant chair and looked at him intently. But Obi-Wan’s eyes were on Qui-Gon’s.

“What was that about?” Obi-Wan asked, voice still hoarse. He cleared his throat. The fever had left his lips cracked and dry.

Qui-Gon just closed his eyes and shook his head slightly, as if to say ‘never mind.’ He crossed the room in three strides, poured a cup of water from a pitcher on the nightstand and wordlessly handed it to Obi-Wan. For a brief second, their fingers touched on the flimsiplast cup and Obi-Wan inhaled in surprise at the heat. He couldn’t tell if the sudden lurching sensation was his nerves, his fever, or the effect of suppressing a near gravitational pull to clasp Qui-Gon’s hand and pull him onto the bed.

The monitor’s beeping sped up. Obi-Wan felt his flush creep up and up, until even the top of his head was burning.

“Drink, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon told him with a stern voice and soft eyes. In that moment, decades evaporated in the sharpness of familiarity and recognition. How many times had they done this dance during his padawan years? He suddenly felt very young, and it was jarring in the wake of his desire.

He held his breath as he met Qui-Gon’s gaze.

Unspoken things simmered between them in the Force.

He blinked his eyes closed, tipped the cup to his lips and lost himself in the cool liquid and damp, contained air for a moment. When he opened them again, Qui-Gon had procured another chair and set it beside the end of the bed, facing Obi-Wan and Anakin.

“Something....” Anakin began. He shook his head, eyes squinted shut and mouth crumpled. “Something’s… off. Obi-Wan?” He looked at him with confusion in his eyes.

“I think it’s me,” he quipped automatically, with a nervous laugh. A stunned silence fell for a millisecond before Anakin barked out a laugh and Qui-Gon joined him with what could only be described as something between a snort and a chuckle. The tension shattered and the three men drank in the particular kind of relief that came from sitting together, alive and breathing.

“I thought you were on Felucia,” Obi-Wan said.

“I was.” Anakin shuffled in his seat. “I’ve been back for a few days. They, uh, grounded me.” He gestured to his flesh hand, which Obi-Wan realized was in some kind of brace. “Ventress landed a decent blow on... Well through my shoulder.” He swallowed. “I’m fine. Or well. I will be.”

“Why didn’t I hear about this?” Obi-Wan asked, worry and guilt sharpening his tone. I should have been there. He’s too reckless on his own.

Anakin shrugged and waved his hand. “They treated me on board the Resolute. Kix did. He said I’ll be fine.”

“Did he?” Qui-Gon asked, his eyes narrowed.

His padawan looked down, his Force presence clouded. “And I haven’t been at the Temple.”

Oh no. Not again. Obi-Wan’s stomach dropped. He can’t keep doing this. He….

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan breathed.

The tense silence crept back upon them.

Anakin raised his chin and squared his shoulders. “Senator Amidala needed…”

Obi-Wan raised his hand and shook his head. Don’t tell me. I know. I can’t know. I’m a council member.

He cast a furtive glance at Qui-Gon, who looked to be mid-sigh.

Who am I to lecture him?
Is this what a hypocrite feels like?
Force, what are we going to do?

“I think,” Qui-Gon said, standing up, “that Obi-Wan needs to rest.”

“Right! Of course.” Anakin leapt upright. “I’ll come by later. I’m shipping out tomorrow, after the briefing.”

“Briefing?” Obi-Wan asked, failing to keep the hope out of his voice. A distraction was just what he needed.

“Rest,” Qui-Gon said firmly, his mouth quirked into a half-smile.

Obi-Wan huffed in annoyance. “Yes, master.”

“Not so fun, is it?” Anakin said with a grin.

Obi-Wan snorted in response.

“Off with you!” Qui-Gon said, with a fake swat in Anakin’s direction.

“Yeah, yeah,” Anakin drawled. He gave a shallow bow to Obi-Wan, and then another to Qui-Gon as he headed out the door.

Qui-Gon lingered, looking at him, waiting. The lines of his body were tense and he seemed to be holding his breath. He shifted his weight from one foot to another, blinked.

The silence sat, heavy and electric at the same time. The Force pulsed with possibility.

“Stay?” Obi-Wan heard himself say.

Chapter Text

Anakin’s departure was a blessing and a curse, Qui-Gon decided as he listened to the heavy footfalls of Anakin’s boots fade. Not for the first or last time in his long career as a Jedi Master Qui-Gon reflected on how much easier it was to be a master instead of a padawan. Though Anakin was a knight now himself, both he and Obi-Wan slid automatically into playing the role of master in his presence, with all of the steadiness and sureness that brought. He watched their collective calm evaporate with Anakin's footsteps, to be replaced by the uncertainty of their new uncharted space. Qui-Gon held his breath and waited, thinking of the wilted flower in his hand as he took in Obi-Wan’s disheveled and pale form, now dimmer for his padawan’s absence.

“Stay?” Obi-Wan asked. His tone was hard to decipher. He wasn’t pleading, but neither was he sure of Qui-Gon’s response.

A shimmer of relief and a thread of wonder wound through Qui-Gon’s chest and he let himself exhale: some part of him had been unsure of how welcome he would be at Obi-Wan’s bedside this time. But Obi-Wan’s gaze told him he was unwavering in his bravery and affection.

I hate that I keep hurting him. I wish I knew how to be with him, how to protect him.

Old instincts crept to the surface: while his heart pulled him forward, almost every other part of him screamed at him to run.

Yoda’s words, damn him, echoed, in his brain, stoking fires of doubt.“Survive Obi-Wan will, without your presence. Indeed thrive more he may. Better for him to be with healers. Clear that is.”

Force, what if Yoda was right?

Because as much as this appeared to be a concerned master sitting at the bedside of his former padawan, it was but a strange facsimile of countless past times.

He stood, frozen, and watched a shadow pass over Obi-Wan’s face.

“If you don’t want to,” Obi-Wan began, worry pinching his brows.

“No!” Qui-Gon cried out before he could think, reaching a hand towards Obi-Wan instinctively and crossing the room in a few strides. He paused in front of the chair beside Obi-Wan’s bed, heart hammering, flush creeping upwards. He scrubbed a hand over his face in frustration.“That’s not it,” he breathed, shaking his head.

Obi-Wan looked up at him, eyes clear, if a little glassy from pain. “Then tell me,” he said gently, taking Qui-Gon’s hand.

Qui-Gon slid into the chair, pressed down beneath a great weight. “I’m not sure I can,” he admitted in a strangled voice and then closed his eyes and squeezed Obi-Wan’s hand. His heart felt like it was swollen and throbbing in his chest, crushing his lungs.

“I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to hurt you Obi-Wan. I have never wanted to hurt you. But it seems I cannot help it, no matter what I do.”

A strange look passed over Obi-Wan’s face.

“What did he say to you?”

“Who? Anakin?” Qui-Gon asked, puzzled.

“No. Master Yoda.” A flash of anger in the force as Obi-Wan’s jaw clenched.

Qui-Gon shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t want to trouble…”

"Qui-Gon." A master's voice this time.

He looked up automatically, conditioned by the tone, feeling for all the world like a scolded padawan. Obi-Wan looked weary and serious, and like he was about to lecture a squirming Anakin.

He met Obi-Wan's eyes almost reluctantly.

“It’s not trouble Qui-Gon, don’t you see?” Obi-Wan said, scrubbing his free hand over his face in frustration. “You don't have to solve everything by yourself. You’re so busy trying to protect me, you can’t see what’s in front of your face.”

Qui-Gon bristled under his former apprentice’s censure. “And what’s that?” Qui-Gon asked, doing his best and failing to keep defensiveness out of his voice.

“That you don’t need to any more. At least not in this...” Obi-Wan waved a hand between them as he sought for the right words. “...one-sided ghost of an apprenticeship. You used to talk to me, you know. You aren’t going to make up for the past by coddling me now.”

Qui-Gon flinched. Oh the exquisite pain of being known. It stung, but he knew Obi-Wan's words were true. He swallowed, ducked his head, humbled. “You’re right. I'm sorry."

This time Anakin's words echoed: You're always running away. Just like Obi-Wan does. I think he learned it from you.

Was this the legacy of his lineage? Masters so afraid of attachment that they fled from connection with their padawans?

But Obi-Wan was right. it didn't used to be like this between them. He remembered a time when he and Obi-Wan could communicate almost without words, a quiet rhythm, their senses in tune, knowing each other so well they could anticipate and adapt to the other without conscious thought. And Qui-Gon had been more open, not only because Obi-Wan had learned to read him, but because he had wanted to. There had been comforting touches, vulnerable words and moments of shared joy and pain.

Was it age? The Order? The war? Qui-Gon couldn’t tell but something had fossilized him. And he realized with a certain alarm that in the last week caring for Obi-Wan had been easy because it replicated all of the intimacy of their relationship with little of the vulnerability on Qui-Gon’s part. As soon as he had felt shaken, he had done what Anakin accused him of, run away, or in this case, shut Obi-Wan out. Letting Obi-Wan care for him… he had been more able to do that when Obi-Wan had still been his padawan, though he couldn’t say why.

You knew him better, a small voice supplied. You knew him better and he knew you. You knew how to be together. Until you didn’t.

He took a deep breath. Change is made through a thousand small repetitions, not a great leap, he reminded himself. Though it felt like a great leap all the same as he put aside his pride and offered Obi-Wan his jumbled, wayward thoughts.

"My reassignment to the temple wasn’t a gift, it was a punishment. I…. misread the situation.
Master Yoda is… less than pleased with my being here."

Obi-Wan's eyes narrowed. “I don’t understand. You’ve never hesitated to disagree with him before?” Dawning awareness widened Obi-Wan's eyes. “He told you I’d be better off without you, didn’t he?”

Qui-Gon's brow furrowed. “How did you…?”

Obi-Wan snorted and leaned back on the pillows, crossing his arms over his chest. “Call it a lucky guess,” he muttered sourly. There was something in his tone that suggested there was more to it.

“Obi-Wan?”

A deep sigh as his shoulders dropped. “He told me the same thing once, almost 20 years ago now.”

“What?!” Qui-Gon exclaimed, shock rippling through him.

“Not exactly. But near enough,” Obi-Wan continued, his hands now twisting the bedcovers. “He said that I need to stay away, hide my feelings, because otherwise I would…tempt you from the Light."

“He said what?” Qui-Gon hissed, voice low. Anger, bordering on fury, started to burn in his gut. How could Yoda have said such a thing to padawan? How could he have not known?

"I know he's wrong now,” Obi-Wan said with a steadiness and acceptance that Qui-Gon found himself envying. His hands rested still in his lap. “I didn’t then."

“Oh, Obi-Wan. You were a teenager." Qui-Gon blew out a breath and fell back in his chair, heart twisting. "I had no idea.”

"I didn't let you. But the point is, he's wrong.”

"I'm sorry. I’m so sorry. If you had told me…"

"I know,” Obi-Wan said quietly, and took Qui-Gon’s hand again. “Why do you think I didn’t? I suppose in my way I was trying to protect you too.”

“Even so, Obi-Wan.”

“I won’t say it’s fine, because it isn’t. But it was his fault, not yours. Love is not attachment. I know that now. And even if it were, I don’t think attachments alone lead to the Dark.”

Qui-Gon blinked. What was he hearing? “This is a strange reversal. You the heretic and me worried about orthodoxy.”

“But it’s not, isn’t it? That’s what you’ve been trying to tell me for decades. There are many versions of the Code and the Code is not the Order.” He smiled. “But it’s not Yoda’s opinion or the Code at stake here, is it, Qui-Gon? What’s really wrong?”

“No,” Qui-Gon admitted, drawing in a long breath, or trying to. He tightened his grip on Obi-Wan’s hand and opened up his shields again, as Obi-Wan had done ages ago, at the beginning of this short yet world-altering respite.

