Work Text:
Insatiable Hearts
~
“Close your eyes, Obi-Wan. Immerse yourself in the living Force.”
Qui-Gon offered a fatherly smile. Sitting cross-legged before him, long limbs relaxed in a posture of lazy grace, he looked just as he had before his death: laughter lines beneath warm eyes, a well-kept beard covering his chin, long brown hair tied back and swaying gently in a breeze that existed in another realm, another sphere of existence.
If it weren’t for the blue veil draped over his body, Obi-Wan could have thought they were young again, teaching each other about the woes and wonders of apprenticeship. It had been years since then, though. Long, long years. Years that had made him a different man, that had sent him through valleys of darkness and death, through guilt and pain he still couldn’t shake entirely.
The past days – Leia, Luke, Tala, Reva – had relieved him of some of it, though; he could breathe again. The tightness in his chest, the feeling of dragging himself along, chains at his feet, was gone. The Force was listening to his orders, and there was balance inside him where chaos had been before.
The memories clawing at him were locked deep inside his mind, in a cage with a single name scrawled atop, a single face, blue eyes blinking from its depths, dark locks curling around a strong jawline. There he would remain, Obi-Wan decided, buried when there was nothing to bury yet. It was not a worthy grave, but it was the only grave he would get. It was the grave Obi-Wan needed – because he would go crazy otherwise.
Anakin Skywalker was dead.
Taking a deep breath of sandy, warm air, Obi-Wan closed his eyes and followed Qui-Gon’s voice as he would a guiding light. He opened his mind for the touches of the Force, shivering from its intensity after so much time spent barely daring to graze it.
Hesitant excitement spread through him. After decades of learning about the Force’s workings, of studying and pushing himself to understand its secrets as no more than a fading presence, Qui-Gon must have much knowledge to impart.
Obi-Wan felt honored to be taught. There was something oddly reassuring about it, a step back to his time as a Padawan with its youthful energy and innocent optimism. It was like discovering a campfire after shuffling through a densely grown, snowy forest.
He was looking forward to this new task. Obi-Wan took a deep breath. Calming down his heartbeat as though about to take a dive, he waded toward the light inside him, the light all around him. The whispers of life. The fireflies buzzing inaudibly in the corners of his vision, as though watching him, leading him.
There was a meadow beneath him, the grass soft as a blanket. If he took steps, they made no sound as he floated on, seeing flashes of color, blurry forms regaining shapes; somehow, he was both wandering on unfamiliar worlds and sitting in this cave on Tatooine, meditating. He smelled freshly blossomed flowers, vibrant spices, the tangy heat of swamps and marshes. He heard faint voices, from the past and present and what might yet come to be. Above all, though, there was Qui-Gon.
Obi-Wan felt a touch at his arm, a tingling presence.
“Follow me,” his old Master said, and though he couldn’t see him Obi-Wan knew he was there. He couldn’t feel his own body, but he wasn’t scared; he knew the feeling would return, slowly, like cut-off blood would rush back into his limbs to give them life. Fingers he didn’t have prickled, ghostly feet found ground, and in the corner of his eye Qui-Gon’s no-more-blue form flickered. Obi-Wan found himself smiling.
Thunder rolled.
Obi-Wan flinched. A wave of power crashed into him that left him cold and heavy, wavering on his feet. Where the sky should be darkness emerged, blacker than the deepest parts of space.
“Master Qui-Gon,” he rasped, gaze shifting, but there was no trace of him, his presence swallowed by icy winds. Strands of reddish hair whirled before his eyes, harsh gusts blowing through his loose robes; a storm was churning around him. And he was right at its center.
This wasn’t real. Still, Obi-Wan felt a jolt of fear; his pace grew hasty. He looked around with urgency, reaching into the Force to find Qui-Gon again. The grass turned gray before his eyes. Gray, then black.
“Master!” he yelled. A trial? But so soon, without a warning? Qui-Gon hadn’t told him anything yet, nothing that could help him in this moment. Where was he? Why wasn’t Qui-Gon with him? Why –
Lightning flashed, blinding him. There was a rumble of destruction, like an earthquake shaking the ground in the distance.
Obi-Wan opened his eyes to fire and heat.
He could taste it in the shimmering air, flakes of ash on his tongue. The black earth was so hot it must be burning inside; tendrils of smoke hissed at the soles of his boots. Flames flared up, climbing out of cracks and holes all around him and spitting out yellow sparks and cinder. Streams of lava wound around dark cliffs. Above him was a canopy of shadows, shuddering in restlessness like hungry creatures. What they snarled he couldn’t understand, or didn’t want to.
