Teach the Padawan - alexjanna91 - Star Wars (2024)

Chapter 1: Death and Then the Force

Chapter Text

Standing in front of Darth Vader was somehow better and worse than walking away from Anakin on Mustafar. The old man that had once been Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi Master, High Council Member, and GAR General, looked into the black bulbous eyes of the Sith Lord’s mask and wished there was enough of Anakin left in that walking nightmare creature that he could apologize. For not being a better master, a better friend, a better brother, for not being what Anakin needed.

Because the man that was once Obi-Wan Kenobi had almost twenty years in the unforgiving desert to reflect on his failures. And there were many; from the impersonal of failing to see the corruption at the heart of his home – in the Senate, in the Jedi Council, either and both -, to the very personal and possibly most devastating failure of not realizing just how far his padawan, his brother – his son – had fallen before it was too late.

And here he was standing before the man he had raised - silently loved - and it was much, much too late to atone.

Their lightsabers clashed and the man now known as Crazy Old Ben, the Wizard of the Wastes, could hear the cry of pain that came from the bleeding kyber crystal in the Sith Lord’s saber. It made his stomach knot, but Ben held his ground and held Darth Vader’s attention. Because even though he was old and tired and heartsick, Ben had something, someone to protect.

Feeling his aged, battered arms tremble with the force of Vader’s strikes, Ben noticed a bright shining presence finally drawing near.

Flicking his eyes to the side, Ben caught Luke’s startled and frightened gaze. His heart gave another ache because though he’d watched that boy grow up from a distance, he still loved him so very, very much. And now Ben was going to have to leave him.

“If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.”

Twenty years of regret and grief and infinite sadness and Ben let his guard fall. His lightsaber held steady and sure in a surrender salute, Ben, with his last dying moments, reached out in the Force and pierced through the viscous miasma of Vader’s Force presence and hoped and wished and prayed that he would touch even just a single remaining thread of the bright, kind, brave young man he had known.

There was a simple moment of searing pain then Ben was gone into the Force, leaving behind both the nightmare creature that he still after all this time loved, and the boy he’d watched over and loved despite his grief.

Luke would live, so Ben had little regrets at his passing into the Force. He just wished, a bare whisper before he disappeared from all time and space, that he would have been able to see that one single shining flicker of light hidden away inside what used to be Anakin become a bright blazing star once more.

*

Unlike in his darkest moments of imagining, where the thought of simply letting go and sinking into the Force seemed preferable to living, being “one with the Force” was not what Ben had been expecting.

For example, the insistent clanging demand that echoed through his being as the Force practically shouted at him.

There was no peace to be had in death, apparently, and Ben figured that was just his luck. He’d finally died and left the harsh painful galaxy behind and the Force chose now after twenty years of silence to want something from him.

Very, very loudly, it wanted something from him. It took a while, rusty as he was with interpreting the Will of the Force, to figure out what exactly it was demanding of him. And when he finally understood he was confused. Confused because it sounded like the Force wanted him to take a padawan.

Yes, Yes.

Or, well, Ben thought that’s what that burst of near blinding positive sensation was supposed to mean.

Fix, Fix. Padawan of Padawan. Fix.

Alright then, Ben thought. His consciousness was becoming clearer and more coherent the longer the Force had him trapped in this amorphous purgatory. And with his renewed coherency the message, or the demand more like, from the Force was becoming more distinct.

Atone. Atone. Teach the Padawan to Teach the Padawan.

That, Ben had to conceded, was what he’d wanted, wasn’t it. To atone for failing Anakin and, through his mishandling and ignorance, allowing him to travel down the path to darkness.

Return As Was at First Death.

That was a little harder to parse. Ben focused his reestablished sense of self to gently, humbly prod the Force for clarification.

In response he got the sensation of scorching heat, of ash clogging his throat, of sweat sticking his linen tunic to his once youthful body. It was all things that featured in his reoccurring nightmares, and Ben was less than pleased that the Force would show him this.

Less than pleased, but unfortunately understanding. That horrid, fateful night on Mustafar could indeed be considered a “death”. There had been a theory, a concept, a belief that appeared in Jedi texts from before the Reformation that delved into the idea that certain events, life changing experiences or choices signified the death of your current self. Much like shatterpoints, Ben reflected, these “deaths” only occurred when your path in life was irrevocably changed, consequently making you a different person.

So, yes, Ben could see how the Force would consider the tragedy on Mustafar to be his first death.

Return to First Journey of the Will.

Ben hummed in his mind, it was finally beginning to solidify. Journey of the Will, the Force said. He thought back through his life trying to remember when he’d first felt the true unquestionable Will of the Force. An old scarred sadness and grief rose up inside him as he realized what the Force meant.

Melida/Daan and all the violence and horror he experienced there was the first time he’d truly felt and understood the Will of the Force. The Force had guided him to help the Young. To protect the children fighting for the their lives and for peace.

Return. Return. Atone. Fix.

Alright, Ben thought, taking a deep steadying breath now that he realized he was starting to feel his body once more. He thinks he knows what the Force wants from him. He thinks he understands the puzzle pieces it gave him. Now that he knows, that he can guess at the Force’s plan for him, Ben centered his thoughts, the Force filling him up, and for the second time in his existence he let go completely.

Yes. Yes.

*

Opening his eyes once he felt solid ground beneath his feet was both what he expected and not. Ben breathed in the smell of dust and decay and despair. He looked around to orient himself and recognized, from the depths of his cloudy memory, that he was in the capital city of Melida/Daan.

The city was more than half destroyed and mostly abandoned. Mostly, because even with the dwindling populous, both the Melida and the Daan had a base within the city limits. It was also the birthplace and the operation center for the Young.

Ben took a step in the direction he vaguely remembered the entrance to the Young’s underground base to be. And promptly went down on one knee in shock.

The Force had told him, Ben thought slightly hysterically. It had told him that he would return to how he was at his first death. And it hadn’t lied, because instead of the aching creaky joints he had been expecting, with his first step in the past he discovered that he was healthy. Young and healthy and staring at his hands in shock. They were muscled and still had the callouses he’d build up over the course of the Clone Wars. The scars and marks scattered over his hands, earned throughout his years as a Jedi, had faded while he was in the desert. The two suns had beaten down on him relentlessly until he’d prematurely aged, became almost unrecognizable.

Yet here he was kneeling on a civil war torn planet flexing his hands and examining the complete lack of pain and exhaustion that used to plague his body. Lifting his hands to his face, Ben stroked over his neatly shaped and trimmed beard, ran his fingers through his thick and undoubtedly red hair. He patted down his chest feeling the return of his lean, hard won musculature, and finally noticed that he was also clad in his preferred Jedi style robes. A brown under tunic, layered with a cream colored over tunic and tabard, cream colored leggings tucked into his sturdy brown leather boots, and a heavy brown leather belt buckled over the sash around his waist.

And there hanging off his belt over either hip were two lightsabers. Ben stared in shock as he shakily touched the hilt on his right side. He recognized that saber. It was the saber he picked up off the ashy ground in Mustafar and kept locked away in a trunk for twenty years. It was the saber he’d passed on to Luke with a twist of both dread and fondness in his gut.

He forcibly pushed his conflicting thoughts and feelings about the saber to the back of his mind. It was unimportant right now, the Force wanted him to have both sabers as he tried to follow its Will in this distantly familiar time, so he would hold onto both until it was time to let one go.

Jerking his eyes away from that lightsaber, Ben hurriedly moved to examine the other saber. His saber he recognized, but when he went to draw it from his belt a flash of gold caught his eye.

In a daze, Ben pulled the sleeve of his tunic up to expose the other gift the Force had left for him. There wound around his right wrist and securely fastened in place was a tightly woven padawan braid. Anakin’s padawan braid, still adorned with every single achievement bead and colored band he’d earned through their years together as Master and Padawan. It looked just as it had when Ben cut it from his too young padawan mere months into the Clone Wars.

Oh, what a painful torturous gift it was, Ben thought as he stroked a shaking finger along the braid. Then he slowly pulled the cuff of his tunic back in place hiding it from view. A gift and a reminder of why he was doing this, why the Force had granted him this path to journey down.

Rising to his feet, Ben took a moment to close his eyes and recenter himself, to ready himself for the long, and undoubtedly painful journey ahead. He was only allowed a minute of deep breathing, before something, a presence, glanced off his own and drew his attention.

Over the war, through trial and error and some instruction from the Jedi Shadows he’d taken various missions with, Ben learned how to extend his searching presence over the area while still keeping himself hidden from others’ awareness. When he expanded his attention out into the Force looking for who had brushed against him, he was not shocked to find a bright, partially trained beacon in the Force several other, dimmer, presences clustered around it.

Following that bright beacon was easy and Ben found that old war instincts came close at hand as he stealthily made his way through the city. He only had to travel a few blocks before he found them.

A group of children, all emaciated and dirty and dressed in rags, carrying blasters in inexpert hands as they quietly as possible hauled their scavenged supplies down the street.

Ben kept himself hidden as he drew closer, observing the hunting party with keen eyes. There were five of them. Four between the ages of five and ten being lead by an older, more experienced - if only just so - boy, barely a teen. He was in better shape physically than the other children, though still dangerously underweight with dark circles of stress and exhaustion under his eyes that Ben could see from thirty feet away.

The boy, the teen, was the lookout. He moved along the outer edges of the group with his head on a swivel, as the clone troopers would have said. Every sound, every shadow, had the teen’s sharp eyes darting around. Ben watched as he followed at a distance. When the group came to a misshapen manhole cover, the teen used the crowbar hanging from his belt and levered the cover off. Then he stepped back and placed his back to the hole in the ground keeping watch as the other four children, hastily dropped their supplies down into the dark and quickly scurried down the ladder after.

When the last child had disappeared down into the sewer, the teen took a minute longer to examine the area, a frown of concentration on his face, before he too climbed down the ladder and struggled to tug the cover back over the hole after him.

Ben remembered this. He remembered going on supply runs with small teams of children. He’d been on practically every single run since he’d joined the Young. With his temple training, mostly initiate level though it was, it was still enough to give them a warning if they were about to be ambushed by a group of Elders.

Ben stayed in the shadows just watching the area, his eyes kept flitting back to the manhole. He felt a sensation of disconnect in his mind. The memories of the supply runs, protecting the younger children, being the lookout, guiding them through the perilous streets, were suddenly so clear that watching it happen before his eyes was surreal.

But it did teach him one thing. Ben realized that though he can remember his own time on Melida/Daan, he didn’t feel like that scared young teenager he’d just seen disappear down a manhole was him. When he looked at that serious, freckled, dirt smudged face, Ben didn’t feel like he was just looking at a copy or a holo of himself. The things he’d experienced since he was a traumatized fourteen year old had so vastly shaped him that seeing himself as he was then made it all the more apparent that from this moment on he and Obi-Wan Kenobi would be completely different people.

Judging that enough time had passed that the group of children were either back at their center of operations further through the maze of the sewers or nearly there, Ben stepped out of the shadows and made his way over to the manhole.

A little flick of the Force and the manhole cover floated soundlessly to the side. Jumping down into the dark, Ben landed lightly in a half crouch then straightened up and used the Force to float the cover back over the entrance. The sewer was then plunged into an uneven patchy darkness from the misshapen cover blocking out most of the sunlight.

He didn’t get a chance to orient himself and choose a direction to head in before a voice from the darkness further down the tunnel made him freeze.

“Don’t move.”

Ben held still and waited. He debated putting his hands up in a show of surrender, but thought from what he remembered of his own frayed nerves at the time, any unexpected movement would be ill-advised.

“Who are you?” came from the shadows about ten feet in front of him.

“My name is Ben,” he replied, his voice steady and calm. He didn’t try to use his Force presence to project any soothing feelings, it would just spook his new companion.

“Why are you following us?” the voice asked, suspicion and a hastily squashed thread of fear.

“I thought I might be able to offer my assistance,” Ben said, then since he hadn’t gotten shot yet figured his could push a little. “Might I know who you are, young one?”

There was a tense pause and Ben could feel the indecision and worry and just a thread of hope drifting along the Force before it was clumsily closed off again.

Finally after a long moment, there was a light scuff of shoes on concrete and Ben’s interrogator took a hesitant step into the light.

“I’m Obi-Wan Kenobi,” the almost painfully young teen said with a glint of defiance in his clear blue-green eyes, a blaster held ready in his steady hands.

Despite the threat the teen tried to present, Ben could do nothing, but smile gently and greet him with warmth.

“Hello there.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 2: Hello there.

Chapter Text

“Hello there.”

Obi-Wan shifted on his feet keeping his eyes on Ben. The boy was still suspicious, but he could see just a hint of hope underneath.

“Why are you here?” Obi-Wan asked, almost demanded. And Ben couldn’t really blame him. At this point he was convinced his master and the Order had abandoned him to fend for himself.

“I was following the Will of the Force,” Ben responded, and kept as much truth in his words as possible. Obi-Wan, for though he was young and untrained, would still be able to feel the lie through the Force. “I’ve since found myself stranded here with no way off planet.”

That hope growing in Obi-Wan’s expression was almost crushing in its intensity when the boy ruthlessly shoved it down. He didn’t release the emotion into the Force, Ben noticed, just shoved it down deep inside him.

“I-I thought the Order would declare Melida/Daan a lost cause,” Obi-Wan said, skeptically waiting for Ben to fumble on his response.

“They might have,” Ben replied honestly. He didn’t know if they had in truth, when he’d gotten back to the temple in his past, he’d been so heartsick and felt so guilty that he couldn’t make himself look up the official mission report to know for sure. “I don’t take direction from the Council, however. I follow the Will of the Force.”

He wasn’t quite sure how Obi-Wan would respond to that justification since he remembered his master using “the Will of the Force” as an explanation and excuse for any number of catastrophic and troublesome schemes.

Apparently, Obi-Wan had less negative associations with the phrase, because he gave no outward reaction.

He was biting his lip and his shoulders were hunched, waiting to be disappointed as he asked, “So, you’re- you’re here to help us? To help the Young?”

Ben tipped his head as if conceding. “It would appear so, but could you explain to me exactly what is going on here? I know Melida/Daan has been at war for generations, but I don’t know much about the current state of affairs?”

It was true enough. Ben needed to know exactly when in his tenure as General of the Army of the Young the Force had landed him. It would be the defining factor on how he moved forward.

“There’s two factions of Elders,” Obi-Wan started, his young face serious, “the Melida and the Daan. They’ve been fighting each other for longer than anyone can remember. Then there is the Young,” he said, flashes of pride and wariness tangling in his Force presence. “They are the children of the Melida and the Daan. They’ve banded together in an attempt to get both sides to stop fighting. It-” he slumped as much as he could while still maintaining his Jedi Initiate trained posture, “it hasn’t been going well.”

Ben took a moment to formulate his response. Obi-Wan had given him an accurate and concise overview, but he hadn’t exactly given a clue to how far into the war they were. He also took the time to really observe Obi-Wan, with his eyes and with the Force.

The boy was fourteen, barely. He’d been with Qui-Gon Jinn for maybe a year and some change at this point. Judging by the length of the boy’s padawan haircut, he’d been on Melida/Daan for almost five months. Just before it started to get really violent, and the elders started to actively hunt the children.

Ben hated to do it, didn’t want to see the shame he knew would appear on Obi-Wan’s gaunt young face, but if he was going to do as the Force asked of him, then he needed to get this out of the way.

“Where is your master, young one?” he asked as though the question had just occurred to him.

Obi-Wan jolted and that expected unwarranted burst of shame tinted his cheeks, before the boy suddenly frowned again in confusion. “How did you know I am- I was a Jedi?”

Ben hummed and brought a hand up to stroke at his beard out of habit. “It may have been a long while since I’d spent anytime around Jedi younglings, but I can still recognize temple training when a mind as bright and warm as yours brushes up against mine.”

The look of astonishment on Obi-Wan’s face had Ben smirking as he added, “Also, grown out or not the padawan haircut is very distinctive.”

That earned him a small hesitant chuckle, before Obi-Wan’s lightened expression fell and his hand came up to fiddle with the burned uneven lock of hair behind his ear that was all that remained of his padawan braid.

The teen’s eyes lowered to the ground and Ben could taste the sadness and shame in the air.

“I’m not a padawan anymore, Master Ben,” Obi-Wan said as if admitting a great sin. “I defied my master and chose to leave the Order so I could help the Young.”

To this day, Ben could still remember the cold despair and betrayal he’d felt when in a fit of anger Qui-Gon Jinn had snatched his braid and sliced it haphazardly off with his lightsaber. He remember the heat of the green plasma blade against his face, the faint burn on the shell of his ear, and the shame he’d felt every time another Jedi’s eyes would flick to the short stubby replacement braid.

When he was a traumatized teenager he’d been thankful Qui-Gon hadn’t followed old tradition and ripped the braid from his scalp.

Now, as an adult, a Master himself that had seen unspeakable horrors and witnessed what a truly defiant and rebellious padawan was like, Ben couldn’t stop his surge of anger at the uncaring and hurtful actions of his old master.

Ben knew deep in his bones that even when he was a young inexperienced knight struggling with a recalcitrant padawan, that there was nothing in the galaxy that could have made him abandon a young Anakin in the middle of war zone where children were being slaughtered.

Stroking his beard again as though in contemplation, Ben gave another thoughtful hum. “And I suppose the Council was able to holocall in and officially accept your resignation?”

The boy blinked at him confused. “What? No. Master Jinn said that if I chose to stay then I could no longer be a Jedi.”

“I see,” Ben drawled again, and met Obi-Wan’s frown with a raised eyebrow. “Then I’m sorry to tell you, Padawan Kenobi, that you are in fact still a member of the Jedi Order.”

“I don’t understand,” Obi-Wan said and Ben felt another surge of anger. There was so much that, upon two decades of reflection, he realized the Jedi failed to teach their younglings. The correct and proper procedure for renouncing your vows and leaving the Order amicably was the least of them.

“When a Jedi, be they Initiate, Padawan, Knight, or Master, wishes to resign from the Order,” Ben began explaining in what Anakin had once dubbed his Boring Educational Lecture voice, “they must first inform the High Council of their intentions then formally renounce their vows with a minimum of two Council members as witnesses.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes were wide like saucers now, Ben couldn’t hold back a smile at the look of agonizing hope in his gaze. “So, you see, my dear,” Ben continued still smiling gently at the young boy, “you are very much still a Jedi, and your master, Master Jinn you said,” he had to suppress a scowl, “did not have the right or the authority to give you such an ultimatum.”

“But-,” Obi-Wan cut himself off reluctant to continue lest Ben snatch this bit of hope away from him, “but I defied my master. Isn’t disobedience grounds for dismissal?”

Ben couldn’t help, but snort at that. Memories of Anakin and Ahsoka both flashing through his mind. “I dare say there would be no Jedi left in the Order if every padawan that ever argued with or disobeyed their master was tossed out on the street.”

Perhaps that was a bit flippant since Obi-Wan had spent the last few months thinking he’d thrown his whole future and everything he’d ever worked for away.

As it was, it was plain Obi-Wan was still afraid to hope. “Really?” he asked cautiously

“Yes, young one,” Ben nodded reassuringly. “If a padawan’s conduct was indeed in question, then the master would have to present the padawan before the Council and they would examine the evidence and then decide if dismissal was the correct course of action.”

A gust of breath burst from Obi-Wan’s lungs. A sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob followed by a strangled and raspy, “Oh, well then.”

Slightly alarmed by the way Obi-Wan was beginning to gasp for breath, Ben took a step forward. “My dear, are you alright?”

That must have been the straw that broke the ronto’s back, because the boy gave a painful sob and hunched over. He tried to cover his face with one hand as the other lowered the blaster to point at the floor.

“Oh dear.” Even after all these years, there was always a moment of panic that froze Ben in place when confronted with a crying being. He thought he’d been trained out of the instinctive flight response over the long often tear laden years of Anakin’s padawanship, but to no avail. Ben was still freezing up at the first sign of tears.

“I’m- I’m sorry, Master,” Obi-Wan tried to push out through his gasping sobs. “I know such- such displays of emotion are- are unbefitting of a-”

“Hush, Obi-Wan,” Ben ordered softly as he finally stepped up and wrapped his arms around the boy’s trembling body. “Everybody, even Jedi, need a good cry every once in a while. Anyone tells you different is a lying liar who lies,” as Ahsoka had so eloquently accused more then one person of being over the years.

With the boy’s face pressed into his chest, Ben could feel the hitch of a chuckle momentarily interrupting his sobbing.

When he started rubbing the boy’s back in soothing circles, Obi-Wan seized the implied consent and reached his blaster free hand around Ben’s waist. He grabbed a fistful of tabard and squeezed himself as close as he could get to the older man’s chest.

A little taken aback by how readily Obi-Wan had reciprocated the physical comfort, Ben blinked into the darkness and dug deep into his memory. Physical affection was not forbidden in the Creche, hugs and hand holding and arms wrapped around one another was fairly common in the younglings. Less so for the initiates, but Ben could distinctly remember Quinlan and Bant ambushing him with hugs or leaning against Garen as they did their classwork together. When had physical touch started to become foreign to him?

During his time with Qui-Gon, Ben realized. The old master had not been one for comfort or affection and had strictly maintained his personal space and expected Ben to maintain his own. He’d silently and not-so-silently discouraged any overtures or expectation of physical connection. Obi-Wan it seemed had not yet been with Qui-Gon long enough to have that instinctual need to experience friendly physical touch with another being trained out of him.

Sighing tiredly, sadly, Ben let his chin drop down on top of Obi-Wan’s dirty, disheveled hair and brought his other hand up to cradle the boy’s head. He held the teen firmly and securely against himself and extended his Force presence. Blanketing the boy’s own trembling, confused presence in soothing warmth he could feel the storm of happiness, sorrow, and a hint of anger roiling inside it.

“It’s alright to feel like this, Obi-Wan,” Ben told the boy, murmuring just loud enough to be heard over the slowing hitches of his breath. “There is nothing wrong with having and expressing your emotions.”

Things he should have realized and should have told his padawan long ago.

“When you are ready,” he continued, drawing his fingers through the shaggy hair at the back of the boy’s head, “when you have gained and learned all that you can from them, I will help you share these emotions with the Force.”

Ben knew his choice of words would possibly puzzle the teen, since the temple standard instruction was to “release the emotions into the Force”, but he couldn’t bring himself to say that. To imply that discarding your emotions was the correct and healthy thing to do.

He received a timid nod in acknowledgment, then Obi-Wan turned his face deeper into his chest. Ben let him. Simply standing still and steady against the boy’s torrent of feelings, holding him firm and safe.

Eventually, Obi-Wan’s grip on his tabard loosened and the boy reluctantly began to shift till there was some space, not much but some, between them.

Ben ducked his head to meet the boy’s eyes. They were red, swollen from the tears and the stress, but once again clear and bright. There was a new light in them, a little flame of hope.

“Ready?” he asked gently, receiving a nod. “Alright, now close your eyes, breathe with me, and follow along in the Force.”

Their breathing synced and they entered a very light joint trance. When Ben knew he had Obi-Wan’s attention in the Force he modeled gathering all his anger and frustration and sadness as if scooping up water with the palms of his hands. Obi-Wan attempted to repeat the action, he was a little slower and more clumsily, but he succeeded.

“Good,” Ben murmured, aloud and through the Force. Then he scattered his emotions into the Force, almost as though tossing the water pooled in his hands into the air. Obi-Wan did the same with a little more vigor than was needed, but it got the job done. Economy and elegance would come with practice.

“Very good,” he praised, opening his eyes to see a bashfully pleased flush on Obi-Wan’s face. “You did well, young one.”

“Thank you, Master,” Obi-Wan murmured back. “That felt different than how Master Jinn taught me.”

“That’s because it was different,” Ben answered. “But that is a lesson for another time.”

Demeanor suddenly serious again, Obi-Wan finally stepped out of Ben’s orbit and gained some personal space between them. “You said you were lead here to help,” Obi-Wan stated. “Will you help us fight the Elders and win peace for this planet?”

As a seasoned general, Ben wanted to answer yes. As an experienced Jedi Master, he wanted to caveat his answer with a lecture on diplomacy and negotiation.

As Ben Kenobi, who was both of the those things and neither, he responded, “I will help you in any way that I can. But,” he continued when the boy seemed unsatisfied, “as they say on Tatooine, there is more than one way to skin a womp rat.”

The bewildered look on Obi-Wan’s face made Ben laugh. Smile wide and eyes creased kind of laugh, the sound echoing pleasantly off the tunnel walls. It was the first genuine laugh he’d had in many, many years.

*

The journey down the tunnels toward the Young’s base of operations was taken up by Ben questioning and Obi-Wan providing a more comprehensive understanding of the situation.

In short, supplies were few and far between. They haven’t lost anyone in two months, but their injuries were numerous and debilitating. There was some disturbing movement, or lack there of, from the Melida and the Daan, and the Young haven’t witnessed a skirmish between the two in the last three weeks or so. Which everyone, according to Obi-Wan, agreed was a bad sign.

Ben knew it was indeed a very bad sign. At this point in the war, the Melida and the Daan have come to a truce to fight together against a common enemy. Their children.

When they finally turned the last corner and stepped into the center of Young, they fell quiet and Obi-Wan let Ben take in the sight before him.

It was both exactly and nothing like how he remembered. The smell of unwashed bodies had faded with time, the small desperate faces that turned to look at them had blurred in his memory, but the feeling of despair, fear, and grim almost idealistic determination permeating the Force was just as gut clenching as he remembered.

The silence that had fallen upon their arrival was tense, and Ben was a little heartbroken to see all those little faces looking at him with apprehension and fear. He did the only thing he could.

He smiled gently at them and greeted, “Hello there.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 3: The Will of the Force

Chapter Text

“Hello there.”

Ben’s greeting echoed in the tense silence until a small commotion toward the back of the gathering caught everyone’s attention.

“Why have you brought an Elder here, Obi-Wan?” demanded a young teenage boy with a grave serious demeanor and an impressively commanding presence.

“This is Jedi Master Ben, Nield,” Obi-Wan answered calmly, not cowed by the other Young leader’s scowl. “He’s come here to help us.”

“That’s what Master Jinn claimed, too,” Nield retorted. “And he left you here to save himself.”

Beside him Ben felt Obi-Wan tense. He remembered that instinct to defend the one you felt indebted to. No matter how much they took you for granted and abused your trust. And what Qui-Gon had done to him, leaving him behind then refusing to return with help out of spite, was indeed an abuse.

It was also not the time or place to work on Obi-Wan’s lack of self worth and misplaced devotion.

He placed a calming hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder when the boy opened his mouth to argue.

Meeting Nield’s challenging gaze head on, Ben chose his words carefully. “What Qui-Gon Jinn did was not how a Jedi Master typically conducts themselves. I followed the call of duty to this planet and as a Jedi Master I plan to do all that I can to save as many of you as I can. That,” he finished solemnly, “is my sole objective.”

While Nield’s eyes were boring into his steady gaze looking for insincerity, Ben felt Obi-Wan give an imperceptible twitch under his hand.

No doubt he’d picked up on the only lie Ben had told him since their meeting.

“Does Obi-Wan vouch for him, Nield?” came another confident voice through the crowd of children.

Ben flicked his eyes toward the newcomer and felt his heart give a little flutter. Cerasi, he realized with an ache of fondness and grief, she looked just as he remembered her.

Cerasi stepped up next to her co-leader and met Ben’s gaze with calm confidence. “Do you believe he truly wants to help us, Obi-Wan? That he will not just leave because it got inconvenient?”

“I do,” Obi-Wan replied. “He followed the Will of the Force. He wasn’t sent on the Council’s orders. There is no other reason for him to be here.”

Ben almost let the corner of his mouth twitch with amusem*nt and a little flash of pride. He hadn’t realized that even at this age he was pretty good at lying with the truth. That he didn’t expose Ben’s own lie only told him that Obi-Wan was waiting to ambush him when they weren’t surrounded by dozens of trigger-happy child soldiers.

The teenage girl nodded in acceptance of Obi-Wan’s words and turned to gesture back the way she and Nield had come.

“Let’s find a quieter place to talk.”

Ben released Obi-Wan’s shoulder and followed the three leaders of the Young through the still watching crowd, deeper into the maze of the sewers.

It was worse now, Ben realized as they walked by what passed for their medical area, that feeling of pain and loss and fear staining the Force. As a Force sensitive child grows and learns how to attune and connect to the Force so does their actual sensitivity to it. That your sensitivity cannot change as you age is a fallacy he hadn’t really comprehended until he was on the Council and suddenly there was a great many things he was learning that the Council kept to themselves.

So he had to wonder, if his sensitivity to the suffering of others had increased as he’d aged due to his growing connection to the Force, or was Obi-Wan just so inured from being constantly inundated with it day in and day out for the last few months that he didn’t feel it as deeply as Ben. The boy didn’t once flinch as they continued on their journey. Not even when that flickering little light finally winked out almost peacefully from behind the med-area divider, followed by a grieving cry and soft childish voices of comfort.

Ben stood frozen, lingering in front of the flimsy moth eaten curtain cordoning off the injured and sick from the other children. It had been a long time since Ben had felt a life so young and full of potential wink out. The last time it had been a desperate slave child running for their freedom in the desert.

He remembered being woken from a dead sleep as the child’s bright light wandered miles off in the desert. He remembered getting into his speeder and racing toward them, trying to reach them before the coming sandstorm or the Tuskens or dehydration got to them. In the end it was the child’s master that was quicker than Ben. He didn’t find what was left of their little body until twenty minutes after he felt them die.

After he’d laid the child to rest in the desert, where they’d found their freedom one way or another, after he’d hunted down the slave master and bashed their head in with a Tusken gaderffii, Ben spent the next three days camped out on the ridge above the Lars farm. Just watching Luke in all his bright, shining, innocent glory go about his chores and follow along on his aunt’s heels as she taught her seven year old nephew how to repair and calibrate the vaporators.

Ben didn’t realize that he was projecting until he felt Obi-Wan tentatively brush against the jagged edges of his mind. The boy had felt the roiling emotions inside of him, he realized when he focused his blurred vision on Obi-Wan’s cautious searching gaze. He’d felt the shock, the grief, the burning cold rage, and the resigned loneliness.

“Master Ben?”

Taking in a deep steadying breath, Ben dipped into himself and shared his emotions with the Force, clearing his mind and his heart so he could look at Obi-Wan with some measure of calm.

“It has been a very long time since I’d felt one so young become one with the Force,” he answered the boy’s unasked question.

Obi-Wan’s face tightened in understanding, his eyes flicked to the curtain then down to the floor. “I think that was Demi,” he said and Ben didn’t want to know, but he knew Obi-Wan needed to tell him. “She got stabbed in the belly last week. There-,” he swallowed thickly, but forged on, “there wasn’t much any of us could do.”

There wasn’t much Obi-Wan could do, he meant. Ben, now an adult and more familiar with hopeless situations than any being in the galaxy should be, knew that sometimes, despite all your efforts, even with all the advanced medical technology at your fingertips, the Force could still simply choose to take someone into itself. Sometimes there just wasn’t anything you could do.

The Force was whispering that it was Demi’s time to join it.

But how do you say that to a grieving, guilty teenager that has taken far more on his shoulders than he ever should have?

“Come,” Ben murmured quietly, stepping away from the curtain and letting an arm drop around Obi-Wan’s shoulders for a brief comforting squeeze. “Let’s catch up to Cerasi and Nield. We have much to discuss.”

The answer, Ben thought as Obi-Wan leaned into his side for a brief moment before he straightened up again and pulled his confident though unpracticed Jedi mask back around him, was that you didn’t.

*

The war room, as Nield had coined it, was an alcove in a larger turn off in the sewer maze. There was an empty munitions crate that served as a table and a smuggler-rigged string of star lights hung from the ceiling to illuminate the area.

They spent the next thirty minutes going over every bit of information the Young’s scouts and supply teams had gathered on the movements and assets of the Melida and the Daan. There was really only one thing that Ben’s attention kept drifting toward, more so than the arms depot or medical supplies cache. It was the Melida controlled communications tower.

At some point in the past five or so years, someone, the Melida or the Daan it wasn’t clear, had taken out nearly every single interplanetary signal tower on the continent. A near complete communications black out except for whoever had access to that one tower, which included a holonet port and communications console, on the outer edge of the capital city.

That was the tower the original call for aid to the Jedi Order came from. It was the only place on the planet capable of calling for help and Ben knew the Young needed to get access to it in order to succeed in their goals.

It was going to be one of the most heavily guarded places on the planet as well.

Ben sat on the cold concrete floor stroking his beard and working various strategies and scenarios in his head. Nield and Cerasi were busy arguing over whether they should hit the arms depot or the just as heavily monitored medical supply cache.

Obi-Wan it seemed had been observing him with keen eyes. “What are you thinking, Master Ben?”

“I’m thinking that unless we get access to that communications tower all this will be for naught.”

“What do you mean?” Nield demanded angrily. “I thought you said you were going to help us!”

“And that’s exactly what I plan to do,” Ben returned, calm in the face of the teen’s sharp anger. “But with the Melida and the Daan potentially allied and no longer fighting each other, the Young are vastly out numbered,” he explained. “Hitting the arms depot and medical supply are both stop gaps. In the long run neither is going to win you this war.”

The three teens were silent as his words hit home. Obi-Wan, from the resigned stoic expression on his face had already come to this conclusion on his own, but Nield looked ready to fight him on it and Cerasi was struggling to keep her optimistic determination.

“You mentioned the communications tower,” Cerasi latched on, bolstering her optimism, “what would the comms tower give us that weapons and bacta can’t?”

Ben gifted the girl with an approving smile. “If we get access to the comms tower, we can send out a request for aid from off planet. We can hopefully contact some allies and maybe bring in reinforcements.”

That brought all three leaders of the Young up short. Obi-Wan spoke his doubt first, “But, Master, the Jedi Council have probably declared the Melida/Daan conflict unsalvageable if Master Jinn gave a report on what happened here.”

“It’s possible,” Ben acknowledged, though he realized not looking up the formal mission report in his past and refusing to speak of his time away from the Order with anyone, even a mind healer, was coming back to bite him in the ass. He didn’t actually know why the Council hadn’t sent anyone else to the planet to at least evacuate the children if they’d deemed the adults themselves beyond help.

“But,” Ben continued pushing everything he didn’t know off for later contemplation, “the Jedi are not the only peoples in the galaxy that might be induced to step into a foreign conflict for the sake of children.”

“Who other than the Jedi would even care about a bunch of kids fighting in a war?” Nield grumbled doubtfully.

“If you are willing to be a little patient with me, I’ll spend some time thinking that very question over before I return with options for you.”

Cerasi bit her lip in thought, then with a frustrated shrug from Nield and a reassuring nod from Obi-Wan, she met Ben’s gaze. “We’ll give you until tomorrow, then we’re going to choose another target regardless.”

“Fair enough,” Ben accepted and climbed to his feet, still distantly marveling at the fact that his knees didn’t actually creak every time he moved anymore. “Obi-Wan, will you show me someplace quiet where I can meditate?”

Standing as well, the boy waved at the other two teens in farewell and gestured for Ben to follow him, “This way, Master.”

*

Obi-Wan lead Ben to a bitter-sweetly familiar little dead end far enough away from the hustle and bustle of the center of the Young that the noise faded easily into the background.

Ben gave the boy a thanks of dismissal and settled into the standard cross-legged meditation pose Master Yoda taught to all the younglings for the past several hundred years. He let himself fall into a light trance and waited patiently.

He was rewarded by a frustrated huff and the scuffing sounds of a gangly teenager flopping dramatically on the floor in front of him.

The feeling of Obi-Wan’s unimpressed regard prodded at his mind and Ben peeked an eye open to see the boy staring at him with an expectantly raised eyebrow. Ah, apparently he hadn’t learned that from long term exposure to Qui-Gon, it seemed he came by his judgmental eyebrow honestly.

“Yes, young one?” he questioned neutrally. “Was there something you wished to ask me?”

Obi-Wan eyed his Jedi mask of calm and scowled. “What are you doing?”

“Whatever do you mean, Obi-Wan? I’m simply trying to meditate on our limited options,” he replied truthfully.

It seemed however, that after less than a day in his presence, Obi-Wan had started to recognize when he was using his words to manage the situation around him. Ben had forgotten just how easy it had been, even at this age, for him to spot a con artist.

Which, in hindsight, made Palpatine’s successful machinations all the more galling.

“You lied,” Obi-Wan half asserted and half accused, “to Cerasi and Nield when you said you’re solely here just to help the Young. You told the truth about everything else, but you lied about that. Why?”

He couldn’t fault the boy for being suspicious. Ben remembered that it took him a very long time to trust the wisdom and intentions of authority figures after the horrors of his time with the Young.

Relaxing out of his stiff pose, Ben made sure Obi-Wan could feel his sincerity in the Force as well as in his expression.

“I told a half truth because the Will of the Force is often more complicated than we’re taught in the temple,” Ben said, knowing he was edging close to controversial territory. “Yes, I followed the Will of the Force here, but I didn’t follow it to the planet. I followed it to you. The Will of the Force was not to help the Young, Obi-Wan, it is to help you,” he confessed.

“Me?” Obi-Wan repeated incredulous and verging on betrayed. “So you’re not going to help the Young at all, are you? Are you going to try to get me to return to the temple? I won’t leave,” he declared defiant and edging on panicked, “I chose to stay and help the Young, you can’t make me-”

“Peace, my dear,” Ben cut in before Obi-Wan could work himself up and his volume could rise any higher and attract attention. “I’m not going to try and force you to leave, Obi-Wan.”

“You’re- you’re not?” the boy hedged confused.

“No,” Ben assured, then explained, “The Will of the Force I followed was to help you. You have already followed the Will of the Force to help the Young. How can I in good conscious possibly prevent you from fulfilling your duties as a Jedi simply because they might seemingly conflict with mine?”

Obi-Wan sat staring at Ben in wide-eyed shock. “But our chosen paths do conflict, don’t they?” he asked hesitantly.

“Well,” Ben rubbed at his beard in thought, trying to word this in a way Obi-Wan with his limited life experience might understand. “If I interpreted the Will of the Force to be to help you return to the Jedi Order, then that could entail taking you back by force.”

“Interpreted?”

“Yes, Obi-Wan,” Ben replied, “What many Jedi don’t understand, what they don’t teach you in the temple, but you must learn from experience, is that the Will of the Force is malleable. Very rarely will the Force be so specific in its request that there aren’t many different ways to follow its directives.”

The boy’s brow was wrinkled in distress now. Trying to assimilate what Ben was telling him into his inflexible temple upbringing was contradictory and confusing.

“But Master Jinn always seems so sure,” Obi-Wan less protested and more asked for clarification. “He always seems to know exactly what the Force wants from him.”

“And maybe the Force is that specific to Master Jinn,” Ben forced himself to be diplomatic. “But I’ve found that when the Force makes a request of me, its Will comes in a form more akin to guidelines than actual rules to follow.”

Obi-Wan still seemed discomforted with the concept. And Ben not for the first time was distantly angry with just how sheltered and myopic the temple teachings are. It took him a long time and much tragedy to admit that he didn’t really gain an understanding and relationship with the Force until he’d abandoned most of the more stringent rules of the Order.

“Alright, take our situation for example,” Ben said pulling Obi-Wan out of his whirling mind. “You interpreted the Will of the Force to be assisting the Young in accomplishing their goals, correct?”

“Of course!” Obi-Wan answered. “How else would I help them?”

“You could have interpreted it as finding a way to evacuate all the children off planet and away from the war all together,” Ben replied patiently. “Or you could have interpreted it as you going behind enemy lines and killing all the Melida and the Daan yourself so the Young would be all that’s left.”

“Oh,” the boy’s shoulders slumped in comprehension and horror at the idea. It hadn’t occurred to him that the Will of the Force could even be interpreted differently at all much less in such a dark and violent way. “I hadn’t even thought about it that way.”

Ben smiled reassuringly at him. “That you did interpret the Will as assisting the Young in their goals instead of either extreme is very admirable and it shows great wisdom and empathy in your nature.”

It was heartbreaking that Obi-Wan’s expression was a mix of surprised pleasure and doubt at the compliment.

“What about the Will that brought you here?” Obi-Wan asked, pushing past the moment, uncomfortable with the praise and suddenly eager to gain a better understanding of this new and different way of thinking about the Force.