“You’re afraid,” Obi-Wan said softly, without surprise or judgement and Qui-Gon felt a sharp release in his chest, like Obi-Wan had popped open a rusted lock with his words. A sound between a cry and a cough escaped him, and he began to laugh the strained, slightly hysterical laugh of unexpected relief. Of course. Of course. It was so simple, and something he’s known himself only hours ago. He nodded, drinking in newfound air eagerly. A few tears trickled down his face into his beard.

Obi-Wan laid his free hand on Qui-Gon’s shoulder with a mild squeeze. “Even Jedi feel fear, Qui-Gon,” he said with a small smile that hinted at a smirk. “My former master taught me that. He’s a wise man. I think you could learn a lot from him.”

Qui-Gon snorted and then promptly choked on his laugh. Force bless his brilliant Obi-Wan.

He shook his head as he wrangled his breathing back under his control. “Oh, Obi-Wan. If you only knew how much you’ve taught me.”

Obi-Wan smiled again, wider now, with a glint of mischief in his blue eyes. “What makes you think I don’t?”

Qui-Gon laughed again, but this time it was a deeper chuckle of affection. His shoulders settled under the reassuring weight of Obi-Wan’s hand.

He found himself leaning closer and closer to Obi-Wan until it was the most natural thing in the galaxy for Obi-Wan to drop his hand and rest his head tentatively on Qui-Gon’s shoulder.

Qui-Gon felt warmth and peace radiatiating through his chest. Gone was his instinct to recoil or flee. And finally, finally, when he reached for the Living Force it sang to him of green sunlit days and the wash of waves upon white sand, the steady heartbeat of the universe vibrating in the movement of all things.

He slid his arm around Obi-Wan, who closed his eyes and sighed as he shifted to find a comfortable position nestled against Qui-Gon’s side.

“Thank you,” Qui-Gon whispered against Obi-Wan’s mussed hair.

“For what?” Obi-Wan asked sleepily, voice faintly muffled against Qui-Gon’s tunic.

“Everything,” Qui-Gon answered, as his own drowsiness descended and relief dragged them both into stillness, soft breaths and sleep.

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan woke to the sound of his grandpadawan’s voice as she barreled through the door to his private infirmary room with all of the speed of a varactyl and grace of a newly dropped bantha calf.

“Master Obi-Wan, have you seen Master Qui-Gon? Master Plo is looking for him and—” She jerked back as if she’d hit a forcefield, skittering to a halt a foot from the bed. She stood gaping at the sight before her for a full ten seconds, before blinking several times and finally meeting his now open but rather bleary eyes.

“Hello there, young one,” he said evenly and projecting calm into the Force, hoping to soothe her surprise. Qui-Gon was still asleep, head tipped back against the wall, snoring lightly, arm draped heavily around Obi-Wan’s shoulders.

He strongly suspected the folds of Qui-Gon’s tunics had imprinted on his cheek.

What a sight indeed.

Ahsoka coughed and blinked again, wide eyed.

“Master… Plo...” She shook her head, as if trying to reload the scene in front of her.

It was a rare and remarkable thing to see Ahsoka struck speechless.

Obi-Wan stretched lightly, wiped sleep out of his eyes and extracted himself from Qui-Gon’s embrace, waking the older Jedi with a snort.

“Obi-Wan? What—” Qui-Gon began, before catching sight of Ahsoka. “...time… is it?”

“MasterPloislookingforyouMasterQui-Gon” Ahsoka blurted.

“Is he now?” Qui-Gon answered, brows furrowing. He yawned, crooked his neck and then began searching through the right side of his robe. A chirping comm noise grew louder as he dug it out of his pocket.

“Seventeen alerts. Three priority one, eleven priority two, four priority two,” a tinny mechanical voice informed the room when Qui-Gon pressed the alert button.

‘Hmmm,” Qui-Gon groan-sighed. “I suspect I know what this is about.” He stood stiffly, shaking out his robe.

Obi-Wan raised an eyebrow at him.

“Nothing I haven’t navigated before,” Qui-Gon said with a reassuring half smile.

Obi-Wan’s brow arched higher. Qui-Gon suppressed a chuckle. “I’ll comm you, or send our trusty messenger, if there’s trouble,” he said, nodding at Ahsoka.

She smiled and Obi-Wan’s heart eased a fraction. He would have to talk to her about their… unusual conduct. Better for them both if she were more comfortable.

Qui-Gon laid his hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder and nodded, his deep blue eyes serious. “I’ll see you soon,” he promised.

Obi-Wan felt a rush of warmth as his breath evaporated under Qui-Gon’s intense gaze. He swallowed and nodded, hoping fervently that Ahsoka hadn’t noticed.

“Now, where might I find Master Plo?” Qui-Gon asked, turning to Ahsoka.

“He’s in briefing room four. There’s a council meeting in —” she checked her chronometer— “one hundred and twenty-seven minutes and he said it’s imperative that you speak with him before then. But that if there isn’t time, you have to make sure you’re at the meeting. He didn’t say why, but I got the impression it was serious.”

Qui-Gon hmmmed again and searched through the left side of his robe to pull out his dented datapad with an unfortunate years-old crack running down the middle of the screen. Multiple notification lights flickered. He swiped at it and began searching through his messages. His brows furrowed and his mouth pressed into a thin line for a moment before he shook off his displeasure to explain to the worried padawan and increasingly worried Obi-Wan. “I suspect it’s nothing more serious than the fact that I appear to have missed a scheduled Council appearance.”

“Master?!” Ahsoka nearly yelped in alarm.

Qui-Gon chuckled. “Don’t worry, young one. It wouldn’t be the first time,” he said. “When you get to be as old as I am, you’ll find that age has its advantages.”

“I’m afraid Qui-Gon has turned keeping the council on its toes into a competitive sport,” Obi-Wan said, fondness creeping into his tone. He focussed on that rather than the seed of worry that was starting to sprout inside him. Qui-Gon had been playing dejarik with the Council since before Obi-Wan was born—a jarring thought given the complexity of their present circumstances, but true all the same.

“Yes, well. Someone has to,” Qui-Gon grumbled. “Someday that will be your job, Ahsoka my dear, and I suspect you’ll be rather good at it.”

She grinned. "I suppose someone will have to make sure Sky—Master Anakin—doesn’t turn into a stuffy old—"

Obi-Wan raised his eyebrows again, this time in mock offence, “Stuffy, old…”

“Uh… never mind, Master,” she said quickly. She bowed lightly to Qui-Gon. “I’d be honoured to follow in your footsteps great-grandmaster.”

Qui-Gon winced. “Oof! My hair’s not that grey yet, Ahsoka. ‘Master’ is just fine.”

"Yes, Master," she said dutifully, smiling from montral to montral.

He smiled and placed a hand on her shoulder. Obi-Wan felt a surge of warmth and a sharp pang that Anakin wasn't there as well. When had the four of them spent any time together outside of a damned attack cruiser? If nothing else, perhaps there would be time for a short cup of tea before they each raced out to their respective corners of the galaxy. A collective breath might be good for all of them.

Ahsoka moved to follow Qui-Gon, but Qui-Gon stopped and turned to meet Obi-Wan's eyes over her head.

Obi-Wan nodded. "Ahsoka, why don't you take a seat? If you don't have anywhere urgent you need to be?"

"Uh, okay? I have a briefing with Master Anakin later, but otherwise it's just me and this stupid—err boring... um…very interesting... paper I have to write for Master Saa. “

Obi-Wan smiled. “Ah, so a visit might prove an interesting distraction.”

“Ugh, you can say that again, Master. I mean, I get why we have to take ‘Ethics of Galactic Conflict' but I don’t see how studying Jedi Master Val Isa from like four thousand years ago is going to be useful,” Ahsoka grumbled as she settled into Qui-Gon’s seat.

“Val Isa?" Obi-Wan asked, furrowing his brow. “And her Sanctuary ship?”

“Uhh…Yes? I think so? I know she fought in the Great Sith War and died in the Mandalorian Wars.”

Obi-Wan hadn’t thought about Val Isa since his own padawan days. Bits of knowledge winked into his awareness like stars appearing on the horizon. He hmmed deeply. “Yes, and in between, she had a vision of the Jedi Temple covered in blood. She took a decommissioned ship and started a travelling temple and hospital she called ‘Sanctuary’.”

“Huh. I wonder why Master Saa wants us to write about her.”

“Maybe Master T’ra is interested in the lessons she had for the Order,” Obi-Wan wondered aloud, frowning. It had been some time since he’d had a chance to speak with Jedi Master T’ra Saa, but he had always appreciated her thoughtfulness and even temper. Perhaps he should do some reading...

“Master?”

“It can be easy to forget sometimes that the history of the Order is steeped in blood,” Obi-Wan murmured, wheels starting to turn in his head as he stroked his now unruly beard.

When he looked up, Ahsoka was looking at him quizzically. “Anakin says Master Saa has been reading too much New Mandalorian Philosophy.”

“Perhaps she’s not off-base. We talk about commitment to peace but the conflict keeps escalating.”

“You sound like Master Qui-Gon,” Ahsoka said, eyeing him suspiciously.

Obi-Wan huffed. “I suppose I do, don’t I?”

Ahsoka’s brows furrowed and she looked down at her hands, but she said nothing.

Obi-Wan cleared his throat. “We should talk about what you saw, Ahsoka.”

“Why?" she said quickly. "I mean, it’s none of my business. You were both tired, I guess." The twitch in her fingers told Obi-Wan that she was holding back from fidgeting.

Obi-Wan raised his eyebrows, which she seemed to sense, despite studying the geometric pattern on the tiled floor.

“I don’t know. It was weird. Everyone’s always telling me not to get too close to anyone because I might risk attachment. But it’s hard. And Skyguy, well, he’s different, but I know other masters disapprove. Sometimes I feel caught between what I know the Code says and how we actually act with each other. Plus…” She hesitated.

Obi-Wan's heart twisted, and he restrained himself from sighing heavily in sympathy. “Plus?”

“I forget that you used to be a padawan, Qui-Gon’s padawan. It makes sense, I mean, when I’m hurt, I want my master too. I know I’m not supposed to, but he never seems to mind. I don’t know. It’s confusing.” She paused. “Does everyone just break the rules in secret? Even you?”

Obi-Wan could feel her anxiety and confusion swirling in the Force. He drew in a deep breath and thought about Qui-Gon’s admission of error and regret only a few days ago.

“It’s a lesson I should have taught you…”.

What errors and gaps in his own teaching would he find himself facing in this conversation? There is ignorance, yet knowledge but unfortunately one had to fight through ignorance to get there. Humility did not come any more naturally to him than patience, but he had been cultivating it for decades.

He drew in a long breath and willed the squirming in his gut to settle. He could see that he had not handed down the important distinctions between affection, love and attachment to Anakin enough that he could pass it on to Ahsoka. Nor had he passed them down to Ahsoka directly—after all, it wasn’t as if he didn’t spend time teaching her one on one. That his own instruction had been partial and convoluted was immaterial. He wished he had done better.

"It’s not wrong, Ahsoka, to feel affection or to need comfort. And it’s not actually against the Code. It’s become a very strong practice to guard against it, especially in the last few years when loss is rampant. There are some who are of a mind that grief could cripple the Order if we felt too much for each other.”

“Do you think that?”

“No,” he said, very quickly, and knew it was true, even as also knew his thinking on that had only recently shifted. “The proscription on love in practice misses the fact that love, by itself, is not attachment.”

“It’s not?!”

“No.Though it could easily become that.”

“How?”

Obi-Wan sighed. “We have a duty, to each other and to the galaxy. And nothing must come before that duty, not someone we love, and not fear of losing someone we love. Imagine if a Jedi put their master or their padawan or their friend or their lover ahead of the people we are sworn to protect? We must always be willing to let go. We cannot be selfish, or possessive, the stakes are too high.”

“I know,” she said softly, curling in on herself a little. “It’s hard though.”

“It is,” he agreed, the gravity of honesty weighing down his tone.

“So, does that mean Jedi can love other Jedi? As long as it doesn’t turn into attachment?”