His heart was racing in his throat; perhaps it knew what was awaiting him before his mind did. Obi-Wan stared and froze with a tug of recognition. Mustafar. His mouth ran dry. Why Mustafar? What was he doing here?
A presence sunk into him like a hook, cutting into his flesh with the strength of a real blade. He spun around, unable to grasp what was right in front of him. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be.
I cut him off! Obi-Wan all but cried out in despair. Why could he sense him if he cut him off, if he’d pushed him away with all he had? There was nothing connecting them anymore. Anakin was dead. Anakin was dead.
But Vader wasn’t.
From the shadows a figure emerged, sitting cross-legged as Qui-Gon and he were. Taut muscles were deformed by pale scars; they devoured his body like an illness, the flesh gray, rotting away, reddish at spots where inflammations raged. There was no hair.
What caused a pang of horror wasn’t what Obi-Wan saw, though; it was what he didn’t see.
Where his arms and legs should be, darkness was coiling like snakes in vague resemblance to the former limbs, blurry as the sight through murky waters. From far away it might have looked as though he was merely wearing black gloves and boots, though up-close Obi-Wan knew that wasn’t the case. This was merely an illusion, created by anger and hatred, existing only in this sphere neither here nor there.
He could sense him as though they were standing in front of each other. If this was a vision, it was a damn well-made one. It wasn’t, of course; everything inside Obi-Wan screamed it wasn’t. His blood was singing as it always did when they were close.
He remembered the bacta tank, as he’d been healing from his injuries – burns he’d caused. Immersed in it, he’d thought to see him, thought to graze his presence for a horrible, beautiful moment, thought to hear him whisper in his mind. It had startled him so much, he’d climbed out of the tank barely healed.
His shoulder prickled at the memory; those scars would stay.
Later, Obi-Wan had talked himself into believing it had been exhaustion speaking, a fever dream perhaps, a forbidden wish. They shouldn’t be able to communicate across such large distances. They shouldn’t be able to find each other so easily after everything that was.
This half-reality felt like that moment in the bacta tank. Only this time there was more. This time he couldn’t climb out of it and forget.
With every fiber of his body Obi-Wan prayed Vader wouldn’t sense him, would let him fade away silently so he could find Qui-Gon again. He held his breath, fixating Vader’s back with unblinking eyes as he would an angry nexu.
The scarred head turned a fraction and that was all the warning Obi-Wan got.
There were invisible hands around his throat, thumbs pressing against his Adam’s apple, squeezing tightly. Spots of light danced before his eyes as he gagged, heels leaving the ground, kicking air. Not again, shot through his mind; he grimaced. A shudder ran through him as he fought against Vader’s grasp. The Force felt slippery here, like fine sand trickling through his fingers. Still, he managed.
With a yelp, sweat breaking out on his skin, Obi-Wan shoved Vader’s storm of power away. The fingers left his skin and, nothing holding him up anymore, he fell to his feet, balancing himself in a crouching position. Panting, chest heaving to draw in tainted oxygen, Obi-Wan needed a moment to straighten, to look up. When he did, Vader was facing him.
Obi-Wan felt something inside him snap, and the guilt he’d thought sealed washed over him like waves of a broken dam. The sound he made was something between groan and sob. I’m sorry, echoed on his lips, tingling, but he suppressed the words.
I am not your failure, Obi-Wan, Vader – Anakin – had said, but at the end Obi-Wan had been the one to leave him bursting into flames on Mustafar. He’d cut off his arms and legs. He’d forced him into this cage of a body, to suffer until the end.
Not for the first time Obi-Wan wondered if he didn’t deserve all the pain inflicted on him.
Beneath all the scars and half-healed wounds, beneath the yellow slits of eyes and the rage confined in them, he could still see Anakin, the boy he’d trained, the friend he’d failed. Seeing him reduced to this state, more monster than man, was almost too much to bear. Only here could he breathe without artificial lungs; only here could he gaze at the world with his own eyes, and not through a red-shaded visor. Without the black armor there was nothing Obi-Wan could cling to for denial.
I am what you made me.
Obi-Wan swallowed, only now making out Vader’s expression. There were furrows in his forehead. Confusion. Why was there confusion?
Obi-Wan expected Vader to smirk at the success of whatever his plan might be, to start torturing him for information, or for joy, to try tracking him down through their connection, whatever would please him. Confusion, though, was unexpected.
Nostrils flaring and teeth flashing, Vader curled his shadowy fingers into his palm. This time Obi-Wan was prepared, however. He put up mental shields, bracing himself for the assault, instinctively assuming a defensive position.