Ben was under no circ*mstances going to to tell this young, innocent, traumatized teenager the exact details and history that lead to him being stranded on Melida/Daan. But he could tell him the truth, from a certain point of view.

“I was brought to this planet because the Force wanted me to help you,” Ben answered. A vast over simplification, but it rang just as true in the Force as anything else he could have said.

“I could have chosen to follow that request by forcing you back to the safety of the temple on Coruscant,” Ben outlined earning a displeased look from Obi-Wan. “Or,” he continued on with an apologetic curl of his lips, “I could have chosen to stay hidden from you and simply protected you from a distance until you had accomplished your task alone.”

Obi-Wan thought about that then asked, “So, how did you actually interpret the Will of the Force?”

Flashing him a smile, Ben said, “I interpreted it as doing everything I can to help you accomplish your goals as safely as possible. I don’t want to interfere with the path the Force has set you on, I want to be there to guide and assist you as you travel it.”

If Obi-Wan hadn’t been so distracted by this shift in his worldview, he might have noticed the parallel in Ben’s words to the pledge a Master makes to a new Padawan. As it was, Obi-Wan was assimilating this knew knowledge and point of view into himself and true to his nature, learning everything he can from it.

“How about you meditate on this topic with me while I meditate on our possible allies,” Ben suggested with an understanding smile.

Nodding in acceptance, Obi-Wan situated himself to mirror Ben’s cross-legged position letting their bent knees touch lightly. He got himself comfortable before beginning his trance and flashed Ben a knowing look.

“You already have an ally in mind don’t you?”

Ben hummed and closed his eyes, breathing out to center himself, he let a smirk curl at his lips as he replied, “How do you feel about Mandalorians?”

*

TBC...

Chapter 4: How do you feel about Mandalorians?

Chapter Text

“How do you feel about Mandalorians?”

It took Ben five minutes to calm Obi-Wan down enough to get him to meditate. He’d forgotten just how much fear mongering and cultural misinformation went around in the creche and initiate dorms.

It’s been so long, that Ben was having to scrape up the most dusty memories to get himself a timeline of Mandalorian history for the current era. It also reminded him that it wasn’t until the New Mandalorians were placed on the throne by Republic hands that the general public stopped being rightly, respectfully wary of the Mando’ade.

Ben had spent a long time thinking over many things in his isolation and came to some realizations about the world and about himself. One of those realizations was that while he had truly loved Satine Kryze, he could no longer support her approach to pacifism. One of the reasons the Empire had been able to genocide the Mandalorians at all was that Satine had spent her years on the throne disarming and tearing out her culture’s identity by the roots.

Peace and nonviolence are admirable goals, but not at the expense of everything that made you what you were. The only thing her radical politics had accomplished was to further divide her people, open up the way for Death Watch to gain an even greater foot hold, and weaken the remaining populous so much that when the Empire turned its great eye on Mandalore, it was the span of a few days before the whole planet was lost and any remaining Mandalorians were so deep underground they may as well have been Jedi for how rare and almost mythical they would become.

Ben now knew why it was so easy for Satine to take the throne from the larger and stronger factions of traditional Mando’ade. In hindsight, her rapid political ascension had all the fingerprints of Sith machinations.

Palpatine wanted the Mandalorians weak, because they, like the Jedi, would have been the only ones in the galaxy that could have and would have stood up to his tyranny.

Ben hadn’t known it until it was already cemented in his mind that one of the things he was going to accomplish here in his past was to hopefully give the Mandalorians a fighting chance.

It could be argued that it wasn’t part of his path set by the Will of the Force, but like Ben had just finished explaining to Obi-Wan, it was all up to interpretation.

In the year he’d spent on the run on Mandalore, Ben discovered that the only other culture or people he’d encountered that spoke to such a deep and personal part of himself was the Jedi. He didn’t know if he and Obi-Wan, with the changes he was sure to wrought on history, would be sent to protect Satine and her father, Duke Adonai Kryze, and he couldn’t deprive Obi-Wan of that feeling of connection and belonging that the Mando’ade had given him.

The traditional Mandalorian warrior philosophy and spirit, while often times at odds with Jedi mores, were almost exactly in line with what Ben was going to be attempting to impart onto Obi-Wan so that he in turn could teach it to Anakin. Mainly their ability to utilize their anger and righteousness and love to bolster themselves in battle without letting the emotions control their actions or cloud their judgment.

He was sure he could probably teach Obi-Wan that himself, but the Mandalorian codes of honor and conduct were just as important. And looking back on some of the things Anakin had said and done during the war, a philosophy of honor more grounded in harsh reality than what the Jedi offered would not go amiss.

Ben felt Obi-Wan begin to rise to the surface out of his meditation. Following in the boy’s wake, Ben let his eyes slowly open to find a much calmer, but still dubious Obi-Wan watching him expectantly.

“You said you’d explain about Mandalorians after we’d meditated.”

“Indeed, I did,” Ben replied jovially, earning himself a scowl from the teen.

Clearing his throat, Ben schooled his expression and began to lay it all out for the young teen.

“Ideally, we would request aid and assistance from the Jedi Council,” he started, earning a nod from Obi-Wan. “However, it is almost a week’s travel from Coruscant to Melida/Daan, and that’s not taking into account the time it will take the Council to deliberate and debate and plan. If they even agree to send help.”

“Surely, as a Master, the Council wouldn’t disregard your request,” Obi-Wan protested.

They would if it was discovered there was no record of him whatsoever at the Coruscant Temple or any other temple for that matter. Ben, having witnessed the Council’s tedious and oftentimes ineffectual deliberation process, knew that they’d be more concerned with discovering his true identity than sending him aid. In some ways Anakin had been right about the Council and how out of touch and detrimental they could be, and it just made Ben feel awful knowing he’d always disregarded his padawan’s complaints.

“Whether they did or not, the Council is a bureaucracy and there are procedures they must follow before they can even bring a request for help up for deliberation,” Ben said and watched Obi-Wan’s face as it wrinkled in knee-jerk protest.

It was better the boy got over his blind obedience to the Council and their prerogatives sooner than later. Ben can guaranty about fifty percent of what they will be doing from here on out will not have the Council’s approval or oversight.

“But why go to the Mandalorians?” Obi-Wan pressed with a little childish curl of fear in his voice.

Ben reached forward and placed a soothing hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I promise you, Obi-Wan, that the Mandalorians will not hurt you. And if they try they will have to go through me first,” he pledged and the Force sang with the violent truth in his words.

After all, if you want to attack the padawan, make sure the master is dead*.

It resonated with Obi-Wan, Ben could tell, because the teen’s shoulder’s untensed fractionally and some of the fear melted from his eyes. He was still, however, doubtful and confused.

“You believe they’ll help us?”

“I believe,” Ben replied, “that Mandalorians love children more than they hate Jedi. Especially these Mandalorians.”

“How do you know that?” He’d almost forgotten the sheer amount of questions an adolescent could pepper him with in such a short amount of time.

“I spent a year on Mandalore when I was a padawan,” Ben told him. “I learned a lot about the culture and the people. One thing they prize more than glory in battle or even their armor, is children. The more traditional Mandalorians have a saying, ‘Children are the Future’.”

Obi-Wan seemed to chew on that for a long moment, then nodded, accepting the older man’s wisdom. “That implies there’s more than one kind of Mandalorian,” he pointed out.

Ben grinned. He wondered if it was narcissistic to feel pride that the kid was so clever. “I’ve kept up with Mandalorian politics since my time there. At the moment there are three main political factions,” he elaborated. “There are the New Mandalorians, who reject anything and everything of their culture even remotely related to violence and war.”

“You say that like it’s bad,” Obi-Wan interrupted, catching the disapproving tone of his voice. “Wouldn’t it be better if they wanted to be peaceful instead of conquering other worlds?”

“Peace is admirable and something we all should strive for,” Ben nodded. “But you have to understand, the Mandalorians are a creed not a race. They are just as diverse and unique a people as the Jedi. Some of that stemmed from conquering other worlds and assimilating the local populace, but it’s since evolved into the mentality that anyone can become a Mandalorian, regardless of race or species, as long as they follow the Mandalorian tenets.”

Understanding, melted over the teen’s expression. “And since that tradition started because of violence and war it is also being rejected by the New Mandalorians.”

“Exactly.” Nodding Ben continued, “Nearly everything about their culture has its roots in their conqueror beginnings. To reject their history-”

“Is to reject their entire culture,” Obi-Wan finished. He had a sad contemplative look on his face. Ben was sure he’d never had to consider that there could be a darker side to peace and pacifism. He knows it wasn’t until he was knee deep in blood on the battlefield that he truly understood why some people abhor pacifism and claim it cowardly.

“The New Mandalorians are slowly, but surely becoming more and more hom*ogeneous,” Ben explained, “A by product of rejecting their armor, their language, and their core beliefs, is also losing a great deal of their individuality.”

A quiet moment passed where Ben reflected on the good intentions and misguided actions of a woman he loved and lost long ago and Obi-Wan tried to marry these new concepts with what his Jedi teachings had instilled in him all his life.

“On the other side of the spectrum from the New Mandalorians,” Ben broke the silence and caught Obi-Wan’s interested gaze, “is Death Watch or Kyr’tsad in Mando’a, the language of Mandalore.”

The boy grimaced. “Let me guess, they want to return to the ancient Mandalorian ways of conquest.”

“Yes,” he answered grimly. “They value the glory of battle and violence even above their traditional tenets. They’ve been known to kidnap children and brainwash them into being soldiers for Death Watch. They have no compunction about killing anyone who protests their atrocities or gets in their way.”

There was a renewed spike of fear inside Obi-Wan, but Ben gave his shoulder a comforting squeeze.

“We are going to stay as far away from Death Watch as humanly possible,” he promised.

Nodding, Obi-Wan pushed the feeling away and turned back to the matter at hand. “So, who’s the third faction?”

“The third Mandalorian political faction and the largest, are the True Mandalorians, the Haat Mando’ade.”

The teen leaned forward a little, truly interested. “What are they like?”

“They are traditional in the way that they follow the Resol’nare, the six tenets of Mandalorian culture.” Ben counted off on his fingers, “Wearing their armor, speaking the language, defense of oneself and family, raising their children as Mandalorians, contributing to the clan’s welfare, and answering the call of the Mand’alor, their king.”

Obi-Wan tilted his head in thought. “That doesn’t sound so bad.”

“It’s not,” Ben agreed with a smirk. “But like the Will of the Force it’s up to interpretation.”

“How do the uh- Haat Mando’ade interpret the tenets?”

“Very literally,” he answered, “and somewhat strictly. Their founder was a historian and used ancient Mandalorian philosophy and literature to make the foundations of the Supercommando Codex, the rules and codes of honor all True Mandalorians must live by.”

Obi-Wan became a little disgruntled at his reply. “So you’re saying no matter where they fall on the political spectrum all Mandalorians believe it’s their way or you’re out the airlock.”

Chuckling, Ben couldn’t argue with his assessment. “They are a very proud and stubborn peoples.”

“And you want to ask these True Mandalorians for help? What makes you think they will listen to us?”

Good question and it took a moment for Ben to form a satisfactory reply that didn’t include “the Will of the Force” or “time travel”.

“The True Mandalorians are largely mercenaries and bounty hunters, though very selective in the contracts they take.” He rubbed at his beard absently, gathering his thoughts. “Since their founder, Jaster Mereel, died and his son, Jango Fett, has stepped up as leader, they’ve relaxed somewhat in their rigid adherence to the Codex.”

A cheeky gleam came into Obi-Wan’s blue eyes, “Use it more as guidelines than actual rules?”

Huffing at the boy quoting him, Ben just gave him a wry look. “I believe that because the True Mandalorians value children above all else, if we present our situation in a certain way, we can gain their assistance despite the fact that we cannot pay them.”

Obi-Wan turned his eyes down do the floor as he contemplated what Ben said. “And you’re sure they won’t just kill us for being Jedi? Or, you know, not even answer our holocall?”

“Like I said, young one, the Mandalorians love children more than they hate Jedi.”

*

It wasn’t that simple though. Ben and Obi-Wan brought the idea before Cerasi and Nield and with further explanation and history into the Mandalorians for the two leaders, they agreed to begin strategizing.

“We need to lighten the guard around the communications tower,” Ben said.

“Yeah, but how?” Nield shot back.

“By making it seem like they are needed elsewhere,” Ben replied with infinite patience. He survived Anakin Skywalker going through puberty, he can deal with a paranoid suspicious teenage soldier.

“How do you mean?” Cerasi frowned.

“Attack them somewhere else,” Obi-Wan suggested. “Make it seem like we really want to capture the arms depot or medical cache. They’d divert more troops to guarding those and leave the comms tower more vulnerable.”

“Very good,” Ben praised earning a light blush across the boy’s cheeks. “We should have scouting parties spotted in the area, maybe we attack an in-going or out-going convoy, make easily suppressed and ineffectual runs on the target.”

“We’d get slaughtered,” Nield argued. “If we let ourselves fail, they’ll kill us.”

“It’s all in the method of attack,” Ben countered. “Small attack forces, sabotage the terrain, strike fast and loud and hard and retreat before the smoke clears.”

A reluctantly considering look replaced Nield’s seemingly permanent scowl. “Use their confusion to our advantage. Maybe make it seem like there are more of us than there are.”

“Exactly.” Ben turned back to the hand drawn map of the city spread out on the munitions box between them. “It’s not much different than what you have been doing already,” he said, “with your small teams going into the city and gathering supplies. We just need to train and strategize in a more organized manner.”

Irregular warfare was what Ben meant. He’d learned a lot on the various campaigns of the Clone Wars. And one of those was just how effective a small, trained surprise team could be against a large organized force. He and his men had that strategy used against them on several Separatist worlds and they’d in turn used it to devastating effect on Separatists when they were out manned and out gunned.

When they, Ben and the three young leaders, had all agreed on a plan and a target, they wanted to begin implementing it the very next day. Ben refused. Though the Young had been fighting this war for almost two years by themselves they’d also experienced heavy losses from lack of training and understanding of warfare tactics in general. He refused to put these children further in danger - and these attacks would definitely be dangerous - when he could increase their chances of all of them coming home by taking a few days to actually train them with the weapons they’d stolen and pilfered.

Nield didn’t like the delay but when Ben pointed out that they were out numbered almost three to one and had vastly less experience in battle than the Elders that had been fighting their entire lives, he conceded the point. With Cerasi’s logical approach to decision making and Obi-Wan’s ready faith in a Jedi Master’s wisdom they gained the five days for Ben to train and prepare their attack forces.

Later, as he corrected a seven year old’s grip on a blaster much too big for them, Ben didn’t know if his soul could take the battering from the shame of preparing children for war. And yet it was sickeningly familiar, because wasn’t this exactly what the Jedi had done with their own younglings during the war.

*

TBC...

Chapter 5: Two Lightsabers

Chapter Text

Over the last few days in between training the chosen attack squads of children, Ben had taken the time to pull Obi-Wan to the side and talk.

Sometimes it was just about how the Young were progressing and their chances of victory. Sometimes Obi-Wan had more questions about the Will of the Force or even the technique Ben used for sharing his emotions with the Force. Once he realized that Ben wouldn’t admonish him from asking too many or too simple questions, it was almost like a floodgate had opened. Obi-Wan wasn’t shy about asking anything and everything.

It was amusing for Ben to witness and it both warmed his heart and made him desperately sad. He could only vaguely remember a time in his own life when he had felt comfortable questioning an adult. It had been when he’d been an initiate, the last time that he hadn’t second guessed himself afraid that he was being a burden or an annoyance. And Ben knew exactly where that negative thought process came from.

The first year of his padawanship with Qui-Gon Jinn had been filled with reluctant lessons, silent but condemning observation, and stiffly polite requests for quiet. When they’d reunited after Melida/Daan it had been another almost two years before they’d found their footing in their partnership again. By that time, when it might have been more welcome, Ben had already been trained out of expressing his natural curiosity and fascination with the world.

He would never say that he didn’t appreciate having Qui-Gon for a master. He’d been a good master, after they’d come to an understanding and became less teacher and student and more partners. Having been Qui-Gon’s padawan had shaped him, it was part of the reason he was the man he was today. Ben would not regret the time they spent together.

That didn’t mean that he was ever going to let another bright young man suffer his master’s careless and distant mentorship. It had been two years into Anakin’s padawanship before Ben could admit that even if Qui-Gon had lived he would have gone before the Council and protested the man’s claim to Anakin.

Being confronted with himself, young and bright and eager, before he’d been shaped into the serious, self sufficient padawan he’d learned to be through trial by fire made that conviction all the more strong.

Even if Obi-Wan wanted to go back to Qui-Gon, Ben was going to do everything in his not inconsiderable talent as a negotiator to convince him otherwise. Even if it took longer to convince Obi-Wan to take Ben as a master, he would not risk the teen going back to Qui-Gon.

It was the evening before their first planned assault on a resupply convoy from the arms depot, and Ben was reaching an almost meditative state as he meticulously went over every single weapon the Young were going to take on the mission. He was checking and cleaning every inch of them so there would be no chance of a malfunction or misfire in the heat of battle. They’d all had to learn the hard way during the Clone Wars that a well maintained weapon could be the difference between life and death.

Speaking of weapons.

Obi-Wan had searched Ben out in his spot in their makeshift armory. He sat down next to the older man and had been silently alternating between watching him and surreptitiously eyeing the lightsaber at his hip for the last fifteen minutes.

Ben waited until he was finished reassembling the blaster in his hands then set it aside. Turning he looked at Obi-Wan with a patient expression.

“Do you have a question, young one?”

Obi-Wan blushed, realizing he’d been caught, and quickly turned his eyes down to his lap and his fidgeting fingers.

“You’re not a dual wielder,” the teen finally said after a moment of gathering his courage.

“How can you tell?” Ben prompted curiously.

Obi-Wan’s eyes flicked back to the hilt hanging from his right hip then he leaned forward a little to see the hilt on his left. “Dual wielders’ hilts always match. Too large a difference in styling and the imbalance can throw you off during a fight.”

Humming, Ben let a little of his amusem*nt and approval show in his eyes. Obi-Wan straightened from his slowly increasing hunch when he saw that the master wasn’t going to scold him.

“Perhaps I chose to keep my first lightsaber after acquiring a new crystal,” Ben suggested, to see where the boy’s observations and logic would lead him. It was not uncommon for a Jedi to get a new crystal upon becoming a Master, but they generally surrendered their previous saber into the temple’s emergency collection in the Gallery of Sabers.

Wrinkling his nose, Obi-Wan examined the hilt closest to him through the force. Suddenly his eyes widened and he darted his gaze up to Ben’s face.

“It’s not yours,” he said with surprise. “That kyber crystal doesn’t recognize you as its wielder.”

He’s not wrong, Ben thought. However, “Does it feel hostile towards me?”

Brow furrowing in concentration, Obi-Wan slowly shook his head. “Not really. It’s not- hm…” he co*cked his head to the side his attention on the saber as if he was listening to something. “Allies,” he finally concluded with a bit of curiosity. “It considers you an ally.”

Ben lifted the saber off his belt, held it in his hand for a moment, then offered it for Obi-Wan.

Jolting a little in surprise, the boy met Ben’s eyes in question, the older man simply held the hilt closer to him.

Slowly, Obi-Wan took the hilt from him turning it over in his hands, but he didn’t light it. His eyes stayed fastened on the saber, deep in thought. “There’s something…” he trailed off then looked alarmed, “there’s a Shadow on this crystal.”

“Yes,” Ben acknowledged solemnly. “That lightsaber belonged to great Jedi Knight. He was intelligent, and brave, and so very kind.” He sighed and met Obi-Wan’s intent blue eyes. “Which made it all the more devastating when he Fell.”

The teen sucked in a sharp breath. “Who-,” he hesitated, but when Ben stayed patiently silent, he asked, “who was he to you?”

Ben closed his eyes against the familiar lance of an ache in his chest, but knew that if he wanted Obi-Wan to trust and respect him he would have to tell the truth. Despite his young age, Ben knew that unlike Luke, due to his experience with masters with Fallen padawans, Obi-Wan would be able to see straight through any kind of truth from a certain point of view.

Knowing the teen would spot the motion, Ben still couldn’t help slipping a couple fingers inside his right cuff to touch the braid around his wrist when he answered.

“He was my padawan.” It sounded like a confession. He watched a neutral expression tightened across Obi-Wan’s face and a guarded shutter fall over his eyes. When he continued he didn’t try to hide the shame and sadness that hadn’t ever faded over the decades.

“While I cannot absolve him of the choices he made, I will not deny that I claim some responsibility for his Fall.”

That brought Obi-Wan’s emotional withdrawal up short. “How so?” he asked warily.

And Ben knew well why he was so ready to retreat, so cautious of the older man’s answer. He remembered what it was like to always be held up to Xanatos’s shining, twisted example and found wanting. For all that Qui-Gon looked for darkness in everyone around him and faulted Obi-Wan - and Ben – for any hint of imperfection from the accepted Jedi emotional detachment, he never once took responsibility for the part he had played in his own padawan’s destruction.

“I failed in my duty to him as his master,” Ben admitted honestly. “There were signs that he was struggling, that he was conflicted, and I either didn’t recognize them or ignored them. For that I hold myself to blame as well.”

Obi-Wan looked back down at the hilt still in his hands and almost seemed to curl in on himself. “You don’t think he was destined to Fall?” he asked quietly, almost like he was afraid of Ben’s answer.

“No.” Ben had to work on regulating his tone as a surge of anger rose up in him. In defense of the sweet, stubborn padawan he’d loved and in his own defense. He remembered being accused himself as a child of being destined to Fall. Damn it, Qui-Gon Jinn. “No, Obi-Wan. I do not think anyone is destined to Fall,” he repeated insistently, drawing the teen’s doubting, but hopeful gaze back to his.

“Even if they show signs of being arrogant and aggressive?” the boy asked hesitantly.

Forcing himself to blow out a steadying breath, Ben reached out and grabbed Obi-Wan by the shoulders gaining the boy’s wide-eyed and startled undivided attention. “Don’t let anyone try and tell you you’re destined to Fall, Obi-Wan. Everyone has the potential for darkness inside of them. It is a choice to surrender to the Dark side, just as it is a choice to stay in the Light. Anyone that claims otherwise needs to take a long hard look at themselves.”

The boy looked slightly scandalized, but the shining hope was quickly over taking his surprise. “You- you really believe that?” he asked almost breathlessly.

“Yes, young one,” Ben gave him a reassuring smile. “I really, truly do.”

The boy’s breath hitched and he squeezed his eyes shut as if trying to fight off relieved tears. Ben just continued to hold him secure by the shoulders to give him something to anchor himself. When he felt Obi-Wan gather up his roiling emotions and share them with the Force just as Ben had taught him, the older man didn’t keep a proud smile off his face.

“Good job, my dear. You’ve been practicing.” He released the boy’s shoulders and they resumed their companionable personal space.

Obi-Wan opened his eyes and flushed lightly at the praise. “It doesn’t feel as harsh and final as the method Master Jinn taught me. I can actually still recall the emotions, but they don’t feel as overwhelming or strong as they did in the moment. Almost like looking at a holophoto instead of being in the middle of the scene.”

“An apt description, young one,” Ben nodded.

They resumed their silence for a few moments, Ben watching Obi-Wan out of the corner of his eye as the boy slowly turned the lightsaber hilt over and over in his hands. After a long moment the boy, offered the saber back to the master.

After staring at the lightsaber in the teen’s hand, Ben placed his hand over the saber and closed Obi-Wan’s fingers back around it. The rightness of that choice echoed through the Force.

Blinking at the motion, the teen met Ben’s gentle gaze. “I don’t understand, Master.”

“We are going into battle tomorrow, Obi-Wan,” Ben said solemnly. “You were right, before. I am not normally a dual wielder, I do not need a second lightsaber and I would not have you unarmed when your life is in danger.”

A soft, understanding look entered the boy’s eyes and he nodded deeply, as close to a bow as he could get sitting on the floor. “Thank you, Master. I’m honored to wield this saber.”

Ben just ruffled Obi-Wan’s hair in answer drawing the boy out of his serious demeanor and breaking the slight tension in the air. Huffing out a laugh, the teen brushed off the older man’s hand, but couldn’t hide the pleased little grin curling at his mouth.

Clipping his borrowed lightsaber onto his belt, Obi-Wan glanced at Ben a little nervously. “Would you- would you tell me about him sometime, your padawan?”

The question took him aback for a moment, but Ben brushed his surprise away and gave the boy an accepting smile. “After this operation is over and we’ve contacted the True Mandalorians. We’ll have a little time then for a few stories.”

“Yes, Master,” Obi-Wan accepted his answer readily. He hopped up off the floor and dashed away to begin practicing his long neglected katas and to familiarize himself with his new weapon, leaving Ben to stare after him.

Not for the first time since meeting his younger self, Ben wondered what kind of relationship they would have had if he and Anakin had met as teenagers, as equals, instead of as Master and Padawan.

*

“When you are out there on the battlefield,” Ben told the children lined up in front of him waiting to leave their base and march to their first attack, “you must remember what you are fighting for.”

He looked into their solemn, frightened faces. “You are not fighting to kill the Elders, or to defeat your enemy. You are fighting for a better future for yourself and your friends.” It was important, Ben knew, that they understood the distinction. Not understanding the difference had caused more than one Jedi to Fall during the war.

“Remember that what is most important is your life and the lives of those that you love. At the end, when all your enemies have fallen and there is nothing left to challenge you, it will not be a victory if there is no love for you to return to.”

His words held a weight to them, and Ben knew that despite their so very young ages, every single child before him understood exactly what he was saying.

They would go out there into danger and they would fight their parents and elders and relatives, and they would protect the their friends in battle, because they knew that if they didn’t all that was awaiting them was more death and more war.

Ben met Obi-Wan’s determined blue-green eyes and received a gentle brush against his mind, a soft request for reassurance and an acknowledgment of his words. Returning the touch with a steady, unwavering press of his Force presence, Ben saw the teen’s tense posture relax and a more confident expression come over those young features.

Turning his eyes back onto the other fifteen soldiers of the Young before him, Ben met their newly determined expressions with a grim one of his own.

“Let’s begin.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 6: Critical Thinking

Chapter Text

Their blue plasma blades clashed together in a teeth grinding hum and Ben grinned in the face of Obi-Wan’s stubborn determination.

“Good! Now, keep your stance balanced,” he called over the electric sound of their blades meeting and bouncing off each other. “Better! Wrist firm, elbow bent!” Obi-Wan met his attack and deflected. “Good combo, young one!”

The teen’s pursed lips gave a twitch starting to grin at the praise, but Ben lunged forward again. At first, Obi-Wan tried to meet the attack, but, uncertain he could follow through, spun away in the other direction to avoid a training burn. As it was called when a lightsaber set on training intensity left little red welts on unwary initiates and padawans.

“Excellent!” Ben called as he reengaged Obi-Wan, noting the boy’s doubtful expression.

“But I didn’t deflect or block your blow, Master,” Obi-Wan protested, skittering backward on carefully balanced feet to gain some distance from his sparring partner before attacking again.

“Dodging an attack is just as valid a strategy when fighting with a weapon that can burn through durasteel,” Ben replied dryly, then disengaged from the lock he allowed Obi-Wan to catch him in glancing his blade off the boy’s wrist on the way.

Hissing at the flash of burn on the exposed skin, Obi-Wan jumped away and more clumsily shifted into a guard stance. The shock of the pain and the suddenness of the Jedi Master’s move had thrown off his rhythm.

Allowing the pause, Ben shifted into a traditional dueling ready stance meeting the teen’s wary gaze. “What could you have done while our blades were locked that might have gotten you the upper hand or distracted your opponent enough that you could retreat and regroup?”

Brow furrowing slightly in thought, “That doesn’t involve my saber?” Obi-Wan clarified.

At Ben’s nod, he offered, “Use a Force-push.”

“You could,” Ben agreed. “But if you are fighting another Force user, they can easily nullify that action with their own ability. What else?”

“Pull another weapon,” Obi-Wan asserted with more confidence.

“Every Jedi should carry a back up weapon,” Ben nodded in agreement once again. “Whether it be a knife, a blaster, or something else. Lightsabers for all that they are sacred to us do have a tendency to become lost or broken in the chaos of a battle or surprise attack. What else?” he prompted again.

Obi-Wan frowned in thought, but smoothly blocked Ben’s blade when he attacked without warning. They traded blows and thrusts and parries and slashes back and forth for a few more minutes, but it wasn’t until Ben had engaged their blades in another lock that Obi-Wan understood where the master had been leading him with his question.

Ben just caught the glint of realization in Obi-Wan’s eyes before the boy took one hand off his lightsaber and socked him in the nose.

An involuntary grunt of surprise and pain escaped Ben as he jolted back from the blow, disengaging their sabers and taking a couple quick steps backward to gain some space.

When his eyes stopped watering and Ben was able to see beyond his Soresu guard stance, Obi-Wan was watching him warily. His body was tense and his brows were pinched as if waiting to be scolded.

“That, dear one,” Ben said after blinking that last couple of stars from his vision, “was a perfect example of using an unconventional attack to surprise and distract your opponent.”

The teen let out a breath of relief. His stance became more natural and relaxed, but he didn’t break his guard form. “As you say, Master. Shall we continue?” There was cheeky gleam in his blue-green eyes to go with the grin starting to curve at his mouth.

Ben huffed in amusem*nt and grinned back at his pad- at the boy. “Yes, let’s.” Then he lunged and they were off, clashing blades while trading advice and inquiries back and forth.

*

An hour later, after a long series of cool down stretches, Ben and Obi-Wan were seated next to each other leaning against the concrete wall, passing a dented water canteen back and forth. The teen was taking heavy breaths and his red hair was matted to his head with sweat. Ben on the other hand was in a body coming off the height of the Clone Wars. He’d fought harder and longer and on little to no rest for years at this point. Sparring with a very young padawan was not going to exert him over much.

“I don’t think most of that was temple approved lightsaber dueling,” Obi-Wan commented a hint of a question in his wry observation.

“No,” Ben agreed. “It has been a very long time since I’ve been to the temple on Coruscant. I’ve learned that sometimes the difference between life and death can be the ability to improvise and think outside the box.”

At Obi-Wan’s silent request, he continued, “The established lightsaber forms have their place and are very effective, but when you are fighting an opponent that is just as good or better than you are, being able to surprise them, to be unpredictable will almost always save your life if not win you the day.”

“You’ve fought a lot of Force users, then?” came the boy’s quiet conclusion.

“I have.”

The boy was silent for a moment. “Our instructors said that it’s rare nowadays that a Jedi will have to fight another lightsaber wielder.”

“Then they do you and all their students a disservice,” Ben replied grimly. He remembered how shocking and harrowing that first battle with Maul on Naboo had felt. How unprepared he’d truly been to fight for his life against another lightsaber wielder. Sparring in the temple in a controlled safe environment was completely different from battling a dark-sider.

Even if Ben had more experience than most in true saber on saber conflict, having to train himself out expecting his opponents to follow the rules of engagement had lead to many near misses in the first months of the Clone Wars.

“The Jedi like to forget that they are not the only ones that can build or wield a lightsaber.” His words came out calm, but he knew Obi-Wan could hear the dark edge of experience underneath. “The Jedi are not the only Force using sect in the galaxy nor are kyber crystals the only gem that can power a saber. I have even come across Force null criminals that carry dead Jedi’s lightsabers as a show of skill and intimidation.”

Obi-Wan paled at the thought, because taking a dead Jedi’s lightsaber as a trophy was anathema to their beliefs.

“To assume that Jedi are the only dangerous beings that carry lightsabers in the galaxy is hubris.”

The teen shifted uncomfortably next to him, but didn’t protest. He knew that Ben’s words had a ring of truth to them. Obi-Wan had experienced how detrimental those assumptions could be.

After all, nobody expected Xanatos to actually attack them much less with a synthetic crystal in his lightsaber.

“You don’t think much of the Order, do you?” It had been a thought that nagged in the back of Obi-Wan’s mind almost since he’d met Master Ben. The techniques he’s taught him, some of the philosophies they’ve discussed, Obi-Wan was very sure that most of the Masters on the Council if not all of them would label Ben a heretic.

“Oh no, I think the world of the Jedi,” Ben protested, his heart giving a little lurch as he turned to meet Obi-Wan’s cautious gaze. “They are my family, my home,” he said, his sincerity clear in the Force. “But I have been away from the order and structure of the temple for a long time. I have seen and experience more in my travels than most of the masters in the temple, and a great deal of it was very bad. Being so removed for so long has given me a clearer perspective on our flaws and mistakes as an organization.”

Obi-Wan didn’t speak for a long time, just sat quietly thinking over Ben’s words. Finally he met the older man’s eyes again. “I don’t know if you’re right, or that I agree with everything you’ve said, but I will think on this more and try to come to my own conclusions.”

Ben couldn’t help the proud smile that curved at his lips as the boy continued to hold his gaze hesitantly. “That is all I could ever ask of you, Obi-Wan, and a far wiser reaction than most Jedi Masters I’ve seen confronted with the same opinions.”

The boy flushed at the praise, pleased that his- the Jedi Master wasn’t disappointed in his response.

Ben could imagine that Obi-Wan was used to being met with disapproval and disappointment from masters in response to anything that even hinted at questioning the traditional Jedi dogma, or even that individual master’s own interpretations. He could remember very well the look of cool disappointment on Qui-Gon Jinn’s face whenever he had dared to question his master’s approach to anything, be it a mission or a Jedi teaching.

Obi-Wan shifted in his seat to get more comfortable and Ben’s eyes were drawn to Anakin’s lightsaber clipped securely on the teen’s belt.

“How is that saber working out for you, Obi-Wan?” he asked, lightly.

“Oh,” Obi-Wan pulled the saber from his belt and held it in his hands just contemplating it. “It’s been working really well, Master,” he said, then hesitated.

“But,” Ben prompted.

“No, no ‘but’, not really,” Obi-Wan rushed out worried that he sounded ungrateful for the opportunity to once again wield a lightsaber. He paused again, then, “It’s just that, the crystal is changing.”

Alarmed, Ben demanded, “How so?” concerned that Anakin’s Shadowed kyber was growing hostile to the young teen.

“It’s not bad!” Obi-Wan tried to reassure the older man. “Or at least I don’t think it’s bad,” he corrected realizing that he didn’t actually know what was making the crystal change.

Taking a deep breath, Ben shoved down the doubts whispering in the back of his mind that giving such a bright, innocent young Force sensitive a Shadowed saber to wield had been a bad idea.

“Describe how the kyber crystal is changing,” he said sounding more calm and collected. “I might be able to posit a theory as to what’s happening.”

The teen gathered his thoughts before starting, “On our third attack of the arms depot I deflected a blaster bolt from hitting Joli. The crystal released an odd resonance into the Force, but then I had to defend against another Elder and got distracted. When we returned to base I examined the kyber through the Force and it almost felt like…” he bit his lip, doubt and puzzlement in his words, “I could have sworn it felt like the bruising on the crystal had lessened.”

Ben’s heart gave a painful beat, then his academic mind began spinning. “Has it only happened once or have you noticed more change?”

“The resonance only happened the once,” Obi-Wan answered turning the saber over in his hands absently. “But I think the shadows have receded a little more since then.”

“May I?” Ben held out a hand in request. The boy readily set the lightsaber in his palm. “I think I might know what’s going on.”

The Jedi Master was quiet as he closed his eyes and sought out the song of the Shadowed kyber crystal in the Force. Ben examined it for several long moments, distantly aware that Obi-Wan was watching him in fascination, following along with his manipulation of the Force in his search for answers. Finally he pulled his awareness back and opened his eyes.

“Well, that’s unexpected.” Ben blinked down at the saber in his hands, feeling his heart lighten and the Force sing around him. “Though, I shouldn’t be surprised really.”

“You know what happened to the kyber, Master?” Obi-Wan inquired eagerly.

Ben hummed in agreement and flashed the teen a bemused, but pleased smile. “I do believe you are healing this crystal, young one.”

“Me?! What do you mean ‘healing it’?” the boy burst out in shock.

Huffing in amusem*nt at the teen’s reaction, Ben asked, “Do you know what turns a Sith or dark-sider’s lightsaber red?”

Frowning at the older man’s perceived evasion, Obi-Wan replied, “We covered the Sith/Jedi wars in history lessons last term. The Sith have red lightsabers because they Bleed their crystals.”

“Yes, but did your teacher explain how one goes about Bleeding a kyber crystal?” Ben pushed, knowing that the subject was definitely not on the curriculum and in fact inaccessible in the archives to anyone not in possession of the rank of Master.

The teen opened his mouth to reply then paused and frowned again when he realized that, “No, they never explained.”

“I’m sure as an initiate you learned that kyber crystals are inherently attuned to the Light side of the Force, correct?”

Obi-Wan nodded suddenly listening a lot more intently. He recognized the tone of voice Master Ben would use when he was about to impart potentially heretical wisdom, controversial opinions, or supposedly forbidden knowledge on him.

“The Sith Bleed their crystals by bombarding them with intense negative emotions that channel the Dark side of the Force, like rage, hate, and fear,” Ben explained. The juxtaposition of his calm voice and the disturbing subject matter made a shiver go up Obi-Wan’s spine. “Eventually this will result in corrupting the kyber and bending it to the dark-sider’s will turning it red, thus the term Bleeding.”

An uncomfortable thought came to Obi-Wan’s mind. “Was-” he hesitated, but remembered that Ben had been so patient with him so far, never discouraging his questions no matter what they were. He gestured to the saber still held in Ben’s hand. “Was that crystal being Bled.”

Expression turned considering, Ben was quiet for a moment, but eventually shook his head. “Not intentionally, I would think. From what I understand, the process of Bleeding a kyber crystal takes time and concentration.”

His answer just gave Obi-Wan another flood of questions. Ones he didn’t particularly want to ask for fear of hurting the older man – What exactly happened when your padawan Fell, that he didn’t have the time? And ones that he really wanted to ask, but didn’t want to potentially get the Jedi Master in trouble for – Where did you learn so much about the Sith?

“No, this crystal is merely bruised,” Ben continued with a tendril of sadness in the Force. “Short but intense exposure to the Dark side left it tainted, but not thoroughly corrupted.”

Obi-Wan bit his lip in debate then scooted a little closer to the older man, hoping to lend comfort with his presence. It must have worked because Ben gave him a small smile and the sadness around him evaporated like mist.

“So, what exactly do you think is happening to this kyber crystal, now?” Obi-Wan prompted gently.

“This was all a bit of a round about way to explain my theory, but I did think you needed a little context,” Ben said with a wry twist of his mouth gaining him a raised eyebrow from the teen. “Like a kyber can be corrupted and Bled, it can also be healed.”

Eye’s widening, Obi-Wan’s burst out again, “But how? I’m not doing anything special to it!” Despite his disbelief, he’d never heard anything like this before and it was fascinating.

“By flooding the crystal with the Light side of the Force, of course,” Ben answered plainly, ignoring the teen’s skepticism. “Inundating a corrupted crystal with love, and joy, and serenity will purge it of the taint and return it to a healthy connection with the Force.”

“Fascinating,” Obi-Wan repeated out loud, then paused as doubt flashing across his face. “But I’m not channeling emotions like that through the Force. How can I be healing it, then?”

“Are you not?” Ben countered with a pointed raised eyebrow. “When you felt the kyber resonate in the Force were you not using the Light side of the Force to help you protect your friend, someone you love? Were you not feeling joy and excitement while we sparred just now?”

The teen opened his mouth to deny it, but closed it just as quick. He realized Ben was right, he had been feeling those emotions very deeply while touching the Force, but, “I wasn’t doing it on purpose,” he protested quieter.

“It doesn’t matter, young one,” Ben assured him with a smile. “You are so light and so bright, your heart is so generous, the way the Force moves through you is something special. Truly I’m not surprised you’re strong enough to begin healing the crystal even without conscious intent.”

Obi-Wan was flushed with the praise and bit down hard on his lip to keep his doubt to himself. He’d noticed that a dark emotion would shade the Jedi Master’s expression every time he protested his own worth or abilities. But there was a nervous thought on his mind.

“You’re not displeased, are you?” he asked and when Ben’s expression creased in puzzlement, “I mean, that I’m changing your padawan’s kyber crystal. You’re not upset?”