“Well….technically… yes. You’re too young to remember Master Giett but he and Master Plo were.. Well…in a relationship… partners.”

“Seriously?!”

“Yes. It’s not a well known fact, but it’s not a secret either. He died a long time ago, when I wasn’t much older than you.”

She hmmed and squirmed lightly in her seat before taking a big breath and asking, “What about loving people outside the Order?”

He wondered briefly if she was thinking of Mina Bonteri’s son, before the sinking feeling in his chest told him she was probably asking about Anakin. “It’s harder,” he said carefully. “People outside the order don’t often understand.”

“Padme does. I know she does.”

Obi-Wan smothered a wince and braced himself for a conversation he had been aggressively avoiding for months now. “What exactly are we talking about Ahsoka?”

“I know you know,” she said, a sliver of accusation in her tone. “Everyone knows. Everyone just pretends it’s not happening.” She waved her hands in exasperation.” I hate it. He never talks about it, but it’s so obvious.” She looked at Obi-Wan directly, eyes fierce. “ Why doesn’t anyone talk about it? It’s so frustrating. Sometimes I feel crazy.”

Seeing the hurt and anger and fear and confusion in her eyes was a painful wakeup call. What a fool had he been, hiding from this, letting his grandpadawan struggle with this, alone? And Anakin. How had his silence, his avoidance, impacted him? He had told himself that feigned ignorance was kindest—and fairest, given how much pressure Anakin was already under—and that they would deal with it when the war was over. But he had never considered how Anakin’s behaviour, and his own complicity, would affect Ahsoka. He weathered a nauseating wave of shame.

“You’re not crazy Ahsoka,” he said with a regretful sigh. “I know Anakin has deep feelings for Padme.”

“It’s not just ‘feelings.’ I walked in on them kissing once. I don’t think they saw me,” she admitted. Guilt radiated from her in the Force. “I hate keeping secrets. It hurts,” she said bitterly, unshed tears glimmering in her eyes.

Oh yes, he had failed her here. I accuse Qui-Gon of running away, but Force help me, I am just the same. He needed to talk to Anakin, but right now Ahsoka needed him.

He met her gaze as evenly as he could and placed a firm hand on her shoulder. “I’m so sorry, padawan,” he said, throat tight. Tears of regret and sadness for her pain stung his eyes. "You never should have had to deal with this alone."

She stared at him for a moment, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing, and then her gaze softened and she gave him a faint smile and nodded. He expected her to ask him to explain further, or have other questions about Anakin and the Code, but her next question took him off guard, though in retrospect he should have seen it coming.

“Is that how you feel about Master Qui-Gon?”

Obi-Wan blinked in surprise and quelled a spike of alarm. He wished fervently he wasn’t having this conversation mired in a medical bed wearing an infirmary gown. He fought a rising blush as he cursed his fair complexion. Well, there was nothing for it. If the Force’s response to his feelings for Qui-Gon had brought him true insights about love and attachment, then it would be a rejection of the Force’s teachings and his own integrity to lie outright to Ahsoka. He could hardly ask Qui-Gon for more vulnerability and openness and then turn around and refuse Ahsoka hours later. He had a choice: answer her honestly, or perpetuate his lineage’s pattern of continually closing doors.

He closed his eyes and drew in a long breath and reached for the Force, letting the peace of connection reveal the buried corner of his heart still coiled in fear. Time seemed to slow as he sank deeper into the Force and felt his awareness shift and open, as if he were looking down from a great height and able to perceive overlapping layers of past and present stretching out before him.

As he looked, began to see threads stitching his fear to Anakin's and Ahsoka’s and back to Qui-Gon’s and Dooku’s and Yoda’s. Ephemeral webs of fear knit Jedi together through generations, a shroud fallen over the Temple stretching back and back and back through the history of the Order. Tight knots, denser networks, appeared around Jedi Masters Valenthyne Farfalla and Fae Coven who saw the Order through the Ruusan reformation, when the Code was changed to outlaw Jedi marriage and families after the Jedi-Sith War a thousand years ago. Another cluster of surrounded Odan-Urr and his contemporaries, tangles drawn together from threads in the Old Sith Wars and woven into his revision of the Code four millennia ago now.

And around Jedi Master Val Isa and her sanctuary ship, a bright little hole in the shroud.

And he knew then that the heart of their dysfunction, his, his master’s, his lineage’s, his Order’s was fear: fear of loss, fear of failure, fear of weakness. Not the experience of fear, but the acting out of fear.

If we are not attached, if we do not love, then we have nothing to lose and we cannot be hurt.

After catastrophic devastation of galactic war over millennia, the Order had structured itself around trying to prevent such violence and loss from ever recurring by cutting themselves off from the galaxy and each other in an endless reinforcing loop that renewed generation after generation.

But Anakin, Anakin wasn’t afraid of connection, of intimacy—no, he was afraid of the opposite—of being alone.

Obi-Wan looked closer at Anakin in his vision and saw different threads, some brighter, some darker, but all of them moving in the opposite direction.

The child of prophecy that would bring balance to the Force.

What if the Order had accepted Anakin as he was, instead of pushed him to change?

“Oh, Obi-Wan. If you only knew how much you’ve taught me.”

Maybe they weren't meant only to train him, but also to learn from him?

Maybe Anakin’s destiny wasn’t to defeat the Dark through war, but through hope?

It’s time, the Force whispered, and Obi-Wan came back to his choice in the present: move forward, or hold back and renew the cycle once more.

This stops here, now, he vowed to the Force. And to his master, his padawan and his patient, wide-eyed grandpadawan and her future padawans.

“There are many different kinds of love, Ahsoka,” he said steadily. “And, if you’re asking do I love Master Qui-Gon, then the answer is yes.”

Her eyes widened even further. He smiled gently and added, “And Anakin, and you.”

“Really?” she choked, tears finally escaping down her cheeks.

He nodded. “Really.”

And then his arms were full of a weeping padawan choking out “I love you too, Master” against his chest, as the Force rippled in approval.

Oh yes, it was high time he pushed for doctrinal revision in the middle of a war.

Chapter Text

As he approached the cluster of briefing rooms in the communications wing, Qui-Gon felt his stomach twist and his breath catch in his throat. He was more nervous than he wanted to admit. There was a note —no, a buzz—of warning in the Force, like a drone at a bass so low it was more felt than heard.

“Plo?” he asked as soon as the door opened with a pneumatic hiss. His friend was hunched over a terminal at the front of the briefing room, a collapsing pile of datapads beginning to surround him.

“Qui-Gon? Good,” he said, looking up. “I’m glad you are here.” He stood up, shaking his head as he crossed the room. “I was hoping to have more information for you, but what I have found so far does not bode well.”

“This is about the Council meeting?” Qui-Gon asked warily.

“Yes. Have they told you anything?” Plo asked, perching on the edge of one of the desks.

Qui-Gon shifted his weight and crossed his arms over his chest. “Only that my presence was acutely ‘missed’ at the last meeting and that attendance is not optional.”

“They have told me little more, but the meeting agenda is strange. There are no notes on your appearance. And there was a directive from the Chancellor’s office two days ago that we are to discuss, but it has not been shared in advance.”

“Is that unusual?”

“Fairly. Generally Mace prefers that we are well informed and spend the time on discussion.”

Qui-Gon’s brows furrowed. He frowned. “What’s the order of the items?”

“The directive proceeds your appearance.”

“Hmm…” Qui-Gon stroked his beard and settled on a desk across from Plo. He took in the rumpled unease of the other master and the buzz of warning grew louder.

“There’s something else?” he prompted.

Plo nodded. “Someone accessed the minutes from your meetings with Yoda after Geonosis.”

“Minutes?” Qui-Gon scoffed. “I wasn’t aware Yoda had filed minutes. Those were supposed to be private.” He crossed his arms over his chest.

“They were, in a sense—the contents were sealed.”

“How do you know they were accessed?”

“I had a hunch and I looked,” Plo said, turning back to his terminal to pick up a data pad. He handed it to Qui-Gon.

Qui-Gon arched an eyebrow as he stared at the record. “A hunch?”

Plo gave a raspy chuckle. “Hello womprat? This is borrat. You’re furry.”

Qui-Gon snorted. “What did you find?”

“Not much. As you can see, the user ID was redacted.”

“Odd,” Qui-Gon observed, handing the data pad back to his friend.

“I agree. Now it could have been Yoda or Mace or another council member wanting to remain anonymous.”

“But why?”

“Why indeed. That, however, isn’t the strangest thing.”

“What is?”

“They were accessed three weeks ago—just after Shaak Ti requested Rissa Mano on Kamino. I had thought I was being a little paranoid or sensitive, but in the last few months, there are members of the council who are…frustrated… with you Qui-Gon. They refrain from voicing their complaints when Obi-Wan is present, but I think they forget sometimes that we are old friends.”

“You have always been good at affecting neutrality, my friend,” Qui-Gon said with a grateful huff as he settled against a nearby desk.

“Less affectation that you might expect, Qui-Gon. You are trying at times, and I have never been one to hide that from you.”

Qui-Gon snorted again. “What does your instinct tell you?”

“You are about to be reprimanded."

"Reprimanded?" Qui-Gon’s eyes widened. It hadn’t even occurred to him, though given his last conversation with Yoda, he supposed it should have. Grounded at the Temple ‘advising’ senior padawans was already a slap on the wrist. He had naively assumed it stopped there.

"Yes, you may remember that the Order does have certain expectations and that not following them can incur punishments,” Plo intoned.

"I hardly think I've done anything to merit a formal reprimand,” he grumbled. “And what would the Chancellor's office have to do with that anyway, if, as you suspect, the directive is related?"

"We're losing generals Qui-Gon, faster than the order can promote knights. And in case you haven’t noticed, the Senate and the Chancellor’s office have been gaining more and more influence on the internal workings of the Order, the longer we fight this war for the Republic."

Qui-Gon bristled. "There are many ways to work for peace."

Plo sighed. "I don't disagree, but we don't have the luxury of some of those ways if we can’t keep our army deployed."

Qui-Gon squared his shoulders as he placed his hands on his hips. "There’s no need to have Jedi generals. The clones are competent, as are the fleet admirals."

"The Senate, and the Chancellor, don't see it that way,” Plo argued, straightening.

"Well it’s the truth!" Qui-Gon said with an indignant huff.

"Some of the Council don't either,” Plo continued. “They see it as a neglect of your duty. They haven’t said it directly, but there’s been a subtext for months now.”

"Duty! Our duty is to protect the Republic, not fight a war for it. We had a duty to those in the CIS too, if you remember. We've worse than abandoned them!"

"It's talking like that Qui-Gon that gets you into trouble,” Plo said warily.

"It's the truth for Force's sake! I'm not going to lie and pretend just because it makes people uncomfortable."

"More than uncomfortable—suspicious,” Plo warned. ”Your status as Dooku's former padawan does not work in your favour here."

“You can’t seriously think that I’m working with him!” He fought rising outrage with deep breath.

“I don’t, Qui-Gon. And I don’t seriously think anyone on the Council does either. But the appearance…”

“Bah!” Qui-Gon threw up his hands and stalked across the room.

“Qui-Gon, you have to admit, it doesn’t look good. You are now the only Jedi Master in the Order fit for field duty who will not command troops. And you are also the only Jedi Master who was Dooku’s padawan. And you’ve been open with your disapproval from day one.”

“Yes, exactly! It’s been nearly three years! Why now?”

“I don’t know. But I’m worried, my friend,” Plo sighed. “I know he’s on sick leave, but I’m wondering if Obi-Wan should attend the meeting.”

Qui-Gon weathered a hot flare of embarrassment. His pride certainly didn't want Obi-Wan there —and that would be foolish and hypocritical given their recent heart to heart. But then he thought about Obi-Wan’s pallor and the shadows in his eyes and shook his head. “He’s in the healers’ ward as we speak. Let him rest. As my padawan, he won’t be able to cast a vote anyway. Whatever it is, I’m sure we can deal with it. We still have an hour. Let’s see what we can find in your documents.”