Vader opened his fist with a growl, a hunted look in narrowed eyes. They seemed to scan Obi-Wan’s most-hidden thoughts.
“No,” he ground out with Anakin’s voice, shaking his head.
This isn’t how it’s supposed to be, Obi-Wan heard in the wind.
“I will destroy you!” A scream through gritted teeth.
Again, Obi-Wan felt vicious strikes with the Force reverberating at his shields, though Vader wasn’t focused, couldn’t be, for they felt sloppy and weak. There was despair in his eyes. A cry of rage. Invisible fist beating against him, and yet never landing a punch. “Bastard! Traitor! Hold still and let me kill you!”
With a sinking feeling in his stomach, Obi-Wan realized Vader didn’t know he was there. He hadn’t called him on grounds of some twisted plan. They were both victims of whoever was playing this game with them. Still, Vader wasn’t surprised.
This is his vision, his land, his fantasy. Obi-Wan felt the heat drain from his face. This isn’t the first time he’s seeing me, fighting me here, far from it – only now I’m fighting back.
“I’m here,” Obi-Wan rasped, straining to withstand Vader’s power. His skin was itching with sweat and smoke and heat. “It’s me. It’s really me.”
Vader froze. The darkness was wavering and licking at the stumps of his arms and legs like black flames. “You can’t be.”
“Well, I am.”
“What did you do, Obi-Wan?!”
The way he growled his name made Obi-Wan’s skin crawl. “This is your… whatever this is. I didn’t do anything.”
“You must have.” Vader tilted his head, muscles flexing in his arms and chest as though he was wondering how to best tear Obi-Wan’s head off his shoulders. A cold hiss. “Leave.”
How strange. Vader wouldn’t try to track him down and torture him? He would let him go, just like that? Obi-Wan frowned. “Having second thoughts, Darth? The last time we met you were all over me.”
Vader’s jaw worked, his cheeks angry-red. “You mean nothing to me. If our paths do cross, I will crush you like an ant.”
Obi-Wan compressed his lips with a pang of sadness. It caught him off-guard, but it shouldn’t have; it would always hurt to hear Anakin’s voice say such things.
“All right,” he murmured. “Still, I can’t leave. I don’t know how.”
Qui-Gon, please, wherever you are, help me, he begged silently. There was no answer.
Vader’s expression changed from enraged to murderous. “You better learn quickly, then, before I learn how to reach you.”
He made a fist again, and this time Obi-Wan felt cold fingers brush his skin before he strengthened his defense, stumbling back in momentum. His heart made a leap. Not good.
His mind was running wild. He had to do something; if fighting wasn’t an option, talking would have to do. Even if there was no more than a sliver of hope Vader would listen.
“There must be a reason we’re both here. Don’t you want to find it?”
Vader scoffed, glaring at him. There was pain in his eyes. “Leave,” he rasped, and though spoken harshly, it sounded like a plea.
How could Obi-Wan leave?
You’ve done horrible, horrible things, he thought. Why can’t I hate you?
Why am I talking with you knowing you’re no more than an empty shell, mad with anger and hatred?
Obi-Wan sighed. “This place is part of the Force, isn’t it?” The dark side of it at least.
Vader didn’t answer. He merely stared at him with bloodshot eyes; Obi-Wan couldn’t say if he was even seeing him, if he was registering his presence as something alive, something that wasn’t there to hurt him. Vader moved, legs of darkness dragging across black stone, toward Obi-Wan, all stiff and tense as though ready to pounce on him.
Obi-Wan made a step back, distancing himself at the same pace Vader approached. They were both aware of that, surely, and yet neither commented on it; eventually, someone would have to stop. Behind Obi-Wan, a wall of heat warned him of fire and lava waiting for him.
He tried ejecting himself from this vision with more effort, but the ladder leading outside seemed to float just out of reach; he couldn’t grasp it.
“If it is part of the Force,” Obi-Wan said, speaking his thoughts as they came, hoping to distract Vader, “can’t you choose how it looks?”
Vader could move and breathe and speak as he had before; he could regain his missing limbs even if they were no more than dark echoes. Surely, they didn’t need to be here, in this hellish replica of Mustafar, and inhale sparks and smoke. And if Vader could do it, couldn’t he too?
Obi-Wan took a moment to ponder his possibilities, wondering if he’d have enough strength left to stop Vader’s attacks. He decided to risk it – after all, his real body was still in a cave on Tatooine. He had nothing but pain to fear, and pain would fade. Pain he was used to.