Ben’s whole demeanor softened and he gave Obi-Wan’s worried look an even more gentler smile than before, “No, my dear,” he said and lifted a hand to brush the shaggy bangs from the teen’s face, taking the moment to cradle his gaunt freckled cheek in a calloused palm. “I’m thankful,” he told him. “So very, very thankful.”

A blush so deep burned at Obi-Wan’s face, but he couldn’t stop himself from leaning into the touch. It had been so very long since an adult had touched him so gently, so kindly. He hadn’t realized he’d felt starved for physical comfort until his eyes were burning and he’d reflexively lifted a shoulder to trap the older man’s hand in place.

Stiffening suddenly, Obi-Wan jerked his shoulder back down and tried to pull his face from Ben’s touch, his lips parted with an apology on his tongue.

“Don’t be sorry, Obi-Wan,” Ben admonished kindly as he stroked his thumb over the teen’s cheek before withdrawing his hand. “There’s nothing shameful about accepting comfort and kindness when it’s freely offered.”

Swallowing thickly, Obi-Wan nodded. He’d had a flash of Master Jinn’s disapproving scowl when he’d realized what he’d done, but the understanding and reassuring expression on Master Ben’s face swiftly swept the image away.

Perhaps, Obi-Wan thought, as they sat in companionable silence, Master Ben’s verging on heretical teachings weren’t so bad. Actually he knew they weren’t bad, but it was nearly fourteen years of conflicting philosophies he was having to reconcile. But Master Ben was so kind and patient and so very Light, Obi-Wan could feel it in the Force. The man had great sadness in his past that much was evident, but it had done nothing to dim his near blinding Force presence.

“I shall return this to you, Obi-Wan,” Ben broke the silence long minutes later when he noticed the boy’s roiling emotions and thoughts finally leveling out and calming. “I believe it is in good hands.”

Obi-Wan took the lightsaber offered to him, and smiled when the weight settled in his palm and the kyber inside trilled a light almost-greeting into the Force. “Thank you, Master. I will continue to wield it with honor.”

Ben suppressed a chuckled. Had he always been so very formal and serious at that age? He couldn’t remember. When Obi-Wan clipped the saber to his belt once more and turned back to him, Ben shifted the tides of the conversation.

“We should go over what will happen tomorrow one more time,” he said, because tomorrow was the day they were finally going to move on the communications tower and Ben didn’t want to take any more chances than they had to when it was Obi-Wan’s and thirty other children’s lives on the line.

The Young, with assistance from Ben, had spent the last two weeks making surprise attacks on the arms depot, and any convoys coming in or out. They hadn’t lost anyone, thank the Force, but they had suffered a few injuries. Ben was grateful for the twenty years alone in the desert for giving him the time and motivation to learn at least rudimentary Force-healing.

They had been using teams of ten to fifteen children armed with an abundance of improvised flash-bang explosives and various other loud, bright, distracting implements. Ben had been on every single attack, using the Force and his wartime experience to make sure the children stayed relatively safe and to take out any Elder that got too close.

They’d discussed it, Ben and the three leaders of the Young, whether he should reveal his being a Jedi by using his lightsaber or not seeing as he was just as accurate and deadly with a blaster, thanks to his clone troopers insisting he practice. It was decided, however, that the risk to the Young was not worth the small advantage of keeping Ben’s identity a secret.

Tomorrow was going to go differently than the other strikes they’d executed. The thirty children of the Young, chosen and volunteered to go on this mission, were going to split their forces. Half would attack the arms depot again to keep the Elders as distracted as possible and the other half would hit the medical supplies cache. Apparently the Young’s efforts had been so convincing that the Melida and Daan had taken guards not only from the comms tower to bolster the arms depot, but also the medical cache.

If they were going to be providing a distraction they might as well make the most of it.

While the children of the Young were distracting and stealing, Ben and Obi-Wan would be the only two to infiltrate the communications tower.

Ideally, they would have planned to take the comms tower completely, but the Young had neither the experience, the numbers, or the firepower needed to hold such a strategic target. So, infiltrate it was. Ben and Obi-Wan would take out or incapacitate the guards, take only as much time as they needed to make their holocall and plead their case to the Mand’alor, then they would get out of there and meet back up with the rest of Young.

“What are you even going to say to the Mand’alor,” Obi-Wan asked after they’d rehashed the plan.

Ben paused before answering. He had tried to be as truthful with Obi-Wan as a time traveling older self could be, but he wasn’t sure how to explain the piece of information he was going to use to persuade the stubborn, dangerous Mandalorian.

“I like to keep an eye on the Senate and how they interact with the Order and the Council,” he started, earning himself a mildly frustrated look from Obi-Wan. The teen expecting another critical analysis of the Jedi. “This is nothing against the Order,” Ben placated him when he caught the look. “It has, however, come to my attention that someone petitioned the Senate requesting aid from the Jedi accusing the True Mandalorians of slaughtering civilians, including children.”

“But you said the True Mandalorians value children above all else,” the boy said, bewildered.

“They do,” Ben asserted. “Which makes this accusation very suspect.”

The teen opened his mouth to question him further, then he stopped and a considering look came across his face. He thought back over everything that Ben had told him about Mandalore and the current political climate, before coming to the conclusion, “You think someone is trying to frame the Haat Mando’ade. To use the Jedi to take them off the playing board.”

He felt another flash of pride in just how quick Obi-Wan had put it all together. “That’s what I suspect,” Ben confirmed. “I’m hoping Mand’alor Fett will take this information as a sign of good faith, proof that we are sincere and agree to our request for aid.”

If it all worked out how Ben hoped, the True Mandalorians will not be slaughtered by the Jedi, Dooku -who had lead the force that marched on Galidraan on malicious misinformation from the Senate – will not lose faith in the Order or in himself, and the Young will have the mighty warriors of the Mando’ade to protect and help them in their pursuit of peace.

It was a lot, and so much could go horribly wrong, but Ben had faith. The Force was singing with hope for this plan, and if he believed in nothing else he had to believe in the Will of the Force.

“Well, I hope it works,” Obi-Wan finally concluded.

Ben chuckled at the dubious look on the teen’s face. “So do I, young one. So do I.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 7: First Divergence

Chapter Text

They’d chosen to begin their coordinated assaults a couple hours after sundown. For all that Melida/Daan had been at war for over a century, they hadn’t evolved their strategies very much, therefore their rudimentary guard rotations were much to the advantage of the Young. Especially now that the Young had the GAR’s High General as a military advisor. Not that any of the children knew that about him.

Ben was just thankful that the Elders were so simplistic and shortsighted. It made it that much easier to keep his numerous young charges alive.

He and Obi-Wan were crouched about twenty yards away from the communications tower on the other side of the fence. The guards had been on shift for four of their eight hour rotation. Long enough for the guards to become bored and complacent, but not close enough to the shift change that Ben and Obi-Wan might be caught by their relief if they were delayed.

Beside him, Ben could feel Obi-Wan gathering up all his nervousness and fear and sharing it rather harshly with the Force. Placing a calming hand on the teen’s shoulder, Ben met his wide eyes in the dark, “I will be with you the entire time, Obi-Wan. Have faith in us and in the Force.”

The boy blew out a shaky breath and nodded. “I do, Master.”

“Good.” Ben drew his saber and lit the shining blue blade. It sent a heavy hum into the night, and Ben sliced through the chain fencing in the blink of an eye. Then he and Obi-Wan were racing across the distance and engaging the first of the ten guards stationed around the tower.

Engaging being a nice way of saying that Ben Force-slammed the Elder into the side of the tower with enough strength they could hear bones crack. Then he darted around the corner and took out the two guards coming toward them with quick precise and deadly strikes of his lightsaber. Perhaps it was not the Jedi way, but Ben had long since come to the realization that sometimes protecting someone or accomplishing his goals were more important than leaving potentially troublesome enemies alive simply because mercy was a prized trait among the Order.

Not that he was going to admonish Obi-Wan for disarming - literally – his next opponent then knocking him out. Ben respected his choice and demonstrated that by taking the belts from his dead opponents to restrain and gag the one living Elder.

“Quickly, now,” Ben urged as he sliced through the locking mechanism on the heavy steel door leading into the tower. “Stop the guard in the control room from calling for help, I’ll take the rest of the guards out here.”

“Yes, Master,” Obi-Wan darted into the tower and up the stairs just as the remaining four Elders came running around the corner.

Ben dispatched them calmly and precisely. He made their deaths merciful and quick, not giving in to the anger that he felt as their darkened, violent presences battered against his own.

Just as he was turning to enter the tower and follow the young teen up the stairs, Ben felt a flare of alarm through the Force then a light dying.

Taking the stairs two at a time, Ben burst through the door to the tower control room and took in the sight before him.

Obi-Wan was breathing heavily, his lightsaber still lit and held in a ready stance, an Elder on the floor in front of him with his head three feet from his body.

“He- he said he was surrendering,” the teen stuttered still staring at the body. “I didn’t feel like he was lying.”

Ben flicked his eyes from the blaster still clenched in the dead man’s hand, then looked back at Obi-Wan. “We cannot always depend on our sense of our enemies’ intent in the Force while in battle,” he told the boy, his voice firm, but not unkind. “A soldier with a lifetime of experience has learned to compartmentalize which is its own kind of mental shielding. You reacted on instinct and it saved your life.”

He felt Obi-Wan gather up his conflicting emotions, his guilt, self-recrimination, and shock at his own definitive reflexive response, then he shared them with the Force and breathed out a sigh. Turning off his saber, the teen clipped it to his belt and turned to face Ben. “I will move the body, Master, so you can get started.”

“No,” Ben sheathed and clipped his own saber at his side. “You begin looking the equipment over for functionality. I’ll take care of the body.”

The teen’s shoulders slumped in relief and he hurried toward the holonet port and communications console, devoting almost all of his attention to that instead of the dead body now floating away out the door.

Ben knew this wasn’t the first time Obi-Wan had taken a life, but he knew it could be a jarring realizing that your first response to a threat was lethal action. Curbing that response took much more control and discipline than a young teenager had, especially one already traumatized by war. Ben still struggled sometimes with his first instinct to eliminate the threat. He had long accepted that the war had scarred him in more ways than he knew, that his experiences would forever effect the way he interacted with the galaxy.

Unceremoniously dropping the body on the pile of the other eight dead guards, Ben returned to the control room to see Obi-Wan underneath the holonet port fiddling with some wires.

“Did they sabotage something?”

“I don’t think so, Master,” Obi-Wan mumbled as he stripped a frayed wire and tightly twisted it together with another. “It looks like a rodent chewed on some of the connections. They didn’t seem to even be trying to repair it.”

“Let’s take a look then.” Ben dropped to his knees and scooted under the console next to the teen.

It took them thirty minutes, and a few shocked fingers, but as Ben plugged the last smuggler-rigged connection in place the console whirred to life.

“There, that’s better.” Ben grinned at Obi-Wan as the teen scowled at him sucking on a smarting finger. He chuckled. “Now, let’s find the contact information for the Mand’alor, shall we.”

Seeing as the True Mandalorian Supercommandos were a legally operating mercenary organization, he really shouldn’t have been surprised at how easy it was to find an actual comm code. The fact that Ben was going to have to bluff his way into actually speaking to the Mand’alor as opposed to whoever answered their public comm channel was of little consequence despite Obi-Wan’s doubt. Ben had bandied words with ruthless Separatist generals, outargued fanatical pacifists, and calmly weathered the adolescent verbal rages of Anakin Skywalker. He could convince a secretary to hand him over to their king.

Thankfully the holographic projector on the console was functional. It was always much easier to have a conversation with a Mandalorian when you could maintain eye contact, so to speak.

“Obi-Wan, step to the side out of range of the projector,” Ben instructed as he keyed in the comm code. “I want to keep the Mand’alor’s attention on me for now.”

Moving out of range, Obi-Wan took a stance off to the right. “Do you really think you can convince them, Master?”

“I trust in the path the Force has guided me down,” Ben replied then turned a reassuring smile on the teen. “But if this doesn’t go well, I promise the Order is my very next call.”

The Jedi Master completed the code sequence and sat back in the chair to wait patiently for the call to connect.

“The is the True Mandalorian Supercommando dispatch, what do you want?”

The holographic blue image of bored Twi’lek in a modified Mandalorian helmet flickered to life above the holoprojector.

“Su cuy’gar, Haat Mando’ad,” Ben greeted with a pleasantly bland smile on his face. The Twi’lek stiffened and visibly turned the entirety of their attention on Ben. “Ni vercopaanir jorhaa’ir ti Mand’alor Fett.¹”

“The Mand’alor doesn’t have time to speak with outsiders,” the Twi’lek replied sharply in Mando’a and Ben could practically feel their suspicion even with the expressionless helmet.

“He’ll want to speak to me,” Ben said with a confidence that the Haat Ad on the holocall did not appreciate. Before the Mandalorian could utter a no doubt scathing comeback or just hang up the call, Ben continued, “I have information about the Jedi coming to Galidraan.”

The Mandalorian Twi’lek was silent for a long moment before they ordered, “Wait on the line,” in Basic and disappeared from view.

“I do believe I’m on hold,” Ben commented wryly earning an unimpressed look from a silently tense Obi-Wan.

In his head time was ticking down as they waited. They only had about an hour and a half before the next guard change would be coming and he and Obi-Wan had to be gone by then.

The hologram flickered to life once more and a Mandalorian appeared wearing full armor, a short cape, and a braided cord looped under one arm. His voice when he spoke was so, so familiar and made Ben’s heart lurch and his breath catch, though he showed no outward sign of being unsettled.

“Tion’ad? Tion’jor gar vercopaanir jorhaa’ir ti ni, aruetii?²” the Mand’alor demanded, his accent and voice so familiar and yet so different.

“Su cuy’gar, Mand’alor Jango Fett,” Ben placed a fist to his chest and nodded his head in respect. “Ni gai Ben. I wish to give you information that I think will save your life and I wish to beg for your aid.”

The Mand’alor was still and silent for along moment as he studied Ben intently from behind the inscrutable face of his helmet. “What news of the Jedi and Galidraan do you think will save my life?” he finally spoke in Basic, his Concord Dawn accent bringing back too many memories that Ben could not deal with right then.

“A petition for aid was made to the Republic Senate recently,” Ben began, “from the Governor of Galidraan. He claimed that a battalion of Mandalorian mercenaries were slaughtering women and children and requested Jedi interference.”

The Mand’alor’s demeanor stiffened even further if that was possible, but he stayed calm. “We are doing nothing wrong here. What makes you believe the Jedi will attack us?”

“Because you may not be slaughtering civilians, but you are not the only Mandalorians in the sector,” Ben replied sternly. “I would not trust your people’s safety on the belief that the Senate would have done their due diligence.”

“And the Jedi would not do their due diligence, as you put it, either?” Fett inquired neutrally.

Ben let himself sigh. “I would like to believe that the Jedi would be wise enough to thoroughly investigate any reports of civilian casualties, but when confronted with the bodies of women and children and all visible clues point to the convenient presence of Mandalorians, I think our contentious history might blind some to other possibilities.”

Fett’s helmet tilted slightly to one side as he thought Ben’s words over. “As you say, I will not leave my peoples’ fate up to the dubious wisdom of the Galactic Republic or the Jetiise. We’ll investigate your claims.”

Something unclenched inside Ben, it wasn’t the definitive response he’d hoped for, but it was enough. “Thank you,Mand’alor.”

Fett just tipped his head in acknowledgment. “I assume this warning did not come wholly through altruism. What is it that you would ask of me?”

Leveling his shoulders Ben replied, “I would request your aid in saving children from their demagolka dar’buire.”

“Demagolka dar’buire?” the Mand’alor repeated incredulously, then demanded, “Explain.”

“I am on the planet of Melida/Daan,” Ben said. “They’ve been at civil war for generations. Within the last year or so, children from both factions banded together to stop the Elders fighting and hopefully restore peace. Unfortunately, the Melida and the Daan rejected their children’s wisdom and have since joined forces to attack and eliminate the Young.”

This may be a little more exaggerated than what has been seen so far in the past, but Ben remembers well the death and destruction that the Elders wrought on the Young in the coming months. He had no problem speaking from that experience if it will convince the Haat Mando’ade to come to the Young’s assistance.

The Mand’alor was quiet for a moment before asking, “How old is the oldest of the Young?”

“One of the leaders has since turned fourteen,” Ben answered gravely. It had been a harsh reminder, hearing about Cerasi’s birthday. While he’d been fighting with the Young in his youth they had felt out of their depth and much too young, but now that he had decades of experiencing the cruelties of the galaxy he looked at all the determined, half starved, dirty faces of the children around him and his heart cried for them.

The Mand’alor sucked in a sharp audible breath and his shoulders twitched in surprise or horror. Ben couldn’t tell which through the expressionless helmet. Stance stiffening, Jango Fett came to a swift decision.

“Regardless of whether or not your warning about the Jedi and the Governor of Galidraan pan out, I will send a squad of Haat Ade to Melida/Daan,” he declared, voice tense and angry. “Mhi hibirar te haat gar jorhaa’ir o’r ehn tuur, Ben Be Nayc Aliit.³”

With those last ominous words, Mand’alor Jango Fett disconnected the holocall and the control center fell quiet.

“So, your plan was successful,” Obi-Wan tentatively spoke into the tense silence. “Though, that last bit didn’t sound super friendly.”

“Not overly much, no,” Ben agreed, not particularly bothered by the implied threat. “He said, ‘We’ll learn the truth you speak in three days, Ben Of No Clan.’ So I would say, not very trusting is the Mand’alor.” He couldn't help, but be at least a little amused by the unintentional irony of Jango Fett’s words, considering what Obi-Wan Kenobi means on Stewjon.

Unfortunately, teenage Obi-Wan was clever, and picked up on Fett’s suspicion of Ben’s omission. “‘Ben Of No Clan’,” he murmured to himself, then turned curious slightly guarded blue-green eyes on the Jedi Master watching him. “Why have you never told me your full name, Master?”

Ben could tell Obi-Wan wanted to believe that there was no malicious or suspect intent behind his omission. And he figured he’d put off that conversation long enough. “I will explain when we are back at base, young one. I promise.”

Accepting this, Obi-Wan nodded and put his questions to the side for now. Ben went about erasing their tracks on the holonet search and the holocall logs. They then worked together and dismantled their repairs leaving the consoles dysfunctional, but not unsalvageable.

Then the two Jedi left the communications tower behind just as quietly and swiftly as they came.

*

Jango Fett tugged off his buy’ce and turned to look at his second in command and his intelligence officer, Myles and Silas.

“So, was he full of sh*t or have we been betrayed?”

“Oh, there’s definitely something this Ben isn’t telling us,” Myles said with a scoff.

Silas smirked then drawled, “I didn’t figure you were smart enough to pick up on that?”

Jango ignored Myles’s indignant protest. “‘Our history’,” he repeated with a displeased if thoughtful frown.

“What?”

“Ben No-Last-Name referred to the ancient conflict between the Mando’ade and the Jetiise as ‘our history’.”

“You think he’s a Jetii,” Silas realized, with a contemplative frown.

“Why would a Jetii warn Mando’ade that his people were probably coming to slaughter to us?” Myles asked dubiously.

“Why request for aid from us, as well?” Silas added. “Why not call his own people if the situation on Melida/Daan is as bad as he said?”

“These are all very good questions I will be asking him when we land on Melida/Daan in three days,” Jango declared. “Did you get a trace on the signal of origin?”

“Elek, Jango,” Silas answered and tapped at the communications monitoring console in front of him. “The signal is definitely coming from Melida/Daan, just on the edge of the capital city on the main continent.”

“Who are you taking with you?” Myles asked, knowing full well his Mand’alor had no intention of leaving these mysteries to someone else.

“I’ll take the Domino squad with me,” Jango replied. “Silas will stay here with Alpha and Bravo squad and investigate the Governor's involvement. Myles and the rest of the Haat Ade will return to Keldabe. If the Jetiise do show up, don’t engage. We’ll coordinate and either meet up on Melida/Daan or in route to wherever.”

“Elek, Mand’alor,” Jango’s two oldest friends and most trusted warriors replied.

“K’oyacyi, ner burc’yase⁴,” he ordered and turned on his heel sweeping out of their temporary command center to begin preparations.

*

TBC...

Chapter 8: No-One Child-of-Nobody

Chapter Text

When they returned to the Young’s base in the sewers, Ben was still trying to decide just what exactly he was going to tell Obi-Wan. He could go with an entirely different last name, but he didn’t particularly want to lie that much to the teen. He definitely wasn’t going to just go with “I’m you from forty-sum-odd years in the future” as an explanation.

Sighing silently in resignation, Ben figured he was going to have to do with Obi-Wan as he’d done with Luke and tell the truth, from a certain point of view.

“Obi-Wan! Master Ben!” Jerking away from his internal debate, Ben looked up to see the preteen in charge of the medical area racing towards them.

Both Obi-Wan’s and Ben’s stomachs sank in dread.

“What happened?” Obi-Wan asked. “Has someone been injured?”

The preteen, Coda, skidded to a stop before them, slightly out of breath, “We don’t think it’s deadly, but Juno got shot during the attack on the depot.”

“Show me,” Ben ordered stepping around Obi-Wan and hurriedly ushering Coda through the growing crowd.

Almost jogging through the sewers they made it to the medical area, Ben sweeping the curtain to the side.

In the weeks he’d been with the Young, their numbers of injured and sick had greatly lessened. Ben having employed a fairly judicious, if inadvisable, amount of Force-healing on the children, there were now only a couple of children suffering from mild cases of dysentery and one preteen that had one of their legs amputated beneath the knee because of infection.

Now there was a bleeding ten year old laid out on a mat on the floor, a little girl with a family resemblance and Cerasi sitting by his side.

“Hello there, Juno,” Ben gave the pale, scared little boy a gentle smile as he knelt beside him. His attention was on the boy, but he was aware of Obi-Wan coming and kneeling next to him. “I hear you had quite the adventure.”

The boy, Juno, swallowed thickly as he gave a jerky nod. “One of the Elders snuck up on me,” he said, voice raspy and audibly pained. “Nield got her, though.”

“I’m glad Nield was able to protect you. Now, show me your wound,” Ben ordered calmly as he slowly reached forward to pull the boy’s white knuckled grip away from his shoulder.

“I packed it with cloth, like you showed us, Master Ben,” Coda said from Ben’s other side. “It’s bleeding more than the other blaster wounds we’ve had before though.”

“Hm, yes, it is,” Ben murmured as he slowly pulled the makeshift pad of cloth away from the still bleeding wound. “Ah, I see.”

“What’s wrong?” Obi-Wan asked recognizing the dark look of anger on the Jedi Master’s usually calm face.

Ben ignored his question as he replaced the bloodied cloth over the wound and ordered Coda to, “Keep pressure here, this will hurt, but don’t let up. Cerasi is going to show me to the medical supplies we just acquired. Stay with Juno and keep him awake for me.” He gave Juno’s little sister, Jinda, a reassuring smile. “He’ll be fine and I’ll be back to stitch him up in just a moment.”

Getting to his feet, Ben made sure Obi-Wan and Cerasi were both following him as he exited the medical area. “Cerasi,” he prompted.

“Follow me,” the teen stepped around him to lead the way.

The three of them were silent as they made the quick journey to the storage alcove where all their new supplies were waiting to be organized and distributed.

Nield was there supervising the inventory, when he saw their grave expressions he made his way over to them.

“What happened?” he demanded. “Did you get the message out?”

Ben held up a hand to forestall anymore questions. “Our mission was successful and I will tell you about it later, but right now we must speak about Juno.”

“I thought you said he was going to be alright,” Cerasi protested.

“And he will be,” Ben assured, “but it is going to be a long recovery.”

Obi-Wan had been frowning since Ben had ignored his question, now he looked to the older man in concern. “Master, what did you see?”

Ben sighed deeply and explained, “Juno’s wound is messier and bleeding more than a blaster wound. This is because it was not a blaster that injured him.”

“No, it was a blaster,” Nield argued his heavy scowl tinged with confusion. “I saw the weapon myself.”

Shaking his head, Ben continued, “I’m sure it looked just like a blaster. Slugthrowers tend to be near indistinguishable from the older models of blasters.”

Uncharacteristically, Obi-Wan let out a sharp curse. “Where did the Elders get slugthrowers?”

“What’s a slugthrower?” Cerasi asked.

“They are like blasters,” Obi-Wan explained with an angry look on his face, “but they fire metal projectiles instead of particle beam energy.”

“Oh,” Cerasi murmured with wide eyes. “That sounds very destructive.”

“They cause fairly the same amount of death as a blaster,” Ben negated, his tone almost back to his regular calm. “However, the wounds one gets from a slugthrower tend to be a lot messier. A blaster bolt, by its nature will partially or almost completely cauterize the wound. It’s fairly common to survive nonlethal blaster wounds even without proper medical aid. Slugs simply tear through the flesh and muscle. Often times even if the shot isn’t immediately fatal the victim will still bleed out before they can get help.”

Nield scowled at the this information then asked, “What can you do for Juno, then?”

“Depending on the supplies we’ve acquired,” Ben answered, “I’ll clean the wound, ensure there aren’t any debris still in his shoulder, then I’ll close up the wound, either by suturing or with a medical bond gel. He’s lost a lot of blood so he’ll be on bed rest for a while, he’ll also need more liquids to replenish what he’s missing.”

With that, Nield pointed Ben in the direction of the supplies he required and then Ben and Obi-Wan were on their way back to the medical area. Cerasi stayed behind with Nield, not wanting to get in the way of Juno getting help.

“There is something else bothering you about the slugthrowers,” Obi-Wan murmured just before they entered the medical area once more.

“Yes,” Ben acknowledged, “and I will discuss it with you later. Now you will assist me tending to Juno’s wound.”

“Yes, Master.” Obi-Wan nodded accepting the delay and followed him inside.

Unfortunately for Juno the slug was still inside his shoulder.

“Alright, my dear,” Ben gave the pale and sweating boy a reassuring smile, “I’m going to be pulling some metal from your wound and it will hurt quite a lot. Will you allow Obi-Wan to help you sleep through it?”

A look of relief rose up in Juno’s progressively glassy eyes and he nodded. He didn’t attempt to speak, his jaw was locked tight trying to keep from making noise with the pain he was already in.

“You’ve been very brave,” Ben praised the boy kindly. “Now, try to relax.” He nodded to Obi-Wan who was sitting above Juno’s head.

“Close you eyes, Juno,” Obi-Wan told the younger boy with a soft gentle voice, placing his fingertips on the boy’s temples. “Breathe out. Good, now sleep.” The Force-suggestion swept through Juno’s already stressed body and the boy was deeply under in an instant.

“Good job, young one,” Ben murmured lowly and Obi-Wan’s mouth twitched in a distracted smile most of his attention on monitoring Juno to keep him unconscious.

“Coda,” calling the medic’s attention, Ben told him, “There will be more blood as I pull the slug from his shoulder. I need you to wipe it up so I can see the wound.”

“Yes, Sir,” Coda the preteen medic swallowed with nervousness, but his brow was tense in determination.

“Alright,” Ben took the cloth away from the wound and was immediately met with a slow welling of blood from the ragged hole in the ten year old’s shoulder, “let’s get started.”

It was a tense forty-five minutes later that Ben was able to secure a clean bandage over Juno’s freshly stitched up wound. Jinda, the boy’s sister, had stayed by his side the whole time, not flinching from the sight of blood or torn flesh.

He gave the solemn little girl a smile. “Juno’s going to sleep for a while longer, but when he wakes you need to get him to drink lots of water. Can you do that, my dear?”

“Yes, Master Ben,” the girl replied with a serious expression. “Thank you for helping my brother.”

“It was my pleasure,” Ben returned, nodding to her as he got to his feet. His knees and back protested his hunched over kneeling position, but not nearly as much as they would have before he’d been brought to his own past.

Wiping his hands as thoroughly as he could with a sterile wipe, Ben sent a quickly questioning look at Coda. The very young medic nodded, “I’ll stay here till he wakes up.”

“Call me if anything seems amiss,” Ben ordered earning quiet acknowledgment from both children.

Then he and Obi-Wan were slipping from the medical area and making their way silently to their semi private alcove.

The teen waited until Ben had tiredly lowered himself to the floor before he sat down directly across from him. He was ready to discuss the many questions he’d allowed Ben to delay him on.

Ben preempted him with a wry look. “What do you wish to discuss first, my lack of a last name or the slugthrowers?”

Obi-Wan answered after a short internal debate. “The slugthrowers. Other than the serious wounds they cause, what else about them has you so concerned?”

“The wounds aren’t enough to be concerned with?” Ben received a scowl for his halfhearted deflection. “I’m concerned, because I fear that the Elders acquired slugthrowers in response to my presence on Melida/Daan,” he answered.

“Why would your presence here effect that at all?” Obi-Wan asked confused.

“Have you learned about the Mandalorian/Jedi wars in your lessons yet?” Ben answered his question with a question.

Apparently, Obi-Wan was not in the mood to be led along to the answer, because he huffed a frustrated breath and demanded, “What does that have to do with anything?”

Holding up a placating hand, Ben tried to express contrition for angering the teen. “I brought up the Mandalorian/Jedi wars because that was when it was discovered that slugthrowers were a very effective weapon against Jedi.”

Some of the boy’s frustration faded as he acknowledged that this did sound relevant. Interesting and concerning, but relevant. “How so?”

“Metal projectiles, or slugs, unlike blaster bolts, are impossible to deflect using a lightsaber,” Ben answered grimly.

Understanding dawning, Obi-Wan paled slightly. “Oh, yeah, that makes sense.” Considering lightsabers generally melt metal, he figured the byproduct of trying to deflect a slug would not be pleasant. “You think the Elders dug up slugthrowers specifically to fight against you,” - and me - he didn’t say as he came to that dark conclusion.

“I fear so.” Ben nodded.

Obi-Wan took a deep steadying breath, scooping up all his fear and apprehension and sharing it with the Force. There was nothing he could do about this new development, so it would do no good to dwell on it. Once he’d centered himself, he opened his eyes to see Master Ben watching him with a glint of pride in his gaze.

“You did very will with that Force-suggestion on Juno,” the Jedi Master said.

“Thank you, Master,” the teen flushed still not used to getting such easy and genuine praise. “I haven’t had a lot of practice, but I’ve seen Master Jinn use them before.”

“Yes, I image you have,” Ben couldn’t quite hide the roll of his eyes. He remembered that Qui-Gon had somehow come to the mistaken conclusion that a Force-suggestion was a fix-all when dealing with uncooperative beings. Despite it being ethically iffy, it also served to anger quite a few beings that could have otherwise been negotiated with or persuaded by other methods.

Puzzled by the Jedi Master’s not exactly favorable reaction to a reference to his old master, Obi-Wan shrugged it off for now, a mystery for another time, and moved on to his other question.

“Back at the comms tower, you said you would tell me about your last name.”

“So I did,” murmured Ben, but he didn’t try to deflect this time. He knew Obi-Wan wasn’t going to be dissuaded. And so began with a question, as was his wont it seemed.

“You know that you were born on Stewjon, correct?”

Recognizing the return of Ben’s method of leading him along to a lesson of some sort, Obi-Wan found that he wasn’t frustrated this time. He was willing to follow the Jedi Master wherever he was going with this.

“I was told that a Knight found me abandoned as an infant and brought me to the temple.”

Ben nodded solemnly and said, “That is how I was brought to the Order as well, an abandoned Stewjoni infant.”

Strangely startled by that revelation, Obi-Wan asked, “You’re Stewjoni as well?”

“I generally consider myself to be from Coruscant, but yes. Where else would you find beings with our shade of red hair?” the older man added, lightening what was to be a quickly darkening mood.

With an amused quirk of his lips, the teen conceded, “I guess you’re right about that.”

“I’m assuming you don’t actually know much about Stewjon, however,” Ben continued, and something in his demeanor swept away Obi-Wan’s amusem*nt. The teen shook his head, no. “Well, the thing about Stewjon is that as a culture they do not welcome Force sensitives.”

“What do they do with them?” Obi-Wan asked almost reluctantly, a sliver of dread in his belly. He’d heard of other cultures, other worlds that didn’t view Force sensitives in a friendly light and he knew that wherever the master was going with this would not be pleasant.

“From what I understand, if a Stewjon infant displays abilities in the Force, they will either kill the child outright, or leave them in the wilderness either to be returned to the spirits they believe replaced the child or to simply perish from the elements,” Ben explained in a detached, but calm tone. He remembered learning that little tidbit about his heritage at fifteen while researching an unrelated topic in the archive. He also remembered having nightmares of being drowned or smothered as an infant for a month afterward.

It took a great deal longer to find peace and repair the damage the rest of his discovery did to his self-worth.

Obi-Wan’s face paled as the implications of his own story began coming together, what could have been his fate. “That’s- that’s,” he swallowed thickly eyes darting around trying to find purchase on something soothing. “It’s horrifying.”

“Yes, it is, young one,” Ben agreed. “And I tell you this, not to hurt you, but so that you might better understand when I tell you my name?”

“What do you mean?” the teen asked looking back up at the older man, puzzled, again not seeing the possible correlation between the two.

“On Stewjon when a child is discovered to be Force sensitive, they are disowned by their family and then given the moniker, No-One Child-of-Nobody. Which in Stewjoni translates to-”

Obi-Wan’s breath caught and it all came together in a gut turning realization. “To Obi-Wan Kenobi,” the teen finished bleakly.

Ben was quiet for a moment, but when the teen finally turned his desolate gaze on him, he asked him, “Do you understand, Obi-Wan?”

The teen swallowed thickly, he suddenly felt very small, very insignificant, but he nodded. “I understand. You’re name is Obi-Wan Kenobi, too.”

“It is the name I have had near my entire life,” Ben said. “And I feel no shame in it.”

Jerking his gaze up from where it had fallen to his hands, the teen looked at him incredulously, a small spark of anger tinting his presence in the Force. “How can you say that?” Obi-Wan demanded. “How can you feel no shame when our name literally means we were abandoned, unwanted, thrown away just like- like-”

Heart aching for the boy’s unhappiness, Ben reached forward and grasped the boy by the shoulders abruptly halting his flood of harsh words. “It can mean that, yes,” he acknowledged, not wanting to invalidate Obi-Wan’s indignation. “On Stewjon it would mean that,” he told the angry, disheartened boy, “but you can also find pride in it.”

“How?” Obi-Wan demanded again, his breath hitching, his blue-green eyes blazing with desperate need for the man before him to help him understand, to give him something to hold onto so that everything that he sees in himself isn’t rendered worthless. “How can you find anything positive about being no one?”

Feeling the bombardment of the teen’s roiling emotions against his mental shields, Ben realized that he hadn’t had to weather such a chaotic onslaught in decades, not since Anakin was a teenage. He was distantly surprised at how quick the metaphorical muscle memory of standing his ground in the center of an emotional storm in the Force came back to him.

Ducking his head till their eyes met and he was sure he had Obi-Wan’s complete attention, Ben then answered in as soothing and confident voice as he could, “Because anything can be positive if one looks at it from a certain point of view.”

The teen scoffed at that, disbelieving. “What point of view would that be?”

A slight smirk curled at Ben’s lips as he replied, “How angry and terrified do you think the Stewjoni would be to discover that one of the infants they threw away like trash was a powerful and respected Jedi Master?”

Mouth dropping open, Obi-Wan’s whirling dark emotions abruptly stilled in his shock. Blinking at the man in front of him still holding his shoulders in a steady unwavering grip, the teen let that question circle around his mind. He picked it apart and looked at it from this angle and that angle. He let every implication of the Jedi Master’s words unspool before him, and once again realized that this man that was so patient with him, so kind and generous with the other children, that offered him genuine praise and gentle correction was actually very heretical.

“Master,” Obi-Wan began almost hesitantly, but unable to stop the sliver of hope from leaking into his presence, “that sounds a bit like spite.”

“Does it?” Ben asked lightly, releasing Obi-Wan’s shoulders and sitting back, an innocent expression of curiosity on his face. “No, I’m sure you’re mistaken, young one, because that would be unbecoming of a Jedi. No, it’s not spite at all. It’s simply using my unfortunate beginnings as motivation to better myself.”

Studying the man’s unwavering expression with a gimlet eye, Obi-Wan added, “From a certain point of view.”

Lips curling into a satisfied, almost mischievous smirk, Ben tilted his head in agreement. “From a certain point of view you could say that I channeled my negative emotions into the Jedi philosophy of striving to transcend one’s faults by mastering my short comings. Then, I consequently became the top student in all my lessons, the best of all the senior padawans in saber training, and theoretically knowledgeable in as many Force techniques as I could find record of in the archives.”

He shrugged as if they weren’t skirting close to the very thing the Jedi Code cautioned against. Letting your emotions dictate your behavior.

“You could also say, from another point of view, that I let my anger at the injustice of my abandonment and my feelings of worthlessness color how I saw myself and my accomplishments. I then spent the next year working myself to the bone and eventually collapsed from exhaustion.” All mirth was gone from Ben’s expression and Obi-Wan waited quietly for him to continue, recognizing there was more the master wanted to say.

“When I tell you that everything can be positive from a certain point of view, I’m not advocating that you should follow my example,” he said once again calm and serious. “I’m telling you all this in the hope that you find wisdom in my mistakes and gain solace from my own experiences without having to suffer the pain and self-doubt that I did.”

Shaking his head slowly, Obi-Wan responded, “I don’t think I understand, Master.”

“When I discovered this information, young one, I let it cloud how I saw myself. I let the circ*mstances of my birth and the meaning of my name define me. That resulted in the belief that nothing I did was good enough, nothing I accomplished was satisfactory. I strove for perfection to such an extent that it effected my health. Once my master figured out what I was doing, he put me under house arrest until I was physically well again, then restricted my time in the archives and training rooms.”

He blew out a heavy breath and Obi-Wan could see that the memories of that time still held some weight in him.

“What I’m trying to tell you is that it took me a long time to find peace within myself. To accept that my origins and my name meant absolutely nothing in my abilities and my worth as a Jedi and a person.”

Understanding the older man’s point did little to alleviate Obi-Wan’s own self-doubt. “I still feel conflicted, Master,” he admitted quietly. “I still feel like I’m not good enough, that nothing I ever have done or will do is going to mean anything.”

“I do not expect you to work through these feelings all in one night, young one,” Ben assured the solemn teen with sympathy in his eyes. “My hope is that by telling you of my own conflict and giving you another way to look at the situation will help you reconcile this information in a smoother, healthier way than I did.”

Obi-Wan thought about that for a long moment in silence. Did knowing that he wasn’t alone in having such dark, negative feelings help him not feel so isolated? Did the suggestion of finding something motivating or positive in these new revelations help him not give in to the hopelessness of the negative connotations?

Not right then, he decided. He didn’t quite believe Master Ben’s “certain point of view”, but just having that thought, those words drifting through his mind kept the despair at bay. That the older man knew exactly how he was feeling, had felt it himself, did help Obi-Wan not feel like a failure for not being able to take in this new information with the ideal indifference of a Jedi.

“I think it will take me a while,” Obi-Wan finally said meeting Master Ben’s patient calm blue-green gaze. “I don’t think I’ll be completely okay anytime soon, but it does help knowing I’m not the only one.”

A smile curved at the older man’s lips and Obi-Wan felt a little of the tight pressure inside him ease. “That’s all I’d hoped for,” Ben said. “There is nothing quite so horrible as feeling as if you are completely alone.”

That had the ring of experience behind it and Obi-Wan could definitely believe that the Jedi Master before him had once suffered that kind of loneliness. He didn’t ask though, even as an emotional teen he knew there were somethings you did not poke into.

Eager to move on from his turmoil and the dark things he’d learned, Obi-Wan started, “So you didn’t tell me your last name because you didn’t want to have to explain the history.”

“Yes and no,” Ben said allowing the air between them to lighten, let their darker conversation slowly ebb away into the background. “I didn’t want to create any confusion with our similar names and you didn’t trust me when we first met. That revelation is not something that can be taken very well from someone you don’t trust.”

Well, he wasn’t wrong, Obi-Wan thought. When they’d first met he hadn’t trusted Ben. At least not enough to accept their shared background at face value. Since then Master Ben had done nothing, but prove his trustworthiness. Sure he was cryptic, heretical, and mysterious, but he was patient and kind. A deep, quiet, harshly shoved away part of himself hoped that maybe… maybe Master Ben would like to continue teaching him when all this was over and they returned to the temple.