Plo nodded and handed Qui-Gon a stack of datapads. He picked a desk with a terminal and settled into searching through Council meeting minutes, which, strictly speaking, he probably wasn’t supposed to read.

After a space of time, finding little of interest, Qui-Gon looked up. “What’s the worst they c—”

“Don’t tempt fate my friend,” Plo pleaded. And then Qui-Gon heard his friend grumble softly, “And they wonder where Skywalker gets it.”

***

Obi-Wan and Ahsoka were halfway through their second cup of tea when Ahsoka’s comm chirped. She handed Obi-Wan her ceramplast mug and fumbled through her robe for a minute before finding it and accepting the incoming transmission.

“Ahsoka, it’s Padme. Is this an encrypted channel?” Senator Amidala’s voice was as urgent as it was tinny as it sounded through the small speaker.

“Hi Senator Amidala. This is Ahsoka. It is. What’s up?” Ahsoka answered, brows furrowed her brows in concern.

“Anakin is on his speeder back to the Temple. He wanted me to see if I could reach Master Kenobi but he’s not answering his comm. Maybe you know where he is?”

“I’m actually here with him right now,” Ahsoka said, handing the com to Obi-Wan.

“Hello there, Senator,” Obi-Wan said, trying to sound far more energetic than he felt. “What seems to be the matter?”

“The Loyalist committee just came across a very concerning directive from the Chancellor’s office. At first it just looked like a routine military operations update, but there was a line stuck into the memorandum of agreement with the Jedi Order that’s new. Senator Organa caught it and commed me. Anakin has a copy. He should be there soon.”

“I see. And what’s so concerning about this directive?”

“It’s calling for suspension and ‘moral inquiries’ into active duty Jedi who don’t accept their military commissions,” Padme said in a rush.

Obi-Wan frowned. He didn’t like the sound of that at all. “What does that mean exactly? Who conducts these ‘inquiries’?”

“More importantly, who decides what’s moral?” Ahsoka interjected.

Obi-Wan felt a rush of pride. His grandpadawan was growing into a wise woman. And Padme’s mentorship, which might not have happened if it were not for Anakin’s relationship, was certainly part of that.

“Exactly!” Padme agreed.

“Wait, isn’t that whas Master Qui-Gon did? Refuse his commission?” Ahsoka asked. “Does this mean he’s in trouble? Is that what his Council meeting was about?”

“Slow down, padawan. There are myriad reasons why the Council could want to meet with Qui-Gon. And Qui-Gon’s arrangement was settled long ago. I hardly think this would apply, as concerning as it is.”

“You didn’t let me finish, Master Kenobi. I was about to say, it’s backdated.”

“What?”

“Yes. To the day before the battle of Geonosis.”

“That’s highly irregular,” Obi-Wan said with a scowl. This was very concerning indeed. No wonder Anakin was racing back here.

“Yes, it is. We only just got eyes on it. I’m not sure what exactly this means. It’s possible it’s just a precaution. But the fact that it was snuck in there…”

“It does not bode well. I agree,” Obi-Wan said gravely, stroking his beard. “When was this passed?”

“Three days ago,” Padme replied.

“Master Jinn was scheduled to appear before the council two days ago!” Ahsoka exclaimed. “It has to be related.”

“If it was two days ago, then we may be chasing the wrong gundark,” Padme said with a relieved breath. “Surely you’d know by now.”

“No, no. Qui-Gon missed the Council meeting. It’s happening in about….” he turned to Ahsoka.

“In 38 minutes,” Ahoska calculated, examining her chronometer.

“I’m sorry, did you say Qui-Gon missed the Council meeting?”

“Yes, Senator. That’s correct.”

“I—didn’t know he could do that.”

“The eternal mystery that is Qui-Gon Jinn continues to elude the best of us. But yes, he can. Right. Well, we have a little time. Padme, when did Anakin leave?”

“As soon as we heard Bail’s news. A few min before I called.”

“Then he should be back shortly. Good. We’re going to need his help. Thank you senator. We will update you with what we can share when we can. Please thank Bail for me, will you?”

“Of course. He said if I spoke to you to remind you that his dinner invitation still stands.”

“He is too kind. I’ll be sure to comm him when this is over,” Obi-Wan assured her. He was about to sign off when he heard Padme take a deep breath.

“Obi-Wan?” Her voice was soft with worry.

He pulled the comm closer instinctively. “Yes, Padme?” he said, voice low.

“Do you really think that Qui-Gon could be in trouble?”

“It’s hard to say. The Council has been trying to get Qui-Gon to play ball so to speak for, well, decades, and he’s always managed to elude them. But in the matter of the war, his apostasy has been grating on them. And he’s just been reassigned to the Temple from Kamino.”

He could practically hear her frown.“That doesn’t sound good.”

“No. It doesn’t. But even if it’s not used against Qui-Gon, this directive is still very disturbing and I will be bringing it to the Council immediately.”

“I knew we could count on you, Obi-Wan. The Republic owes you a great debt.” Coming from almost any other politician or bureaucrat, Obi-Wan would have dismissed the words as flattery. But he could feel her sincerity reverberate in the Force. Anakin had chosen to give his heart to a remarkable woman.

“You’re very kind, Senator,” he said letting his own sincerity ring in his words.

“Take care, Obi-Wan.”

“You too.”

He clicked the comm off and looked up at an anxiously pacing Ahsoka.

“Should we comm Master Qui-Gon? Maybe we can brief him in time?”

Obi-Wan sighed. “We don’t know this is connected. The last thing I want to do is set Qui-Gon up to be more morally outraged in a Council meeting. It never goes well.”

“So what are we going to do?”

“You and Anakin are going to get to me to that Council meeting.”

“What are we waiting for? Let’s go!” Ahsoka said, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she reached to help Obi-Wan out of bed.

Obi-Wan put up his hands to ward her off. “No offense, young one, but I don’t think you can support me all the way there. We’ll have to wait for Anakin.”

Her mouth twisted in disappointment. “Gah! I hate waiting.”

Obi-Wan chuckled. Like Grandmaster, like master, like padawan. She was definitely part of their lineage. “I know how you feel. But I have a very important task for you in the meantime.”

Her face lit up. “Do you need me to distract Master Che? Because I’ve been practicing a new one.”

“A new what?” Obi-Wan asked sharply. Why did Anakin think he always needed to sneak out of the medical bay?

“Uh. Never mind. What did you need me to do?”

“It’s two things, actually. First, I need you to give me your research on Val Isa.”

Ahsoka made a face. “Why?”

Obi-Wan arched an eyebrow.

She blushed. “I mean, yes Master! And the other thing?”

“I need you to get me some pants.”

Chapter Text

“Spintir?” Qui-Gon exclaimed, taking a half step back. He stood before the assembled Council and was beginning to regret his decision to leave Obi-Wan out of this. It was hard to tell Plo’s reaction thanks to his goggles and anti-ox mask, but he knew the other master wasn’t expecting the remote temple sanctuary to make an appearance in whatever disciplinary measures the Council was considering.

“Yes. As you know the Dawn Temple on Mount Tellec is a…” Mace paused, as if trying to find a more savory word than ‘remedial’ or ‘retirement.’ “...refuge… haven, really, for Jedi whose long service has worn on them.” His expression was mild but Qui-Gon could sense the firm set of his jaw. Mace was ready for a fight.

“Lose one’s way, all of us can. No shame in it there is,” Yoda chirped.

“I still walk in the Light,” Qui-Gon growled. He drew himself up to his full height and squared his shoulders.

“As do many of the inhabitants of Mount Tellec,” Mace said, unperturbed.

“I think you mean ‘inmates,’” Qui-Gon scowled.

“Prisoners the Jedi do not keep!” Yoda retorted.

Qui-Gon raised his eyebrows and took a deep breath to centre himself and quell the rising wave of anger rising in his gut. His voice was low when he spoke. “You and I both know that hasn’t been true for a long time.”

Mace stared down at his steepled fingers. Plo shifted in his seat and sighed. Adi Gallia winced and Shaak Ti directed her gaze out the window. He couldn’t see the masters seated behind him, but he could sense their discomfort curling in the Force.

“Humility for you, Qui-Gon Jinn, a challenge it has always been,” Yoda declared.

“There is no honour in blind obedience,” he answered sternly.

“Honour in leaving your colleagues and friends to die, is there?” Yoda questioned.

Qui-Gon grit his teeth as his hands curled into fists. “I have done no such thing and I will not entertain such falsehood.”

“This isn’t personal, Qui-Gon.” As she turned to face him, Shaak Ti’s elegant intonation slowed her syllables down, carrying a breath of air into the increasingly suffocating room.

Still, Qui-Gon couldn’t help the scoff that escaped him.

“This new directive from the Chancellor’s office is necessary for everyone’s safety,” Ki Adi Mundi’s nasal voice resounded from his seat behind Qui-Gon.

“I’m sorry, I appear to have missed the revision of the code that added ‘following the Chancellor’s orders’,” Qui-Gon retorted.

“Protectors of peace we are,” Yoda pronounced, hitting the tiled floor with his gimer stick. The sound rippled through the vaunted chamber, shocking the assembly into silence.

Qui-Gon felt an odd sort of pride in being able to rattle the ancient master, but it was a dangerous satisfaction. He wouldn’t expose the Council’s hypocrisy by giving them more ammunition against his alignment to the Light. He looked past Yoda and Mace to the sky behind them and searched for the sun in the clouds surrounding the tower. Not even a glimmer of a brightness to indicate a shrouded orb—just bleak expanses of grey and white. He took a deep breath and reached down into himself for a well of calm that often eluded him in Council meetings. Like groundwater hidden beneath the earth, his peace was elusive, but strong and steady when he found it. He would weather this as he had weathered everything else in his life, by trusting in the Force. Something important would come of this—he could sense that—but the future was clouded. There was more to this, he was sure of it.

“Your sarcasm is not helping your case, Qui-Gon,” Mace warned. “Now, since your previous arrangement, negotiated by Yoda on behalf of the Order, was settled before this clause was added to operational agreements with the Republic and the Chancellor’s office, we can, in fact, offer your commission again.”

I should have seen this coming. I did see this coming, just not playing out this way, Qui-Gon thought. This is underhanded, even for war time.

“You mean this time you can give me an ultimatum,” Qui-Gon stated as neutrally as he could, as if he were observing the colour of a tea or the temperature in the Room of a Thousand Fountains.

“By Order of the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic, you are granted the title and rank of General and your assignment is to command the 183rd legion. Do you accept?” Mace read off of his datapad.

“Weigh carefully your choices, Qui-Gon,” Shaak Ti advised, and there was a hint of softness to her voice.

Qui-Gon let his confusion and disbelief colour his words as he asked in earnest, “You really think I would be more useful to the Order, to the Light, if I were confined on Spintir? That’s better than refugee protection? Supply missions? Rebuilding efforts?”

“Not more useful, but less troublesome, yes,” Yoda declared, tapping the floor with his stick once more. “A bad example you set for Knights and Padawans.”

Qui-Gon could hardly believe what he was hearing—not that he was trouble, he was used to that—but that the Order purported to believe in the directive they had just been handed by the Chancellor’s office. How was it that those who refused their commissions were morally suspect, and not those who took to the violence without question or reservation?

He looked around the Council chamber and felt a creeping sense of horror. What a fool he had been to keep Obi-Wan out of this. A stubborn, prideful fool. While it was true that Obi-Wan could hardly veto the disturbing ultimatum, perhaps he would have been able to sway the other masters with his silver tongue? Or at least Qui-Gon wouldn’t be staring down the barrel of a blaster almost alone.

“Masters,” Plo spoke, “I understand that Qui-Gon has been...independent… even defiant at times. But confinement at Mount Tellec or generalship? These are not viable choices. How would any one of us react if asked to betray what the Force is telling us?”

“Isn’t it curious how Qui-Gon’s experience of the Force is so regularly and predictably different than what the Council and the rest of the Order perceives?” Eeth Koth chimed in.