With great effort, he focused on the sky, imagining the fresh cool of water and the soft pattering of long-overdue rain. Before his eyes, the black transformed. There was a low rumble, but this time it held no aggression, no warning. It was a sigh of relief.
There was a light drizzle at first, then the drops grew, splashing against hard rocks and evaporating with sizzling noises in lakes of fire. Sparks hissed and vanished. Flames slumped and cried and died. Soon, Obi-Wan’s clothes stuck to his skin, drenched and dripping. He brushed wet strands behind his ears, blinking through blurry lines of rain at the creature that had been his friend once.
Vader wasn’t moving anymore. He wasn’t looking at him either. His head was tilted toward the sky, glistening lines wandering down his cheeks and chest. His mouth was ajar, lips trembling with each breath he took; he was panting as though coming from the battlefield. His shoulders slumped, shaking softly, and his fists opened.
Obi-Wan found himself stepping forward, as though pulled forward by an invisible rope, a strange fire inside him urging him on. Something told him Vader wouldn’t attack him, not now. He’d bought himself a moment of time, and perhaps more than that. There was a stinging behind his eyelids, a dull ache in his chest.
I’m sorry, he thought. I’m sorry.
He could sense Vader’s pain in every made-up rock and fading flame, in every shadow circling them; it was screaming with the wind and radiating from his presence like poisonous gas. And he wished, oh so wished, he could take it off him, even a fraction, take it as his own, so that he wouldn’t have to suffer alone. He knew, deep inside Vader Anakin was imprisoned, with all that which Vader couldn’t allow himself to feel, decaying in darkness. But he couldn’t reach him, could he?
Anakin was dead. Dead. Dead. Obi-Wan repeated the word with the thump of his heart, couldn’t quite let go of it. He needed to let it go. Let him go. He needed to leave. Now was the time. Now –
But as he stood before Vader, as his head dropped and the shadowy limbs shrunk into themselves, black tendrils scattering, fuzzy and fading, as he fell on his knees with quiet sobs, Obi-Wan couldn’t turn his back on him.
“Anakin,” he whispered despite himself.
Vader swayed, handless, upper body writhing, eyes screwed shut in a tight grimace. Beneath the rain his scars seemed to mingle, blend in with his skin, pale and frail under constant strain, never quite allowed to heal. Obi-Wan’s stomach twisted at the thought of what torture it must have been, to survive all those years, ever since Mustafar. Never-ending pain. Never-ending anger and hatred.
With a shaky sound, he threw all caution in the wind and let himself fall on the wet stone, hands reaching through the storm. The air was cold, but Vader’s body was warm as Obi-Wan slung his arms around his torso, hesitantly at first, then more tightly. He rested his chin on Vader’s scarred shoulder, feeling the muscles move beneath him, tense and twitch. There was no heartbeat.
Of course not, Obi-Wan thought, holding back tears. It’s not real. If this were real, he’d be dead, dead without his armor, dead without the Sith.
But it felt real as Vader didn’t push him away, but leaned into the embrace, crying softly into Obi-Wan’s damp clothes. Holding him felt like the hardest thing he’d ever done, and yet he couldn’t help but wish this moment would last forever. There was no fire in the gray lands behind Vader’s back. The shadows had stopped moving.
Vader was mumbling something, a grunt of pain. Obi-Wan barely made out the words.
“Kill me. Obi-Wan. K-kill me.”
The words went through him like lightning. Coldness clawed at his heart, replacing the blood in his veins. Obi-Wan thought Vader must be holding him upright, because he couldn’t feel his body, his knees numb against the hard ground, and surely he would have collapsed otherwise.
Kill me.
How could he kill him?
I’m a coward, Obi-Wan thought. Selfish.
And it was then that he realized that it might have been Vader after all who had called him, as he’d called him after their battle, full of agony and rage. The Force had merely facilitated this wish, the Force – and their connection.
It would always exist, wouldn’t it?
“I can’t,” Obi-Wan murmured, tears caught in his lashes, rubbing slow circles on Vader’s back. Not here… and not outside. “This isn’t real.”
Vader might have heard him. If he had, he didn’t show it. Obi-Wan rocked him in his arms, whispering meaningless words, engulfed by rain in this timeless place only they shared and always would. The rain kept pattering, drowning out all thoughts and doubts and fears, drowning out the pain, if only for a moment.
Obi-Wan held Vader until the black stone vanished, until the drops of water dried up and the warmth between them became bodiless, all colors and shapes fading away.
Gleaming fireflies carried him away, through dizziness and dream-like haze, and when Obi-Wan opened his eyes, it was Qui-Gon’s blue ghost he glimpsed.
He didn’t tell him what he’d seen.
~