But there was no good in dwelling on things that had little chance of happening, so Obi-Wan didn’t acknowledge those thoughts… very often.

“Will you,” Obi-Wan hesitated then forged ahead reminding himself Ben never minded questions, “will you meditate with me, Master?”

Ben felt a blossom of happiness and smiled at the boy’s display of trust and comfort. It was one thing for a master to instruct a padawan in a joint meditate, it was another for the padawan to request it from the master.

“Of course, my dear.” Shifting into a relaxed position, he waited for Obi-Wan to mirror his pose, their knees lightly touching. “You only ever need to ask.”

They closed their eyes, their breaths synced together and they fell into the deep soothing currents of the Force.

*

TBC...

Chapter 9: Driving a Hard Bargain

Chapter Text

At first Obi-Wan was anxious that the Mandalorians wouldn’t arrive on time or show up at all, but Master Ben assured him that while Galidraan, where the True Mandalorians were stationed at the moment, was pretty far away, the space ways between there and Melida/Daan were a lot less heavily traveled than the hyperspace lanes to and from Coruscant. The lack of traffic, so to speak, should make their travel time shorter.

And he was right. Three days after their holocall, just as the Mand’alor had promised, a Mandalorian ship was seen touching down on the outskirts of the capital city.

“We’re the leaders! We should all be going with you,” Nield argued when Ben suggested that one of them stay behind when they went to greet the Mandalorians.

“That is why one of you needs to stay here,” Ben reiterated calmly. “There should always be a leader at the base with the Young. If the Melida or Daan attack while we’re gone the other children will need someone to lead them in an escape.”

That had been another fight. Nield didn’t want to run, but Cerasi and Obi-Wan saw the logic in a strategic retreat. They didn’t have the numbers to meet the Elders head on. It was better to run so they could fight another day.

Eventually, with both Cerasi and Obi-Wan in agreement, Nield conceded. He even demanded that he be the one to stay behind. He was the most decisive between the three of them. The Young would need that if the worst should happen.

So it was that Obi-Wan, Cerasi, and Master Ben made their way toward the large troop transport parked in an empty field just on the edge of the city. The Mandalorians had landed in the late morning and it had been decided that they should go greet them before the Elders could get wind of their presence and investigate.

Not that it was a concern that the Mandalorians weren’t more than a match for the Elders, but it was agreed all around that they wanted to cement their alliance with the Mandalorians as quickly as possible.

There was a nervous churning in Obi-Wan’s stomach the closer they got to the Mandalorian’s camp. All the horror stories from the creche as well as the grim depictions from his history lessons were making an appearance once again.

“Be mindful, young one, that your anxiety is not clouding your mind,” Master Ben said to him quietly as they made there way on a circuitous route to their destination.

“I’m sorry, Master,” Obi-Wan muttered in shame. “I’m having trouble releasing my fears.”

“Do not disregard them, Obi-Wan,” the Jedi Master chastised, “You have good reason to be anxious, it is a natural emotion when one goes to treat with ancient enemies. I do not mean for you to ignore or rid yourself of the anxiety entirely. Merely trying to remind you to rely on your logical mind and your intuition in the Force to guide your actions, not your fears.”

Strangely enough having permission to be anxious, actually made some of the emotion fade. Obi-Wan took the instruction with a determined nod. Having his fear validated made it easier for him to think through it with his logical mind. Master Ben said the Mandalorians would never harm children and a teenager though he was he would still be a child in their eyes. Regardless of that Master Ben would never let harm come to him or Cerasi. Of that Obi-Wan was sure down to his bones.

“Are you sure it was wise to bring your lightsabers, Master Ben?” Cerasi asked in a whisper as they crouched in an abandoned building with the Mandalorian camp in view.

“Mandalorians respect warriors,” he told the young girl. “Also forthrightness. If it was revealed later that I am a Jedi after having omitted that information, they would see that as a dishonorable deception.”

And Obi-Wan was thankful for it. He may not be a true match for a fully trained and armored Mandalorian, but it made him feel better not to be weaponless.

Out in the field was a troop transport painted with some kind of an animal skull sigil on the side. Around it was a rotation of about five Mandalorians watching the surroundings vigilantly. So vigilantly in fact that they hadn’t been watching for more than five minutes when somehow their presence was detected.

Suddenly Obi-Wan could feel that the majority of the Mandalorians’ attention was on them, hidden from sight though they were. The warriors stood still waiting for a long moment before another Mandalorian appeared at the top of the ramp of the transport. This one was familiar.

Obi-Wan watched the Mand’alor march down the lowered hatch of the ship and stand out in the open seemingly waiting patiently.

“Well,” Master Ben drawled next to him, “that’s as much of an invitation as we’re ever going to get. Come along.” He stood from his crouch and stepped out of their cover.

The effect was instantaneous. Every single Mandalorian stiffened to attention except for their king who just watched them walking forward with a confident, relaxed posture.

Obi-Wan walked just behind and to the side of Master Ben, unconsciously taking up the place of a padawan. Cerasi, following his lead, took the spot on the Jedi Master’s other side.

They came to a stop ten feet from the Mand’alor and Ben put a fist to his chest in greeting. “Su cuy’gar, Mand’alor Fett.”

The Mand’alor tapped his fist to his chest as well and returned, “Me’vaar ti gar, Ben Be Nayc Aliit?”

Obi-Wan remembered that last phrase. Ben Of No Clan, that is what Mand’alor Fett had called Ben before they’d disconnected the holocall. Apparently the no last name thing was a sticking point. Obi-Wan flicked his eyes to Master Ben to see how he would react to the unsubtle dig.

A wry huff of a breath was apparently it, before he responded, “Ah, ni ceta. Ner gai Jetii Ba’jurir Ben Kenobi.”

That got a reaction from the Mandalorians, Obi-Wan observed with a spike of apprehension as the warriors all stiffened further and even a few hands twitched toward weapons. A wave of calm and assurance swept over him in the Force and he was able to keep from reacting. He sent a flash of gratitude and his own renewed calm back to Master Ben.

The only one that didn’t seem to be surprised or have a reaction was the Mand’alor. He just tipped his head in acknowledgment.

“I’m a little surprised you actually fessed up,” Fett said in Basic then, his voice slightly altered by the vocorder in his helmet, but still very individual and distinctive.

“Yes, well,” Ben replied with a shrug, “I figured you would have at least noticed my lightsaber at some point. It wasn’t really my intention to keep it from you.”

Fett hummed thoughtfully for a moment then nodded his head back toward the ship. “Come, we’ll talk contracts and strategy inside. My verde can look after the ade.”

“They’ll be coming, as well,” Ben negated, before Obi-Wan or Cerasi could protest. They may not have understood some of the Mand’alor’s words, but the meaning was clear. “This is Cerasi of the Melida and Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi. They are two of the leaders of the Young and have been fighting this war much longer than I have.”

The Mand’alor was quiet for a moment seemingly studying the two teens from behind the dark t-visor of his helmet. Then he nodded in acquiescence and turned back toward the transport without another word.

Obi-Wan and Cerasi traded quick looks, before they followed Master Ben through the line of heavily armed and twitchy Mandalorians with as much calm and dignity as they could.

Mand’alor Fett lead them through the transport to what must have been his personal office. Then he gestured to a low round table off to one side.

“Take a seat,” he politely ordered, then to the two teens’ surprise casually took off his helmet setting it on the table and easily folding himself down onto one of the cushions on the floor.

Obi-Wan was a little bit impressed that a man in full presumably beskar armor could be so flexible and graceful. And shocked that the Mand’alor was so young, he couldn’t be older than his early twenties.

Master Ben on the other hand took the Mand’alor’s exposed face in stride, though Obi-Wan was sure he was the only one that felt the sharp flash of grief through the Force before the Jedi Master had pushed it down or hidden it away. He didn’t share it with the Force and the teen was both curious as to why and, at the same time, too hesitant to ask.

“I thought Mandalorians never took off their helmets,” Cerasi commented as she lowered herself onto the cushion on the other side of Master Ben and across from Obi-Wan.

“In ancient times, we did not,” Fett said easily. Obi-Wan had a moment of anxiety that the man would take offense to his friend’s seemingly innocent question, but he continued speaking with patience. “Only aliit – family and clan - would see our faces. Now, we consider it up to the individual Mando’ade or clan to determine their level of adherence. It is only Ja’hailir Ade¹ or the Children of the Watch that still so strictly follow The Way.”

That, Obi-Wan had to admit, was fascinating and he dearly wanted to ask more questions. His slightly embarrassing academic fascination with other cultures and peoples was rearing it’s head, but a quick glance at Ben’s wry understanding look, kept him quiet.

“Shig,” Fett offered when everyone seemed finally comfortably seated, gesturing to the industrial looking tea set at the center of the table.

“I would love some,” Master Ben said then seemed a little surprised at his own enthusiastic response. “I haven’t had shig in many years,” he explained in a more subdued formal manner.

“I was going to ask about that,” Fett commented faux casually as he passed out the handle-less, saucer-less cups and poured each of them a generous amount of the dark amber colored hot tea. “You know some of our culture, you speak Mando’a fluently, but your accent is strange.”

For some reason, that made the Jedi Master flash the Mand’alor a neutral smile with an of edge chagrin. “I spent a year of my apprenticeship on Mandalore for a mission and learned the language from Kalevala natives. I’ve since spent a fairly good amount of time with Mando’ade that originated from Concord Dawn.”

Obi-Wan didn’t know whether to be thankful to know more about his- the mysterious master or put out that it was only being revealed because an intimidating Mandalorian was asking. That and now wasn’t the time to ask more questions.

Ben’s explanation caused a strangely perplexed look to cross the Mandalorian king’s face. “Those are two wildly different examples of the Mandalorian people.”

“Yes,” Master Ben nodded as he sipped elegantly at the steaming tea in his cup. “There was a bit of a learning curve.”

Fett’s lips twitched in amusem*nt at the Jedi’s wry response, but he quickly schooled his expression into a serious frown. “I understand that because of your past, you know how precious Mando’ade consider all children, but why wouldn’t you contact your own people first if you needed back up? From what I’ve heard Jetii claim to hold children almost as sacred as Mandalorians.”

Realizing where this line of conversation was going to lead made a rock sink in Obi-Wan’s belly. He knew part of the reason they weren’t contacting the Order was his nebulous relationship with them, and though Master Ben had assured him that it wasn’t his fault, he still felt shame around the circ*mstances of his presence here on Melida/Daan.

He didn’t speak up though, it was clear that Master Ben knew how to handle Mandalorians a lot better than either he or Cerasi did, and with their shared look earlier they’d silently agreed to follow the Jedi Master’s lead.

“Other than the fact that you were closer by almost three days of hyperspace travel,” Ben started with a dry tone that then quickly melded into a grave one. “Due to the unfavorable circ*mstances surrounding two other Jedi missions on this planet, the Jedi Council will have most likely closed the mission report and put a block on further interference. It has been years since I’ve had contact with the Temple on Coruscant and I do not have the influence on the Council needed to expedite a reopening of the investigation or approval for assistance.”

The Mand’alor’s gaze grew sharp on Ben at his explanation. “If you have not had contact with your Council, how did you and your Jetii ad end up here?”

Obi-Wan was willing to admit that he picked up languages with an impressive amount of ease and speed so it wasn’t exactly surprising that he’d heard enough Mando’a to parse out the general gist of short uncomplicated conversations. That he knew the Mand’alor was referring to him when he said Jetii ad wasn’t the problem. The problem that made his gut twist was the flash of yearning he felt at the assumption that he was Master Ben’s padawan. It also brought up the realization that his circ*mstance was going to be put before the scrutiny of a world leader.

Sensing the teen’s inner turmoil leaking into the Force, Ben placed a gentle hand on the boy’s forearm and gave him a reassuring squeeze. The gesture did not go unnoticed by Mand’alor Fett.

“Unfortunately, Obi-Wan is not my apprentice, my padawan,” he said earning him a quick darting look of speculation and hope from the teen, before he continued. “On the last Jedi sanctioned mission to the planet, he was separated from his master, his Cabur Ba’jurir², or Ba’ji³ if you will, and became stranded here. I was called to the planet some months later by the Force. We met here and have since become partners in our efforts to assist the Young in their goals.”

Fett frowned at that, his eyes darted back and forth between Ben and Obi-Wan in suspicious confusion. “Do the Jetiise not allow parent and child to interact, to be apprentice and mentor?”

Master Ben coughed at that and Obi-Wan felt a bewildering flash of amusem*nt from the older man.

“We are not father and son,” he attempted to correct, but when he got a doubtful look from the other man he elaborated, “We share a planet of origin where red hair and fair skin are fairly common. Our shared last name is also a cultural quirk of the planet.”

That was one way of putting it, Obi-Wan thought with a silent scoff. A cultural quirk as opposed to a culturally approved excision of a fraction of the population.

Apparently his scoff hadn’t been quiet enough because he was suddenly the object of the Mand’alor’s piercing scrutiny. Blushing, Obi-Wan’s eyes widened and he involuntarily started to curl his shoulders under that intense look.

“I didn’t say it was a pleasant cultural quirk,” Ben amended with a companionable roll of his eyes, taking the king’s attention off his- the embarrassed padawan and easing the boy’s tension. “That however is a longer explanation for another time. A time when children are not being hunted by their own parents.”

The Jedi Master’s deceptively mild words and expression hid the unyielding boundaries he’d just drawn. Fett gave a sharp nod in acknowledgment, putting his questions and suspicions on the back burner for when the demagolka dar’buire were taking care of.

Turning his eyes back to the since then quiet teenager girl and the padawan, Fett requested, “Alor Cerasi, Alor Obi-Wan, tell me what you can about the situation.”

Master Ben took a metaphorical step back and let the two teens at first hesitantly then with more maturity and confidence speak with the Mand’alor. It took a long while, almost a full hour to explain the three factions, the birth of the Young, and how the children had learned to fight and adapt to their increasingly hostile and violent environment.

Cerasi did most of the talking about the history of the conflict and the beginnings of their movement. In deference to how uncomfortable she knew Obi-Wan was with the specifics of his joining the Young, she glossed over the details simply saying that he’d chosen to stay with them and help their cause.

Despite her efforts, her choice of words didn’t escape Jango Fett, and his suspicions were piqued by the implication that the boy wasn’t so much stranded as left on the planet. But he was perceptive enough to not push for more on the subject. He did however listen and observe intently when Obi-Wan picked up the conversation and went into more technical explanations of the tactics and strategies he’d helped the Young implement to survive and actually begin to get the upper hand on the Elders.

“Though, it wasn’t until Master Ben came that we really had any definitive victories or a really solid strategy to end the war completely,” Obi-Wan finished his speech.

That earned him a lightly scolding frown from the man in question. “You give yourselves too little credit, young one. You would have accomplished your goals on your own, eventually. I simply expedited the process.”

“We would have won our peace, eventually,” Cerasi agreed, then added, “But how many of us would have died before then?”

That brought the Jedi Master up short. He stared at the girl for a long tense moment, almost like he was seeing something very far away. Then he tipped his head conceding. “You’re right, young one. It would have been a painful and tragic victory.”

There was something about the way he said it that made Obi-Wan think he knew that for a fact. And maybe Master Ben did know, maybe he’d seen it. Obi-Wan himself was not a stranger to dark terrifying visions, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that the Jedi Master had received visions when he felt the call to follow the Will of the Force.

“Alor Cerasi,” Fett called everyone’s attention back to the present and away from the could have been dark future, “what exactly is it that you and your people wish from me and mine? We would be more than happy to take care of the demagolka dar’buire for you, but I sense that is not what you want.”

Turning back to the Mandalorian king, Cerasi straightened on her cushion, her expression confident. “We do not have the numbers or the supplies for a drawn out, open conflict with the Elders. Until Master Ben came and helped us we were surviving on what we could scavenge. It is our hope that you and your people will help us chip away at the Elders’ infrastructure, then ultimately you would assist us in taking the Halls of Evidence.”

Her brow creased unhappily with her next words, “Two Jedi have already tried ending the conflict with mediation and negotiation, neither were successful. We realized that we needed to try something different. If we can hold the Halls of Evidence essentially hostage, the Melida and the Daan will agree to negotiate for peace.”

“What are the Halls of Evidence?” asked the Mand’alor.

“They are where we display homages to those that died in the war,” Cerasi explained solemnly. “They are also where the Melida and the Daan showcase their propaganda to keep enthusiasm for the war going.”

Fett nodded in understanding. “We would have to discuss strategy and reconnaissance more, but that does not seem an impossible task.”

Cerasi relaxed some at his easy acceptance, but still her expression turned serious once more. “We have nothing to pay you with, Mand’alor Fett. Obi-Wan, Nield, and I have discussed it, though, and agreed that once we have a peace treaty signed, you can take what of our natural resources or you can salvage anything else from the city that would be of equal value to your standard price.”

A series of emotions streaked too fast across Fett’s expression for Obi-Wan to pick them out, but he felt it in the Force when the Mand’alor settled on intense feelings of anger and protectiveness.

“We will not have payment from you, ad’ika. Haat Mando’ade do not take money from ade,” he said it almost calmly, but Obi-Wan had noticed that when the king experienced strong emotions he slipped more Mando’a into his speech. From what he was still leaking in the Force, Jango Fett felt indignant and insulted at the implication.

Unfortunately for the man, Cerasi was also a leader of her people and maybe as stubborn as a Mandalorian herself. She insisted on payment. The Mand’alor insisted on none and they proceeded to politely argue about it for the next twenty minutes. Throughout it all Master Ben gave off the impression of being both amused and bewildered.

When Obi-Wan noticed Cerasi was grinding her teeth he tried to step in to mediate, but neither the girl or the Mandalorian listened to him.

Finally, when it seemed like they were about to start yelling at each other from frustration and wounded pride, the Jedi Master spoke up.

“Unfortunately, Mand’alor, you will have to accept some form of recompense for assisting the Young.”

There was an almost black flash of rage from the Mandalorian, before it was boxed away and then Obi-Wan could feel nothing from the man at all. It was disturbing, but a quick look to Master Ben showed that he was at least outwardly unconcerned. In fact, he held the Mand’alor’s fearsome stare with utter calm as he lifted his cup and took a leisurely sip of tea.

“Explain, Jetii,” Fett demanded, his voice low almost verging on a growl.

Cerasi was able to observe that while Fett had been frustrated with her, for some reason Master Ben’s words had practically enraged him. She didn’t try to continue the argument, considering the suddenly tense atmosphere, she figured it would be better for Ben to handle it now.

“Mandalore is an independent system and not a member of the Galactic Republic,” Ben said as if he wasn’t staring down a man that would in another life kill six fully trained Jedi Knights with his bare hands. Not that anybody knew that, but him.

“Melida/Daan, on the other hand, is a member of the Republic. You are a sovereign leader of a theoretically neutral planet. If it came to the Senate’s attention that you brought a military force to one of its member planets and interfered with its governing, legally that would be seen as an act of aggression.”

His words dropped between the four of them like a rock. Obi-Wan didn’t pretend to be an expert on politics, but this sounded like it could cause serious problems for everyone involved, not just Melida/Daan. The Mandalorians were already viewed with suspicion verging on hostility by a lot of the galaxy, not to mention that it seemed like they had enough political issues of their own to deal with. If the Senate viewed their presence here as an act of aggression it could lead to a galactic war.

Obi-Wan felt his stomach sink with the realization that this could very well make everything so much worse, not better. Why did Master Ben have them contact the Mandalorians if they wouldn’t even be able help because of the Force forsaken politics? He sucked in a sharp breath and was sure he was going to have to force himself not to hyperventilate.

Until he realized that most of the Mand’alor’s anger was gone, replaced by cool interest.

“What do you suggest, Ba’jurir Kenobi?” he drawled pointedly. “You don’t seem like the kind of man that would let a thing like politics get in your way.”

Master Ben nodded at him in agreement then laid out his plan. “You will have to make it clear that your presence here is as the leader of the True Mandalorian Supercommando mercenary company. We’ll negotiate and draw up a contract. Since the Galactic Republic age of majority for hiring services like mercenaries is sixteen, I will co-sign as a facilitator. Cerasi of Melida and Nield of Daan will be the main signatories and essentially your employers.”

“And the issue of payment,” Fett prompted seeming more intrigued now than hostile.

“Payment doesn’t have to mean something of traditional monetary value,” Ben replied with an almost sly twist to his mouth. “My suggestion would be that going forward the new government of Melida/Daan guarantees all True Mandalorian Supercommandos permission to enter the planet for a refuel, medical help, rest, ect. Along with an obligation that if any other situation arises where a squad of mercenaries might be needed, they call the True Mandalorian Supercommandos first before any other company.”

There was a long stretch of silence where Master Ben’s words sank in. Obi-Wan just stared at the man in awe. It was brilliant. It would allow the Young to keep their independence and pride and it would satisfy the Mandalorians’ aversion to being paid to protect children.

Mand’alor Fett’s face showed an impassive mask of consideration. Then he threw his head back and laughed.

For a second Obi-Wan thought that was a bad sign, that the king didn’t approve of or take Master Ben’s suggestion seriously, but when he looked cautiously toward the Jedi Master, he saw the man’s mouth curled into a smile and his blue-green eyes gleaming with triumph.

“Ori jate!” the Mand’alor exclaimed, abruptly slapping a gloved hand on the table making the tea set rattle and nearly causing Obi-Wan and Cerasi’s hearts to jump out of their chests. “Ni vorer!⁴”

“Lovely,” Master Ben replied, his expression once again pleasant and inscrutable. “If Cerasi agrees, I think we should draw up the contract.”

Clever girl that she was, Cerasi saw Master Ben’s solution to their problem for the stroke of preplanned brilliance that it was. “Those terms are acceptable,” she answered with as much dignity as a fourteen year old military leader could muster.

“Jate,” the Mand’alor repeated more calmly, an approving grin on his face as he nodded respectfully at the young girl. He tapped the commlink set into his vambrace. “Pezmah, I need you in my office. We’re drawing up the contract.”

There was pause on the line then another surprisingly young voice came over the comm with a slightly confused, “Elek, Alor.”

It was only five minutes of Fett and Master Ben making bland completely inconsequential small talk before the office door opened and a helmetless Twi’lek young enough to match his voice walked in. He was gangly and tall and appeared to be just out of adolescence, his thin armored arms wrapped around a datapad, a stack of flimsi, and a leather pouch of some sort.

He scurried over to the low table and snatched up an extra cushion from the stack in the corner, plopping down next to his leader when the man scooted over to make room. It was plain to see he was nervous as he hurriedly organized his supplies. When he’d lined up the datapad and the flimsi to his satisfaction he unrolled the leather pouch on the table, revealing a set of honest to Force ink styluses, a sealed ink stamp pad container, and a solid metal stamp of some sort.

“This is Pezmah Dezara, he’s apprentice to our lead contract author and notary,” the Mand’alor introduced the nervous young Twi’lek. “He’ll be taking down the terms and advising on legal wording as well as witnessing the signing.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Koor Hibir Pezmah. I’m sure your insights and suggestions will be invaluable,” Master Ben said with a kind smile, the one that said he had complete and utter faith in you, you just had to live up to it.

“Th-thank you, Ba’jurir Kenobi,” Pezmah stuttered with a blush turning his green cheeks emerald. “I’ll do my best.”

Obi-Wan gave the young Twi’lek a sympathetic look. He knew just how heavy Master Ben’s trust could be the first time it was laid on your shoulders.

“Let’s get started,” Mand’alor Fett commanded and they spent the next two hours writing and rewriting a contract that would get them all what they wanted without bringing the scrutiny of the Senate down on their heads.

It was a stressful two hours.

*

TBC…

Chapter 10: The Golden Braid

Chapter Text

After the contract was finalized, Ben, Obi-Wan, and Cerasi lead Mand’alor Jango Fett, Pezmah the young contract writer, and three other True Mandalorian warriors back through the city and into the sewers. When they came to the center for the Young, Nield was waiting for them.

He stood at the head of a gathering of curious wary younglings with his arms crossed and an expectant scowl on his face.

“Well,” he said, abruptly, “Are the Mandos going to help us?”

Ben was amused and he could tell that Jango and the other Mandalorians were as well. Obi-Wan and Cerasi on the other hand were an exasperated mix of frustrated and embarrassed.

“Mand’alor Fett,” Cersai began stepping forward shooting Nield a sharp look. “This is our co-leader Nield of the Daan. Nield this is the Mand’alor, Jango Fett.”

Helmet impassive but leaking a smirk into the Force, Jango nodded his head respectfully, “Well met, Nield of the Daan.”

“You too,” Nield responded somewhat cautiously. “Gotta say, never met a king before,” then he shrugged unconcerned and gestured for them to follow. “Come on, let’s go to the war room.”

Cerasi let out an almost inaudible sigh, then flashed Jango a smile, “Please follow us, we can look over the final contract and sign it there.”

Fett made a few sharp hand signs to his men before he and Pezmah followed Cerasi.

Ben placed a hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder before he could go as well. “Stay here,” he said, earning a confused look from the teen. “Fett ordered his warriors to speak with the children, to investigate their situation. Stay here and supervise, smooth things over. I’ll be at the signing to make sure everything goes well.”

Looking around, Obi-Wan did indeed spot the three other Mandalorians trying and failing to interact with the wary children. “Alright, Master.”

“Good,” Ben released his shoulder with a light squeeze. “We’ll talk more this evening. I’m sure you have questions.”

That earned him a pointed, deadpan expression from the padawan, before he left to go facilitate Mandalorian-child relations.

Ben released a deep breath and boxed away his reluctance and his fear. If he wanted this to work with Obi-Wan he would have to be honest. As honest as a time traveler could be, he’d already decided that. It was just that near twenty years of hiding and lying made for hard habits to break.

But Obi-Wan, the bright, clever, neglected boy deserved all the honesty and consideration Ben could give him. Ben hadn’t received it when he was still Obi-Wan. He knew now, as a jaded, old man, that he’d been treated unfairly by a great many people in his early life and that had colored his interactions with the galaxy and eventually with his own padawan. Never again. He would do better than his masters and mentors did for him and set a better example for Obi-Wan, the boy he once was long ago who would, Force willing, never be him.

The signing of the contract went without much fanfare. Ben signed in his temple trained ostentatiously ornate script as Ben Kenobi. Cerasi and Nield, with little formal education, printed their names in shaky unpracticed Basic. Jango signed in Basic and Mando’a as Jango Fett, House Mereel with handwriting almost as frivolous as Ben’s. Apparently being the adopted son of the previous Mand’alor entitled you to just as many tedious, impractical lessons as a Jedi.

After Pezmah, the apprentice notary, had stamped the Mandalorian seal of a finalized, sovereign approved contract and the seal of the Galactic Republic exchange of services on the flimsy, they repeated the process on the datapad with the digital version of the contract. With a few codes typed in and a thumbprint scan, Pezmah had sent off the contract to be stored on the True Mandalorian servers, should the Republic ever come asking.

When they stepped out of the war room and into the main common area, they were met with the sight of two of Jango’s Mandalorians sitting on the floor in a circle of children with their helmets removed and clipped to their belts. There was a small girl walking around the circle tapping each person’s head and labeling them a tooka.

When she got to one of the Mandalorians, a large muscular Togruta with green hued skin, orange face markings, and cream and brown striped montrals, she hesitated for a moment before she hurriedly tapped him on the head and exclaimed, “Nexu!”

On cue the Mandalorian jumped to his feet and made a show of chasing the squealing little girl around the circle before she lunged into his abandoned spot giggling breathlessly as he just missed tagging her. The other children were all smiling and laughing as well, and the Togruta pouted and slumped in a display of exaggerated loss. Then he gamely began his way around the circle gently tapping the children with playful, “tooka”s, starting the cycle all over again.

Off to one side the third Mandalorian, a kind faced Chalactan had a cluster of children around her all patiently waiting their turn to have their hair combed and braided into as many different styles as she knew. Apparently they’d never seen braids as elaborate as hers.

Ben focused on their group to hear what a little boy with shaggy, knotted brown hair was saying as he gently played with the woman’s long braids.

“Are you a um- palawan, Ms. Sheeva?”

Humming curiously, the Chalactan, Sheeva, flicked her eyes towards the boy for a second before turning her gaze back on her nimble fingers working through the blond hair of the little girl in front of her. “What’s a palawan, ad’ika?”

“Like Obi-Wan,” the boy said, like it should have been obvious. “He had a braid when he first came here.” Then he frowned in thought. “Then Master Jinn left and he didn’t have a braid anymore.”

From the mouths of babes, Ben thought in a mixture of exasperation and sadness.

Unfortunately, Obi-Wan was only about three feet away, apparently in charge of distributing scrounged up pieces of string to tie off the children’s new braids with. He’d tensed up at the little boy’s question, then went completely rigid with his last unintentional revelation.

Sheeva it seemed was experienced with children and perhaps traumatized teens, because she didn’t bring any more attention to Obi-Wan, she just gave the little boy a kind smile. “I think you mean padawan, ad’ika. And no, I’m not a Jedi. I’m a Mandalorian.”

“Oh, okay,” the little boy said and nodded unconcerned, completely oblivious to the sight of Obi-Wan’s face blanching then rapidly reddening in shame.

If his padawan’s distress wasn’t issue enough, Ben was acutely aware of Jango Fett’s tightly controlled anger from the man’s place standing next to him. Apparently he was familiar enough with Jedi customs to understand the implications of the little boy’s innocent observation.

“Cerasi, why don’t you go rescue Obi-Wan. I’m sure Mand’alor Fett would like to meet some of the children as well.”

He could tell the Mand’alor did not like being handled, but he would like Ben’s reaction even less if he pushed the issue. Smart man, he just gave the Jedi a sharp scowl silently promising to get his answers sooner or later before following after Cerasi. Ben returned the look with a bland smile.

Having traded off string holding duty with another child at Cerasi’s arrival, Obi-Wan hurriedly moved toward Ben. His eyes were fastened on his feet and his shoulders were tight when the older man placed a soothing hand on one.

“Come, my dear,” Ben murmured quietly, gaining a quick glance of Obi-Wan’s eyes before they avoided contact again. “I believe I promised you some old history.”

“Yes, Master,” the teen muttered and gratefully allowed himself to be lead away from the commotion of children and Mandalorians, toward their quiet alcove.

“You have nothing to be ashamed of, Obi-Wan,” Ben said when they’d settled into their customary sitting positions on the cool concrete floor.

Obi-Wan sighed. “You say that, Master, but I have a hard time believing it.”

Sighing himself in sympathy, Ben nodded, “I understand.” When he didn’t get anything more from the teen other than sullen staring at the ground between them, Ben gritted his teeth and made a decision. His history with Mandalore would just have to wait.

“You’ve never asked me more about my padawan.”

Jerking his eyes up to the Jedi Master’s, Obi-Wan blinked in surprise. “I didn’t want to bring up anything that would cause you pain.”

Humming in agreement, Ben still continued on, “It was painful, young one. But I have had some years to come to terms with what happened.” He tilted his head to meet Obi-Wan’s eyes again, “And I think if you heard more of the story it might help you.”

Obi-Wan felt humbled. Master Ben was willing to tell him about what was surely one of the most painful moments in his life, all because it might help him. How could he deny such a gift? Even if he doubted it would do much good for him.

“I will listen, Master,” Obi-Wan said, giving the Jedi Master his full respectful, attention.

Ben took a deep breath and thought for a moment on where to begin. At the beginning, he figured, wryly.

“My padawan came to the Order later than most,” he started. “He was older and had already experienced much of the worst of sentient nature. He was a slave.”

The teen sucked in a sharp breath, and Ben was reminded that this boy in front of him had been a slave at one point as well. It was something he’d have to address more later.

He continued on. “The circ*mstances of his coming to us were such that his mother was left behind still in slavery.” An old wave of guilt swept through him there and gone again not even leaking into the Force. “That, I think, was the first instance of the Order, and myself, failing him.”

A half curious, half protesting sound came from the teen, but Ben just forged on explaining, “That his mother was still in danger, still a slave was a source of great fear and anxiety for him. He could never let his attachment to her go like every master, myself included, advised him to. Looking back, I realize that it wasn’t just insensitive of us, but cruel as well.”

“What do you think would have helped him?” Obi-Wan asked, sounding worried though he knew the events were long over and done with.

“Nothing the Order or the Code taught would have helped,” Ben said with a grim confidence. “Only knowing that his mother was free and safe would have eased his mind.”

“Did she ever…” seeing the look on the older man’s face, the teen trailed off. It wasn’t a leap to guess that her story didn’t have a happy ending either.

“Despite this, though,” Ben continued, lightening his tone a little as he allowed the good memories of training Anakin to float through his mind, “he was a brilliant student. Even as behind the other children in his age group as he was, he caught up fast. He was very smart and very stubborn. I think he demanded the very best from himself even more so than I did.”

“So it wasn’t all...,” Obi-Wan hesitated over the word.

“Bad?” Ben finished for him with an eyebrow raised, then his face softened. “No, having him as my padawan was a privileged. A trying, challenging, exasperating privilege, but even knowing how it ended, I wouldn’t give those years up for anything.”

It was curious, Obi-Wan thought, the vast difference between how Master Ben and Master Jinn responded to the same experience. Master Jinn swore never to take a student again and repudiated both of his padawans, even his first who was a successful knight by then. Then he never looked at another youngling or initiate again without examining them for signs of darkness and character flaws.

On the other end of the spectrum, Master Ben mourned his Fallen padawan. He claimed partial responsibility for his padawan’s Fall. Tried to understand how it had happened, what he could have done differently to maybe help his student. And he hadn’t once looked at Obi-Wan with disapproval, or suspicion, or a hint of rejection.

There was a painful lurch in Obi-Wan’s heart when he realized that he wished desperately that Master Ben had been at the temple when he was about to be aged out into the AgriCorps. Maybe he would have considered taking him on as a padawan if they’d met then.

“I wouldn’t give those years up, but if given the opportunity I would change them,” Ben admitted, breaking the teen from his regretful thoughts.

“How so?” he asked curiously.

“Because of my padawan’s life experience before joining the Order, he didn’t see the galaxy the way the vast majority of the Jedi do.” Ben rubbed at his bearded chin thoughtfully. “A lot of the Jedi philosophy and culture was stifling to him. He struggled trying to conform, to fit himself into the mold of a good Jedi. I didn’t realize it then, but I can acknowledge now that much of what we- I tried to impose on him would have seemed oppressive. In hindsight, that he felt a distinct absence of freedom as a Jedi should not have come as a surprise.”

It was a sobering concept. That anyone could look at the Jedi and see repression, possibly even to see another, different form of slavery.

It was even more sobering that Obi-Wan realized he couldn’t actually disagree. The memories of never being good enough, never fitting into the expected mold of a model initiate, always being looked at with disappointment and even a little suspicion, were stark in his mind. He didn’t feel quite as stifled as Master Ben’s padawan must have felt, but he could understand.

“I know this is a very controversial opinion, but one of the things that I would change the most in how I approached teaching my padawan,” Ben said drawing a confused look from the teen, “is the Order’s interpretation of the Code.”

Eyeing the older man warily, Obi-Wan prompted, “What about the Code?”

Ben almost grimaced in anticipation of this tense conversation, but he had long since decided that if asked, no matter who asked, he would give his honest opinion. After all that’s why he’d brought it up. “Well for one thing, nowhere in the currently accepted version or the original unaltered version does it imply that prohibiting attachment is a valid method of preventing one from Falling to the Dark side.”

“Wh-what?” Obi-Wan’s eyes must be as large as saucers he thought, as he stared unblinking at the definitely heretical Jedi Master. “But we’re taught-”

“I know what we were taught, young one,” Ben interrupted more harshly than he’d intended. Schooling his expression he gave the teen an apologetic look, but continued in a calmer voice, “The Jedi had been around for twenty-five thousand years before the Ruusan Reformation and in all that time they were allowed to know their birth families, allowed to fall in love and get married and have children. There were hundreds of thousands of Jedi throughout the galaxy.”

Obi-Wan despite himself was entranced by Master Ben’s surprisingly passionate speech, until the man finished by saying, “Now there are maybe ten thousand of us and a handful of dwindling temples. The Temple on Coruscant being the largest by a staggering margin.”

Intellectually, Obi-Wan had already known this. They’d learned it in history. Well, they’d learned bits and pieces of this spread out over several years. Having it pieced together and so bluntly stated like that was jarring. Ben’s intensity regarding this information was also a clue as to what had most likely eventually been the final push to cause his padawan to Fall.

“He had an attachment, didn’t he?” Obi-Wan asked quietly before he could talk himself out of it.

Ben seemed to deflate before his eyes, but he nodded. “Yes, my padawan did indeed have an attachment. He fell in love.” Then with an incongruous roll of his eyes, he said, “And because he could never to anything by halves, he also married her.”

Eyebrows shooting up, he asked, “Did the Council find out and dismiss him?” Perhaps revenge was what caused him to Fall.

What little levity the older man had mustered drifted away leaving him solemn once again. “No, no one found out until it was too late.”

Biting his lip, Obi-Wan felt like he needed to know. It was almost like the Force was urging him to pry, to continue asking Master Ben these sad questions.

“What happened?”

They were quiet for a long moment, Ben turning his thoughts over and over in his mind, before finally answering Obi-Wan’s question.

“My padawan had visions, sometimes. Not often, but they were always dark and almost always came true.” Blowing out a steadying breath, Ben went on, “He’d had them of his mother’s death.”

That she did indeed die, went unspoken.

“I didn’t find out until later that he’d been having visions of his wife.” There was a flash of grief through the Force and Obi-Wan was surprised by the thought that it seemed like Ben had known his padawan’s wife, maybe even mourned her too. “Visions where she died in pain and calling out to him.”

There was sadness permeating the Force around them. Obi-Wan stayed quiet letting Master Ben tell the story in his own time. Then abruptly the sadness disappeared and a sharp hot flash of anger streaked through the Force before it was gone.

“I have often wondered that if he knew for certain that I wouldn’t have rejected him, wouldn’t have even turned him into the Council, if he would have come to me for help,” Ben said with regret though there was a darkening edge to his voice. “What I will never forgive myself for is not realizing that a Dark side user, a self proclaimed Sith, had insinuated himself into my padawan’s life. He convince my padawan that the answer to saving his wife from certain death could be found in the Dark side of the Force.”

A spike of fear went through Obi-Wan. The Sith were extinct. Everyone knew that. And yet, there was no lie in Master Ben’s words. No misleading or deception or even delusion tainting the Force. In fact the Force rang with the absolute truth of his words.

There must be more to the story. Obi-Wan accepted the truth in Ben’s claim, but the sequence of events still didn’t quite add up. Questions like why hadn’t his padawan gone to Ben to help save his wife, filtered through his head. Even if Master Ben had told the Council, surely, a man that valued attachments and love the way the padawan must have would have seen the logic in sacrificing his place in the Order if it meant being able to save his wife.

He had many questions, but seeing the dark look on the Jedi Master’s face, feeling his dark emotions in the Force convinced him that now was not the time. The Force sent him an odd little jolt, telling him that there would be time, somewhere in the future for his questions to be answered, just that now was not it.

“He Fell to save his wife,” Obi-Wan concluded with sympathy in his voice, when it seemed like Master Ben would not continue.

“Yes,” Ben sighed, anger gone again and leaving old scarred over grief and guilt in its wake. “When I finally caught up with him he’d already left a path of destruction in his wake and it was all for nothing. She died anyway.”

Obi-Wan didn’t need to know what happened after that. The fact that Master Ben was in possession of his former padawan’s lightsaber said it all. They dueled and only one of them walked away.

It was then that Obi-Wan noticed Ben had slipped his fingers under the cuff of his right sleeve. He’d seen that motion before, when they’d first spoken about his padawan’s lightsaber. Slowly, so the master could stop him if he wished, Obi-Wan reached forward and took the man’s right hand in his, gently pulling the sleeve up to expose his wrist.

There fastened around the Jedi Master’s wrist was a golden blond padawan braid. Woven into the strands were an impressive number of beads and colored bands signifying the achievements and skill one earns during their padawanship. Even wound around Master Ben’s wrist, Obi-Wan could tell that the braid wasn’t as long as most padawan braids were. He must have been knighted very young.