“Indeed,” Mace rumbled.

“Your answer, Qui-Gon? Spintir or generalship? Choose you must.”

Time seemed to slow and Qui-Gon reached out to the Force, praying for some direction, some insight. How could he possibly make this decision? Every cell in his body screamed that the war was wrong, that the clone troopers were being treated like slaves, that the Separatists had every right to leave the decaying corpse of democracy that was the Republic. His former master’s words on Geonosis still haunted him. But exile? Everyone he cared about was involved in this Force-forsaken war. Plo. Ahsoka. Anakin. Even Mace and Yoda, as infuriating as they could be.

And Obi-Wan.

Either choice would take him farther away from Obi-Wan, but Spintir could mean years without Obi-Wan. Nogill Crana had been sent three years ago, and he was still there. As a general, at least their paths would cross in the Temple, and there was a chance they could be posted together on joint missions.

One thing was clear: he could not claim he was not guilty of attachment, because he was considering betraying his conscience and acquiescing to the Council and the Chancellor’s demands. The Force had no reproach for him on the matter of his attachment, but neither did it have any direction for him but wait.

When caught up in a great maelstrom, sometimes all one could do was let oneself be carried by the current and trust the water to settle into stillness and balance over time. He didn’t know how long he could wait, but wait he would. Drawing in a long breath, he planted his feet firmly and bowed his head in surrender to the Force.

“Spintir? I can’t say I’d recommend it this time of year. It’s awfully humid,” Obi-Wan’s lilting voice broke through the stifling silence like a clarion call.

Qui-Gon turned to see Obi-Wan standing unsteadily, one arm flung up around Anakin’s shoulders. His too long robe failed to conceal that he was wearing his padawan’s spare tunics, minus the leather tabards. His hair was tousled and his beard looked particularly unkempt, but his blue eyes were glinting and there was a smirk on his lips.

He shuffled with Anakin’s help to his empty chair. He thanked Anakin, who nodded and silently moved to stand behind Obi-Wan.

“Now then, what’s this about the Dawn Temple? Qui-Gon is unorthodox, but any one of us in this room can sense that he’s not fallen.”

“A shroud over many things the Dark Side casts, Master Kenobi. Precautions we must take with all Jedi.”

“Oh yes, of course, it’s not personal,” Obi-Wan parroted the Council disclaimer. “Is this what the Order is coming to then? Threat and coercion, hidden behind the pretence of ‘choice’?”

“Careful, Master Kenobi. Your rank does not entitle you to speak disrespectfully to the Grand Master of the Order,” Ki Adi Mundi warned.

“Disrespect? Is that what we’re calling the truth now?” Obi-Wan said, his accent sharp and resonant in the troubled chamber.

“From your point of view,” Mace countered.

“Time was that different points of view were welcome at this Council.” Obi-Wan sat straighter in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m not sure what’s worse, the idea that the Chancellor is dictating this, or the idea that you are choosing to treat a fellow master like this.”

“A punishment Mount Tellec is not. Reflection, restoration, centering, healing, learning, growing… these are the things that Jedi do at the Dawn Temple. In times of peace, enrich our thinking a maverick can. In times of war, a liability they become.”

Mace sighed heavily. “For the safety and good of the order and the republic, Qui-Gon’s difference must be contained and nurtured back to the collective good.”

“I see,” Obi-Wan said slowly. He fell silent, stroking his beard, brows furrowed. After a few long moments, he added. “Well, yes, that makes sense.”

The Council members seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief, sinking into their chairs with the rustle of robes and quiet sighs. But a spike of alarm shot through Qui-Gon. What did Obi-Wan mean? He looked at his former padawan with his curiosity and worry plain on his face.

Obi-Wan met his gaze with a kindness and a confidence that was so sincere that it managed to settle something inside Qui-Gon. Whatever might come of this strange and threatening situation, he was glad Obi-Wan was here. Behind Obi-Wan, Anakin glowered at the Council, arms crossed across his broad chest, but he was uncharacteristically silent.

“In that case, I think I have a solution that we can all agree will contain and nurture Qui-Gon’s unique sense of duty.” He paused to look slowly around the room. “I don’t think anyone can argue that I have not fulfilled my duty to the utmost in the last few years, and that my commitment to the Order and the Republic is unwavering.”

“You have been a stalwart guardian, to be sure, Master Kenobi,” Plo affirmed, as nods of agreement flickered throughout the assembly.

“A paragon of duty,” Ki Adi agreed.

“Excellent. Now that we’re agreed on that, I take Qui-Gon Jinn as my padawan learner.”

Chapter Text

The Council chambers erupted into a chaos as everyone tried to speak at once. Saesee Tiin and Eeth Koth leapt to their feet. Oppo Rancisis slithered higher in his chair. Depa Billaba gripped the sides of his chair so hard that her knuckles paled. Shaak Ti facepalmed. Mace Windu’s eyes could cut through durasteel.

Plo Koon chuckled and sat back in his chair, hands clasped in his lap.

“Order! Order!” Yoda urged, hitting the floor with his stick. But the masters were too worn down and outraged to settle. In the din, Qui-Gon could only make out a few words: outrage, mockery, too far, unbelievable, and of course, attachment.

Obi-Wan stood up. Anakin moved to help him but he waved him off.

“Masters!” Obi-Wan yelled, arms open, beckoning them to listen to him.

The esteemed company, unaccustomed to the soft-spoken master raising his voice, stopped in their tracks. Silence fell and bodies sank back into seats.

Qui-Gon shuddered at the power in Obi-Wan’s voice. The Force flowed through him even as the sun caught the auburn sheen of his hair. Luminous beings we are, not this gross matter. Qui-Gon had never completely bought that interpretation, committed as he was to the Living Force, but watching Obi-Wan he felt something tremble inside him and open and then still as the entire room waited. He didn’t know where Obi-Wan was going with this, but there was no one in the universe he trusted more. He met Obi-Wan’s gaze and nodded tightly, heart softening at the crinkle of relief at the corner of Obi-Wan’s eyes.

“This is not some game or trick, or vile manipulation; I offer this in all sincerity,” Obi-Wan said, his tone grounded without being grave. “If you remember, padawan simply denotes a state of mind open to learning.”

“We are all aware of the meaning of padawan, Master Kenobi,” Ki Adi Mundi interjected sourly. “No one has used it in that sense in literal ages.”

Obi-Wan continued with nothing more than a curt nod in Ki Adi’s direction. “Jedi Master Val Isa took the role of padawan several times in her lifetime.”

“That was 4,000 years ago, Obi-Wan,” Mace protested.

“Yes. And before you argue that the war changes things, remember she fought in the Great Sith War.”

“Assumed the role she did, but a master did she have?” Yoda asked rhetorically. He clearly expected the answer to be ‘no.’

“Does it matter? You want Qui-Gon ‘contained,’ and frankly so do I. Who better to teach Qui-Gon about humility than his own padawan? And who better to direct his skills and energies to ending this war than someone who knows them intimately? In any case, I have no padawan and he has no teacher. “

“He has no teacher because he has trained several padawans himself,” Eeth Koth argued, losing his patience.

“Nothing more than symbolic were Master Isa’s successive padawanships,” Yoda added.

“With respect, Master, that’s not entirely true,” Anakin said. “Val Isa gave up all of her roles and privileges in the Temple each time she assumed the role of padawan.”

Several pairs of shocked eyes, including Obi-Wan’s, trained themselves on Anakin.

“What? My padawan is writing paper on her,” Anakin explained, slightly affronted. When the inquiring eyes didn’t slacken, he added, “And I read her rough draft. What kind of master do you think I am?”

“With your lineage, there’s really no telling,” Oppo Rancisis grumbled.

Qui-Gon considered a defensive retort but then thought better of it. He didn’t want to throw the proverbial hydrospanner into the hyperdrive of whatever ship Obi-Wan was piloting.

“Impressed I am not with your recitation of facts,” Yoda replied. “A solution this is not!”

“We may not have a choice.” Plo Koon’s low baritone resounded through the chamber. “There are few words more sacred in the Order than the taking of a padawan and the acceptance of a master. We would be hard pressed to dissolve that bond if it were formed.”

“You are not helping matters, Plo,” Mace nearly hissed, then furrowed his brows and looked intently at the other master with a long ‘hmm’. “Though I suppose you are not trying to.”

“I’m afraid ‘help’ depends very much on your point of view,” Plo returned with a deferential nod.

Mace scowled and sat back in his chair with a sigh and looked up at the sky, if beseeching some higher power for intervention—or at least a greater measure of patience.

Qui-Gon definitely owed Plo several cases of Corellian brandy after carving out such a natural but magnificent opening. It was rather like stumbling upon a sparkling cavern in the middle of a snow storm on Ilum. He took a half-step towards Mace and Yoda, and bowed his head. “Citing the example of Val Isa, I lay down my privileges and roles as Jedi Master and return once more to the role of student and learner. I become once again padawan Qui-Gon Jinn.”

Yoda frowned and Mace stared wide-eyed and began massaging his temples.

Qui-Gon couldn’t say he enjoyed stressing out his colleagues like this, but he also couldn’t say he didn’t enjoy gaining the upper hand at this point. He fought the impulse to smile, turning to face Obi-Wan, who stood luminescent in the sunlight despite his dark robes.

Obi-Wan’s expression was solemn: there was no doubt that Obi-Wan was utterly serious about his proposition. The Force rippled with portent. Something profound was going to come of this, Qui-Gon was certain. He strode forward and sank to his knees before his former padawan, bowing his head with a respect that bordered on reverence.

“ Qui-Gon Jinn,” Obi-Wan’s voice rang throughout the vaunted chamber. “I wish to take you as my padawan learner in front of this assembly of Jedi. Do you consent?”

“It will be my honour to accept your wisdom, Master Kenobi.” Qui-Gon spoke without hesitation the words that he hadn’t spoken since Dooku had taken him as a padawan decades ago. He felt strangely light, almost giddy as Obi-Wan placed his hands on his shoulders.

“I take Qui-Gon Jinn as my padawan learner,” Obi-Wan said slowly, but with a conviction that sent shivers down Qui-Gon’s spine. He felt a little like he was being claimed and he could not deny that he liked it. Rarely had he ever heard a protective warmth in Dooku’s voice, but now there was a warmth that surrounded him, as if Obi-Wan were wrapping his cloak around his shoulders with his words. After a breath of silent acceptance—if not exactly approval—on the part of the Council, Obi-Wan released Qui-Gon’s shoulders and offered him a hand up. Qui-Gon took it gratefully, not because he needed the help but because everything inside him was aching to stay in physical contact. His former padawan’s —now master’s—palm was warm and dry against his own, and his eyes a fierce azure in the sun-filled chamber.

“It is done,” Obi-Wan said plainly, gazing out across the room, an unspoken challenge glinting in his eyes.

“Clever you are, Obi-Wan. But saved Qui-Gon from his military service you have not. As your commander he will now serve, as is the custom for padawans,” Yoda asserted.

Obi-Wan folded one arm across his chest and stroked his beard with the other. “Hmm… yes, I can see you point; however it’s not uncommon for there to be important tasks for padawans to perform at the Temple, and I have a special assignment for him.”

Mace Windu bit back a burst of bitter laughter and threw his hands up. “Of course you do.”

“A bad feeling about this, I have,” Yoda proclaimed. He groaned, and shook his head. “A recess I need. Rest and contemplation for us all, I suggest.”

Ki Adi Mundi sighed wearily. “May the Force be with us.”

Qui-Gon had a lot of questions as he saw a triumphant smile break across Obi-Wan’s face, but of one thing he was sure: the Force most certainly was.

Chapter Text

Ahsoka was bouncing on the balls of her feet in front of one of the towering windows when Obi-Wan, Anakin and Qui-Gon emerged from the Council chamber. Her whole face lit up when she saw them and she bounded over.

“What happened? They won’t tell me anything! And I can’t hear anything from out here! And is everyone just like, really good at shielding, or is there some kind of Force dampeners or something? Because I should have been able to tell something!” she blurted out in a rush.