As he examined the braid, his fingers brushed against the golden hair and Obi-Wan got a sudden blinding vision in the Force.

A Force presence like a supernova. A bright, happy childish laugh, “Come on, Master, we’re gonna miss it!” A teasing, adolescent voice saying, “What would you do without me, Master?” The same voice, older, deeper, “You’re the closest thing I have to a father.” A feeling of love and fond exasperation and a constant strive for approval. A flash of fear and rage like an explosion. “If you’re not with me, then you’re my enemy.” The scent of ash in the air and scorching heat. “I hate you!”

Master Ben jerked his wrist out of Obi-Wan’s grip abruptly cutting the connection and dropping him out of the vision like a rock.

Sucking in a shaky breath, Obi-Wan blinked black spots from his eyes. Lifting a trembling hand to his cheek he was surprised when his fingers came away damp with tears.

“I am so sorry, young one,” Ben murmured roughly tugging his sleeve back over the braid hiding it from view. “You should not have had to experience that.”

“It-,” Obi-Wan swallowed thickly when his voice came out raspy. “It wasn’t all bad. Some of it,” he paused, breathed deep and brought his gaze up to meet the master’s worried, guilty expression. He gave the older man an unsteady, but genuine smile. “Like you said, some of it was actually really wonderful.”

His words seemed to ease some of Master Ben’s concern and the older man was able to return his smile.

“Even if,” Obi-Wan hesitated, but in the face of Master Ben’s infinite patience, having experienced a mere glimpse into his tragic story, he found courage to continue, “Even if he Fell in the end, I’m glad you were able to know him. I’m glad you have happy memories of your padawan to look back on.”

Obi-Wan couldn’t know that his words felt like a blessing and forgiveness to his older, haunted self.

Ben in that moment knew that even if he failed, even if Anakin Fell to the Dark once more at the end of it all, that Obi-Wan would still cherish his memories with him. Like Ben himself, Obi-Wan would not regret the love he would feel for the young man that was both like his brother and his son.

And that realization gave the man that once was a Jedi Master and a desert hermit a renewed sense of strength and purpose, courage and hope that everything would be alright. That the Will of the Force would not let him down and even if he should stumble and fall, he would not regret his second chance, not one bit.

The teenager had a split second to wonder if he’d said something wrong, because Master Ben’s breathing gave a hitch and a strong wave of jumbled emotions swept into the Force around them. Then he let out a yelp as the older man grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him into a strong hug.

Frozen in Master Ben’s arms in shock, Obi-Wan was pressed close enough to his chest to feel it rumble when he whispered, “You are going to be an amazing Jedi and a far better master than me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. Don’t you ever doubt that.”

A wave of warmth unfroze Obi-Wan’s limbs and he let himself relax into Master Ben’s hold. He closed his eyes, tipped his face into the man’s shoulder, and wrapped his own arms around the master’s waist.

They stayed like that for long moments. Holding each other, drawing comfort from their embrace. Hope, and healing grief, and gentle joy giving the Force around them a warm, soft glow.

*

TBC...

Chapter 11: Hindsight

Chapter Text

The Mandalorians had pretty much moved into the sewers with the Young after about forty-eight hours of being on planet. At first Jango argued that it would be better for the Young to move into the troop transport with the Haat Mando’ade. However, once it was brought to his attention just how many children there were in the Young, he conceded and instead the Mandalorians moved into the sewers, with a rotation of five verde at a time keeping watch of the now camouflaged transport ship and running above ground reconnaissance.

Ben thought the whole argument was rather entertaining since it nearly brought Jango and Cerasi to a shouting match again. Surprisingly enough it was Nield that put an end to it in his usual unimpressed, sarcastic way.

“You do realize that we’re never all gonna fit on your little ship, right?” the teen had said when both his co-leader and the foreign king had paused to breathe in the midst of their argument.

“What do you mean? My transport can hold thirty fully armored Mando’ade,” Jango said with a frown.

Nield just looked at him like he was doubting his intelligence. Ben had to cover his mouth with a hand lest any of them see his amused smirk. Obi-Wan however wasn’t fooled at all.

“There’s over a hundred kids down here, Mando,” Nield informed him as one would speak to a confused child. “You’ve only seen about a quarter of us, because we can’t all fit in one junction point.”

Jango stared at the teen with a blank face for a moment then cursed a blue streak and started shouting instructions and orders to the Mandalorians nearby and into his comm unit.

Obi-Wan raised an unimpressed eyebrow as Ben tried to smother his growing amusem*nt. “It’s not that funny.”

“It is,” Ben protested. “Though I do wonder how many of the children will wish to remain on planet when all of this is done.”

“Why?” the teen asked, confused.

“Mandalorians,” Ben informed him with a sly glint in his eyes, “love children, as I told you, but it is also a massive part of their culture to adopt.”

Obi-Wan eyed the man trying to decide just how serious he was about this becoming an issue. “How exactly do Mandalorians go about adopting?”

“Oh, it’s all very straightforward with the Mando’ade,” Ben said, and Obi-Wan was not happy with the totally unconcerned tone of his voice. “They just say, ‘I know your name as my child,’ in Mando’a, the child accepts and that’s that.”

“What’s their criteria for adoption?” Obi-Wan asked. “How long does the general getting to know you period last?”

“Oh, there is no getting to know you period and they’re really not picky. They’ll try to claim just about any youngling that’s struck their fancy.” At the teen’s uncomprehending expression, he said, “Let me put it to you this way,” oh, Obi-Wan really did not like the smirk on his face, “I was seventeen almost eighteen when I went on my first mission to Mandalore and I was almost forcibly adopted four times within the first month.”

Eyes widening, Obi-Wan gaped at the man then suddenly darted off to find Cerasi and Nield to warn them. And spread the word to the other kids to be very sure what they were responding to if the Mandalorians start recited weirdly formal sounding phrases at them.

“You know, Mandalorian adoption is not quite that simple.”

Ben, because he was a war hardened Jedi Master did not jump is surprise at the young voice behind him. Turning unhurriedly, he gave Pezmah, the young Twi’lek notary a pleasant smile. “Oh, I know, but it’s good to keep them on their toes. Also that the children know they do in fact have options.”

“So, you don’t disapprove of the Haat Mando’ade trying to adopt any of the Young?” Pezmah asked curiously.

“No,” Ben answered. “In fact I think it could be a very beneficial thing for some of the children, especially the really young ones, to find new families.”

The young Twi’lek stared at Ben as if trying to visually gauge his sincerity then nodded decisively. “I have to speak with the Mand’alor.”

Ben watched him scurry off, wondering idly how long it would take for Jango to just establish a permanent Mandalorian colony on the planet and be done with it.

*

Jango was back in his office on the troop transport ship where the secure comm channels were easily accessable. He’d been sending both Myles and Silas text updates, but now it was time to at least get a verbal sit-rep from Silas who was presumably still on Galidraan gathering intel on the Governor and his possible backstabbing with the Senate.

Strangely enough corrupt interfering Senate osik seemed only at least half as problematic as the situation on Melida/Daan. And none of that was the Young’s fault. No, all fault lay with the mysterious Jedi Master and the clearly traumatized and abandoned padawan.

Yes, it had not escaped Jango’s notice that they’d glossed over how Obi-Wan had ended up alone on the planet before Kenobi showed up. However, somehow both Jedi had done an admirable job of avoiding Jango so he wasn’t able to demand further explanations. Though, the little snippet of conversation they’d overheard between Sheeva and one of the children did bring up some very unpleasant implications.

Those implications being that Obi-Wan’s ba’ji, the Cabur Ba’jurir in charge of his education and safety, had voluntarily up and left him here in the middle of a civil war fought by children. And not just left him. Jango wasn’t exactly sure what the significance of the braids and beads he’d seen on the few Jedi young he’d spotted over the years meant, but the implications of a youngling suddenly no longer having a braid wasn’t hard to parse out.

The fact that Kenobi didn’t seem all that happy with Obi-Wan’s dar’cabur¹, and was in fact rather protective of the boy, was the only reason Jango hadn’t pressed the issue harder. But he still wanted the story. Wanted to know what possible excuse a Jedi could have for leaving not just their child, but over a hundred children to fend for themselves against violent adults.

He entered in the comm code and waited for Silas to pick up the call. It wasn’t longer than a few moments before his intelligence office greeted him.

“You’re alive, Mand’alor,” came Silas’s professional greeting in Mando’a.

“So are you,” Jango returned with a slight curl of his lips, then his face smoothed out and he ordered, “What have you found?”

Silas huffed and Jango could tell that what he was about to say was not going to be pleasant. “The Jedi was right. Someone tried to set us up.”

“Did you track them down?”

“Sort of,” Silas’s expression wrinkled in displeasure. “I was able to uncover transmissions from the Governor on several known Death Watch channels, and from there I uncovered more transmissions from elsewhere.”

“From elsewhere?” Jango didn’t like the sound of that. It meant that more than just Death Watch and the greedy Governor of Galidraan had been plotting against them.

“The calls were rerouted through Trade Federation channels, but I lost them from there.”

That was not good. Everybody with any sense knew that the Trade Federation were as dirty as they came. Any corporation or guild of supposed merchants that needed battle droids to get things done was knee deep in sh*t and anyone that says different was on the take or stupidly naive.

“Keep working on that,” Jango ordered receiving a nod from Silas, then he asked. “What did you find out from the Senate?”

“Well, any official inquiries into the source and validity of the complaint and request for aid were almost immediately shot down or shunted off into the bureaucratic abyss.”

Really not good, then, Jango thought grimly. That meant someone in the Senate with lots of pull wanted them out of the picture.

“And your unofficial inquiries?”

“A little more fruitful,” Silas replied with a wry twist of his mouth. “It didn’t take my best slicers long, and they didn’t find much, but they did discover that a few Senators had received a number of calls from Concord Dawn and strangely enough Kalevala and Sundari.”

Jango gritted his teeth. So this wasn’t just more cowardly scheming from Death Watch and Vizsla then. This had New Mandalorian fingerprints on it as well.

“Was that all you discovered from the Senate?”

“Well, we dug up the original request for aid,” Silas offered and held up a datapad to the holoprojector in demonstration. “The Jedi was right. The Governor claimed a troop of Mandalorians were terrorizing and slaughtering his citizens. He also specifically requested a contingent of Jedi Knights to come and put a definitive stop to the bloodshed.”

So it was murder then, Jango scowled at the realization. Whoever was the architect of this entire thing, and he knew it wasn’t Death Watch, Tor Vizsla was not this subtle or this clever, really wanted the True Mandalorians not just out of the way but dead and buried.

“Did they include any evidence in the request?”

“No,” Silas said, but something in his tone tone made the hairs on the back of Jango’s neck raise.

“But?” he prompted.

“But,” Silas continued, “we were able to slice into the Jedi Temple’s systems and grab a copy of the aid request before they booted us off their servers. Their version of the request was very different from the one the Senate received.”

Oh, he did not want to hear this. “Different how?”

“For one thing it has photographic evidence,” Silas said with a darkly wry tone. “And from our analysis the images were not doctored in any way.”

Jango exhaled a long breath and rubbed a rough hand over his face. So someone in the Republic Senate was working with Death Watch, probably using the Trade Federation as a proxy, with the goal of conning the Jedi into slaughtering the Haat Mando’ade.

“And the Jedi were convinced?” Jango asked, because he needed confirmation.

The expression on Silas’s face was not comforting. “Jango, if I didn’t know for a fact that we weren’t killing anyone on Galidraan, I would have believed it.”

“I want you off planet as soon as possible,” Jango ordered gravely. “Come to Melida/Daan. Bring as much medical supplies and food rations as you can, but I want all of our people off Galidraan by tomorrow.”

“Way ahead of you, Jango,” Silas nodded with a smirk. “We started loading up an hour ago. We’re almost done breaking camp and we’ll be hitting atmo some time around late meal.”

“Good,” Jango sighed swiping a hand down his face half in relief, half in frustration. “What about that other thing I wanted you to look into?”

“Oh, you mean, the mysterious Jedi Master and his adorable padawan?”

Rolling his eyes, Jango sighed, “I gave you their names.”

“For all the good it did me,” Silas huffed, earning a questioning look from his leader. “Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi was easy enough to find, and there was plenty to unpack in his file. I’ll get to that later. What was harder and by harder I mean impossible to find was any information on Jedi Master Ben Kenobi.”

“Do you mean his file was classified?” Jango asked with a frown.

“I mean, it doesn’t exist,” Silas corrected. “As in there are absolutely no records of him. Granted I only had about twenty minutes to snoop around before whoever’s in charge of their cyber security noticed me and shut me out, but Ben Kenobi wasn’t even listed in their Missing on Mission or Killed on Mission rosters. In fact the only other Kenobi I could find, other than the padawan currently on planet with you, was a Jedi Knight from about three hundred years ago.”

Jango was quiet for a moment thinking that through. He was sure Kenobi wasn’t lying when he said he was a Jedi. Jango may not hear the Ka’ra² the way Jaster had, but he trusted himself to know when someone was lying to him. Ben Kenobi for all that he was cryptic and sparse on details of himself, was not an outright liar.

“Could Kenobi be one of their special forces, their Jedi spies or whatever they call themselves?”

“Their Shadows, you mean.” Silas tapped around on his datapad before answering. “I didn’t get that deep in their system, so I don’t know what kind of information black out the Jedi do when one of them becomes a Shadow. He could be, I suppose. If you want a more definitive answer I’ll need to either be on site to slice into their systems directly or have a slicing team of at least five and a solid connection with the holonet on planet.”

Contemplating this, Jango finally answered, “We’ll put that on hold for now. Tell me what you found on Obi-Wan.”

The look of wide-eyed disbelief on Silas’s face was not reassuring. “Well, I’ll give the kid one thing, reading between the lines, if even half of what’s hinted at in his file is true he’s got some serious Mandokar.”

It took a split second of debate then Jango said, “Send me his file.”

Silas quirked a knowing smirk at him, but nodded, “Elek, Alor.”

As Jango waited for the files to download onto his datapad, he thought about everything he’d learned so far. Someone in the Republic Senate wanted his people dead and was willing to work with Death Watch to do it, Ben Kenobi was an even bigger mystery than he first appeared, and this job on Melida/Daan was shaping up to be a lot more complicated than he’d originally thought.

*

The first planned raid on the Elders of Melida/Daan was a success. Well, after the arguing and the clashing prides were out of the way, the Mando’ade and the Young worked well together.

Once Nield and Cerasi convinced Jango that some of the children would in fact be on the various raids and assaults they planned, working out the dynamics was relatively simple. The Mandalorians would train all the children in hand to hand against larger opponents and effectively using blasters. Maybe even some knife work since that was pretty much the extent of their weapons variety. However, only the children eleven years and older would be going on the actually raids. This stipulation Ben had no problem endorsing.

He remember trying to keep a five year old from bleeding out from a belly wound when he was fourteen. It was not something he ever wanted to see again. Not to mention sometimes when he looked at the exhausted, emaciated, haunted children he would get a sense memory flash back to the Council Chamber. In his twenty years in the desert there hadn’t been a single night that passed without him dreaming of finding those little youngling bodies scattered across the floor, sliced up and dismembered by a lightsaber, eyes clouded over in death, faces frozen in terror.

A shiver ran down his spine and Ben shoved those thoughts, those memories to the very back of his mind.

So, the first raid was on the arms depot. The same one the Young had been taking potshots at so they could get easier access to the medical supplies cache and the communications tower. While the Mandalorians traveled around with enough weaponry to arm small planets, any weapons they could take from the Elders would weaken them. Since the recon and the scouting on the arms depot was already pretty well fleshed out, that was their first target.

They took three Mandalorians, ten Young, and Ben and Obi-Wan on the raid. It was a slaughter. Out of the twenty Elders stationed to guard the depot, one escaped, severely injured, but alive. Ben doubted he would live for much longer however.

The Mandalorians lead the charge, the Young following after them, just as determined and serious. Ben and Obi-Wan flanked their attack and spent the majority of the surprisingly short fight deflecting blaster shots away from the Young and not getting in the Mandalorians’ way.

When they were finished loading up the last of the weapons and ammunition, the Mandalorians blew the depot sky high to send a message. It was an effective one, Ben thought as he watched the flames and ran his gaze over the cooling bodies of the Elders. Whether this all would eventually end in a more favorable outcome than his experience on Melida/Daan was yet to be determined. He had hope and despite all the death the Force was still fairly adamant that this was the correct path.

A couple days later, when Ben let himself onto the Mandalorains’ troop transport and walked to Jango’s office, that was still true. They’d had no injuries, no deaths and the children were slowly, but surly being cycled past Jango’s squad medic. There was nothing they could do about the lack of immunizations, but the general check ups and readily given remedies for the various minor injuries and illnesses the children had been suffering with was a boon that Ben was not going to forget any time soon.

“All work and no play makes Jango a dull boy,” Ben drawled with humor as he stepped into the open door of the man’s office.

The Mand’alor was bent over several datapads on his desk and looked to have been there for a few hours at least. He looked up at the Jedi’s arrival with an unamused scoff. “I’ll have plenty to celebrate when the demagolkase are dead and the Young are safe.”

Nodding in acceptance, Ben came to a stop in front of the desk. “On that, I think we agree, Mand’alor.”

Said leader just hummed and leaned back in his seat, making a wordless gesture of invitation to the chairs in front of his desk.

Taking a seat, Ben studied the man before him for a moment. He can admit that he was somewhat surprised when he’d seen Jango without his helmet for the first time. For some reason he’d half expected the man to look exactly as he had on Kamino the first and only time they’d had a conversation in his last life. When he’d lifted his helmet and instead of the hardened, deadly, middle aged bounty hunter Ben was expecting, he saw a serious young man, the spitting image of his long ago second in command. It shouldn’t have surprised him since Cody had been Jango’s clone, but for some reason the resemblance had still thrown him for a loop.

Now, after close to two weeks of acquaintance, Ben could look on Jango’s painfully young face without expecting to see a scar curling around one eye, or hear him call, “General Kenobi,” in his Concord Dawn accent.

“You wanted to see me, Mand’alor?”

Jango’s expression, for a young man of twenty was surprisingly hard to read. Not that Ben couldn’t read him. It was just more challenging than most. “I’m sure you know I’ve had my people checking into your information about the Governor of Galidraan and the Senate.”

Ben tipped his head, but didn’t interrupt. Jango would have been stupid not to double check his information and no one could accuse Jango Fett of being stupid.

“Would you be surprised to know that this little frame job looks to be part of a much larger conspiracy to destroy the Haat Mando’ade?”

Well, it appears Jango’s intelligence people were a lot more thorough than Ben was expecting. Not that that was a bad thing.

“It wouldn’t particularly shock me, no,” Ben answered as neutrally as possible.

Jango shot him a scrutinizing look. Not necessarily suspicious, but not exactly trusting either. “I get the feeling you know a lot more than you’re sharing, Kenobi, and I don’t appreciate being led around by the nose.”

Huffing in amusem*nt, Ben almost rolled his eyes. “That was certainly not my intention, Fett. Truthfully, I don’t know much more than you do. Someone in the Senate doesn’t want the Haat Mando’ade in power. For what reason, I can think of a few, but I have no concrete or even circ*mstantial evidence.”

“What do you know, then?” Jango demanded and Ben wanted to roll his eyes again, but he understood the man’s attitude. He’d surely realized that if he hadn’t gotten Ben’s call he and his people would have been attacked and probably slaughtered by a team of Jedi Knights by then.

“I can only tell you that the Jedi were severely misinformed and it was done entirely on purpose,” Ben offered. “This wasn’t just an attack on your people, Fett. Someone in the Senate wants to use the Jedi as their own personal hit squad and that I cannot abide.”

Oh, the Jedi was clever, Jango thought with a grudging sense of respect. Not only had the man given them a common enemy, but also common footing. He’d equalized the Mando’ade and the Jedi by making them both victims of a nameless politician’s machinations. For a man that had presented himself as a simple Jedi following the call of the Force, he was dangerously good at politics and word play.

Dangerously good at word play, though he was, there were still holes in some of the things he’d said. “How did you come by this information about the aid request if you have not been in contact with your Jedi Council?”

Ben paused and cursed internally. He’d known the inquiry was coming, of course he did, he’d just completely forgotten to think up an explanation that made sense from a certain point of view. f*ck it, he thought.

“I had a vision.”

The flatly disbelieving look on Jango’s face was fair. But Ben was committed now, so.

“It wasn’t anything so specific as a corrupt politician in the Senate,” Ben assured the man. “I had a vision of Jedi and Mandalorians killing each other. At the end of it, only one Mando’ade was left. And he wore armor just like yours.”

Ben let that grim image sink in before continuing. “I had to do some research on the symbols on your armor to figure out the details, but after I found out you were on Galidraan it wasn’t hard to dig up the request the Governor sent into the Senate. From there I made some logical conclusions.”

Improbably correct conclusions, Jango thought, but remained outwardly impassive. “How does that tie in to you being on Melida/Daan? I assume you didn’t have this vision while you were already here.”

“Ah, no,” Ben conceded. “My presence here was a separate matter. I’d already had the vision of the Haat Mando’ade before I followed the Force’s Will to Melida/Daan. When the Young’s situation became apparent I figured I could kill two womprats with one stone so to speak. Warn you about the danger on Galidraan and hopefully gain some assistance for the Young.”

Jango took a long moment to contemplate that. He could tell Kenobi was not being completely truthful, but his explanation had enough honesty in it that Jango didn’t feel like he had malicious intent for whatever he was holding back.

Finally he nodded, then picked up a datapad. “While my people were investigating the request to the Senate I had them investigate you.”

Ben sighed then. “And you found nothing.”

Jango raised an eyebrow at him, but agreed. “The Jedi have no record of any other Kenobi, but Obi-Wan. If I asked, would you tell me why the Jedi don’t have any records of you?”

That was a smart question, Ben acknowledged. Jango knew that if he interrogated Ben he’d get nothing, and to save himself the trouble he’d changed his line of inquiry. It also gave Ben a convenient way to gloss over his lack of a paper trail.

“No,” he answered honestly. “There’s nothing I can tell you about my lack of records, at least not until I speak with the Jedi Council once all this is finished.”

“You are returning to Coruscant when the planet is stable?”

Ben nodded, folding his hands together in his lap. “I’ve been away from the temple for too long, and Obi-Wan needs to tell the Council his story.”

There was a gleam in Jango’s eyes at that and it put Ben on edge.

“Speaking of Obi-Wan,” the Mand’alor started, “How much do you know about the boy’s history?”

He almost let out a wry laugh, but Ben kept it behind his teeth. “I know what he has told me,” and everything he didn’t tell me. “Why do you ask?”

“Because I’ve read his file,” Jango answered, unrepentant when Ben gave him a pointed look. “And it does not paint the Jedi in a flattering light.”

This was a surprising statement. Ben, of course had read his own file and he didn’t think that there was anything truly alarming in it. “How do you mean?” he asked almost reluctantly.

In answer Jango silently passed the datapad in his hand over. Ben took it almost warily, pulling it toward himself and looking at the screen.

At first glance it was all pretty standard. His intake form with his planet of origin, name, age, birth date, the name of the Jedi Knight that found him, Feemor MacLeod. Which he had forgotten and for some reason rang a bell in his mind. Then the compulsory medical evaluation and the acceptance form for the creche. None of that was anything out of the ordinary. Maybe the recounting of how Knight MacLeod found him naked and abandoned in a barren desolate field almost blue from the cold was cause for alarm, but it didn’t reflect badly on the Jedi.

It wasn’t until he’d scanned through a couple more pages of standard progress reports and moved onto when Obi-Wan outgrew the creche and was placed in an initiate clan that he started to see a pattern, a trend that would have made Ben pause if he’d seen this in any other youngling’s files.

His memories of Master Vant, the Twi’lek docent that had charge of his initiate clan, were mainly filled with disapproving frowns, criticisms of his work ethic, and admonishments for his anger, arrogance, and supposed aggression. With some-forty years of distance Ben could say that his memory was not actually all that accurate. In fact it seemed the years had faded some of the harshness of his treatment from his clan master, because her written reports reflected very little that was complimentary about him as a child.

Initiate Kenobi is reticent to interact with his peers and displays antisocial tendencies.

Initiate Kenobi displays unbecoming attachment to only a select few of his clan mates.

Initiate Kenobi is quick to resort to aggression when met with peer criticism.

Initiate Kenobi doesn’t apply sufficient effort in his studies.

Initiate Kenobi has an attitude of entitlement in regards to his future with the Order that could prove problematic in the future.

Initiate Kenobi shows no particular talent in his utilization and interaction with the Force.

Initiate Kenobi expresses feelings of anger and unfairness when disciplined.

Initiate Kenobi is disruptive at night and has alarmed his clan mates with inappropriately scary stories.

On and on from the time Obi-Wan was five and placed with the clan to when he was assigned to the AgriCorps and shipped off to Bandomeer at barely thirteen. Master Vant hadn’t had more than possibly three nice or complimentary things to say about him in those seven years. Ben stared at the words on the screen and felt an odd sort of disconnect.

Logically he knew that the words were about himself. He was Obi-Wan after all. Until they’d met in the sewers over a month ago, they’d shared an identical history. Everything in this file was about him and if he’d been viewing the file as such the content wouldn’t have been nearly so disturbing.

As it was he was having a problem not feeling waves of anger at his old Clan Master. He was a fifty-five year old Jedi Master in the body of a mid-thirties war general. He’d seen and experienced more tragedy than any being should. He’d long since come to terms with his attachments and his sometimes aggressively protective streak. When he’d acknowledged that he and Obi-Wan had diverged into two separate people he’d unconsciously laid claim to him as someone he needed to protect and care for.

Initiate Kenobi has acted against Initiate Chun in anger and attacked with a display of violence. Despite Initiate Chun’s reasonable peer guided criticism, Initiate Kenobi let his feelings of wounded pride dictate his reaction. Initiate Kenobi seems to have taken an irrational dislike to Initiate Chun, likely a response to Initiate Chun being more competent and a more capable student in many areas of study. Many of the boys’ interactions result in a physical confrontation because of Initiate Kenobi’s unrestrained emotions.

Considering that Bruck Chun had been an unpleasant young boy and had relentless bullied Obi-Wan almost since the moment they’d met, reading the blatant bias Master Vant had against Obi-Wan made anger burn hot in Ben’s belly.

If it was just about himself, Ben knew he wouldn’t feel boiling anger at this injustice, but he wasn’t thinking about this as an offense against himself. He was reacting to this as he would if the offense had been against his padawan. In fact he remembered when he had been forced to confront bias against Anakin as a child.

Anakin had been placed in several initiate classes to catch him up on the standard lessons new padawans were generally already proficient in. An initiate in his galactic history class, a young Zygarian girl, Ben remembered, had taken an instant disliking to Anakin and had bullied and picked on the boy from almost the moment they’d met. The master teaching the class had done nothing, even though several other children had complained and supported Anakin when he’d attempted to bring the issue to the master’s attention.

When Ben had confronted the master about his lack of interference, the being had said that it was an object lesson in forbearance and that Anakin shouldn’t let personal feelings or his wounded pride dictate his actions. That was the first time Ben had ever been tempted to draw his lightsaber on another Jedi.

As it was Ben had dragged the master before the Council and forced them to justify their inaction before the full twelve Council members. Needless to say, no one was particularly impressed and they’d relieved the being of their teaching position almost immediately. Unfortunately they’d stuck Ben with the job of teaching galactic history until they could find another competent teacher to take over.

On a positive note that had been the first time Anakin regarded Ben with something like trust and happiness since they’d become Master and Padawan.

With those memories in mind, Master Vant’s comments read with the same highhanded self-righteousness as that master’s justifications from so long ago.

Ben swiped to the next page and on it was Master Jinn’s accounting of the debacle that was the journey to Bandomeer and the clusterkark that whole mission had been.

It was not as Ben expected. It wasn’t like the mission brought up any kind of good memories, so he didn’t expect any pleasant feeling while reading the report. That didn’t exactly make Ben feel better as he read through Qui-Gon Jinn’s tellingly sparse recitation.

The master had left a lot out. By which Ben meant there was no mention about the fact that the entire mission was one giant trap set up by his disgraced former padawan. Xanatos was in the report, of course, there was no way his involvement couldn’t be mentioned. The conflict between the Hutts and the Arcanons on the freighter, however, the attack by pirates, and the crash landing on the draigon infested planet didn’t make more than a footnote.

There were tensions between two mining factions on the transport to Bandomeer. I was forced to stop Initiate Kenobi from getting in the middle of the conflict and possibly escalating matters further. After a brief delay for repairs on an uninhabited planet, we arrived on Bandomeer without lasting problems.

If Ben hadn’t been a Master himself for many years, he might have found Qui-Gon’s ability for understatement amusing. Now, Ben didn’t find anything humorous about the extreme lack of detail the man had put into his report. Whether that was purposeful in this instance or not, Ben didn’t know. He was not however unfamiliar with his old master’s very deliberate way of wording things in reports, written and verbal to downplay the various shenanigans he’d gotten them both into over the years.

And as he continued to read Qui-Gon’s report about the events on Bandomeer, Ben found it no more amusing than he had as an exhausted, exasperated padawan.

Not only had Obi-Wan’s kidnapping and enslavement on a deep sea mining facility not been mentioned as anything other than, Xanatos du Crion held Initiate Kenobi against his will as an incentive to trap me in a confrontation. But Obi-Wan’s offering to blow himself up so Qui-Gon could save the miners was simply summed up as, Initiate Kenobi’s willingness to sacrifice himself for the greater good is admirable and shows a growth in character from his previous aggressive and bordering on selfish tendencies.

What the kark, Qui-Gon Jinn? Ben thought incredulously as he silently stared at the report. Somehow, Ben couldn’t remember ever seeing this report before. He didn’t know if he’d just never looked it up like he’d never looked up the report on Melida/Daan, but this, he thought staring at the screen, this was not acceptable.

Ben could admit that he was no stranger to creative justifications in some of his reports especially in regards to some of the stunts he and Anakin had pulled during the war, but if he as a Council member had caught a knight or master trying to turn in a report this sparse on details and full of blatantly glossed over elements, he would have put their field status on hold pending a full in person recounting in front of the Council.

That the High Council had allowed Qui-Gon to get away with turning in this bantha-sh*t was unbelievable.

Sensing Jango’s impatience with his seemingly taking his time, Ben flipped past the next few mission reports Qui-Gon had logged in and were consequently cross referenced in Obi-Wan’s file until he got to the last one. The one from Melida/Daan.

Padawan Kenobi justified his renouncing of his vows and his place in the Order by citing his attachment to one of the female leaders of this group of young war protesters. He refused to return to the temple with me to explain himself to the Council.

Ben sucked in a sharp breath and stared blankly at the words on the screen.

It hurt, Ben realized distantly. It hurt to learn that his old master had lied. He’d lied to the Council and when they’d reunited he’d lied to Obi-Wan- to Ben. No wonder Ben hadn’t seen another Jedi on Melida/Daan until he himself had called in a request for aid. The Council hadn’t known a damned thing about the situation on Melida/Daan. They hadn’t even known that Obi-Wan was in any danger at all.

Setting the datapad on the desk in front of him, Ben took a steadying breath and looked up to meet Jango Fett’s assessing gaze.

“I assure you, Mand’alor Fett, what you read in Obi-Wan’s file is not how the Order and it’s Jedi normally conduct themselves.” Maybe he was lying to himself as much as he was to Jango, but Ben couldn’t let himself believe that the way he- the severity of the way Obi-Wan was treated was normal. He couldn’t let himself believe that his experience wasn’t an outlier, because if not, then he was a little afraid of what he was willing to do to rectify it.

Ben Kenobi knew himself well enough to realize that if he found it necessary to take on the entire Order and remake it from the ground up there was little that any of the Masters could do to stop him. Anakin may have been a force of nature when he’d fixed his mind on a goal, completely capable of great displays of destruction and devastation, but Ben was something else. If Anakin was the roaring sandstorm that could strip the flesh from your bones, Ben was the bright heat of the twin suns. You don’t notice it’s killing you until you’re already a hallucinating dried out husk lost wandering in the Dune Sea.

There must have been something of his thoughts on face, because the Mand’alor’s expression flickered, reassessing him.

“What are you going to do about it?” he asked Ben, almost blandly.

Carefully keeping his expression in the practiced neutral Jedi mask, Ben said, “First of all, I’m going to request a full Council audience. All twelve members are rarely called in at once. Not unless there is a truly important issue. Normally a conflict between a Master and Padawan would not warrant even half the Council. This however is much larger than just Obi-Wan’s former master’s blatant neglect.”

“Oh?” Jango’s brows lifted in curiosity. So far he’d only picked up on the fact that this Master Jinn was at worst a compulsive liar and at best a decent Jedi that just shouldn’t have ever been given charge of a child. Kenobi’s reaction, however made him think there was something else in the file that was a lot more serious than Jango had realized.

Ben debated the wisdom of revealing more to Jango. On the one hand it would gain Obi-Wan great sympathy and possibly even Jango’s protective attention. On the other hand it would expose far more of the inner workings of the Order than even Ben, heretical reformist that he was, was comfortable revealing.

“Suffice to say that there is evidence of several sever breaches in youngling care protocol that could be indicative of a larger spread issue.”

That was a lot of complicated words just to say that someone wasn’t doing their kriffing job, Jango thought wryly. And by the look of cold anger in Kenobi’s eyes, he figured the Jedi was itching to make heads roll.

“What are you going to do about this di’kut Qui-Gon Jinn?” he asked recognizing that he wasn’t going to get anything more on that previous subject.

Now there was a complicated mix of emotions moving through the man’s blue-green eyes. Jango caught a flash of regret, anger, and strangely enough grief.

“Obi-Wan is not going back to Master Jinn,” Ben said firmly, not worried about divulging this at least to the Mand’alor. “He should have never been entrusted to Qui-Gon in the first place and after having read this, I’m more sure than ever that he cannot return to that man’s care.”

“If he doesn’t have Jinn as a master anymore, who will teach him?” Jango asked, wondering if Ben will be honest or not.

The look of unwavering, confident determination on the Jedi Master’s face said it all.

“I will,” Ben said and if he’d still had doubts of depriving the boy of the experiences awaiting him under Qui-Gon’s tutelage, they were swept away like so much dust in the wind after the truths revealed in Obi-Wan’s file. “I’ll take him as my padawan.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 12: Foreboding

Chapter Text

The Mandalorians have been on Melida/Daan for a month and a half and Ben has to admit it’s been one of the most interesting months of his life. Three days after his rather emotionally trying conversation with Jango, another Mandalorian troop transport ship landed next to the first. He’d been there to greet the newcomers, one of whom was apparently Jango’s intelligence officer.

Ben was very interested to meet him.

The Mandalorian didn’t take off his helmet when Jango introduced him to Ben as Silas, House Mereel, but he did give the Jedi an assessing once over.

“I must say,” Ben started after offering the traditional greeting. “I’m impressed you were able to break through the temple’s cyber security. Our Tech Masters take their jobs very seriously.”

Silas, the intelligence officer, tipped his head in what Ben recognized as a helmeted smirk. “They’ve earned my respect,” he replied. “It took my five man team five hours to get into your temple’s system, and it took me alone an hour and a half to break into the Senate servers.”

Ben allowed an unbecomingly smug smirk to curl at his lips. “I’ll pass along your compliments when next I’m on Coruscant.”

Though Ben hadn’t been expecting more Mandalorians to join them their presence was welcome. With their increased numbers they were able to take the communications tower again and this time hold it. A two person Mandalorian guard was worth the increased fifteen man Melida/Daan team they took out acquiring the tower.

They also captured one of the Melida’s ration supply warehouses and liberated the capital city water treatment plant from the Daan. Though that location they simply locked down and booby trapped, it being too large and sprawling for them to guard and occupy.

Thankfully there had been no major injuries and no deaths from the Young. Their scouts reported that their efforts had not gone unnoticed. The Melida and the Daan were hurting, down a nearly crippling amount of soldiers and a large majority of their essential supplies.

After a long strategy meeting between the three leaders of the Young, the Mand’alor, and the Jedi Master, it was decided that in three days they would take the Halls of Evidence.

It was a large undertaking since the buildings were massive and on opposite sides of the city. Most everyone agreed that taking them simultaneously would be best. It would put all the bargaining chips in the hands of the Young in one fell swoop and hopefully bring an immediate ceasefire.

Everyone was awaiting the day they would raid the Halls with itching anticipation and anxiety, but until then the Mandalorians worked on training the Young in hand to hand and basic weaponry. While Ben and Obi-Wan worked on their lightsaber training and various other Force techniques Ben thought would be the most immediately helpful.

It went unspoken that Ben was acting as Obi-Wan’s master in all, but name. Neither one wanted to risk broaching the subject. Ben because he was still struggling with the idea of taking another padawan. Anakin had left him not a little bit blaster shy and heartbroken and he was somewhat embarrassed by his fumbling his way through two standard weeks of training with Luke. That said padawan was his teenage self no matter how different their lives would be from now on, took some soul searching to reconcile.

Obi-Wan was reluctant to bring up the evolution of their relationship to the older man’s attention for fear of rejection. It had been difficult and disappointing and painful when Master Jinn had rejected him so harshly and so adamantly, but Obi-Wan could admit to himself that a kind let down from Master Ben might possibly be something he never recovered from. He’d admired Master Jinn for being an accomplished Jedi Master. He felt something unbecomingly verging on hero worship for Master Ben, because though he was heretical and often times cryptic, he was confident in his beliefs, unfailingly kind and generous, and he made Obi-Wan want to be better, to be the best version of himself.

He pushed Obi-Wan in his saber training, in his Force techniques, in the way he viewed the galaxy and the Force and the Order. He expected so much more from Obi-Wan than Obi-Wan expected from himself. And when he inevitably faltered and failed and messed up, Master Ben wasn’t disappointed or frustrated with him, he helped Obi-Wan pick himself back up and try again.

The teen could admit if only to himself at the moment that he desperately wanted to be Master Ben’s padawan. But he couldn’t let himself get his hopes up. He knew Ben still felt pain from the tragedy of his former padawan’s Fall and he highly doubted that the Jedi Master wanted to take on an already rejected and mediocre student like Obi-Wan, no matter how kind the man was to him.

*

They’d crippled the Elders and taken almost total control of their side of the capital city, so it was agreed that there was minimal risk to the Young coming above ground and doing their training in the field around the Mandalorian transports.

Ben and Obi-Wan were both thankful for this. It was required that one must learn to be able to wield their lightsaber in a confined space, but having the free range of an empty field made it so much easier to learn and to teach. Even the smallest training rooms in the temple were bigger than the small sewer junction point the two Jedi had staked out to train in.

Their enthusiasm for the change in location was such that they didn’t notice that they’d gathered an audience, they were too focused on the lesson before them.

Ben had been touching on six of the seven lightsaber forms with Obi-Wan. Attempting to give the teen a grounding in all of them, because he’d learned it was unwise to rely too heavily on one form. He believed you should absolutely master at least one form, but having an in depth working knowledge of many forms opened up your options for unpredictability.

So today they were working on Djem So. It was bringing back memories, and more than once Ben found himself tripping over Anakin’s name on his tongue. He’d resorted to simply calling Obi-Wan young one.

Ben met Obi-Wan’s powerful overhead attack with a vibrating crash of their sabers. There wasn’t quite as much power behind the move as there should be, but the teen was getting better.

“Good,” Ben grunted under the teen’s on going attacks. An angled slash, a swooping up swing, an overextended thrust. “Mind your reach,” he corrected, and had to quickly maneuver to gain distance when Obi-Wan threw in an Ataru leap to make up for his shorter legs, closing the gap between them quickly.

“Excellent!” Ben grinned even as he blocked the teen’s next five moves with seeming ease. “We may be working on Djem So, but don’t be afraid to use the other forms to fill in the gaps of your abilities.”

“Yes, Master,” Obi-Wan panted and promptly used a Shii-Cho move in an attempt to twist Ben’s saber from his hands. It didn’t work, but it earned him another grin.

“Nice try, young one.” He parried another forceful Djem So attack and locked their glowing blades together.

Obi-Wan didn’t hesitate this time. In a flash he took a hand off his lightsaber, punched Ben in the face, and followed it up with a flurry of attacks that the older man had to use his awareness in the Force to counter since his eyes were still watering.

Unfortunately for Obi-Wan, Ben’s temporary loss of sight didn’t stop the man from using his staggering control of Soresu to disarm him. The teen’s saber went flying off to the side and he found the master’s blade hovering a hair’s breadth from his neck. Blinking at the suddenness of the move, it took a moment for Obi-Wan to gather his breath and concede.

“I yield.”

Ben, able to see again, shut off his lightsaber and gave the mildly put out teen a proud smile. “You did very well, Obi-Wan.”

The teen grumbled as he held out a hand, his borrowed lightsaber sailing into his palm. “I still lost.”

He received a wry eyebrow raise at that. “I do have over two decades worth of experience on you, young one. I imagine when you’re my age you’ll find most teenagers don’t present a very great challenge.”

Said teen huffed, but couldn’t stop the slight twitch of his lips, not truly put out by the loss. “As you say, Master.”

Snorting, Ben reached out a hand and ruffled Obi-Wan’s progressively shaggy red hair affectionately. “Come on, young one. Let’s go again.”

Obi-Wan was about to move into the first attack formation of Djem So when he realize that most of the Mandalorians and the Young had been watching their spar in fascination. Shoulders stiffening self consciously, he shot Ben a wide eyed look.

Pursing his lips, the man raised his eyebrows at the spectators. “I believe you all have training to get back to, as well,” he said pointedly.

“Can you blame them?” Jango drawled from his place at the front of the crowd. “I don’t think any of them have ever seen one, let alone two, Jedi really fight.”

Meeting the Mand’alor’s challenge, Ben retorted, “And they still haven’t. This is a training spar between teacher and student.”

Tipping his head, Jango got a considering look in his eyes. “What do you say we give them a demonstration?”

Brows raising again, this time in surprise, Ben studied the other man. “You want to spar, Mand’alor?”

Jango shrugged and stepped forward drawing even with Obi-Wan not taking his eyes off of the Jedi Master. “I’ve never tested my skill against a Jedi before. Call it professional curiosity.”

Ben took a long moment to think that over. In another life Jango Fett, a young inexperienced leader of his people, killed six fully trained Jedi Knights with his bare hands. In another life they’d fought each other on a wet landing pad in the pouring rain. In another life he was almost a decade younger than Jango. In this one he was almost forty years older, battle hardened, and accustomed to fighting for his life.

Well, it will definitely be an interesting match.

“Alright,” Ben nodded. “I accept. Rules?”

The anticipatory gleam in Jango’s eyes disappearing as he put his helmet on. “To first yield.”

“If you set your blasters to stun, I’ll adjust my saber to sparring intensity,” Ben offered, not wanting to run the risk dismembering the Mand’alor.

In answer Jango pulled out his blasters and changed the required settings.

Obi-Wan had been quiet, but as the two men prepared to fight all he could think about was the lessons he’d had on the Mandalorian-Jedi wars.

“Master?” his called nervously.

Ben gave the boy a soothing smile. “It’s just a friendly spar, Obi-Wan. Go ahead and join the crowd.”

After another second of hesitation, Obi-Wan finally resolved to trust in his- the master’s ability and quickly stepped out of the sparring area to stand with the other spectators. Everyone was watching with eager anticipation, especially the Mandalorians. Cerasi moved next to him and grabbed his hand giving it a comforting squeeze.

“It’ll be alright, Obi-Wan,” she murmured to him. “They aren’t going to hurt each other.”

Giving a jerky unconvinced nod in return, Obi-Wan turned his complete attention on the two tense fighters before them.

The Jedi Master and the Mand’alor both gave the traditional Mandalorian salute to their opponent, then there was long held breath, waiting.

Ben kept his eyes on Jango, infinitely patient. Still, when Jango did draw and fire on him, the man was so quick Ben just barely got his saber up in time. He deflected the blaster bolts effortlessly, taking a step closer with every twist of his saber. Jango, dangerously observant, noticed and then his jet pack burst to life and he shot up into the air. The change of altitude was not optimal so Ben continued to deflect with his saber in one hand and used the other to guide the Force to grab and launch a half empty crate of rations at the man’s back.

Jango’s hud in his helmet gave him a warning and though he attempted to dodge the impact still knocked him off balance he was forced to make a rolling landing. Jumping to his feet again, Jango, having holstered his blasters on the way down, began throwing battle stars at the Jedi from the collection on his left vambrace.

One hand out, Ben halted the razor sharp stars mid air and shot them back at the Mandalorian. Jango crossed his vambraces in front of his vulnerable throat and let the blades bounce off his armor. It was a good thing too, since there wasn't a second to blink before the Jedi came down on his crossed arms with his lightsaber.

With a heave, Jango shoved the Jedi off him and kicked the man in the chest. Ben fell back five feet, then was on the defense as the Mandalorian took advantage of his plasma blade impervious beskar. Jango came at him with a vibro knife using his vambraces to block the saber and got in close enough headbutt the Jedi.

Reeling back with a bitten off curse, Ben pushed out with the Force, tossing Jango through the air. The man ignited his jet pack arresting his momentum so he could put his feet back on the ground. Ben followed him and used a move he learned from watching Cody physically take down battle droids. Spinning on one foot, Ben kicked his other leg out and hit Jango right across the helmet with the heel of his boot. Since his opponent was sporting over fifty pounds of beskar armor, Ben put a little of the Force behind the kick and succeeded in sending Jango flying.

The man landed in a shoulder roll and quickly popped back to his feet once more, though Ben could tell he’d rung the man’s bell a bit.

Shaking off the ringing in his head, Jango pulled one blaster and shot off a volley in distraction even as he thrust out with his other arm and launched his grappling hook.

Surprised he’d gotten caught with that move twice in his very long life, Ben only had a second to scowl as his saber spun out of his hands when the steel cord wrapped around his wrists pinning them together. Jango dropped his baster grabbed the line with both hands and gave an almighty yank. Flying off his feet, Ben hit the ground on his belly with a grunt, then was dragged along the ground for a couple yards before he could roll and get his knees then his feet underneath him.

When the Jedi planted his feet staying in a crouch low to the ground and Jango’s reeling him in came to an abrupt halt, he launched himself back into the air. Unfortunately, his attempt to pull the Jedi off his feet again failed. All Jedi learned how to lift off into the sky with the Force, Ben learned how to keep things pinned to the ground using the Force while battling desert sandstorms. He was planted like a tree and Jango’s ascension jerked to a stop.

He saw Jango about to cut the line tethering them and Ben acted fast. He yanked on the steel cord tying them together with a little added Force, effectively pulling Jango from the sky. Reacting just as fast Jango accelerated his downward trajectory with his jet pack and impacted with Ben like a speeding hover-car.

The two men went rolling. When they finally came to stop Ben was crouched over Jango with his summoned lightsaber held against the man’s unarmored throat.

“Yield,” he demanded.

“You first,” Jango shot back and Ben blinked in surprise to feel sharp pressure high up against his inner thigh. Flicking his eyes down he saw somehow Jango had drawn his vibro blade again and was holding it steady along his femoral artery.

“Well, then,” Ben chirped, eyes wide, but amusem*nt dancing in his gaze. “Why don’t we call this one a draw?”

A dry chuckle echoed from Jango’s helmet speakers, but he obligingly withdrew his blade from between Ben’s legs. “I’m willing to accept a draw.”

“Lovely,” Ben grinned at him, turning off his saber and gracefully rising to his feet. He stepped to the side and gestured at his still pinned wrists. “Mind releasing me?”

Climbing no less gracefully to his feet, Jango sheathed his blade and made quick work of unwrapping the Jedi’s wrists and reeling the steel cord and grappling hook back into his vambrace.

“That was a good fight, Jetii,” Jango said, then commented, “You’ve fought Mando’ade before.”

Ben didn’t bother denying it. “I’ve done a fair amount of sparring with some Concord Dawn natives,” he said vaguely. Then tacked on, “I also fought Death Watch a few times while I was on Mandalore as a padawan.”

Jango hummed in acknowledgment. “You must have been just as good as a padawan to survive Death Watch. They would not have spared you for being an ad.”

“I will say it was a learning experience,” Ben offered then the sound of running footsteps caught his attention.

Much to his surprise, Obi-Wan skidded to a stop almost impacting with him, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “That was amazing!” the boy gushed in awe, his smile wide. “You have to teach me that, Master.”

Chuckling, Ben threw an arm around the teen and pulled him into his side. If he put a little more weight on the boy’s shoulders than normal, that was between him and his severely bruised hip and chest. “All in good time, my very young padawan. All in good time.”

He didn’t even realize he’d said it until he felt Obi-Wan stiffen up in his grasp. Turning his eyes down to the boy, he saw bright desperate hope reflected in the boy’s blue-green gaze. He opened his mouth, to say what, he didn’t know, but snapped it shut when they were interrupted by several children rushing up to them to ask Ben about the fight.

The tension in Obi-Wan’s body didn’t ease, in fact it got worse the longer they stood there. Half of Ben’s attention on the chattering children, his slip going unacknowledged. Obi-Wan’s worry and quickly dwindling hope was leaking into the Force, and Ben couldn’t have that.

Finally the children were distracted and the two Jedi were left in a tense silence. Ben studied Obi-Wan’s subdued expression, his eyes pinned on the ground.

“I would be honored, you know.”

Jerking his gaze up, Obi-Wan stared at Ben with tentative hope. “What?”

Ben gave Obi-Wan’s shoulder a squeeze. “I would be honored to have you as my padawan, Obi-Wan.”

Breath hitching, the teen could hardly believe his ears. “You mean it?”

“Very much so, dear one,” Ben smiled down at him, but his expression became serious once more when the boy’s became tentative.

“Even though-” Obi-Wan bit his lip, “even though my previous master rejected me?”

Silently cursing his old master, Ben gave the boy a light shake to draw his eyes back on him. “Obi-Wan, listen to me. What Qui-Gon Jinn did and how he’s treated you was wrong. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you. It is the master’s job to smooth out the rough edges and guide the padawan in growing as a person and a Jedi. Padawans do not come to the master as already fully formed beings.”

“But no other master wanted me,” Obi-Wan pointed out softly. “Master Jinn didn’t even want me. I had to convince him to take me on.”

Yes, Obi-Wan had told Ben a very edited version of the clusterkark that was Bandomeer. And without revealing that he’d already known the whole story or that Jango had stolen his file, Ben couldn’t really use his knowledge to argue against the teen’s doubts.

“I have a feeling there is a lot more to that tale than you’ve told me, padawan,” Ben said, earning him a flush of regret from the teen. “But I can tell you, even without knowing the whole story, that not being chosen by a master was not your fault and every master that rejected you was an idiot.”

Obi-Wan blinked at him almost scandalized, but with a hint of guilty glee. “You can’t say that, Master.”

Ben grinned down at him,“Sure I can. You’re shaping up to be a wonderful Jedi and you are a talented student. I’m lucky you’d even consider me for your master.”

He didn’t even feel like that was something narcissistic to say. Obi-Wan as he was now, was already very different from how Ben had been in this same time in his life. And their paths would only continue to diverge. And that, he thought looking back on his youth and his padawanship, was a good thing.

Blushing bright red, Obi-Wan let a pleased grin curl at his lips. “Thank you, my Master.”

“It’s only the truth, my Padawan.” Ben’s expression cooled a little and he turned serious. “We cannot make it official until we return to Coruscant, however. The Council will have to dissolve your padawanship with Qui-Gon Jinn, and then approve of my taking you on.”

Biting his lip again, a nervous habit, Obi-Wan felt another surge of worry. “Do you not think they will approve?”

Frowning in thought, Ben admitted, “I don’t know. Their approval hinges upon how easily they will accept me back into the temple. I haven’t been back in many years, remember. I don’t know this Council as well as I would like.”

It took a split second of debate then Obi-Wan’s expression folded into fierce determination. “It doesn’t matter. I won’t have any other master. If they disapprove I’ll still follow you anywhere you go.”

It wasn’t like any other master would want him anyway, regardless of how much Master Ben believed his own words. And Obi-Wan would not go back to being an AgriCorps farmer. He knew in his bones that was not his path in life or in the Force. He would be a Jedi Knight, even if he had to be an exiled one.

Good, Ben thought, because if the Council did not accept him he had been fully prepared to convince Obi-Wan to leave the Order with him. Or at least take an unsanctioned leave of absence until he was fully trained and knighted. As Anakin was so fond of demonstrating, it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission.

“I promise you, Obi-Wan. No matter what the Council says, I will not abandon you.”

Throat tightening, Obi-Wan leaned heavily against the Jedi Master and let himself bask in the warm glow of acceptance the man was giving off in the Force around them. They stood there for long moments letting the world spin around them, just enjoying being in each other’s calm presences.

*

It was the night before they began their assault on the Halls of Evidence. The Mandalorians did not anticipate a very large amount of resistance since recon had established that while there was a Melida and Daan presence at both Halls it was not quite as heavy as it had been at the water treatment plant or a couple of their other targets. The Young however were full of nerves.

The Halls of Evidence were a large part of their heritage. A dark and violent and currently controversial part of their heritage, but important nonetheless. It didn’t help that Cerasi and Nield had begun to argue over the fate of the Halls once peace was gained.

“We should burn the whole of lot it to the ground,” Nield asserted angrily.

“It is part of our history!” Cerasi argued back. “If we erase our history we run the risk of repeating it.”

And so the argument went back and forth. Obi-Wan trying and failing mostly to mediate. Now it was the day before their assault and they still hadn’t come to a final decision. Only Jango had been able to bring the debate to a stalemate.

“If we destroy it we lose our leverage,” he said plainly. “We can take it down and lock it away until a permanent solution can be made, but for now it stays.”

Neither leader was particularly happy about that, but Obi-Wan was just thankful the Mand’alor had been there. Ben had disappeared off somewhere before the argument had begun and Obi-Wan was not making progress on keeping the peace.

Late evening had come and gone and everyone one was asleep, mostly restless, but still asleep, aside from the various Young and Mandalorians on watch around the sewer entrances.

So no one was awake to witness Obi-Wan shooting up from his sleep in terror. He could still hear the shot ringing in his ears, still feel the grief and the fear, still feel the hot blood gushing over his hands as he tried to stop the flow.

Scurrying from his threadbare pallet, Obi-Wan swallowed down the roiling nausea in his belly as he quietly as possible jogged through the Young’s base toward that private alcove he and Ben often found solace in.

His body hadn’t stopped trembling, his hands shaking with the phantom sensation of blood coating them. When he turned the corner to see Master Ben sitting seemingly serene in a meditation pose, Obi-Wan couldn’t stop his breath from hitching loudly in the quiet.

Eyes shooting open, Ben took in the sight of his padawan, standing before him with frightened eyes and hunched shoulders quickly descending into panicked hyperventilation.

Alarmed, Ben began unfolding himself from the ground, “What’s wrong, dear one? What’s happened?”

He didn’t get further than half crouching on one knee before he suddenly had his arms full of trembling sobbing teenager. Pulling the boy closer to his chest, Ben let Obi-Wan bury his face in his shoulder. He also ignored the uncomfortably tight grip his padawan had of his arms wrapped around his waist.

“Hush, my dear,” Ben murmured into the top of Obi-Wan’s disheveled hair, bewildered. “Take deep breaths with me. In and hold. Then out and hold.”

Slowly the teen began to calm down. The steady rise and fall of his master’s chest against his helping him slow his breathing and regain some control over himself.

When Ben felt Obi-Wan try to clumsily gather up his emotions and share them with the Force, he sank into a light trance and wrapped his presence around the teen. “Easy, Obi-Wan. Let me help you.”

Ben’s calm demeanor and rock steady presence around him helped Obi-Wan concentrate. Slower and more precise than before he let the master guide him through gathering up his roiling fear stained emotions and tossing them to the Force leaving only a distanced memory behind.

“Good, Obi-Wan. Now,” Ben leaned back, putting just enough space between him and his only mildly calmer padawan to see his flushed, tear streaked face, “tell me what has happened. I don’t think we are in immediate danger or the Force would have warned me.”

“No,” Obi-Wan shook his head and harshly swiped at his face to get rid of the physical remnants of his panic, “nothing happened like that. It’s just-” he sucked in a breath and blew it out gathering his courage. “I had a vision.”

There was a sudden sinking feeling in Ben’s stomach, but he let nothing show on his face or in his Force presence.

By Obi-Wan’s age he’d started to lose his unusually strong connection to the Unifying Force. Partly because he was growing up and his own connection to the Force was gaining a more defined shape and partly through active discouragement from Qui-Gon. His old master had been a solid skeptic on the validity of Force-visions and a fierce almost fanatical proponent of the Living Force. His favorite mantra was, “be in the here and now”. Which was all well and good when your life depended on your situational awareness or knowledge and worry for the future would be actively detrimental to you.

But when your padawan was having terrifying Force given visions in his sleep, or the Force was warning you of danger before, say, the room was pumped full of poisonous gas and battle droids tried to assassinate you then ignoring Force-premonitions was just plain short sighted and stubborn. While Ben had learned to mostly ignore his late master’s teachings on the matter and always listen to his “bad feelings”, he had unfortunately emulated his example too much when it came to his attitude to Anakin’s visions.

Ben would not be making the same mistake twice. The fact that Obi-Wan had had some sort of vision and he had not was also worrying.

“Tell me about your vision.”

“I know I should be mindful of the present, Master,” Obi-Wan said tangling his fingers in Ben’s tabards in distraction as he once again avoided his master’s gaze. “But it was so strong. So clear. I couldn’t even try to release it into the Force.”

“Nor should you have,” Ben scolded him finally gaining startled eye contact from his padawan. “The Force does nothing without reason. Force-visions may not always be clear, their intent and their message may often times be confusing or misleading, but you always receive them for a reason. Disregarding them entirely can be foolish and deadly.”

His words were obviously conflicting with advice and direction Obi-Wan had previously received, but the teen thought back to his master’s story about his former padawan’s visions of death. How they came true and how Ben spoke of his deep regret at not taking them more seriously.

“It was about Cerasi,” he said and was concentrating so hard on making his recounting clear that he didn’t notice the shift in Ben’s expression. “We’d taken the Halls of Evidence. Several leaders from the Melida and the Daan were captured and brought to us to surrender and begin negotiating peace. I think one of them had hidden a blaster though.” Obi-Wan’s face darkened. “They took us all by surprise and shot Cerasi. She was right next to me. She bled out under my hands.”

A shiver went up Ben’s spine. His hands unconsciously tightened in the back of the teen’s tunic where they’d been resting in a gesture of comfort. He remembered very well when he was fourteen and Cersai had died in his arms.

Silently blowing out a long breath, Ben boxed away his old grief stained memories and tossed his newly shaken emotions into the Force.

“I’m glad you came to me, Obi-Wan,” Ben finally spoke, his padawan’s entire body deflating in relief. “This vision may mean exactly as it appears or it may not. What do you think we should do to discover which it is?”

Recognizing one of his master’s impromptu lessons, Obi-Wan took a moment to think his answer through. “I should meditate on the vision. Ask the Force if there is anything more it wishes to show me.”

“Very good,” Ben praised and released his hold on the teen, letting the boy adjust until he was sitting in front of him in a cross-legged meditation pose. “We will meditate together. If the Force has more to tell you, I will try to help you decipher and understand it.”

Another wave of relief flowed over the boy. He was immensely grateful he wouldn’t have to deal with this alone. With his master by his side, ready to help him if he needed it, Obi-Wan didn’t feel so scared. After all, Master Ben gave off a justifiable – Obi-Wan was sure - impression of knowing just about everything.

They sank into a deep meditation, Ben following along in Obi-Wan’s wake catching the echoes of everything the Force showed to his padawan. Unfortunately the Force didn’t show them anything they hadn’t already seen before.

It just kept repeating the image of Cerasi’s blood flowing freely from the wound in her chest. Over and over, it showed the same image and while Obi-Wan only grew more determined to discover any hidden message that might help prevent his friend’s death, Ben felt the hairs on the back of his neck tingle. He had a bad feeling and it just grew worse and worse.

*

TBC...

Chapter 13: Slugthrower

Chapter Text

The moment the sun rose on the day they took the Halls of Evidence, Ben had a bad feeling. It didn’t abate at all as they made their way on site and took observation positions around the Melida’s Hall.

Ben, Obi-Wan, Jango, and Cerasi were on the team attacking the Melida Hall. Nield, Silas, and the captain of the squad Jango first arrived with were taking the Daan. They had a smaller team because the Daan didn’t have as many men guarding their Hall. The Melida for unknown reasons, but something about the grim expression on Cerasi’s face said she had an idea, had almost twice as many soldiers guarding their Hall.

They were crouched on the roof of a building a block away scoping out their target, making sure nothing changed from the last time they’d done recon the day before. Unfortunately, they would be disappointed.

Cerasi let out an uncharacteristic curse causing Ben’s eyebrows to raise and Jango to tilt his helmet toward her curiously. She was looking through a borrowed set of binocs staring down at a group of Melida conversing by the front entrance of the Hall.

“Wehutti’s here,” she said. Obi-Wan apparently understood, because he let out a curse as well.

“Who’s Wehutti?” Jango asked, being the only one of the four that hadn’t met Wehutti in one life or another. Ben on the other hand almost cursed himself. He remembered Wehutti. He’d been their contact when he and Qui-Gon had first come to the planet. He was the one that sold them out and convinced the other Melida leaders that they shouldn’t trust the Jedi. He was also-

“My father,” Cerasi said, grimly. “He’s the leader of the Melida.”

Jango was quiet for a long moment studying the girl’s expression. Then the Mand’alor spoke, “Will you be able to face your father in battle, Alor Cerasi? Will you be able to kill him?”

The girl shot him a fierce look. “I don’t want to kill anyone, but if he will not surrender, if he will not accept peace, then I will do what I must.”

Ben experienced a strange disconnect at her words. He heard his own voice, smelled ash in the air, felt stifling heat on his skin.

“I will do what I must.”

“You will try.”

A hand on his arm shook him out of the vision, the memory. Turning to look, he saw Obi-Wan watching him with a concerned look on his face. The teen must have felt his distraction in the Force. Must have felt the echo of the vision-memory. He didn’t need to ask to know that Obi-Wan had recognized the heat of Mustafar and the dark tone of his Fallen padawan’s voice from his own vision after touching Anakin’s braid.

“I’m alright,” Ben whispered to his worried padawan. “It was simply a memory.”

Eyeing the older man for a moment longer, Obi-Wan finally nodded and turned his attention back on their target.

“With this Wehutti here, he’s brought more men with him,” Jango was saying as he scanned the area through the HUD on his helmet. “It’ll be a more challenging attack, but we still shouldn't have too much of a problem.”

“Well, then,” Ben drawled with a sardonic quirk to lips. “Let’s go prepare the troops.”

The assault, when it started, was both faster and slower than Ben was expecting. He and Obi-Wan lead half their force through the back while Jango and Cerasi lead their half through the front. At the first sign of blaster fire, Wehutti had retreated into the Hall and locked himself and several of the other leaders in a conference room. Which was fine, that just left the Melida foot soldiers for them to deal with.

The goal was to take as many people captive as possible, so Ben was using the Force to knock enemy soldiers against walls and pull blasters from hands. Obi-Wan less practiced at fighting using just the Force was deflecting blaster bolts and tossing large objects as people to knock them out or distract them long enough for a Mandalorian or a Young to take care of them.

There was a yelp from off to the left and Ben had a split second to see that one of the Young had taken a blaster bolt to the leg and was down on the floor.

“Obi-Wan!” He jerked his head in the child’s direction when the teen’s eyes darted toward him. “I’ll cover you.”

Igniting his saber, Ben was an impenetrable wall of spinning blue plasma between Obi-Wan’s unprotected back and the Melida soldiers laying down fire from behind impromptu cover.

The teen was by the child’s side in a moment lifting him up and carrying him behind a corner in the hall, a natural shield from the blaster bolts. Ben backed up after him and ducked around the corner when he could.

“How is he?”

Obi-Wan didn’t look up from where he was doing triage on the wound on the young boy’s thigh. “It’s mostly cauterized, minimal blood, but he can’t walk on it.”

The kid gritted his teeth as Obi-Wan tightened a bandage made from the boy’s torn pants over his wound. “It’s not that bad. I can still fight.”

Ben placed a staying hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Right now you must heal.” He turned his head toward where he’d pinned the presence of a specific Mandalorian in the Force. “Baar’ur! Ni linibar baar’ur!¹”

A Mandalorian, armor painted mostly teal for healing outlined in lustful for life orange with duty green pauldrons, appeared seemingly out of nowhere. “Din’kartay!²” she shouted over the sound of blaster fire.

Before Ben could open his mouth, Obi-Wan started rattling off a string of information without missing a beat. The teen was speaking in Basic, but the baar’ur, the medic, was demanding clarification and issuing short orders completely in Mando’a. She must have a translation of Obi-Wan’s responses running in her helmet, but Ben thought it was safe to assume whether Mando’a was her first language or not, she knew very little if any Galactic Basic.

It took Ben a second to realize he was staring at his padawan in surprise. Sure he’d always been abnormally gifted in languages and he’d picked up Mando’a shockingly quickly in his youth, but he'd always partially attributed that to the almost complete immersion he’d had on Mandalore. That Obi-Wan could understand seemingly perfectly what the medic was saying to him without pause for thought or clarification was impressive.

And distracting apparently because Ben had a split second warning in the Force before he was spinning around. In a blink he had the Melida soldier sneaking up on him disarmed and flipped over his shoulder and onto the floor with an arm twisted painfully behind his back. The man kept struggling so Ben put a little Force-suggestion in his fist and punched him with it.

Glancing up he noticed the medic was looking at him with an air of unimpressed.

“Stop staring and get your ass back out there!” she shouted at him in Mando’a.

He did not blush like a scolded initiate. “Elek, Baar’ur,” he replied then after making sure the Melida soldier was secure, jumped back to his feet and into the fray.

The last ten minutes of the fight felt like they went on for an hour. But that was the way of battle, Ben had noticed during the Clone Wars. So much death and destruction felt never ending and it all happened in what later seemed like the blink of an eye.

When the last of the blaster fire stopped, Ben met up with Obi-Wan, Jango and Cerasi just down the hall from where Wehutti was holed up with the other Melida leaders.

“How did the other team’s assault on the Daan go?”

“I just got confirmation from Silas,” Jango replied. “Their captives confirmed that the leaders of the Daan were meeting with Wehutti here at the Melida Hall today. They’re not sure why, but that explains their presence.” He nodded his head toward the still locked and probably barricaded conference room.

So the other people in the room were Daan and not Melida. That was an interesting discovery. Also convenient, since they needed both factions’ leaders to negotiate and eventually sign a peace treaty.

“Nield and Silas are on their way here,” Cerasi added. “The rest of the Young and the Mandalorians with them have the Hall under control.”

“Wonderful.” Ben let a grim yet pleased grin curl at his lips. Though the day was not over yet. “Perhaps we should begin preparations for when they get here.”

The pointed way he gestured toward the conference room was explanation enough. Jango simply nodded while Cerasi’s and Obi-Wan’s expressions continued to be determined and serious.

Marching up to the large door, Jango banged on it with an armored fist. “We’ve taken the Halls of Evidence. Your people have been killed and captured. Surrender and come out peacefully or we’re coming in.”

Sighing, Ben shook his head and pointedly rapped his knuckles against Jango’s pauldron to get his attention. “If I may?”

Huffing, Jango stepped to the side and waved an imperious hand. “Have at it.”

Ben didn’t knock on the door again, but he stretched out his senses with the Force and counted four beings, all anxious and angry and scared.

“I am Jedi Master Ben Kenobi, and this is Mandalorian Jango Fett. We are here representing the interests of the Young. If you surrender peacefully, the leaders of the Young are prepared to negotiate a treaty and cease fire.”

There were several long moments of silence. Ben observed the changing emotions of the room beyond the door. It seemed three of the anxious occupants were arguing with the angry fourth. Finally, one of the anxious ones stepped forward.

“We are the leaders of the Daan and we surrender,” the woman called through the door.

“Unlock the door and step back,” Ben ordered calm and assured.

The heavy bolt on the door was released and Ben waited for Jango to steady his weapon before he pushed them open. On the other side were three adults, all standing nervous, but passive with their hands raised and their weapons holstered. The fourth was standing off to the side. Wehutti did not look happy, but his hands were also raised and he made no threatening moves.

“Slowly take your blasters out and place them on the floor,” Jango ordered as he stepped into the room with Ben. The Melida/Daan leaders didn’t protest and followed his instructions, though with some reluctance. “Kenobi’s going to lead you to through the halls. I’ll be behind you.”

He said it like a threat, which it was, and Ben didn’t try to soften it. He’d experienced betrayal by the Melida/Daan, he wanted them to understand the consequences if they should try anything.

When the leaders stepped out of the room and came face to face with Obi-Wan and Cerasi, they paused as if shocked to see them. Wehutti sneered.

“This is all your doing?” he demanded angrily of his daughter. “You’re a disgrace to the Melida. You’ve sullied your mother’s memory.”

Ben felt a flash of hurt arch through the girl, but her face remained impassive. “If the Melida and the Daan had stopped fighting long ago, she would still be alive.”

Then she turned on her heel and lead the way toward the main entrance hall where they’d placed their prisoners, their command center, and their medics.

The walk was quiet and Ben was thankful for that. He didn’t think he would be able to or even want to stop Jango from retaliating if Wehutti had continued his tirade. The Mand’alor had built up a friendship and fondness for Cerasi. He respected her as a leader and admired her perseverance.

When they stepped into the main hall, the Daan leader that had first surrendered gasped in shock when she saw the rows of secured and captured Melida and a few Daan. “You didn’t kill them all?”

“The Halls of Evidence are still places of worship and remembrance,” Cerasi said solemnly. “We didn’t want to add more death to their walls if we could help it.”

Her words, the deference she showed for the cultural importance of the Halls of Evidence seemed to earn her an amount of respect from the Daan leaders.

Jango called over a member of the Young and a Mandalorian to stand watch over the leaders. Then he walked away to check in with his people. Ben stood further away watching the surroundings and movement in the hall. He kept most of his attention on the leaders though. Obi-Wan’s terrified recounting of his vision still fresh in his mind. He’d had to watch Cerasi die once already. He did not want to do it again.

Obi-Wan had the same idea it seemed, because Ben could tell that the boy had an almost hyper-vigilance about him. He was stiff and alert and his eyes kept darting between the leaders and any place an attacker may be hiding around the room. His vision had not been the clearest. All he knew was that someone, he assumed one of the leaders, shot Cerasi. He didn’t see who or where they were.

There was a commotion at the front doors as Nield and Silas finally arrived to begin negotiations. Most everyone’s attention turned to their entrance. Ben took his eyes off the leaders for a split second and the Force shouted.

It happened almost in slow motion. Ben felt Obi-Wan tense as the warning in the Force echoed inside them. He registered Wehutti crouched having taken the moment of distraction to pull a snub-nosed blaster from a hidden ankle holster, he saw Obi-Wan knock Cerasi away and ignite his lightsaber to deflect the bolt.

Then the Force shrieked in warning and Ben watched in horror as Wehutti pulled the trigger. He just barely had time to realize that wasn’t a small blaster, it was an antique slugthrower. A shout of warning was torn from him in the Force and aloud, but it didn’t come fast enough.

“Obi-Wan, don’t!”

The slug shattered against Obi-Wan’s blue plasma blade and sprayed molten metal across the right side of his neck and face.

It was like an explosion in the Force when the teen dropped to the floor. All Ben could hear was rushing in his ears as he lunged toward him. He skidded on his knees to Obi-Wan’s side, not registering the mayhem and blaster fire that had broken out in the room.

Obi-Wan was still conscious. His blue-green eyes stared shocked and blank up at the ceiling as he struggled to breathe. The side of his neck was torn up by small pieces of metal the size of a pinhead. There were gleams of silvery shrapnel visible through the blood and flesh of his wound. Alarmingly, one of the chunks of metal appeared to have torn a small hole in his carotid artery, blood was steadily pumping from the wound with the fluttering rhythm of his heartbeat.

Across his cheek and forehead was less damage, but no less concerning. There was blood pouring from a long, deep gouge of above his eyelid along his socket, and there was a gleam of silver lodged in the white of his cheekbone. The flesh of his cheek was raw and bleeding in long streaks like he’d been slashed across the face.

“Obi-Wan, can you hear me? Obi-Wan, look at me!” Ben knew he was shouting, but he couldn’t help it. He hurriedly pressed a hand hard against the wound on the boy’s neck, his fingers quickly becoming sticky and slick with blood. He felt pinpricks of the still burning hot metal scorch against his palm, but he didn’t let up pressure.

The boy’s eyes turned slightly wild as they roll toward him, agonizing pain and fear pouring into the Force around them. His mouth quivered like he was trying to speak.

“Don’t talk, Obi-Wan,” Ben ordered, no longer yelling now that he could feel Obi-Wan’s attention was on him both with his eyes and with the Force. “Hold onto me. Grab onto my presence and let me help you.”

He did. Ben felt a trembling weak hand flop against arm and latch onto his wrist. And he felt Obi-Wan dive into his Force presence so deep that if Ben wasn’t used to being periodically subsumed by Anakin’s supernova and Luke’s blinding bright sunlight he would have been worried he wouldn’t be able to untangle them later.

“That’s it, good,” he said and felt it as the near bone breaking tension in the teen’s body relaxed. He began feeding his own strength into Obi-Wan, a brute force healing technique that was just as likely to kill the one doing the healing as help the wounded recover.

There was a clang of metal and Ben tensed before he registered the determined serious presence of the Mandalorian medic. She was speaking to him, demanding a sit-rep.

“I’m slowing his bleeding,” Ben told her in Basic, unable to pull his concentration enough to speak Mando’a. “His carotid as been nicked.”

“We need to move him. I need my equipment on the transport,” she said all this to the Mand’alor hovering over her shoulder, anger and concern wafting off of him. She tried to nudge Ben’s hand out of the way to apply a thick coagulation pad. Ben furrowed his brow in concentration and edged his palm away from the wound.

He felt a flash of the medic’s confusion and concern when an unnaturally slow trickle of blood came from the exposed wound.

“I’m slowing the bleeding,” he repeated. “I can’t stop it, but I’m keeping him from bleeding out.”

She muttered something about convenient Jetii magic, but let him press his palm back over the now covered wound. Ben sank into a trance as he worked on keeping Obi-Wan wrapped secure and protected in his Force presence, monitoring the slow but steady decline in his condition the longer they sat there.

He distantly observed the chaos around him as the leaders were subdued, Jango shouted for a stretcher, and Cerasi sat near Obi-Wan’s head with tears streaming down her face.

“Kenobi.” The accent was familiar and Ben felt a flutter of long forgotten safety and warmth, before it was swept away in his concentration.

“Kenobi. Ben!” His eyes focused on the man speaking to him and Ben realized it was Jango Fett crouched beside him. “We need to lift him on the stretcher.”

Without a response, Ben gathered the Force and gently, softly lifted Obi-Wan from the floor and onto the stretcher. The boy made a noise of pain, twitched hard as his wounds were aggravated. Ben lost his grip on the blood flow for a moment and the medic cursed when a gush seeped through the bandage.

“Obi-Wan,” his voice sounded like it was far away, and Ben recognized that he was sinking dangerously far into the Force. “I’m going to help you sleep.” He felt a weak acknowledgment through the Force.

Master, I’m scared.

“I know, dear one,” Ben responded aloud.

I don’t want to join with the Force.

“You won’t, Obi-Wan,” he assured the boy, looking into his pleading glassy eyes. “It’s not your time yet. I won’t let you be taken from me.” It smacked of attachment, but Ben didn’t care when he felt the swell of relief and absolute faith Obi-Wan had in him.

“Breathe with me, Obi-Wan,” he ordered, stroking his free hand along the uninjured side of the boy’s face in a soothing motion. “Close your eyes and let me in.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes fluttered close and he released a long shuddering breath. His weakened voice in the Force echoed in Ben’s ears.

Please, Master, don’t leave me.

“Not ever, Obi-Wan,” he vowed, even while pressing the Force-suggestion of sleep along the boy’s mind with a stroke of his thumb over the boy’s brow. The teen went limp in unconsciousness.

“He’s asleep,” Ben responded to the medic’s flash of alarm. “We can move him. I’ll keep him under.”

Ben sank back into the Force as he stood on automatic and walked along with the stretcher into the speeder and finally up the ramp into the transport ship.

He didn’t come back to full awareness until the medic was prodding at his hand on Obi-Wan’s neck again.

“I need to examine him closer,” the medic said when she had most of Ben’s attention. He nodded and lifted his hand, but kept his other one on Obi-Wan’s arm. The physical connection facilitating the control he was exerting over the Force to keep the boy alive.

“Tion te kaysh?”

Ben glanced toward the door of the med-bay. Jango was standing watching the medic work on Obi-Wan with his helmet off and his face creased in concern.

“I can stabilize him,” the medic answered as she applied a compound to the open wound that would stop the bleeding. “But I don’t have the equipment to perform surgery.”

“Surgery?” Ben asked, in a forced calm.

“Some of the shrapnel is lodged in his carotid and in the bone in places. He’s lost a lot of blood and none of our blood in storage will work for him. He has a rare, anomalous blood type,” she explained grimly. “He won’t last till we get to Mandalore and if he does the damage might be permanent.”

She didn’t need to mention the laceration above Obi-Wan’s right eye was one of the most worrisome. Ben could tell that it had severed something just by the disconnect he felt in the Force. It took him a split second of thought, but he knew what he must do.

“Mand’alor Fett, if you provide transport for Obi-Wan and myself to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, I would owe you a life debt.”

Jango studied him for long moment. “The trip to Coruscant is longer than to Mandalore. Will he survive it?”

“I can put him into a healing trance,” Ben said. “It won’t heal wounds this severe, but it will put him in a sort of stasis. His condition will hold until we can get to the temple healers. They have Force techniques that will heal him almost completely.”

“He needs blood,” the medic protested. “His brain and heart are already struggling with the loss.”

“Use my blood,” Ben countered immediately. “We have the same blood type. Hook us up in a transfusion, take as much as you need.”

The medic scoffed in doubt. “He has the rarest blood type in the galaxy. Only Stewjoni have this blood type. How do you know you’re a match?”

How indeed, Ben thought. “I’m Stewjoni,” he said. “Scan me and check, we’re a match.”

She pricked his arm and her scanner beeped. It was only then that Ben considered the complications if she ran his genetic sequence against Obi-Wan’s. It seemed she just ran a blood type analysis, though, because her helmet turned back to him and she nodded.

“I don’t understand this Jedi healing magic, but I’ll set you up for a transfusion. I’ll check his status afterward, then you can use your magic on him.”

“Thank you,” he bowed his head to her then turned back to Jango waiting for his answer.

“I’ll organize who’s staying for the negotiations and who’s coming to Coruscant with us,” the Mand’alor said. “We’ll be in atmo before sundown.”

“Vor entye, Mand’alor.” Ben put a fist to his chest and bowed his head low.

“Nayc entye,” Jango replied then disappeared to return to the Halls and the chaos they’d left behind.

Ben used the few minutes the medic took to set up the transfusion to scrub Obi-Wan’s blood from his hands. Never again did Ben want to see his padawans’ blood staining his hands. Anakin’s blood may only appear to stain his hands in dreams, but the guilt of leaving him to scream and die in agony never left him. Obi-Wan’s injury may not be wholly Ben’s fault, but he knew he would carry the blame inside himself.

At least now, he thought morbidly, he knew why the Force kept showing them images of Cerasi’s heavily bleeding wound. If it had been a blaster bolt she wouldn’t have bled anywhere near as much. There was no comfort in the realization because his painfully young padawan was laying still and wounded, frightened and in pain, and Ben hadn’t been able to spare him from it.

He resumed his seat next to Obi-Wan’s bedside and let the medic adjust and needle and shuffle him around as she connected tubing between them. She started a slow blood drip. Inundating Obi-Wan’s taxed body with too much at once could do just as much damage as the loss. After an hour and a half, she unhooked them. Obi-Wan had a healthier pallor, still sickeningly pale, but no longer deathly.

Ben placed one hand on Obi-Wan’s forehead and the other over his heart and sank into a deep meditation, distantly aware when they lifted from the ground and rose through the atmosphere.