“Easy, Snips,” Anakin said, with a hand out to catch her on the shoulder. “We need to get Master Obi-Wan back to the healer’s. He puts on a good show, but he’s about to fall over. But we’ll tell you everything afterwards, I promise.”

“But, but…!” she stammered.

“Everything is going to be okay, Ahsoka, I promise,” Obi-Wan said with a small smile.

The energetic padawan stopped mid-bounce, eyes wide and let out a breath as she landed. “Okay.”

“That's much better. I was beginning to feel like I was in the back seat and Anakin was driving,” Obi-Wan huffed as the colour progressively drained from his face. Qui-Gon instinctively caught his elbow to steady him for a moment.

“Hey! It’s not my fault you’re so sensitive!” Anakin protested. “I keep telling you you should just take your anti-whatever drugs. If you’re so high and mighty—”

”High and mighty? I just drowned in your tunics in front of the whole Council. I hardly think—”

Qui-Gon’s mirth began as a chuckle and then tipped over into full-blown laughter as the absurdity of the situation, the narrow escape and the wash of grateful relief bombarded him in successive waves.

“Are you alright, Master?” Ahsoka asked, concern plain on her face.

“Not Master any more!” Anakin proclaimed. “Meet Padawan Jinn,” he said, slapping Qui-Gon on the back.

“What?” Ahoka stared in confusion but Anakin just turned to Qui-Gon with a wicked grin and puffed out his chest.

“Haha! Now I outrank you!”

“Anakin. Must I remind you that revenge is not the Jedi way?” Obi-Wan sighed.

Qui-Gon dipped his head. “It’s a long story, Ahsoka, but we will explain everything. For now, I think we need to get Master Kenobi back the healer’s ward.”

“Later, please,” Obi-Wan protested, taking Qui-Gon’s proffered hand of support. “Right now I just want to go home.”

***

Qui-Gon’s quarters were still in the mildly disheveled state they had been when he’d stormed out in the early morning to find Obi-Wan—a short two days ago, but it felt like an age. Anakin, Ahsoka and Obi-Wan landed in a heap on the sofa as Qui-Gon put the kettle on.

Anakin launched into a play by play of the Council meeting, complete with voiced impersonations of the Council members, while Ahoka squealed in shock and delight as she bounced on the middle cushion between her master and grandmaster. Obi-Wan looked on with an exhausted but bemused expression while he sank further and further into the pillows.

Something about the darker tunics made the grey at Obi-Wan’s temples stand out in the early evening light. Qui-Gon suddenly had a flash of Obi-Wan as an old man, older than Qui-Gon was now, sitting beside a different young woman, not much older than twelve or thirteen, chattering excitedly. She was dressed in padawan tunics, but she looked so much like Anakin that Qui-Gon’s breath caught.

His quarters seemed to fade as the Force vision expanded. Now he could see a light-haired young man, holding a blue lightsaber, sparring with a striking Togruta, whom he realized with a shock was Ahsoka. Anakin, grey streaks in his dark waves now, stood in civilian robes with his arm around a beaming Padme. A little girl, maybe four or five years old, sat on his shoulders, hands dug into his hair for balance.

What was the Force showing him? Was this the future? But how? He knew that Anakin and Padme were close, closer than most Jedi would approve. But children ?

They looked so happy. All of them. For all his white hair, Obi-Wan looked refreshed. Gone were the perpetual dark circles around his eyes and the hunch of his shoulders. He no longer looked as if he bore the weight of the galaxy, and he smiled at Anakin’s daughter with a gentle fondness that looked natural instead of hard-won. Ahsoka whooped with laughter, her presence more settled and sharper somehow, but owing to experience, not pain. And Anakin? He’d never felt peace radiate from his grandpadawan in all the years he’d known him. Not even as a small boy in his mother’s arms. The warmth in Qui-Gon’s chest was almost unbearable in the cold, war-plagued present.

And then he heard vision-Obi-Wan call his name and beckon him to join him. He nearly gasped aloud from easy affection in his voice. He stood frozen in surprise. Vision-Obi-Wan rose to meet him. Mouth quirked in a half-smile, his eyes sparkled as he placed a gentle kiss on Qui-Gon’s lips and then took his hand to draw him into the serene company.

“Qui-Gon?” Present-day Obi-Wan’s hand was taking the kettle from him and turning off the water. His quarters reappeared around him. The golden light of the approaching sunset bathed the usually dim living room in an orange glow —usually dim and usually empty living room. There was something preternaturally right about the four of them here together.

He looked into Obi-Wan’s concerned blue eyes and was struck by a pang of deep longing for Obi-Wan to look at him the way he had in his vision. The feeling surprised him, but he was not alarmed as he would have been days ago. Something felt different. He looked closer at Obi-Wan’s face and he realized with a stab of regret that he could no longer see the young man he’d trained in Obi-Wan’s tired features. The boy he had known was gone, grown up, years ago, though Qui-Gon hadn’t been ready to admit it. He hadn’t been ready to let go of padawan Kenobi—or perhaps he hadn’t been ready to let go of Master Qui-Gon. But all of that was changed now. Possibility bubbled impatiently in his chest, squirming and urging him forward as the Force whispered of a newly hopeful future.

He took the kettle from Obi-Wan’s hands slowly, letting his hands touch Obi-Wan’s, savouring the press of skin against skin. Small though the contact was, it was electric and Obi-Wan’s gaze snapped up and he drew in a sharp breath. Qui-Gon felt then what Obi-Wan had sensed days ago in the middle of the night: the Force was singing now, of hope, of peace, of not just an end to suffering, but the relief of healing afterwards.

Had they been alone, he felt sure they would have kissed then. For the first time, he could imagine—without shame or guilt—the taste of Obi-Wan’s lips and the brush of his beard against his own, the heat of his skin pressed against his. Something deep inside him trembled in warning at the sudden fire in Obi-Wan’s eyes, and yet he was not afraid.

Alas, now was not the time. They nodded in silent agreement. Qui-Gon placed the kettle on the stove before pulling Obi-Wan into his arms and hugging him tightly. Obi-Wan wrapped his arms around Qui-Gon’s waist and leaned his forehead against Qui-Gon’s chest, his hair tickling the skin where Qui-Gon’s tunics dipped.

Relief melted through Qui-Gon at the contact, the solidity of Obi-Wan’s body in his arms. “Thank you,” Qui-Gon whispered into Obi-Wan’s hair as he squeezed Obi-Wan against him.

Obi-Wan sighed, a muffled sound against Qui-Gon’s tunics.. “Thank you for going along with it. I never thought I’d see Qui-Gon Jinn kneel in the Council Chamber.”

Qui-Gon huffed. “Without you, I’d be off to Spintir or worse, the 183rd legion.” He shook his head. “No thanks needed.”

Obi-Wan looked up at him. “I do, actually, have an assignment for you.”

Qui-Gon’s brows furrowed. “Oh?”

“The Force sent me a vision. I think it’s time you got to prove your theory about Odan-Urr’s mistranslation.”

“A vision? I don’t understand,” Qui-Gon replied as the kettle began to whistle.

“Pour the tea and come join us. I will explain,” Obi-Wan said evenly.

Qui-Gon was struck by the assuredness of Obi-Wan’s tone. The younger man bore the future of the Order on his shoulders as if it weighed no more than his own cloak. There was an ancient wisdom buoying him that Qui-Gon perceived with a kind of wonder. Once again, Qui-Gon felt himself settle and still in Obi-Wan’s presence. Qui-Gon smiled and without any sarcasm or humour, answered sincerely, “Yes, Master.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes widened and he blew out a breath. “I will never get used to that!” he vowed, but there was a shiver of delight that he could not hide.

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan felt every single one of his thirty-six years and then some as he settled himself back on Qui-Gon’s couch beside Ahsoka, who had mercifully begun to settle herself in the far corner of the couch. He could hardly blame her for her restlessness: Qui-Gon becoming a padawan was beyond any of their strangest dreams, much less becoming Obi-Wan’s padawan.

Anakin was weirdly amused and delighted by the whole thing. He had often chafed against the Order’s hierarchies, so having them thrown into a turmoil probably came as some kind of relief. His old padawan was pacing by the window, arms crossed over his chest, as if he were trying to contain an energy that would not let him still.

Qui-Gon handed out teacups with his usual quiet measure, but there was a new peace in his features that eased Obi-Wan’s heart. He had felt it, the moment everything shifted for Qui-Gon, like water breaking through a dam, not in a sudden rush, but a gradual flow that finally pushed through cracking duracrete and poured forth, altering, the whole landscape. The shock of Qui-Gon’s touch, heated and alive with the energy of what was no longer held back, had promised the fulfillment of everything Obi-Wan had been dreaming of for twenty years. It had been overwhelming, electric, and completely unbearable in his current state. Thank the Force for Anakin and Ahsoka, whose presence naturally titrated the intensity of feeling and allowed them both to wait.

Now he had to explain everything and his tired mind slowed in protest. He sipped his tea even though it was too hot. Aromas of citrus and mint filled his senses as he closed his eyes for a few long moments and sank into the Force, letting it ease his exhaustion, his pain.

“The Force granted me a vision today,” he began, eyes still closed. “I don’t fully understand it, but I can feel the truth of it. And for better or worse, our lineage sits at the heart of something that needs to shift inside the Order.”

“What does this have to do with Qui-Gon becoming your padawan?” Ahsoka asked, head cocked and eyes narrowed. She had such a sharp mind, and she was already putting things together, he could tell.

“Val Isa appeared in my vision in a very particular way—as a bright spot of hope in an Order shrouded in fear,” Obi-Wan continued.

“Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon asked, voice cautious as he settled himself on the floor cross-legged. It was his ‘should we talk about this before bringing in the padawans?’ voice.

Obi-Wan cast him a reassuring look as he proceeded to describe his vision: webs of fear knitting Jedi together through generations—a shroud fallen over the Temple stretching back and back and back, through the history of the Order, woven in response to the pain and loss and violence of war.

“But Master Yoda says Jedi should not feel fear. Surely he would know if he was shrouded in fear,” Anakin protested.

“One would expect so. But he is, as we all are, only living, fallible. The fear is so old, Anakin, I don’t think it’s felt so much as fossilized. Too often we forget that the legacy of the Order is steeped in blood. Violence shaped the Order for millennia. It’s only natural that would be as true in peacetime as in war. The Code was revised in response to that.”

Qui-Gon hmmed. “I think I see what you are getting at, Obi-Wan. Jedi who are not attached, who do not love, cannot be hurt because they have nothing to lose. And thus, they are less likely to fall.”

Obi-Wan sighed in agreement. “Yes. And so we cut ourselves off from the galaxy and from each other because we forgot the most important truth.”

“And what’s that?” Anakin asked, voice edged with durasteel.

“That the path forward is not to avoid pain and loss, but to heal it,” Obi-Wan said gently, inwardly bracing for the storm he could feel brewing in his former padawan.

“Val Isa’s sanctuary ship,” Ahsoka said. “It was a medical ship. She travelled around the galaxy healing.”

Tears glinted in Qui-Gon’s eyes and his voice shook as he spoke. “We cannot heal pain, if we cannot feel it. And we cannot heal alone.”

Obi-Wan nodded, closing his eyes to center himself and breathe. While it was a relief to openly acknowledge this with Qui-Gon and Ahsoka, it was quite another to broach this topic with Anakin, who had been fighting for over a decade to fit himself into the Jedi Code and had been lectured on attachment and emotional control, not only by Obi-Wan, but his teachers, Council members, Yoda, even fellow padawans, for just as long.

When he opened his eyes, Ahsoka and Qui-Gon were watching him with awe and open relief. But Anakin…. Oh Anakin.

Anakin’s face broke his heart.

His padawan’s features were twisted in pain. "So what are you saying?" Anakin growled.