“We’ll enter hyperspace whenever you’re ready, Kenobi.” Ben rose out of his meditation and turned to the Mand’alor. Jango lifted something from his belt and handed it over. “I also thought Obi-Wan might want this back.”

Ben hesitated for a moment before he took the offered lightsaber, once Anakin’s and now Obi-Wan’s, from the man. He clipped it on the opposite hip from his own before speaking. “Wake me before we enter Coruscant airspace. I’ll get you through air traffic control and get you clearance to land at the temple.”

Jango frowned at him. “You’re going to sleep the whole way?”

“No,” Ben shook his head. “Obi-Wan is too young and his grasp on the Force too malleable to hold a healing trance on his own. I’ll be in a deep trance as well to control and monitor him the entire time.”

With that, Ben closed his eyes breathed out all his roiling turmoil. His fear for his padawan, his anger at his own failure to protect him, his trepidation at seeing the temple and the Council for the first time in twenty years. He excised it all into the Force. Sharing his emotions with the force would have left an echo of them behind, Ben needed a completely clear mind if he wanted to hold a stasis healing trance for the estimated five days it would take to get to Coruscant.

Mind blank of emotions, Ben wrapped the Force around himself and Obi-Wan and sank so deep that his awareness of the world around him disappeared.

The last thing he registered before he completely gave over to the Force was the jolting of the ship as it jumped to hyperspace.

*

TBC...

Chapter 14: Warm Welcome

Chapter Text

Ben rose from from the Force to an insistent calling of his name. Blinking his eyes open, he looked over and saw one of Jango’s Mandalorians, the large Togruta he’d first seen playing “tooka, tooka, nexu” with the children. He had his helmet off and was watching Ben with a fascinated wariness.

“We’re about to be hailed by Coruscant air traffic control,” he said when he saw that he had Ben’s somewhat still distant attention.

Ben straightened his shoulders and grimaced as his spine cracked and his muscles ached. “Thank you, I’ll be on the bridge in a moment.”

The Togruta eyed him for a second longer before he nodded and left the med-bay.

Turning his attention back on his injured, unconscious padawan, Ben examined him. It seemed the medic, he really needed to learn her name, had taken the time to clean Obi-Wan’s injuries more thoroughly. There was an opaque gel spread over the open wounds, not bacta Ben realized. It was an antibacterial gel of some sort. A wise choice, he acknowledged. Applying bacta before the wounds were cleaned and the more severe damage seen to would only cause complications in the healing process.

She’d removed most of the metal fragments of the slug from Obi-Wan’s wounds as well. He spotted them sitting on a tray on the other side of the medical bed. They were misshapen from being super-heated and rapidly cooled, but the medic had done an admirable job of trying to piece the slug back together. In the temple the healers would use the Force to make sure they’d removed all traces of foreign objects, but when one didn't have the Force, putting the object back together was often the only way to figure out if they’d removed all the pieces from the wounds or not.

Though, Ben could see that medic hadn’t tried to removed the large shard from the bone of Obi-Wan’s cheek. Another wise, cautious choice.

She’d wipe the blood away from his skin as well, but hadn’t been able to move him to replace his bloodied clothes with Ben keeping physical contact during the stasis trance. Still she’d tidied him up as much as she could and Ben was immensely grateful. The care shown to his padawan was something he could never repay.

The med-bay doors opened and the medic herself walked in, her helmet still in place. “I’ll watch over him while you’re getting us on the planet. Will your Jedi magic hold while you’re gone?”

“We’re close to the temple now,” Ben replied as he stood and grimaced again at the aching creaks of his stiff joints. Apparently even in his young body meditating for five days straight in a hunched over position was not advisable. “I can hold the stasis over him until we land.”

Looking back down at his padawan, Ben stroked a hand through Obi-Wan’s shaggy, tangled red hair. We’re nearly home, padawan mine, Ben thought, hold on just a little longer.

The walk to the bridge was quick. He stepped through the door just when a female voice rang out from the ship’s comm.

“Mandalorian transport cruiser, this is Coruscant air traffic control, state your ship’s designation and your business on planet.”

Jango turned at the sound of Ben’s entrance and raised an expectant eyebrow at him. “We’ve ignored the summons twice already, Kenobi. You took your time.”

“A Jedi is never late nor is he early, he arrives precisely when he means to,” Ben intoned hearing his old master’s often infuriating lack of repentance in his head. He stepped up to the comm. and pressed the call button.

“Coruscant air control, this is Jedi Master Ben Kenobi on Mandalorian transport Jaster’s Revenge, requesting permission to enter the planet on Jedi High Council authority.”

He felt a tickle of suspicious amusem*nt from Jango and curiosity from the Mandalorian in the co-pilot seat, Silas, he remembered.

There was a pause over the channel before air control returned, “Master Kenobi, state your authorization code and destination.”

Ben took a deep breath and threw caution to the wind. “Council authorization code: Yirt-Osk-Dorn-Aurek-7081-2381-Mern-19. Destination: the Jedi Temple.”

Another pause, presumable the being on the channel checking the validity of his code. It would go through, Ben knew. After all he’d used Yoda’s authorization code.

“Jaster’s Revenge, you are clear to enter atmosphere.”

Silas lowered them through the atmosphere and turned them toward the temple. Ben could feel Jango’s eyes boring holes into the side of his head.

“I thought you said you didn’t know the current High Council,” he commented with a darkly neutral voice.

“I don’t,” Ben replied calmly. “But Master Yoda has been the Order’s Grand Master for the last two hundred years. And I have found that knowing a Council member’s codes comes in handy more often than you would think.”

Ben’s own Council authorization codes are about twenty years away from being generated and Obi-Wan didn’t have the time to wait for air traffic control to contact the temple and get authorization any other way. It was a good thing he’d been able to remember Yoda’s code after all these years.

That his using the code has surely alerted the Council to his subterfuge and his presence is something he’ll have to deal with later. After Obi-Wan is safely in the Halls of Healing.

The ship’s comm. channel crackled again and a vaguely familiar voice called through the speakers. “Mandalorian transport, you do not have authorization to enter Temple air space.”

Ironically, it was a much less friendly greeting than Coruscant air control had given them. Thankfully, Ben knew exactly how to get them entrance.

“I am a Jedi Master, master authorization code: Jenth-Mern-Qek-Grek-Jenth-7885. I have an injured padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, on board in critical condition. I need a medical team on standby in the temple hangar.” He was equally glad he remembered Qui-Gon’s codes, trying to convince the temple air control to let them land without a master’s code would have been a nightmare.

The return response was much quicker than Coruscant’s. “Right away, Master. I’ll send directions to your nav. computer for the temple hangar. What details can you give me of the padawan’s condition?”

“Padawan Kenobi was injured attempting to deflect a slugthrower projectile,” Ben replied quickly and concisely. “He’s sustained damage to the right side of his face and neck. Possibly severed optic nerves and a punctured carotid artery. I have him in a stasis healing trance right now, but I won’t be able to hold it once we land.”

“Acknowledged, Master. I’ve sent the information on to the medical team. They’ll be waiting for you in hangar bay seven. May the Force be with you.”

“You as well,” Ben signed off and turned off the comm. The navigation computer beeped with incoming directions and Silas guided them smoothly around the temple.

“I must go with Obi-Wan,” Ben said to Jango as he walked from the bridge. “If I don’t see you before you leave, thank you again and no matter what you said, I am in your debt. “

“We’re not going to leave so soon,” Jango countered calmly as he kept up with Ben’s quick steps, earning himself a questioning look from the Jedi. “I want to make sure Obi-Wan is alright. Besides,” he continued almost offhandedly, “I’ve decided I would like to speak with your Council on some matters.”

That didn’t sound like it boded well, but Ben didn’t have the time or the desire to analyze what Jango could mean by that. He’d just entered the med-bay when the ship gave a gentle jolt of landing.

Suddenly it was like Ben could feeling everything. All of them, every Jedi on Coruscant at that moment came rushing at him. His hold on the Force keeping Obi-Wan suspended in time shattered and Ben had an incredulous moment to realized that the entire time he’d been on Melida/Daan the Force itself had been shielding him from the almost blindingly bright Light in the galaxy. Then he was struggling to gather his wits again, shoving back the luminous encroaching presences of thousands of alive lightsiders just going about their day.

It was like going from dying of dehydration in the desert to drowning in an infinite ocean. Ben almost lost himself in it, was in the process of losing himself when he noticed the stain. The oily slick of darkness streaking its way through the brightness in the Force. Ironically it grounded him in reality, in his new here and now. The Sith were alive and well and Ben latched onto that knowledge and dragging himself back to awareness.

“He’s bleeding again!”

Jerking his head up, Ben saw the Mandalorian medic was standing over Obi-Wan holding a rapidly reddening gauzy pad against the boy’s neck and face.

Been took a deep breath and threw his presence out into the Force, spotting the bright determined, professional light of Vokara Che rushing toward them with three other healers.

“The Jedi healers will be here in a moment,”Ben said hurrying over to his padawan that was somehow regaining consciousness again. “Help me get him ready for transfer.”

Master? The boy made a pained whimpered as his body twitched, trying to move.

“Hush, padawan, stay still,” Ben murmured stroking a hand over Obi-Wan’s forehead. “We’re almost to the Halls of Healing, Obi-Wan. Go back to sleep.”

The teen released his hold on consciousness again and let his master gently press him back down into sleep.

The sound of hurrying steps grabbed their attention and Ben looked up. There was a moment of surreality when he laid eyes on Healer Che for the first time in over twenty years. Then she pinned him with stern demanding look and he was jolted back into the present again.

“Who’s been treating the boy? What’s his status?” she shot out as she came around the bedside and started to examine him both with the Force and with a medical scanner held out to her by the senior padawan at her side.

“I’ve been treating him,” the Mandalorian medic replied in Mando’a and Ben seeing the sharp startled look from Vokara Che hurriedly began translating.

Everything moved fast after that. They had Obi-Wan Force lifted onto a gurney and wheeled down the ramp of the transport ship and through the hangar in what seemed like no time. The Mandalorian medic rattling off instructions and information almost faster than Ben could translate as he jogged beside his padawan keeping a worried hand on the boy’s wrist.

They took the emergency lift to the Halls and rushed out of the doors when they opened.

“Healer Dune, get a surgery room ready!” Vokara ordered to the healer waiting for them. “I need six quarts of Padawan Kenobi’s blood from storage and prepped for a transfusion. And contact the High Council,” she said as a last ominous statement her eyes meeting Ben’s over Obi-Wan’s body, “they’ll want to know exactly what the sith-hells is going on here.”

Ben was stopped from following them into the surgery theater. A junior padawan politely, but surprisingly firmly barring his entrance to the sterile room. The Mandalorian medic was by his side presumable relaying information back to Jango on the ship as she pressed the call keys on her vambrace comm.

He didn’t move even when the medic was escorted back to the hangar and her people. Ben just stood in the waiting area of the Halls monitoring the progress of Obi-Wan’s surgery through the Force. It was a struggle not to lose himself in the overwhelming brightness of the Force while in the heart of the Jedi Temple, but keeping his concentration on his padawan helped keep him grounded.

That is until the doors to the Halls slid open again and two sets of booted footsteps caught his attention.

Glancing over his shoulder, Ben realized he shouldn't be surprised by the sight of two temple guards. He had after all used a Council member’s authorization code to gain access to the planet and a Jedi Master’s identification code to gain admittance to the temple. Both said Council member and master who were currently in residence at the temple at this very moment.

“Come with us, sir,” one of the guards spoke in a low voice through the blank white mask. “The Council wishes to speak to you.”

Ben didn’t respond right away. Not until he felt the breath of relief in the Force as Healer Che finished repairing the damage to Obi-Wan’s body. There was a cool almost tingly feeling across his neck and face. Since he’d been so intently monitoring his padawan’s progress with Force that he was getting echoes of his physical sensations Ben guessed that meant she’d applied a thick layer of bacta to the boy’s wound.

Turning his full attention back to the guards he nodded his head in acceptance. “Lead the way, gentlemen. Let’s not keep them waiting.”

They escorted him out of the Halls of Healing and toward the lift, one on either side of him. Whether they were guarding him from escape or the rest of the temple from a potential attack he didn’t know. At least, Ben thought, they didn’t try to take the lightsabers from him. That would not have ended well.

*

When they stepped out of the lift to the waiting area outside the Council Chambers Ben had a moment of panic. Last time he’d walked through those doors he’d seen a dozen youngling bodies scattered across the floor.

His heart pounded in his chest and his breath caught in his throat, he felt his body about to lock up on him. Then he saw the being standing outside the doors obviously waiting for their arrival. It was Senior Padawan Depa Billaba, he recognized. This wasn’t the temple after the purge, there would be no lifeless dismembered bodies of children through those doors.

Ben was calm again. He quickly excised the feelings of panic into the Force and gave the young Chalactan a smile.

“Hello there.” The girl jumped at the sound of his voice and hurriedly straightened up, putting on a serious face, though her curiosity wasn’t very well hidden. “I believe the Council summoned me.”

She eyed him for a moment, taking in his surely rumpled blood stained robes, his no doubt greasy unwashed hair, the dark circles under his eyes. Really the dubious look she was giving him was probably deserved.

“Yes, sir. The Council well see you now.”

“Splendid,” he muttered under his breath, stepping away from his guards to follow her through the opening chamber doors. He’d spent the whole journey to the Council Chamber trying to strategize what he was going to say to the Council. Needless to say, he’d not come up with anything truly satisfactory.

Looks like he’s taking a page out of Anakin’s book after all and winging it.

He entered the Council Chamber and was met with that odd feeling of disconnect again. Pretty much everyone in the room with him had been dead last he’d heard. All except Yoda. Who was sitting in his customary seat with both hands folded over the top of his gimer stick watching Ben take in the people around him with keen, sharply observant green-brown eyes.

“Who are you, and used my authorization codes to enter the planet, why did you?”

The little green being’s voice brought up a wave of old resentment, rusty affection, and barely remembered safety. Ben was quiet too long trying to wrestle those feelings back into their box, because Yoda gave a throaty dissatisfied hum.

“Know you, I do not. Give you my codes, I did not,” he stated. The room was almost oppressively silent and Ben had never felt so scrutinized in this chamber before. And between Qui-Gon, Anakin, and Ahsoka, he’d been the subject of High Council scrutiny plenty in his last life.

Ben blew out of a breath and bowed before his grandmaster, the Grand Master of the Order. “I apologize for using your authority to gain entrance to Coruscant, Master Yoda. Padawan Kenobi did not have time to wait for proper authorization. His injuries were too severe.”

There was shift in the Force permeating the room. His mention of Obi-Wan had zeroed in many of the Councilor’s attention.

“Use Master Jinn’s code as well, you did,” Yoda said, his eyes boring into Ben with an edge of curiosity to go with the suspicion and disapproval, “to gain permission to dock in the temple.”

Ben pursed his lips, but nodded. “Obi-Wan was his padawan. The least he owed the boy was quick access to medical care.”

There was a restrained swell of discontent in the air. Ben, so open to the currents of the Force in the room then, could tell that some of the Councilors did not appreciate the implied criticism and censure of a Master of their Order.

“Reveal much, your words do,” Yoda commented, his gaze more assessing. “Familiar with Padawan Kenobi, you are. Disapproving of the boy’s master, you are as well.”

Huffing out a sharp breath through his nose, Ben unpeeled his lips from their pursed expression before he spoke. “I was under the impression, Master Yoda, that Master Jinn repudiated his most recent padawan and left him in a war zone where children were being slaughtered by their parents.” There was a grumbled of insult quietly going around the room, but Ben kept his attention on the Grand Master, whose large telling ears had twitched at his words.

“Left the Order voluntarily, Obi-Wan did. Refused to return and discuss his resignation, we were told.”

“Yes, I know what you were told,” Ben felt only a little less harsh seeing that Yoda wasn’t hiding his concern very well. “You were mislead at best and lied to at worst.”

“Preposterous!” Ben’s head snapped around to Master Rancisis’s forbidding scowl. “A Master of the Order would never dare lie to us.”

Ben pointedly did not roll his eyes, though he did raise an eyebrow. “That Master is Qui-Gon Jinn,” he said. “He’s never been known to respect the authority of the Council when it did not suit him.”

There was a louder swell of discontent and muttering from the venerable Masters of the Council.

“What reason could Master Jinn have for lying to us?” Ben flicked his eyes over to the smooth accented voice and quickly smothered his reaction when he saw a younger Shaak Ti looking at him seriously.

There was a sharp bang and the room quieted. Jerking his attention back to Master Yoda, Ben took in the look of displeasure, concern, and gravity in the small Master’s expression.

“Relate to us, you will, what Obi-Wan told you of his leaving the Order.”

“Obi-Wan didn’t leave the Order,” Ben corrected sternly. “If I’m not mistaken he would have had to renounce his vows in the presence of at least two members of the High Council. Which I’m sure you know, he did not do.”

“What do you, a stranger to us, know of our ways?” Master Mundi demanded, and Ben felt a pang for being under his suspicion. He and Ki-Adi didn’t often see eye to eye, but they had been fellow members of the Council and comrades in battle.

Before Ben could think of a reply, Yoda banged his gimer stick again, this time with more force. “How he knows, important it is not. Correct he is, renounce his vows, Obi-Wan did not. A padawan we have failed, when follow our own traditions, we did not.”

There was a heavy almost chastened quiet over the room. Yoda running his eyes over his fellow Council members, Ben was surprised to realize that the little master was a little angry. At what he wasn’t sure, but he’d never seen the Grand Master this grave except during the Clone Wars.

Turning his piercing attention back on Ben, Yoda gave him a sharp nod. “Correct, you are. Still a member of this Order, Obi-Wan is. Tell us what happened, you will.”

Ben didn’t realize until Yoda had said it, but a doubt he’d had since he was fourteen was suddenly extinguished. That Master Yoda, who he’d admired and looked up to and was afraid to disappoint, acknowledged that the Order had failed him not that he’d failed the Order made all the difference.

Bowing again, he was sure his sudden burst of relief and gratitude in the Force was puzzling to the old master, but Yoda didn’t question it.

“First, I’m going to tell you about the latest conflict on Melida/Daan, so that you’ll understand the context of Obi-Wan’s decisions.” There was a whisper of the beginnings of grumbling, but a sharp look from Yoda silenced them.

Ben explained the three factions and the generations long civil war and violent division between parent and child. He could pick out which Council members were horrified by the revelations and which were indifferent. When he began recounting the mission to rescue Master Tahl, Ben had a little trouble speaking as though he’d heard it second hand, but he didn’t slip so any hesitation could be written off.

When he finally reached the part of the story where Obi-Wan refused to leave the planet, to leave the Young to fight by themselves, there was a heavy air of dread leaking into the Force from several places. He couldn’t quite pinpoint which Councilors were most effected by the tale.

As he recounted Qui-Gon’s ultimatum and Obi-Wan’s refusal, as he told them of the violent severing of the boy’s padawan braid, there was a powerful flash of shock and guilt, there and gone again in a breath. Ben turned surprised eyes on Yoda’s outwardly impassive expression.

There was silence as his story sank into the room and the Councilors digested this disconcertingly different sequence of events than they’d previously been aware of.

“Know this, we did not,” Yoda finally spoke, his ears lowered in the only physical sign of his reaction. “Would have sent help to Obi-Wan and the Young, had we known.”

This too was like a balm on an old, almost forgotten wound. “I hoped as much, Master Yoda,” Ben said solemnly.

“We obviously failed Obi-Wan,” came a familiar voice from the seat next to Yoda. Ben looked toward it seeing a young Mace Windu staring at him with a dark, heavily contemplative, and mildly suspicious expression on his serious face. “But how did you come to be with Obi-Wan? Where do you fit into this mess?”

Good old Mace, Ben thought wryly. Always on point and always asking the important, if inconvenient questions.

“I followed the Will of the Force to Melida/Daan,” Ben answered simply earning himself an unimpressed eyebrow raise from Master Windu. “There I determined that my path was to help Obi-Wan in any way that I could.”

They could tell he wasn’t lying. They could also tell he wasn’t exactly telling the truth either.

“Many consider a lie of omission to still be a lie,” the muffled, filtered voice of Master Plo Koon put words to what the rest of the Councilors were thinking.

Huffing out a quiet chuckle, Ben tossed the Kel Dor a wry curl of his lips. “I answered with the truth, Master Plo,” Ben returned earning himself a surprised considering look from the master, “from a certain point of view.”

A deep hum from Yoda brought Ben’s attention back to him. When he saw the expression on the Grand Master’s face however he was wary. The small master was studying him with such intensity and focus, Ben could actually feel Yoda’s attention in Force examining his Force presence.

“Familiar, I am, with that concept from my own master, of a ‘certain point of view’,” Yoda said gaining a flash of shock from Ben. “Taught it to my last padawan, I did. And he to his padawan.” The little green master met Ben’s widened blue-green eyes with a look close to recognition. “Who are you, I ask?”

Throat suddenly tight, Ben swallowed and steeled himself. He hadn’t exactly planned out how or even if he was going to tell the Council about time travel, but Yoda was almost nine-hundred years old. He’d seen more than almost any living master could contemplate. If anyone was going to figure Ben out in the space of a conversation it would be him.

The Force was suddenly very insistently pushing him. Prodding at him. Demanding Ben’s trust.

“My name, Master Yoda,” Ben said and took a leap of faith, “is Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi. But you can call me Ben.”

His words brought a gleam of fascination to Yoda’s green-brown eyes and a crease of an on coming migraine to Mace’s forehead. The other Councilors muttered and started shouting in denial, in questions, leaking curiosity or indignation into the Force.

Standing in the middle of it all staring down his great-grandmaster, the man that was Jedi Master General Obi-Wan Kenobi and Crazy Old Ben Wizard of the Wastes thought that there was no need for the Force to feel quite so amused.

*

TBC...

Chapter 15: The Mystery of Obi-Wan Kenobi

Chapter Text

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Yoda’s gimer stick only brought the steadily rising din down enough to hear individual masters’ complaints.

“Preposterous! How dare you claim to be a Jedi Master!” There was Master Rancisis again.

“It’s a fake name,” Master Tiin, “he’s obviously lying again.”

“We should hear him out,” kind, gentle Master Shaak Ti. “There is more to this story.”

“I felt no lie his words,” said the boundlessly patient Master Plo Koon.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Room finally silent, Yoda huffed in exasperation and eyed the other masters scolding. “Truth, this is. Feel no lie in the Force, did I. Trust the Force, do I alone?”

Wow, Ben blinked at the small master, that was harsh. Apparently the other masters thought so too, because several of the more vocally denying ones slumped fractionally lower in their seats. But they didn’t protest again.

Grunting, satisfied that he’d cowed the young whippersnappers on the Council, Yoda turned his expectant gaze back on the one laying claim to the same name as the padawan of his grandpadawan.

“Explain you will, what you mean by that,” Yoda ordered. “Not in two hundred years, has another Obi-Wan Kenobi been a member of the Jedi. Until fourteen years ago, our young Obi-Wan came to us.”

Right, Ben thought with trepidation. Now he had to actually convince a room full of ironically skeptical space wizards – as he’d heard the smugglers in Mos Eisley call the Jedi of old – that he was a time traveler.

“I’ll tell you my story, Masters,” Ben said, “if you will bear with me and listen until the end.”

“Listen, we will,” Yoda assured him while simultaneously ordering the other councilors to silence. “Interested to hear this, I am.”

Ben almost snorted at that, suddenly remembering there was more than one reason the Grand Master of the Order was sometimes referred to as a troll.

Shaking the thought away, Ben straightened up and prepared to give his audience a very abridged, though completely truthful retelling of his life.

“I was brought to the temple as an infant,” he began. “A Jedi Knight found me freezing to death in a field on Stewjon. I had been given the name Obi-Wan Kenobi and treated accordingly by my birth people.” There was a flutter of confusion from several of the masters, but not from Yoda or Mace or Plo. It seems they knew enough of his planet of origin to understand the implication of his name.

“I grew up in the creche, I joined an initiate clan, and when I came of age I struggled to find a master that would take me.” If Yoda didn’t suspect before, he did now. Mace on the other hand was growing more skeptical of the validity of his story.

“Eventually, a master agreed to take me on. Despite more than a few rough patches in our partnership, I spent my padawanship learning all I could from him.” Ben didn’t want to bring up the details of his tumultuous relationship with his old master. That wasn’t the point of this story and there would be time enough later to bring up his complaints about Qui-Gon’s conduct with his padawan.

“I was in my twenties, still a padawan when I lost my master,” Ben had to pause for a moment. No matter his mixed feelings, Qui-Gon had meant a lot to him and his death had pained him. “I killed the darksider that killed him and was Knighted for it.”

That garnered a rumble of unease from the Councilors. What Ben had technically earned was a Battlefield Knighting. Something they hadn’t put in common practice since the last Mandalorian-Jedi conflict over seven hundred years ago. During the Clone Wars more than a few padawans, his own included, had earned themselves Battlefield Knightings.

If his Knighting caused a stir, his next words would cause more of one. “Days prior to my Knighting a young boy was brought to the temple. He was very powerful, but most considered him too old to admit into the Order.” Here’s where Ben was going to be skirting close to lying by omission. He had no intention of revealing more of Anakin’s history and circ*mstances than he had to. One of the failures of the Order had been letting his status as the presumed “Chosen One” become common knowledge not just among the Jedi, but in the Senate as well.

Some of Anakin’s story, most of it dark and painful, Ben would have to tell, but he would protect his padawan as best he could. How could he do anything less when he’d done nothing, but almost since the moment he’d met the boy.

“This boy was, however,” Ben continued, “too powerful to leave to the mercies of the galaxy. I took him as my padawan not a week after my Knighting.”

There was a surge of disapproval from the more traditional masters, but Yoda’s warning held and no one spoke.

“I trained him as best and as faithfully to the Code as I could,” he fought not to frown as familiar feelings of self recrimination made themselves known again. “He was a good student, talented in the Force, amazing with a lightsaber, and so kind and compassionate. But he did not take the teachings of the Code well.” The masters didn’t like that, he could tell. “He felt the Code was limiting, stifling, oppressive.”

Some indignation floated into the Force, but Ben ignored it. There was a quiet hum from Yoda and when he flicked his gaze over to his grandmaster, Ben knew his unspoken agreement with the sentiments had not gone unnoticed.

“Despite the tension this brought to our partnership and the friction our differing philosophies made between us, I was so very proud when I was granted the honor of cutting his braid as he was Knighted.” Unconsciously, Ben wrapped his left hand around his right wrist and the braid still hidden under his cuff. This too did not go unnoticed, but he didn’t realize it as he spoke again.

“He was a wonderful Jedi Knight, the best star pilot in the galaxy, and a good friend.” The echo of the words he’d said to Luke rang in his ears and Ben had to pause again to fight the tightening in his throat. He knew his words made his attachment to his padawan glaringly obvious, but Ben didn’t particularly care. He brushed the masters renewed disapproval aside like it was nothing, no repentance would they find in the feelings of love and grief that he was leaking into the Force.

What he didn’t do though, was bring up a whisper of the Clone Wars. Master Sifo-Dyas, the supposed architect behind the creation of the clones, was sitting in the circle of dour Jedi Masters and until Ben could do some investigation and consult with the Force, the clones, the Separatists, and the war would be kept in his memories alone.

Now, Ben was at the point in his story where he had a choice, he could go into detail about Anakin’s attachments, his wife and his unborn children, as an explanation for his Fall, or he could keep Padme, Luke, and Leia safely tucked away from the scrutiny and disparagement of the High Council.

“Unfortunately,” Ben said, not bothering to smother the anger starting to seep into his presence, “what I did not realize until much later was that his strength and power in the Force made him a target. An enormously powerful and cunning darksider, a self proclaimed Sith, had insinuated himself into my padawan’s life from a very young age and had spent years subtly grooming him.”

Most of the masters let their outright denial and disbelief into the Force purposefully. Yoda had practically forbidden them from speaking while he told his story, but they didn’t need words to make their doubt heard. Master Shaak Ti on the other hand let out a gasp and a spike of disgust and horror hit the Force. Ben darted his eyes toward her and didn’t know if his next words would be a comfort to her or not.

“Grooming him to become the Sith’s apprentice to the Dark side.” The disgust melted away, but it was replaced by sorrow. “I didn’t realize what was happening until it was much too late.” Ben made no effort to hide his guilt. “The Sith had been sowing seeds of doubt and suspicion and anger in my padawan. Seeds I helped grow by my strict seemingly blind adherence both to the Code and the Council’s edicts. My frequent admonishments of my padawan’s questioning the wisdom of the Code, the Order’s dogma, and the Council’s sometimes questionable wisdom gave credence to his doubts in both myself and the Jedi. My padawan had no idea of the true depth of my care and loyalty to him.”

Several of the masters frowned at such a blatant admission of attachment, but Ben thought they were rather missing the point.

“He did not believe that I would have done everything in my power to help him regardless of the restrictions of the Code. And so when he found himself in dire need, the only avenue he saw for himself was to turn to his manipulator and the empty promises of the Dark side.”

Here he paused for a long moment, wondering how he was going to phrase what came next. “You must understand, Masters, why this is so integral to the question of who I am and how I came to be here.” Because he could tell that the longer this went on the more doubtful of it’s relevance some on the Council were becoming. “The Sith and his scheming is important because my padawan’s power and connection to the Force was such that when he Fell, his dark master was able to use him to bring the entire Republic and the Jedi Order down with him.”

That didn’t garner him the reaction he felt the destruction of the Republic and the purge of the Jedi really warranted. Then again this was just a story to them, and not a particularly believable one. This was so far from what they conceived to be possible that their disbelief and indignation at his perceived lies were not really surprising. However, to Ben it was his history.

“When I learned what had happened, what he had done, I confronted my former padawan,” Ben said, taking a moment to glance down at the floor and gather himself. “We dueled and I left him injured, but alive.” Maimed and burned and screaming vitriolic hatred, but alive. “I knew that if I was to survive I would have to go into hiding, so for the next twenty years I became a recluse living in the desert, biding my time and waiting.”

Waiting for what he did not say. He’d already decided to keep Luke and Leia tucked safely away in his memories.

“I was an old, broken man when I next saw my padawan.” Ben released a heavy breath and met Yoda’s calm accepting expression. It was easier to tell him the next part than to meet the skeptical scorn of the rest of the Council. “He was unrecognizable from the bright, happy little boy I had raised. When we dueled for the second time, he did not hesitate to strike me down.”

There where reactions from the masters that surely he should be lying since he was very much alive and standing before them, but the Force rang like a bell with the honesty and truth in his words. The sheer volume of it shocked most of the masters into withdrawing their doubt from the Force.

“But moments before I became one with the Force,” Ben continued softly knowing that at the Force’s insistence, the entirety of the Council’s attention was now wholly on him, “I stretched out my presence to his one last time and found a last sliver of hope. Buried deep in the hatred and rage and darkness filling up my padawan’s being, there was a single spark of Light remaining.”

Ben knew that his eyes probably showed the relief and sorrowful joy he’d felt in that split second before he’d disappeared into the Force. Yoda simply held his gaze with patient understanding. “I went into the Force wishing and praying that my padawan would one day return to the Light.”

There was dead silence in the chamber while the Force continued to echo with the truth of his words. Not just that he believed them, but that they were a truth of the Force as well.

When he didn’t say anything for a long moment, but the Force still waited, Yoda said to him, “Not finished, your story is. More to it, the Force says. Another revelation, I believe, you have for us.”

He couldn’t help the wry smile that curved at his lips as he held his grandmaster’s knowing gaze. “As you say, Master Yoda,” Ben nodded his head to the small master then continued on.

“I came back to awareness still one with the Force,” Ben said to the skepticism of several of the old masters. “And when I was able to form my own thoughts, I realized that the Force was offering me a second chance to atone for my failures and fix my mistakes. The Force told me I would be returned to the form I had when I experienced my first death at the age of thirty-five.”

“First death?” Padawan Depa blushed when her outburst got her the attention of the whole Council as well as the mysterious Jedi Master before them. She slouched in her seat next to her scowling master, Mace Windu, and whispered an embarrassed apology.

Ben just caught her eye and gave her a kind smile. “There is an ancient Force philosophy that refers to the death of present selves,” he explained, earning a shy interested look from the senior padawan, who’d relaxed when she wasn’t scolded by Yoda the way the masters had been. “The theory is that when you are confronted with an event or situation that changes your path in life so completely as to render it almost unrecognizable from your previous one, it is considered a death of your current self. My first death, according to the Force, was when I dueled my padawan after his Fall.”

The implications of that were not lost on the adults in the room. Ben was physically young to be a master much less to have already raised a padawan to knighthood. The only person in the room that didn’t raise their eyebrows at the revelation of his age was Depa, since to teenagers everyone older than them seemed ancient anyways.

“Know of this philosophy, I do,” Yoda said and consequently silenced a few grumbles of disbelief from the Council. “Continue, you will.”

Nodding again to the Grand Master, Ben said, “When I understood that the Force meant to return me to my younger body, it then became apparent what it wanted me to do with that. The Force was surprisingly clear in its intent when it told me I was to take a padawan again.”

Teach the Padawan to Teach the Padawan.

The words echoed through the chamber distinctly and inarguable in their meaning. Ben was sure most of these masters had never experienced the Force making it’s Will known so clearly before.

“You must understand, Master,” Ben said into the tense silence, “I spent the last twenty years examining my mistakes and my regrets. In that time I realized there were a great many things I did wrong in teaching my padawan and a great many more things I would change given the chance. Not just for my padawan, but for the rest of the Order as well.”

Yoda raised an eyebrow at that. “Think the Order must change, you do,” he said with no doubt in his tone. “To the past, you believe the Force sent you, to begin these changes before your padawan comes.”

He doesn’t know why he is surprised that Yoda pretty much hit the nail on the head, but Ben couldn’t help that his reaction leaked into the Force. “I know it will not be easily accepted, or believed, but yes, Master Yoda. I believe I was sent to take my younger self, Obi-Wan Kenobi, as a padawan so that he will learn from my experiences and when he takes his padawan he will not repeat my mistakes.”

He hesitated, but forged on with his next words, “I also believe that it will not be enough just to teach Obi-Wan. If the Order is going to survive, as it did not in my past, it needs to change as well.”

Yoda’s hold on interruptions didn’t last with that inflammatory statement. Almost the entire Council burst out in a myriad of reactions. Anger, skepticism, fear, consideration, confusion, concern, indifference. For a group of masters that were supposed to embody the serenity and wisdom all Jedi strove for, this loud disorganized outpouring of indignation was actually pretty on point with how even normal Council meetings went. Ben remembered being practically scandalized the first time he’d witnessed two venerable masters getting into a shouting match his first year sitting on the Council.

Eventually after close to a minute of indecipherable noise, one voice rose above the rest grabbing Ben’s attention.

“Disregarding your heretical assertion for right now,” Mace Windu said, gaining most of the room’s attention, “You’re telling us that you’ve traveled back in time. That you are actually an old man in a young body, and that Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi, who is recovering in the Halls of Healing right now, is your teenage self.”

Ben met the man’s challenging glare head on. “Yes, Master Windu, that is exactly what I said.”

“Preposterous!”

“He’s lying again!”

“That’s not how the Force works!”

“I’ve never heard of such a thing!”

“Absolutely ridiculous!”

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Yoda hit his gimer stick on the floor so hard Ben was surprised it didn’t crack the tile. The room paused for breath, and the small master spoke into it with utter confidence.

“Believe you, I do, Master Kenobi,” Yoda said, his gravely voice lilting with conviction. “Told of another traveler, I was, by my master.”

Ben wasn’t the only one shocked by this revelation.

“A two decades before I came to the temple, it was. Jedi Knight Obila Kenobi, she called herself. Her holocron, there is, in the temple vault.”

Stunned didn’t cover what Ben was feeling. Truthfully he didn’t know how to react to this information. That he was not the first or the only one to be sent through time by the Force.

Apparently Yoda wasn’t done dropping bombs on them either. “Another before her, there was,” he said into the stark silence and unwavering attention of the entire room. “Five hundred years before, Jedi Master Healer Obi-Wan Kenobi appeared. His records, on flimsi they are, in the Council restricted section of the Archive.”

Twice is a coincidence, three times a pattern, so Ben always believed. He frowned. “Master Yoda, how many other time travelers have there been?”

“Know, I do not,” Yoda answered with a shrug, his fingers flexing on the top of his gimer stick. “Only two others, we have record of. All named Kenobi, they are.”

So he wasn’t the only one to notice that.

“What is the significance of that?” Shaak Ti spoke up for the first time since his story began. She’d refrained from adding her voice to the prior verbal melee of doubt, preferring to keep her contemplations to herself for now. “That all these supposed time travelers should be from the same biological line.”

“A family name, Kenobi is not,” Yoda said, some of his earlier solemnity returned with the subject.

“The Stewjoni do not welcome Force sensitives,” Plo Koon spoke up for the first time in a while, having previously kept his thoughts to himself as well. “When a child is discovered to be Force sensitive they are disowned from their family and either killed outright or abandoned to the elements. Their family names are stripped away and they are given the moniker Obi-Wan Kenobi. Which means, No-One Child-of-Nobody.”

“That’s horrible!” Ben turned his head to see Depa blush and quickly look back down at her datapad where she’d been diligently taking notes the whole time.

“Yes, Padawan, it is horrible,” he agreed, drawing her hesitant gaze back up to him. “Though I think given this new information, in terms of the Force it might mean something completely different.”

A throaty hum from Yoda interrupted any response to Ben’s supposition. “Research more on this, you will,” he said like he was giving any other Jedi an assignment, his tone brooking no argument. “Unique opportunity, this is, to discover more how the Force works.”

A slightly hysterical giggle almost made it past Ben’s iron control. As it is he’s pretty sure Yoda could read something of his incredulity in his eyes, because the old master raised an eyebrow at him. Clearing his throat, Ben nodded in acceptance. “Of course, Master. As time permits, I will research my situation as thoroughly as possible.”

“As time permits?” repeated Master Sifo-Dyas, speaking up for the first time since Ben entered the room.

That the mysterious master, known for his foresight, chose now to speak made the hairs on the back of Ben’s neck stand up. He didn’t let any of his unease show though, as he clarified.

“Yes, Master. With Obi-Wan as my padawan, I will not have all the free time in the world.”

There was an uprising of protests from several of the masters at his presumption. Sifo-Dyas, just eyed him curiously. “Obi-Wan already has a master,” the seer said, “And while the Force was clear that Obi-Wan must be taught, there was no definite indication that it had to be by you.”

Ben wasn’t sure what the master was getting at, but he didn’t like the way this conversation was turning. “Qui-Gon Jinn repudiated his padawan, left him in a war zone, and lied to this Council about it. Obi-Wan will not go back to him.”

“Master Jinn was your master, though, was he not?” Sifo-Dyas inquired neutrally. “Changing the course of time is tricky. Seeing as you are a supposedly fully qualified Jedi Master, and did not suffer overly much from his tutelage, would it not be wiser to stay the course.”

There was something off about how the master was speaking. Like he was trying to lead the conversation to a specific conclusion. Ben didn’t know what that conclusion would be, and the Force was unhelpfully silent. It almost felt like it was just as puzzled about where this was leading as Ben.

“Master Jinn was my master, yes,” Ben conceded, but everyone in the room could hear the terseness in his voice. “And if it was up to me he would not take another padawan again.”

There was a wave of shock and unease at his words. Yoda however had his inner thoughts and feelings locked down.

“For Obi-Wan’s abandonment and lying to the Council, investigated and chastised, my grandpadawan will be.” Ben didn’t know if the old master referred to Qui-Gon that way as a reminder to everyone of their connection or if it was unconscious. “Unfit to continue as a teacher, have doubts, I do.”

Pursing his lips, Ben thought that over. He knew that Yoda had a soft spot for his lineage. He knew that Yoda had pushed Qui-Gon toward Obi-Wan as master and padawan. Whether he wanted Obi-Wan for his lineage specifically or thought them a good match for another reason, Ben did not know. And he had always been reluctant to ask.

Now he was an adult and he knew better that no Jedi Master, definitely not Yoda, was infallible.

“Melida/Daan is not the only instance Qui-Gon Jinn has neglected his duty not just as a master but also as a Jedi,” Ben finally stated, gaining him more shock and anger, but also some concern.