“Qui-Gon is more learned about Odan-Urr’s revision of the Jedi Code than any living Jedi and he has been trying to convince me—and Master Yoda—of something the Order has been fighting for a long time: that emotions and attachment are not to be guarded against or pushed away, but experienced. As the ancient Code says, Emotion, yet peace. Passion, yet serenity. Love is not attachment. But even more than that, love and connection can ground us in the light.” Obi-Wan spoke slowly, carefully, as if the Temple itself would crumble at this heresy.

Anakin exploded.

“Now?! NOW you tell me this?! After she’s DEAD,” Anakin roared, his fury rolled off him in dark waves, almost tangible in the evening light as he advanced on Obi-Wan with burning eyes.

Qui-Gon was on his feet in an instant. “Anakin, I know you are shocked, angry. And you have every right to be—” Qui-Gon pleaded, reaching for his grandpadawan’s shoulder.

“No! No! You don’t have ANY idea what I’ve lived through trying to fit myself into this fucking BOX for years!” he yelled, twisting away from Qui-Gon’s grasp. “And now you tell me it’s for nothing! And I was right all along,” he hissed as his hand found his lightsaber.

“Anakin!” Qui-Gon yelled, moving instinctively to get between them, but Anakin deflected him with a Force push that sent Qui-Gon tumbling to the floor. Ahsoka darted to his side, eyes wide.

Obi-Wan didn’t move. He was transfixed by shards of his splintering heart—because while they had all been wronged by this, his padawan had been tortured by it.

He let his tears fall freely.

“I am sorry, Anakin. I’m so sorry. I failed you,” he wept, head bowed, fighting a tidal wave of grief for his suffering padawan. “We, the order, we failed you. We have lived in fear, and our fear has betrayed us—and you.”*

“I don’t c—” he fumed and then stopped, jerking back in shock. “What?”

Obi-Wan met his piercing eyes and drew in a deep breath as he stood up and moved closer to Anakin. “I failed you, padawan. I’m sorry.” He placed a hand carefully on Anakin’s shoulder. “I wish, oh I wish, things had been different. We should have gone to find her. Together. “

“She needed me,” Anakin spat.

“Yes, she did. And Ani, you needed her. And there was nothing wrong with that,” Obi-Wan breathed through the twisting agony in his chest.

Anakin’s face shattered into tears as he collapsed to his knees in front of Obi-Wan. He curled in on himself, heaving sobs.

Obi-Wan sank down onto the carpet before him and took Anakin’s face in his hands, tipping his forehead to touch Anakin’s.

“I’m so sorry. I was wrong, padawan. I should have fought the Council then. There are many things I should have done. And if you will let me, I will take responsibility for them. And seek your forgiveness."

Anakin cried harder and Obi-Wan wrapped his arms around his padawan, pressed Anakin’s face into his shoulder, like he had when he was a child, only this time he struggled to reach around his broad frame, and Anakin’s dark waves caught in his beard. The regret was heavy, heavier than he could have imagined, and yet he bore it, one moment at a time, rocking slightly to comfort them both.

He felt Qui-Gon’s hand on his back, warm and steady, an anchor and a balm all at once.

“It was not your failure, alone, Obi-Wan. I also have much to answer for, in the matter of teaching, and Anakin’s mother. I should have brought her to Coruscant years ago. I thought sending her the means to buy her freedom would be enough. I do not know if the Council would have listened, but if I had stood with you, then we might have found a way.”

Anakin’s tears slowed as he looked up. “What?” he breathed in disbelief.

“We have much to answer for, if what Obi-Wan says is true. And I believe it is,” Qui-Gon said.
“We will fix this together, “ Qui-Gon promised, as he waved for Ahsoka to join them.

She approached tentatively. Obi-Wan closed his eyes in sympathy.

“There is an ancient Naboo proverb that Padme taught me” she said softly, as she pushed the kaff table aside and settled on Obi-Wan’s other side. “ It is not the only sun that causes us to grow, but the rain that strengthens and makes us whole.”*

“Padme is a wise woman,” Qui-Gon said. “We need rain as much as we need sun, though I fear the Order has become overused to artificial weather.”

At the mention of Padme, Anakin froze in Obi-Wan’s arms. Obi-Wan squeezed him in reassurance.

“I love her, Master,” Anakin confessed, sitting back, but unable to meet Obi-Wan’s eyes.

“I know, Anakin,” Obi-Wan said softly.

He looked away then and withdrew even more, hunching his shoulders and crossing his arms across his chest. “No, you don’t understand. Not like you love Master Qui-Gon. Or I like I love you and Ahsoka. Or even like I loved my mother. I need her sometimes in a way that isn’t Light. And it scares me.”

A shudder of foreboding passed through Obi-Wan as warning curled in the Force. If Anakin were to fall, he would become a very great threat, to the Order, to the Republic. And if he joined the Sith, he could take the galaxy with him. He couldn’t reassure or minimize Anakin’s fear. The young man was right to be afraid. But something had already changed and there was hope to be found there.

“You are not alone in this Anakin. Not anymore,” Obi-Wan said softly, touching Anakin’s elbow lightly.. “In my vision, I saw you, and the threads around you were different, some brighter, some darker, but they moved in a different way. And I wondered then, what if the Jedi had learned from you, even as we trained you?”

“Learned from me?” Anakin asked, brows furrowed.

“Hmm,” Qui-Gon rumbled. “The prophecy speaks of bringing balance to the Force.” He paused, stroking his beard. “Along comes a child, a supernova in the force, who has attachments and profound feelings—more emotion than we can sometimes handle, and what do we do? We, in our arrogance, first reject him, and then try to change him, thinking we knew better than the Force.” He shook his head. “That explains so much. Obi-Wan, I think you are right.” He looked at Anakin with eyes soft with regret and said gently, “Oh Anakin. We have so much to mend.”

“I—” Anakin started, bewildered. “I don’t know what to say. I never thought— I never, ever thought....” He blinked several times and shook his head. “But you’re never wrong. I mean, you are, but you never admit it.”

Obi-Wan flinched. “I would have hoped that I’d set a better example than that.”

Ahsoka huffed and crossed her arms across her chest. “You do. He’s just stubborn.”

Obi-Wan and Anakin both turned to look at Ahsoka, with her raised eyebrow and chin jutted forward in protest, looking for all the world like an exasperated and protective tooka cat. Anakin burst out laughing.

“You’re right, Snips. Sometimes I get stuck in my own head sometimes.”

“Sometimes?” she tossed back.

“Sometimes,” he agreed, tone solemn now. He looked at Obi-Wan steadily, and took a deep breath. “Thank you, Master,” he said softly, voice cracking at the edges. “It means a lot. It means everything.”

Obi-Wan swallowed and closed his eyes as he nodded and gripped Anakin’s flesh hand in his own.

“We will fix what we can, I promise, padawan,” Obi-Wan said, his own voice tight with relief and sadness and gratitude for Anakin’s acceptance, Ahsoka’s clear sight, and Qui-Gon’s humility. His lineage. His little family . They felt like a family here, sitting squished together on the aged carpet of Qui-Gon’s living room. He wanted to hold them all close and tell them how much they meant to him. And then he realized that he could. He would.

But maybe not at this very moment because he could feel his exhaustion looming, now that the adrenaline was wearing off.

He looked up into Qui-Gon’s concerned eyes.

“We should meditate,” he and Qui-Gon said in sync. Anakin and Ahsoka laughed as they rolled their eyes and shifted to form a circle with Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan.

The four of them joined hands and settled into the quiet peace of each other’s presence and the Force weaving them together.

Chapter Text

Several hours later, Qui-Gon guided them back to ordinary consciousness with a series of delicate bells. As he opened his eyes, Obi-Wan found that he was still tired, but he felt refreshed and strong in a way he hadn't in weeks, or maybe even months. The jittery edge that frayed his patience and wore at his steadiness was gone. Though he hadn't had a fever for some time, he felt as if one had just broken, clearing away the last layer of fogginess in his mind. He drew in a long breath and exhaled slowly, letting the tension that had built up in his hips and knees and shoulders melt away as he stood.

Anakin was the first to break the silence. He looked energized and happy, even if there was a flicker of disbelief in his Force presence.

"Masters," he said, standing and proffering a half-bow. He waited for Qui-Gon and Ahsoka to get to their feet, shifting his weight and clasping his hands behind his back. "I know we have much to talk about. I don't know what this… revelation… will bring. But I trust you. And.. er…." He rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. "...I am sorry about my temper."

Obi-Wan nodded, letting his approval soften his gaze. Anakin’s remorse held none of his usual defensiveness and that was a very good sign.

"I am glad I didn't hurt you," Anakin said to Qui-Gon. He looked down. "I didn't want to."

Qui-Gon hmmed and caught Anakin’s eyes as soon as he looked up. He considered him for a moment, head tilted, gaze serious, but not unkind. "I know, Anakin. But if you had...."

Anakin winced. "I will work on it."

Qui-Gon nodded and said somberly. "Yes, we will."

Anakin smiled a bit sheepishly. "Our departure was rescheduled to tomorrow,” he said, smoothing his tunic. “I…” He paused and looked back and forth between Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon.

“Anakin?” Obi-Wan asked, curious and a little concerned.

Anakin took a deep breath and swallowed and squared his shoulders. “I want to spend the night with my... wife."

"Wife!" Ahsoka squeaked. Qui-Gon's eyebrows shot up and he blew out a breath.

Obi-Wan started in surprise. "Wife?" he repeated, marvelling at the word. Anakin, married? When had he had the time? He was shocked, and he wasn't. A part of him was proud that if Anakin was going to have deep feelings for someone, he had the sense to make a commitment to her. Still, he felt a pang of sadness for Padme then, and for Anakin. So much secrecy, so much time apart, so much lying and longing. His face fell.

"Master? Are you very disappointed?" Anakin sounded worried and suddenly very young.

Obi-Wan shook his head and gave Anakin a regretful smile as he grasped his shoulder. "Only that I wasn't there."

Anakin exhaled sharply and visibly relaxed. Then his face lit up in delight. "I'll have R2 play you the holofeed.”

"What? R2 was there?! And he never told me? That little…!" Ahsoka blurted.

"Easy, Snips. You can watch too,” Anakin promised.

"Wait, so does this make Padme my aunt or something? Stepmother? Step-master?" she asked teasingly.

"Ugh! Stepmother? That would make me your father. I'm way too young to be a dad. Dads are old. Like Obi-Wan," Anakan said with a moue of disgust, waving in Obi-Wan’s direction.

Obi-Wan snorted, but caught a strange look on Qui-Gon's face: wistful and suspicious at the same time.

"Don't tempt fate, Anakin," Qui-Gon warned.

Anakin grimaced. “Ugh. I really hope that doesn't mean what I think it means."

"What?" piped Ahsoka.

"Just be careful, that's all. A war is no time to have children," Qui-Gon said gravely, crossing his arms across his chest.

"Ugh, it did,” Anakin said, squirming under Qui-Gon’s gaze. “Alright. That's it. I'm outta here."

Ahsoka paled and then sniggered. "Oh! That kind of careful. Ew!"

"Let's talk tomorrow, before you ship out," Obi-Wan said, ignoring Ahsoka's embarrassment.

Anakin nodded. "Sounds good. We'll meet you here at 10h. Right, Snips?"

"Roger that. Okay, I'm off to find Bariss. She and Luminara arrived at 19h,” she said, donning her robe.

"Not a word, Snips,” Anakin said, index finger pointed in caution.

"Never,” she said quickly as her expression shifted to one of utmost seriousness. “I understand. This will be a long road, won’t it?"

"It will," Obi-Wan answered, proud of her thoughtfulness and sense of responsibility. "But I am hopeful we will be able to start the changes the Order needs to make soon. Qui-Gon's research will help. And we have changed. Even the smallest pebble can alter the course of a river over time."

"And we have a set of boulders, don't we?" Ahsoka said with a smirk.

Obi-Wan laughed. "Anakin counts for at least three."

"Are you saying I'm dense?" Anakin said with mock affront.

"Never, my young Padawan," Obi-Wan said with a wink, before embracing Anakin. "Say hello to Padme for me. Thank her for her help with this...situation.”

"I will,” Anakin said, shifting so that he could look at Obi-Wan without letting him go just yet. His smile that was so bright it made Obi-Wan’s heart ache.

Obi-Wan met his eyes. "I love you very much, Anakin. And I always will. Nothing could ever change that."

Anakin squeezed him tightly. "Thanks," he whispered, voice wavering. "I know. But it's nice to hear it." Then, even quieter, “I love you too, Master.”

Obi-Wan pressed his eyes shut against a wave of relief and hope that things were already mending between them. The Force rippled its approval like a soft breeze along the surface of water. He sighed and hugged Anakin closer before releasing him. And then he hugged Ahsoka, who looked at him with grateful eyes and relaxed in his arms.

“Thank you,” she whispered against tunics.

"Thank you, Padawan,” he said, taking her by the shoulders so that he could look at her. “Without your honesty, and your bravery, I’m not sure we’d be standing here.”

Her Force presence shimmered with delight and pride and she grinned at him.

His heart clenched. He was glad he would see both Anakin and Ahsoka again before they were deployed. It was harder to think about sending them into battle when he was present to his love for them. But he could and would. They had duties to fulfill, all of them. The war was far from over, and it was unclear how their tiny revolution would change the Order and affect the dangerous political climate supporting the violence. He only knew that they had stepped on the right path. With his love, Obi-Wan found a gentle sense of certainty, a deep knowing, that grounded him in a way he had not expected. He hoped they could feel that too—and he had good reason to suspect that they did. He saw Ahoska’s smile and steadiness in her own space. He watched the ease and peace that infused all of Anakin’s movements as embraced Qui-Gon and guided Ahsoka out of the quarters with an affectionate hand on her back. And when he turned to face Qui-Gon, his former master and new padawan was gazing at him with awe.

"You are magnificent, you know that, don't you?" Qui-Gon said.

Obi-Wan huffed. "Aspiring to magnificence is for padawans," he replied, lips curled into a wry smile as he fought a rising blush. "I am as I have always been, just myself." He moved to tuck his hands into his sleeves and realized he was not wearing his robe.

"That's not true, and you know it,” Qui-Gon replied, eyes shining as he closed the distance between them. “You felt what happened here today. A vergence in the Force, nothing less."

"A vergence?" he asked, looking up at Qui-Gon, who was suddenly very close. It dawned on him that they were finally alone. He tried to ignore the nervous flutter in stomach. He was glad to have something to focus on besides Qui-Gon’s looming presence.

Qui-Gon nodded. "I was also granted a Force vision."

Obi-Wan’s brows furrowed."Really? When?” Another vision. How strange. The Force was rarely in the habit of being so direct.

"Today. When we arrived here after the council meeting. It’s why I was so distracted.”

“What did you see?”

“I saw their children,” Qui-Gon said with an air of wonder. “Anakin's and Padme's. And Ahsoka, all grown up.”

Unbidden, an image of Anakin and Padme nestled beneath an arching Nubian mulberry tree, each holding a baby, a dark haired girl and a blond boy rose in his mind’s eye. They gleamed in the Force, bright and powerful.

“Twins?” he asked.

Qui-Gon narrowed his eyes. “Yes.”

“I can see them,” Obi-Wan breathed. “They will be strong in the Force.”

Qui-Gon nodded. “We will train them. You, and me, and Ahsoka.”

Obi-Wan blinked. "Me?" he asked, realizing as he spoke how disconnected he had been from any sense of the future. “What about the war?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know how it ends. But the war was over. And I saw you as an old man, gray-bearded and smiling.” Qu-Gon paused, a shadow passing across his striking features. ”You looked… free,” he said, voice heavy with compassion and regret.

It was too painful, far too painful, to be seen so completely in his current state, emburdened by the staggering responsibilities of the GAR and the Order and his own unwavering sense of duty. Trapped by the endless war, he had long ago learned that to survive this, he couldn’t look at it, nor could he imagine life after.

He choked on the cry that escaped him.

"I'm sorry. I don't know what's—" he gasped, pressing his hand over his mouth as he squeezed his eyes against stinging tears.

"Shhh, Obi-Wan.” Qui-Gon laid a steadying hand on his elbow. “You have nothing to apologize for. You just upended four thousand years of tradition and carried the Order into a new age.”

"I—we're not there yet, Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan objected with a wave as he stepped back. “There's still so much to do. And I didn't do it alone!"

"Magnificent and modest," Qui-Gon sighed, rubbing a hand over his face as his shoulders fell. "I wonder if there is anything in ancient prophecies about the teacher of the Chosen One, because you have put something together that no one has been able to see for millennia."

"It was the Will of the Force. Without the vision—" Obi-Wan explained.

Qui-Gon shook his head. "You listened, Obi-Wan. You listened. And more importantly, you loved. Despite everything. You loved without giving into fear. You loved with hope and trust in the Force, in yourself and in us…” He stopped, flushing at his word choice. “In all of us. I have never seen a Jedi be so brave,” he said, voice tight with emotion.

"Qui-Gon!" Obi-Wan protested, squirming at the undue praise.

"Any fool can risk his life, Obi-Wan. Only the courageous risk their hearts,” Qui-Gon declared, voice rising with such conviction that Obi-Wan’s embarrassment was powerless in its wake. Against the backdrop of the Coruscant twilight, Qui-Gon was the magnificent one, his vast chest and long limbs energized with the strength of his sincerity. He towered like a Wroshyyk tree, filling Obi-Wan’s field of vision completely.

A memory of his early padawan days flickered to the surface of his mind. After their bumpy start, Qui-Gon had been reserved. More careful than caring, more kind than affectionate, he had guarded his heart after Xanatos’ betrayal like a krayt dragon guards its egg. Obi-Wan had felt like he was living on the outside of some great fortress, only allowed to roam the grounds. And then one quiet, unremarkable day of training and study and meditation and a stroll in the Room of a Thousand Fountains, something shifted. Obi-Wan had looked up into his Master’s face and seen Qui-Gon’s smile reach his eyes and there had been a warmth shining there that Obi-Wan had never experienced before.

Obi-Wan swallowed, trying to clear the lump in his throat. He took a deep breath and met Qui-Gon’s eyes. "I learned it from you," he said simply and watched Qui-Gon’s mouth fall open in surprise.

"‘We are what they grow beyond, that is the burden of all masters’,” Qui-Gon whispered, brushing tears from his eyes. “But Yoda is wrong—it's not a burden, it is a measureless joy."

Another Jedi aphorism came to Obi-Wan’s mind then, and it was simultaneously so perfect and absurd that he couldn’t help but quip, "I suppose we could say, the student has become the master.”

Qui-Gon stared at him for a second of disbelief before his expression cracked and he laughed out loud—a bright and rippling sound that carried Obi-Wan with him into laughter that had them both curling forward and wiping tears from their eyes.

And then Obi-Wan wobbled, but instead of falling, he found himself in Qui-Gon's arms, gasping for air. He slipped his arms around Qui-Gon's broad back and looked up into deep blue eyes full of love and a smile that made his knees weak.

"Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon breathed as his hand found Obi-Wan’s face, brushing his cheek with his thumb.

Obi-Wan blew out a breath, heat squirming in his belly and lower. His mouth went dry and his heart hammered in his chest. "What changed?" he choked out, pressing his hands against Qui-Gon’s shoulder blades in a vain attempt to anchor himself.

"What didn't?" Qui-Gon answered, looking down at him with all of the desire Obi-Wan had sensed in the Force, but had never seen before. Qui-Gon’s eyes were dark and his features sharp with something like hunger. Qui-Gon gripped Obi-Wan’s waist with shaking hands as he leaned down and brushed his lips against Obi-Wan’s. The kiss was tender and tentative, as if Qui-Gon was asking permission.

Everything in Obi-Wan’s being resounded with yes.

He kissed Qui-Gon back with the fervor of a bonfire set ablaze after twenty years of gathered kindling. He pressed up against Qui-Gon's body, chest to chest, nearly unable to breathe for the thrill of meeting a desire so long awaited and so recently denied that pain and pleasure mingled in excruciating intensity.

After decades of dreaming about this moment, Obi-Wan was shocked to find that neither he nor the world around him dissolved into a haze, nor did he startle awake when he lost himself in Qui-Gon's taste, his scent, his body—familiar and new all at once because he was allowed, now, to touch and taste and stroke hard muscles beneath soft fabric.

He cried out in surprise when Qui-Gon's hands slid down his back to grip his buttocks and lift him clear off the floor. Keening with pleasure, he wrapped his legs around Qui-Gon's waist, pressing his swollen cock against Qui-Gon's massive frame. Qui-Gon growled as he hoisted Obi-Wan higher and hauled him into the bedroom. Obi-Wan felt his back hit the mattress and then Qui-Gon was on top of him, a heavy weight between his legs that was grounding and exhilarating at the same time.

"I love you, Obi-Wan, I love you," Qui-Gon gasped, breaking the kiss and bowing his head to Obi-Wan's chest. He pressed his lips against Obi-Wan’s heart. Even through layers of tunics, the kiss was searing. Qui-Gon’s whole body trembled above him, cock hard against Obi-Wan’s hip.

"I love you too,” Obi-Wan wept, stroking Qui-Gon’s long-beloved hair. He drew on the Force then to steady them both. “We don’t have to do anything tonight, Qui-Gon,” he whispered, fighting creeping disappointment. He could tell Qui-Gon was as overwhelmed as he was aroused.

Qui-Gon nodded, catching his breath. “I—”

“Yes?” Obi-Wan asked, hope and lust burning through him in equal measure.

“I’m not sure I can bear it if we don’t,” Qui-Gon bit out.

Obi-Wan’s heart leapt in relief. “Oh, thank the Force,” he gasped.

He arched up against Qui-Gon as he scrambled with Qui-Gon’s belt and tunics. A flurry of hands and lips and far, far too much fabric, before their clothing was torn off and tossed aside. And then the world became nothing but skin against skin, Qui-Gon’s tongue in his mouth, Qui-Gon’s hips thrusting, and Qui-Gon’s long fingers pressing their weeping cocks together. Obi-Wan wrapped his arms tightly around his lover, shields crumbling as his entire being struggled to withstand the ecstasy tearing through him. Pure happiness and love enveloped him when Qui-Gon dropped his shields in turn and collapsed on top of him, shuddering.

They came at the same time with answering cries and tears in their eyes.

They held each other until their bodies stilled and their breathing slowed enough for them to rearrange themselves. Qui-Gon rolled onto his back and reached for a discarded tunic to dry them off. He curled his free arm around Obi-Wan’s shoulders as Obi-Wan settled his head on Qui-Gon’s chest.

As he sank back into his body, Obi-Wan became aware of the waning light, the slight chill in the air, and the tickle of Qui-Gon’s chest hair against his cheek. He looked up and ran his hand along Qui-Gon’s jaw, feeling the soft bristles of his beard.

“Stay?” Qui-Gon asked, laying his hand against Obi-Wan’s and leaning into his touch.

“Tonight? Of course,” Obi-Wan said with yawn. Sleep was already beginning to beckon, as much he didn’t want to sleep just yet.

“Tonight, yes. And also tomorrow. And the day after that,” Qui-Gon rumbled, leaning over to kiss Obi-Wan.

“As long as you want,” he promised, returning the kiss with a sigh.

“How about forever?” Qui-Gon asked.

Obi-Wan stared at him speechless. Had he misheard?

“I am serious, Obi-Wan. I do not know what the next few weeks or months will bring, but I have to tell you: in my vision, I saw love in your eyes.” His voice was solemn. “I know that our future is together.” Qui-Gon’s eyes shone and his face was peaceful as he spoke.

Obi-Wan searched inside himself for any reservation, any worry, or fear, yet he could find nothing but joy and hope and the Force singing its approval.

There were tears in Obi-Wan’s eyes when he finally spoke. “Forever, then.”

Qui-Gon’s smile brightened the whole room.