Yoda sat back in his seat then, eyeing Ben and pursing his own lips in thought. “Had reasons, I did, for pushing them together,” he admitted. “A good partnership, I saw, between them. Wrong, was I?”

Ben studied the old master. There was more to this. With his foresight and his experience, Ben could read Yoda maybe better than most anyone in the room. There was more to Yoda’s admittance of having matchmaked him and Qui-Gon, so to speak. However, Ben felt now was not the time to demand deeper answers from the Grand Master.

“We did not get off to a good start, Grand Master,” Ben said. “After Melida/Daan it was at least a couple years before our partnership was able to solidify. Even then it was in practice a partnership. We never established a traditional Master-Padawan dynamic.”

He could tell his words didn’t please Yoda. The small master’s ears drooped for a moment before he consciously straightened them out.

“Regret, do you, having Qui-Gon for a master?”

“No, Master,” Ben admitted, but his tone was more serious than one would expect. “My experience as his padawan shaped the man I am today, I cannot regret that. But having been a master myself, I can acknowledge that I would never have put my own padawan through a great deal of what Qui-Gon put me through, inadvertently or not.”

Turning back to the other Councilors, Ben continued. “Regardless of my wanting to take Obi-Wan as my padawan, I would not have allowed him to return to Master Jinn’s care.”

“You’ve spoken to Obi-Wan about this?” Sifo-Dyas spoke up again.

Ben kept a wary on him as he answered. “Yes, I offered to take Obi-Wan as my padawan. He accepted pending a formal dissolution of the bond between him and Master Jinn.”

“Does young Obi-Wan know of your true origins?” Plo Koon inquired.

“No,” Ben shook his head. “He knows I’m Stewjoni, that we share a name and what our name means. He knows I followed the Will of the Force to Melida/Daan and to him, and I’ve told him about my Fallen former padawan. Everything I told him was the truth.”

“From a certain point of view,” Master Plo added with a verging on humorous edge to his filtered voice.

Ben quirked a wry agreeing grin toward the kind master. “Just so, Master Plo.”

“More, there is, to discuss in Council,” Yoda spoke up again, pulling the attention back to him. “Speak with Obi-Wan, we will, about his time with Master Jinn. Speak with Qui-Gon, we will as well, before out final decision we discuss.”

Ben nodded at this, having expected the delay.

“Events on Melida/Daan, you skipped over, when recounting the tale to us,” Yoda said not accusing, but pointedly reminding. “Mention Mandalorians, you did not.”

Suppressing a grimace, Ben tucked his hands behind his back to hide the bashful fidgeting. “I should mention that Mand’alor Jango Fett will seek an audience with the Council sometime in the next few days.”

“We had request for aid against violent Mandalorians recently,” Mace commented, slightly suspiciously.

“Ah, yes, well,” Ben shrugged, “I expect that discussion will take a whole Council meeting in itself.” Master Windu pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

Yoda on the other hand let out a throaty chuckle, a little more levity lightening his eyes. “Another story for another time, I think.” He tapped his gimer stick on the floor with an air of dismissal. “Meditate on what you have told us, we will. This meeting, adjourned for now. In the temple, you will stay. Soon speak with me alone, you will.”

“Thank you, Master Yoda,” Ben bowed low to his grandmaster and released a silent relieved breath.

Not everything was resolved. Not everything went the way he would have preferred, but it hadn’t gone badly either. It had gone almost exactly as Ben had expected, truthfully.

For all that Anakin used to complain about the Council dithering and refusing to make definitive decisions, Ben knew that this delaying and slow deliberation was actually in his favor. The longer it took the Council to form a solid opinion about him one way or the other, the longer he had to prepare contingencies.

As Ben straightened up he felt a wave of light-headedness. First things first, he decided. Find the refectory and eat something, then go to the quartermaster and get a room assignment. He’d held a stasis trance over another person or five days straight. That was five days of no eating or true rest. No matter what Anakin and Ahsoka used to tease him about, he could not in fact subsist entirely on meditation and sass.

*

TBC...

Chapter 16: Honesty of Youth

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan floated up to consciousness in bits and pieces. He heard voices around him, smelled something sharp and chemical like bacta, felt a tight ache on the right side of his neck and face. When he finally opened his eyes he had to immediately shut them to block out the bright lighting above him. Well, one eye anyway, since it seemed his right eye was completely covered in a bandages.

Grunting, he squinted open his left eye again and looked around. He was in the temple Halls of Healing. And he ached from his neck up to his head. Gingerly he lifted a hand and prodded at the bandages that covered him almost from shoulder to forehead.

“Don’t touch that,” Master Healer Vokara Che scolded as she stepped into the room.

Clearing his throat, Obi-Wan attempted to croak a greeting, but earned himself another scolding look.

“Don’t speak just yet,” she said as she stepped over to a pitcher of water and poured him a small cup, slipping a straw into it. “Sip this slowly.”

Following directions, Obi-Wan’s eye closed as the cool water soothed the scratch and dryness in his throat. “Thank you,” he rasped, then took another sip.

Healer Che just hummed, giving him an assessing look. “Well, Padawan, you sure did a number on yourself.”

Obi-Wan opened his mouth about to ask what happened, when it all came rushing back. His vision of Cerasi, Wehutti pointing a blaster at his own daughter. The realization that the blaster was actually a slugthrower. He felt the blood drain from his face and turned a panicked eye on Healer Che.

“What-uh, how bad is it?” he asked, prodding at the bandages on his neck again. Healer Che lightly smacked his hand away.

“Stop that. It’s not as bad as it could have been,” she said. “I was able to repair the damage to your eye and patch up the puncture in your artery. You’ll have some scarring, but it shouldn’t be too bad.” She had a thoughtful expression on her face as she looked at him. “That there wasn’t any permanent damage, you have the Mandalorians and Master Kenobi to thank for that.”

A jolt went through him as he realized that his master, Master Ben was nowhere to be seen. “Where is Master Ben? Is he-” he hesitated almost afraid to ask. “He is still in the temple, isn’t he?”

Master Che snorted, her dubious thoughts on the master showing themselves. “The Council granted him residency in the temple. Though no one is exactly sure where he came from. He’s been in and out of meetings since he brought you back. I banned him from the Halls when I caught him trying to sleep in your room.”

She couldn’t possibly know how reassuring her words were. Master Ben still wanted him. He wasn’t disappointed that Obi-Wan was stupid enough to attempt deflecting a slugthrower. He kept his promise and didn’t leave Obi-Wan alone.

“Can I see him?” Obi-Wan asked trying to conceal how eager he was. “Now that I’m awake, I mean.”

The healer, however, didn’t give him the answer he was hoping for. “You’re to speak with Master Yoda and Master Windu first,” she said. “They want to ask you about what’s happened to you the last few months.”

There was a surge of dread inside him, but Obi-Wan swallowed it down and nodded. “When will they be here?”

“Your bandages need to be changed, first. Then you need to eat something, you’re unhealthily thin at the moment, and I’ll help you get cleaned up.”

Obi-Wan frowned. “I’d rather get the conversation over with,” he muttered.

“And I’d rather not have padawans rushed into my Halls with slugthrower injuries, but we can’t all get what we want.” She threw a scorchingly chastising scowl at him.

Sinking further into his pillows and blankets, Obi-Wan grimaced and nodded meekly. “Sorry, Master Che.”

She harrumphed at him and spun on her heels toward the storage cabinet. “Now, let’s get your bandages changed.”

The rest of the hour was spent following Healer Che’s list. Reapplying bacta and bandages, feeding him a light meal, and assisting him with a makeshift sponge bath. That last part had been a bit embarrassing, but she wouldn’t just let Obi-Wan take a sonic. Apparently he was still slightly anemic from blood loss, despite more than one transfusion, and she didn’t want to risk him passing out in the fresher.

“Now, rest for a bit and I’ll call Master Yoda and Master Windu to tell them you’re ready for visitors.”

It seemed like an endless wait before the door finally slid open to reveal the diminutive Grand Master of the Order followed by the stern faced Master of the Order.

“Good to see, it is, that you are healing well, young Obi-Wan,” Yoda greeted him with a kind smile on his wrinkly face.

“Thank you, Master Yoda,” Obi-Wan returned, thought when he tried to smile back his wounds pulled and he grimaced.

The old master hummed in sympathy as he stepped forward. He used a Force assisted leap to land gently on the foot of Obi-Wan’s bed, where he sat cross-legged with his gimer stick laid over his lap.

Master Windu took a seat in the chair by his bed and gave the young padawan what Obi-Wan assumed was an attempt at a softer expression. The boy wondered how long it had taken Depa to be able to tell the difference between her master’s various scowls.

“It’s been brought to our attention, Obi-Wan, that some of the details so of your last mission with Master Jinn were overlooked,” Master Windu began, though privately the man thought it was a vast understatement, if everything Ben Kenobi told them was true.

The teen looked between the two masters in light confusion. “Didn’t Master Jinn give you a report?”

“Report, Qui-Gon did,” Yoda nodded and Obi-Wan was surprised to see that the master’s expression was very serious. “Speak to Master Tahl, able to, we are not. Still healing, she is. Hear your experiences on Melida/Daan, we would.”

“Oh,” Obi-Wan allowed some of his concern to echo into the Force. “I hope Master Tahl will be alright?”

“She’s expected to be released from her healing trance and taken out of the bacta tank some time next week,” Master Windu told him. “Master Che believes she’ll eventually be able to resume her duties.” That the master was not expected to regain her sight, he didn’t say. He didn’t want Vokara to skin him alive for upsetting her young patient.

“From the beginning,” Yoda prompted not unkindly, “you should start. When arrived on planet, what did you find?”

Obi-Wan took a pause to think out the sequence of events. His mind was a little sluggish, but he recognized the effect of low level painkillers from when he’d broken his arm as an initiate.

“When we met our contact on the planet, we discovered that the Melida had taken Master Tahl hostage,” he began his story and succinctly recounted the events all the way until he and Master Jinn had disagreed on the future of the Young.

“They’d risked their lives to help us rescue Master Tahl,” Obi-Wan said, trying not to sound as desperate for understanding as he was. Then he reminded himself that Master Ben understood and he mostly convinced himself that was all he needed. “They were only children. Cerasi and Nield were the oldest at thirteen. I couldn’t just abandon them to fight the Elders on their own. They were getting killed already.”

“Felt your path lied with the Young, you did,” Yoda asserted when Obi-Wan took a steadying breath.

“I did, Master,” the boy nodded. “I felt like the Force wanted me to stay. To help the Young end the war their parents were fighting and gain peace.”

“And you discussed this with your master?” Master Windu asked, his expression unreadable.

Obi-Wan hesitated. He almost didn’t want to tell them the whole truth. His shame and the faint remnants of loyalty to his old master made the prospect of revealing the rest daunting. But he remembered how calm and understanding Master Ben had been. How he’d even been a little angry on his behalf and completely understood his need to help. Even if the master said he would have gone about it differently.

“I tried to, Master,” Obi-Wan finally admitted. “I tried to convince Master Jinn to stay,” he grimaced again, “but Master Tahl was too injured. I know she needed medical help, but I also knew I couldn’t just leave. Master Jinn didn’t believe me when I told him it was the Will of the Force.”

“What did Qui-Gon do then?”

Obi-Wan looked at Master Windu and saw his expectant scowl. He remember Master Che mentioned that Master Ben had been in meetings with the Council. It wasn’t exactly impossible that he’d already told them what Master Jinn had done. If he had there was no way Obi-Wan would be able to fudge the details.

“Master Jinn told me that if I didn’t leave with him and Master Tahl, that if I chose to stay and help the Young, I would no longer be a member of the Jedi Order. Then,” Obi-Wan’s breath caught with familiar shame and he made an aborted move to touch the shaggy burnt length of hair behind his right ear, “then he cut off my braid and demanded my lightsaber.”

There was a flash of quickly released anger and he turned to see a heavier frown on Master Windu’s face. “He demanded your lightsaber?” When Obi-Wan nodded, his face tightened further. “He left you in a war zone without a weapon?”

Slightly confused by the master’s demeanor, Obi-Wan just nodded again. “Yes, Master.”

“How did you protect yourself?” demanded the Master of the Order.

“Nield taught me how to use a blaster,” Obi-Wan replied. “Then when Master Ben came, he let me borrow his former padawan’s lightsaber.”

Alarm colored Master Windu’s Force presence. “Kenodi gave you a Fallen Jedi’s lightsaber?”

Surprised by this reaction – and that Master Ben had told the Council about his padawan-, Obi-Wan eyed the master, but quickly realized the source of his concern. “It’s alright, Master. The crystal hadn’t been completely corrupted yet, it was only Shadowed.”

That didn’t seem to ease the master’s mind much. He looked about to demand more answers when Yoda’s throaty hum interrupted him.

“Master Ben’s padawan’s kyber, felt, how did it?” the small master asked curiously.

Obi-Wan thought about how to put it into words. “It didn’t feel hostile,” he said first. “It wasn’t exactly friendly, but it accepted Master Ben as an ally, sort of. After I held the saber for a few moments and touched it with my Force presence, it accepted me as an ally too.”

Strangely, that didn’t seem to surprise the masters. They shared a silent speaking look then turned their attention back on him.

“Generous, it was, that Master Ben lent you his padawan’s saber.”

A light blush only visible on the left side of his face, Obi-Wan agreed quietly. “I was honored to wield it. I know how much his former padawan still means to him.”

It was only after he said it that Obi-Wan realized what his words implied. The blatant attachment Master Ben still felt for his Fallen padawan. Attachment that was forbidden by the current interpretation of the Code.

Feeling the boy’s worried guilt in the Force, Yoda simply nodded. “Attached, we all are, to the younglings we raise to knighthood.”

Obi-Wan blinked in shock at the old master. Darting his gaze toward Master Windu he witnessed the man grimace and throw the Grand Master a disapproving frown.

Huffing when all he got was a raised eyebrow from the small green master, Mace turned the conversation back on hand.

“How long were you alone with the Young before Master Kenobi showed up?”

“About five months,” Obi-Wan answered, deflating in relief that he hadn’t accidentally revealed one of Master Ben’s secrets to the Council.

“Why didn’t you try to contact the Order?” Master Windu asked. “Why didn’t you request aid from the Council directly?”

Obi-Wan gave the master an incredulous look. “Master Jinn dismissed me from the Order, Master Windu,” he answered like it should be obvious. “Even if I could have gotten to an interplanetary comm unit, I didn’t think the Order would send aid to a disgraced padawan.”

There was so many things wrong with that sentence that Mace didn’t know where to start. “Surely you know that a master cannot simply dismiss a padawan like that. There is a procedure that must be followed.”

The boy looked down at his lap, a twinge of embarrassment and anger in the Force. “I know that now,” Obi-Wan said, his voice stiff. “Master Ben told me when I explained how I ended up on Melida/Daan.”

“Explain this, your master should have, when taking you as his padawan,” Yoda said with a troubled expression.

Obi-Wan for the first time showed a flash of temper toward the masters before him. “Well, he didn’t. Master Ben is the one that told me Master Jinn couldn’t actually kick me out on a whim. He also told me that you need two Council members to witness before you can resign from the Order. I don’t know of anyone else in my age group that knows these things either. Even the ones with masters already.”

That was not a pleasant realization, Mace thought as he stared at the injured, yet unbowed teenager in front of him. Kenobi the time traveler’s words came back to him then, that the Order needed to change. If so many of their younglings were growing up and being sent out into the galaxy without even knowing their rights, something did need to change. At least in how they educated their members.

Almost dreading the answer he would get, Mace asked, “Did Qui-Gon explain anything when he accepted you as his padawan?”

Another flash of anger streaked across the boy’s injured face, but there was also a heavy undercurrent of insecurity in his Force presence.

“I was just grateful Master Jinn accepted me at all. I wasn’t going to risk him changing his mind by demanding explanations and answers from him.”

That was not how the master and padawan relationship was supposed to start, much less how it should have continued a year into their relationship. Mace turned to see what Yoda was making of this and was surprised when he saw that the older master’s ears were drooped and his shoulders slumped, a feeling of guilt and regret just barely escaping his control.

There was a long pause before Mace felt he needed to speak up again. “I want you to know that you are not a disgrace, Obi-Wan. What Qui-Gon did was not right, it was not how we do things. You are still very much a valued member of our Order.”

The boy bit his lip and darted his gaze away from eye contact. “Master Ben has told me this many times. I have trouble believing it, but when he says it, I want to.”

Another wave of sadness came from Yoda before the old master controlled his emotions once again. “Wise, Master Ben is,” he said with quiet sincerity. “Much gratitude, do I owe him, for looking after you, young Obi-Wan.”

That surprised the teen and Mace took the shift in conversation to move back to more immediately pressing matters.

“After Master Kenobi joined you, what happened?”

“We made plans to capture the communications tower so we could call the Mandalorians,” Obi-Wan answered plainly and guiltily enjoyed seeing the disgruntled expression on the Master of the Order’s face. Even if the masters didn’t buy into the Mandalorian horror stories from the creche, he knew that the tenuous peace between their peoples left much to be desired.

“Contact the Mandalorians, whose plan was it?” inquired Yoda curiously, much of his previous emotional turmoil put to the side for now.

“Master Ben suggested it,” Obi-Wan told them without an ounce of doubt or hesitance. “Mandalorians treasure children above all else. Master Ben said that the Haat Mando’ade – the True Mandalorians – wouldn’t refuse to help us once we explained what was happening.”

“Again you did not attempt to contact the Order, even after learning that you weren’t dismissed.” Mace had never felt so much like they were failing their younglings as he did during this conversation.

“Master Ben made the case that it was likely that the Council would have declared Melida/Daan a lost cause and prohibit more interference.” He wasn’t wrong, Mace had to admit. That was exactly what they had done when Qui-Gon had returned with an injured master and sans padawan. “He said if we contacted the Jedi it would take too long for the Council to investigate our claims and then debate on whether or not to send assistance. He estimated it would have been two to three weeks before the Jedi could begin to send aid.”

Obi-Wan didn’t mention that Master Ben was also wary of the Council’s reaction to him.

Again, Mace couldn’t exactly negate anything Obi-Wan had said. The matter of reopening the Melida/Daan case would have taken a fair amount of debate and investigation. Deciding on a course of action after that would have been no less time consuming.

“How long did it take the Mandalorians to arrive?” he asked almost reluctantly.

“Three days,” Obi-Wan replied with a hint of pride and not an ounce of repentance. “Jango showed up with fifteen Mandalorian warriors and enough rations to feed the Young for a week.”

“Jango,” Master Windu repeated warily. “The Mand’alor gave you permission to use his first name?”

Obi-Wan shrugged, not exactly understanding the master’s reaction. “After we signed the contract and established that the Haat Mando’ade were on Melida/Daan as independent contractors, not diplomatic envoys from Mandalore, he said it would be simpler to just use his name.”

There was a lot to unpack in that statement. Most of it, Mace was pretty sure, would be better to address when the Mand’alor himself eventually demanded his face to face with the Council.

“Formidable warriors, the Mando’ade are,” Yoda commented, with an audible amount of respect. “Honorable, they are as well.”

“What exactly did the Mandalorians do for the Young?” Mace asked, his voice still wary.

“They helped us chip away at the Elder’s power base,” Obi-Wan said with a grim seriousness that didn’t belong on a teenager’s face.

As they listened to Obi-Wan explain the strategy and effectiveness of their campaign to weaken the Melida and the Daan, Mace reflected that if he never again witnessed a youngling speaking this knowledgeably about war it will be too soon.

“Taking the Halls of Evidence was fairly simple at that point,” Obi-Wan said after his long and detailed recounting of the scarily effective irregular warfare a bunch of children waged on warmongering adults. “We split our forces and attacked both Halls at the same time.”

“Where you were injured, this was?” Yoda asked, having been quiet and unreadable while observing his great-grandpadawan speaking of war.

Obi-Wan stiffened at the question, his face, what they could see of it around the bandages, pinched in a look of self recrimination. “Yes, Master Yoda.”

The old master studied his slumped posture curiously. “Not your fault, this is. Blame yourself, why do you?”

The boy sighed, resigned and looked back up at the Grand Master. “Master Ben told me what happens when you try to deflect a slugthrower. I should have known this was going to happen.”

Mace frowned at that. “How could you have known? Slugthrowers look very similar to old style blasters. In the moment I wouldn’t have expected you to tell the difference.”

There he hesitated again, before reluctantly explaining, “One of the Young had already been injured by a slugthrower, so we knew the Elders had some. And I had a vision the night before we took the Halls.”

“Of your injury, this vision was?”

“No, Master,” Obi-Wan shook his head. “I had a vision of Cerasi being shot and killed.”

The two masters traded a look. “Tell Master Ben of this vision, did you?”

He nodded, then admitted, “I almost didn’t. Master Jinn didn’t like when I mentioned my ‘bad feelings’ or talk about the other visions I’d had in the past year. He’d always admonish me to live in the here and now.”

Yoda’s brow creased, but he offered almost cautiously, “Not bad advice, this is.”

Obi-Wan wasn’t quite fast enough to hide his scowl, but Mace blinked and the boy was doing a surprisingly good impression of his older counterpart’s serene mask. “As you say, Master.”

That was a response Mace had heard many a time from padawans that thought their masters were being particularly dense, but knew they’d get scolded if they said so outright.

Morbidly curious, Mace asked, “What did Master Kenobi tell you about your vision?”

He earned himself a wary look from the teen and he could tell the boy was internally debating whether or not to be truthful with them again. The obvious lack of trust from Obi-Wan was actually hurtful and disheartening, but Mace was the Master of the Order, his hurt feelings were less important than a youngling’s well-being.

When the teen finally answered he did so with a defiant gleam in his visible eye. “Master Ben told me that the Force does nothing without reason and disregarding Force-visions can be foolish and deadly.”

That, Mace could tell, was almost a direct quote. “Acting on visions has been known to lead to greater and often times worse outcomes than what you were trying to prevent,” he countered just to play devil’s advocate, curious as to see how much conviction the teen would defend Kenobi’s advice.

Obi-Wan attempted to cover up a roll of his eyes, but the burgeoning scowl on Master Windu’s face told him he hadn’t been as subtle as he thought. He quickly schooled his expression when he replied, “Master Ben also told me that visions can be confusing and misleading. We meditated together and asked the Force for clarification, if it wanted to show me anything else.”

That was actually really good advice. Plagued with shatter-points as he was, Mace often meditated for clarification on the things he saw. It didn’t always help, but more often than not it did.

“Did the Force respond with any kind of clarification?”

Surprisingly there was another flash of self recrimination in the boy’s expression. “The Force kept showing me the image of Cerasi’s heavily bleeding wound,” he said. “I realize now that it was trying to tell me that the wound was made by a slugthrower. I just didn’t understand.” He prodded at the bandage on his cheek sullenly and grimaced.

The pitfalls of visions, Mace contemplated, was that they often didn’t make sense until after it was all over. Still Obi-Wan was alive and presumably he’d saved the other teenager’s life as well.

“Understand this message, Master Ben also did not,” Yoda offered with a sympathetic hum. “Shame, you must not feel. Shame he feels, for allowing harm to come to you.”

Obi-Wan was quick to protest that. “That’s not true. He didn’t allow me to get hurt! It’s my fault for not paying attention. I’m lucky I wasn’t hurt worse.”

“Think this of you, Master Ben would?” Yoda asked the boy pointedly. “Find fault in your mistakes, does he?”

Obi-Wan snapped his mouth closed and sighed. “Well, no. Master Ben never gets frustrated with me when I do something wrong. He doesn’t even get impatient when I can’t understand one of his lessons.”

“One of his lessons?” Master Windu asked with a raised eyebrow.

Again there was a flash of hesitation and the master could tell that the boy was having another internal debate. By this time it was fairly obvious that Kenobi had already been imparting dubious wisdom on his younger self, but what that wisdom entailed, the time traveler had been tight lipped about. The Council had questioned him further on his assertions of their stagnation and the supposed shortcomings he’d perceived in their philosophies, but he’d mostly refused to elaborate.

If Obi-Wan could tell them what Kenobi had been teaching him the Council would have better idea of what kind of upheaval he was looking to cause. And hopefully how to circumvent it.

“Tell us, you should, more of Master Ben’s wisdom,” Yoda prodded gently, casually. “Discover what kind of master he is, the Council would like.”

Still Obi-Wan hesitated, bit his lip and darted his exposed eye back and forth between the two masters.

“You’re not in any kind of trouble,” Mace tried to assure the teen, assuming fear of punishment was what was staying the boy’s tongue. Instead, Obi-Wan’s expression turned indignant, verging on defiant.

“In trouble, Master Ben will not be either,” the Grand Master added, ignoring the exasperated look the younger Master of the Order shot at him. “Punish beings for differing opinions, we do not.”

The defiance was replaced by mild dubiousness, but the old master’s words did reassure Obi-Wan he wasn’t accidentally going to bring the might of the High Council down on his master’s head.

That the teen was already so loyal to a mysterious master he’d only known for a couple of months was disconcerting, thought Mace. Could this be a byproduct of their true relation to one another, unknown to the teen it may be?

“The first thing Master Ben taught me was how to share my emotions with the Force.”

Mace frowned. “Releasing your emotions into the Force is touched on in initiate training.”

Obi-Wan huffed at the master’s misunderstanding. “Not release my emotions. Share my emotions.”

“Perhaps, describe this technique, you should,” Yoda suggested.

“Releasing your emotions into the Force is like erasing them all together, there’s nothing left. You can’t even describe them once they’re gone,” Obi-Wan said, both masters nodding along. “When you share your feelings, you’re not getting rid of the emotions. You’re sharing the burden with the Force. It leaves behind an echo, so you remember experiencing and feeling the emotions but they don’t overwhelm you.”

Yoda gave a thoughtful hum while Mace scowled at the concept. That was not exactly in keeping with the There is no emotion, there is peace, aspect of the Code.

“Demonstrate this, you should,” Yoda finally said. “Learn something new, I just might.”

Obi-Wan brightened at the old master’s almost playful grin, then closed his eyes and concentrated. He slowly scooped up all the anxiety, exhaustion, and frustration he’d pushed aside through this conversation. Keeping his movements in the Force slow so the masters would see exactly what he was doing, he gently tossed the emotions into the Force where they dissipated like mist leaving, as he said, an echo, a slight imprint behind.

At Yoda’s throaty hum, Obi-Wan opened his eyes and examined the masters’ expressions. Master Windu looked like he’d bit into something sour, but Master Yoda was tapping his clawed fingers on the wood of his gimer stick thoughtfully.

“Teach you this, why did he?”

“Master Ben said that emotions are natural,” Obi-Wan replied slowly, thinking through his answer. “He said we have them for a reason and we shouldn’t just get rid of them. We shouldn’t let them control us, but we can gain and learn things from them.”

“Interesting, this technique is,” said Yoda after a moment of thinking on Obi-Wan’s words. “Not wholly unfamiliar with it, I am. Think and meditate more on it, I will.”

Sighing heavily, Mace silently resigned himself to doing the same. “What other things has he taught you?”

“Well, there was the thing about my visions,” Obi-Wan said, visibly running through a list in his head, obviously picking and choosing what he should mention. “And he’s taught me a little bit of Force-healing, just minor things like pain management and scrapes and bruises. We had a good amount of practice on that.”

Neither master wanted to delve into the implications of that last part.

“Experienced, he must be,” commented Yoda thoughtfully, “saved your life, he did, with his use of Force-healing.”

“What do you mean?” Obi-Wan frowned. He remembered Master Che mentioning something like that as well.

“How much do you remember about your injury, Obi-Wan?” Mace inquired.

“Not much,” Obi-Wan admitted. “I know Master Ben was there with me before the medic came. I barely remember him telling me he was going to Force-suggest me to sleep. After that I think I woke up for a second when we landed at the temple, but that’s about it.”

“Master Kenobi, it appears, is knowledgeable enough in Force-healing to slow your blood loss,” Mace told him, an actual measure of respect in his voice. “Then he held you in a Force-healing stasis trance for five days straight. From what Healer Che told us and what the Mandalorian medic relayed, that’s the only reason you were able to make it to Coruscant.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes were wide. A swell of shock and warmth surged inside him. “Master Ben really did that?” he asked wonderingly. His kind, generous, heretical master really sat in a meditative trance with him for five straight days?

“Care for you greatly, Master Ben does,” Master Yoda answered with a kind smile.

Master Windu watched the play of emotions on the teenager’s face. Anyone would be impressed and thankful that someone held them in a healing trance for five days, but there was something about the pure disbelief and happiness on Obi-Wan’s face that bothered him. It was almost like the boy was surprised anyone would go to lengths just for him.

“Yes, Master Yoda,” Obi-Wan nodded, his throat becoming a little tight not with his injury, but with quiet joy. “I care about Master Ben as well,” he said with no shame. If the man could hold him in a trance for five days, Obi-Wan could admit to the two most powerful people in the Jedi Order that he had an attachment to the mysterious master.

“Expressed to us, a desire to take you for his padawan, Master Ben did,” Yoda informed him, his gaze intent on the boy’s reaction to his words.

There was another flash of happiness, not quite hidden fast enough for the two masters to miss. Obi-Wan quickly schooled his expression though when he realized that Master Windu and Master Yoda were still very serious.

“Rare it is, that a master and padawan should be separated at the request of another,” the old master added.

Obi-Wan’s face fell and his wasn’t able to stop the spike of worry inside him. “You didn’t- you’re not- Masters,” he sucked in a breath and tried to calm himself, but it was hard. “Masters, what did you say to him?”

“We said we would speak to you and discuss it further,” Master Windu answered. “He lodged serious complaints against Master Jinn. We would be remiss if we didn’t investigate them.”

“I won’t go back,” Obi-Wan burst out before he could stop himself. “I won’t go back to Master Jinn. I respect him as a Jedi Master, but I can’t- I can’t be his padawan.”

“Your differences, be mended, they cannot?” Yoda inquired neutrally, none of his own inner guilt and sadness apparent in his demeanor or his Force presence.

“No, Master,” Obi-Wan said a little sharply. His panic and firm refusal was disconcerting for the two masters who had never seen quite so adamant a reaction from the teen before.

“Master Jinn never wanted another padawan. In fact he harshly refused me numerous times citing my anger and aggression as proof of my destiny to Fall to the Dark side. And even after he reluctantly accepted me I always felt like he was watching me, just waiting for me to prove him right. Nothing I did was ever satisfactory enough for Master Jinn. I can’t go back to that.” He sucked in a shaky breath. “I can’t go back to living in Xanatos’s shadow. Expected to Fall at any moment, but still being unfavorably compared to him.”

Mace was taken aback by just how unstable the teen was at the suggestion of returning to his former master. He knew they couldn’t allow Obi-Wan to remain in Qui-Gon’s care. Just the fact that the master had obviously ruined what little trust they had between them by abandoning his padawan in a war zone was enough of a reason to separate them. But some of the things Obi-Wan said, though concerning, also made him curious.

“Master Kenobi had a Fallen padawan as well,” Mace reminded him, and the boy’s sharp gaze shot to him. “Don’t you think you will be living in his shadow should you become Kenobi’s padawan.”

Instead of uncertainty or doubt or even sadness, Obi-Wan’s defiance spilled unhindered into the Force. “Master Ben doesn’t believe anyone is destined to Fall. He doesn’t look down on me for my emotions. Even after I told him none of the other masters would take me because I was too angry and aggressive, he didn’t make me feel ashamed. Not once did Master Ben make me feel like he was comparing me to his former padawan. Not once did he make me feel like he was just waiting for me to fail.”

The implication being that Qui-Gon had been blatant enough in his own distrust of a child that Obi-Wan felt shamed and inadequate was not complimentary. Mace gritted his teeth, trying to fight down his anger and frustration.

No child should feel as if they were destined to Fall. No child should feel as if their caretaker was just waiting to be disappointed in them.

He considered that they should have forbidden Qui-Gon from ever taking another padawan after he repudiated not just Xanatos, but his first padawan as well. They should have known pushing that man into taking another padawan wasn’t going to end well. And there Obi-Wan Kenobi was, abandoned in a war zone and injured from a slugthrower.

Not to mention how apparently having Qui-Gon for a master negatively effected Kenobi enough that the time traveler implied it was partly why he’d made certain mistakes with his own padawan.

No, there was no doubt that Obi-Wan Kenobi and Qui-Gon Jinn were to be separated. Whether Ben Kenobi would be allowed to take his younger self as a padawan was another issue.

Yoda’s familiar throaty hum broke through Mace’s thoughts. “Remain Qui-Gon’s padawan, you will not,” he said and both masters could see the relief on Obi-Wan’s face. “Speak more with you and Master Ben, I will, before a decision about your future master, made it is.”

“Thank you, Master Yoda,” Obi-Wan sighed, finally able to share his panic and fear with the Force regaining himself some emotional stability. “Just thank you.”

*

TBC...

Chapter 17: Creative Liberties

Chapter Text

It was three days since they’d returned to the temple. Ben had been in just as many Council meetings, and the Mandalorians were still camped out in the temple hangar making the pilots and mechanics nervous.

Ben wasn’t informed on what Obi-Wan had told Mace and Yoda when they went to speak with him once he’d finally woken up, but whatever it was Ben now had permission to sit at his padawan’s bedside. Which is what he was doing, Obi-Wan was still asleep when he’d entered the room, so Ben chose to sit quietly and wait for the boy to wake.

It wasn’t like there was a shortage of things for Ben to do while waiting either. The Council had given him a datapad chocked full of paperwork they wanted him to bantha-sh*t his way through so they could add him into the temple systems. It wasn’t a bad idea. Especially since Ben knew that Jango’s intelligence officer and resident slicer was probably well on his way to digging through the temple servers. He hadn’t seen the need to warn the Council about the breech either. A little transparency with their oldest enemy wouldn’t go amiss, he didn’t think.

So Ben was occupying himself with truthfully filling out personal paperwork, from a certain point of view.

Name: Obi-Wan “Ben” Kenobi
Species: Human Variant
Birth Planet: Stewjon
Birth Date: (He had to do some math on this one) mm / dd / 7902 CRC
Temple Arr. Date: 7902 CRC
Finder:…

It was while he was discussing some of the details of his fake background with the Council that Ben remembered where he knew the name of his actual finder from, Knight Feemor MacLeod.

Feemor MacLeod was Qui-Gon’s first padawan. He’d been charged with finishing Feemor’s training when his first master died. Feemor, for all that Ben had been able to dig up on him, was a good Jedi, a successful Knight, a credit to the Order. That Qui-Gon so callously threw him and his accomplishments away, that he disowned Feemor for Xanatos’s actions was heartbreaking.

Ben resolved to find out more about his oldest brother-padawan. Maybe he could even introduce Obi-Wan and Feemor. Some Jedi had friendly or even mentor like relationships with their finders. Plo Koon and Ahsoka being a prime example of that. And truthfully, Obi-Wan could use all the supportive adult influences he could get.

So, given that Feemor MacLeod was actually within four or five years of Ben’s current physical age, he couldn’t put him down as his finder. When he’d brought this up, it was Yoda that came up with the solution.

Finder: Master Yoda

Apparently, in 7902 CRC Master Yoda had taken several highly classified missions off planet, one of which resulted in a two month long chase through the Outer Rim. It was entirely plausible that he’d found himself on Stewjon at some point and subsequently stumbled upon an abandoned red headed infant.

That Yoda had managed to poach the time traveler into his pseudo-lineage did not go unnoticed by the other Councilors. It did make Ben smile, though. He knew Yoda had pushed him toward Qui-Gon to begin with partly because he considered himself too old to take another padawan, but he thought Obi-Wan- Ben had great potential. His other reasons, if any for putting them together, Ben was less sure about.

Still it was a little comforting that even though he was a relative unknown Master Yoda still saw a place for him in his lineage.

Creche Master: Master Trevor
Initiate Clan: Clan Gundark

On and on it went. Ben filling out some of the information with the details from the Council and some of them Ben fudged from his real records. Like his grades and test scores. The Council agreed that keeping most everything as close to the truth he knew as possible was wisest, so Ben had Obi-Wan’s academic file to compare and alter at his discretion.

The only thing that really stumped them for a time was his former master. Ideally having him apprentice to one of the Council members would be best, but it was also common knowledge around the temple that Ben had been a relative stranger to them. If they tried to put in his files that one of the Councilors had taken him as a padawan there would be suspicion and questions. Finally they decided on picking a plausible candidate from a list of retired or deceased Jedi Shadows, the Jedi secret operations forces so to speak.

This actually worked well, since Ben did in fact know a great deal of the techniques a Shadow would learn in their specialized training. Mainly thanks to Quinlan being an almost compulsive rule breaker, but also because the Clone Wars forced many Jedi to learn Force techniques they otherwise wouldn’t have even heard of in order to survive and accomplish their missions.

At Ben’s request they settled on a Master Shadow that had died in the field. His experience with Qui-Gon’s death was a large part of what shaped him as a knight and later a master. He didn’t want to pretend that he wasn’t effected by his master’s untimely death. Plus he’d already mentioned to Obi-Wan that he’d been there when his master had died. It had come up in one of their late evening conversations. Trying to backtrack on that now was just not advisable.

Master: Master Shadow J. Bond

Ben was in middle of debating whether he should attempt filling in his medical history without Healer Che’s input when Obi-Wan finally began to stir.

“It’s good to see you awake, padawan mine,” Ben drawled quietly when Obi-Wan’s uncovered eye blinked open.

“Master Ben,” Obi-Wan croaked his mind trying to sluggishly awaken through the painkillers Master Che still had him on.

“Hello there,” he smiled down at the teen as he set the datapad aside and picked up a cup of water. “Here, Obi-Wan, sip some of this.”

The boy shakily rose up on his elbows and sipped some water through the offered straw. It soothed his throat and cleared his mind a bit more. Master Ben helped him sit up and adjust the bed so he could lean back but stay up right.

“I’m glad to see you, Master,” Obi-Wan said once he was comfortable and Master Ben was returned to his seat. “Master Yoda and Master Windu told me what you did for me, with the trance.”

Ben waved it away, but Obi-Wan knew he was very serious when he said, “There isn’t much I would not have done to make sure you were alright.”

This rather blatant admission of attachment made Obi-Wan blush. He smiled as he felt warmth inside him. “Thank you all the same, Master.”

Nodding, Ben allowed the subject to drop. “How are you feeling? Master Che said she repaired the worst of the damage.”

“Yeah, she said I’ll scar though,” Obi-Wan answered, somewhat glumly.

“But it won’t effect your physical abilities at all,” Ben said, with a tone of light admonishment. “And that’s the important part.”

Sighing, the boy conceded, then a frown pinched at his half hidden brow. “Master, do you know what happened on Melida/Daan after I was injured? Was- was Cersai alright?” he asked with no little amount of concern.

Thankfully, Ben could answer him. “I’ve spoken with Jango since we landed. He left most of his verde behind on Melida/Daan to help with the peace treaty and the government restructuring. So far he’s been receiving favorable reports.” He held up a hand when Obi-Wan’s mouth opened to ask again, “And that includes Cerasi. She was completely uninjured in the attack and has since been very ruthlessly spearheading the negotiations.”

Relief melted some of the tension in Obi-Wa’s body. “Good. I’m glad.”

“I am as well, young one,” Ben offered, but his expression was grave. “I would be much happier if you never put yourself between a slugthrower and someone else ever again.”

He felt shame rise in his chest not for the first time. “I’m sorry, Master. I know I should have recognized what it was. The Force was trying to warn me about the slugthrower, I just didn’t understand.”

Blowing out a breath, Ben reached forward and placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder drawing his lowered gaze back to him. “This is not your fault, Obi-Wan. I saw the same images in the Force as you did. And I am an experienced Jedi Master. I don’t have the excuse of youth and novelty for my mistake.”

“It’s not your fault either, Master,” Obi-Wan tried to protest as he lifted a hand and grasped his master’s wrist. A sign of trust and comfort to them both.

Ben gave the boy a wry grin. “You’ll find, dear one, that every injury your padawan acquires, from a flimsy cut to a slugthrower, is always the master’s fault.”

Obi-Wan pursed his lips unhappily, but knew that he wasn’t going to win the argument.

“Did I miss Jango leaving, then? I wanted to say goodbye and thank you.”

Another wry smile, this one with far more amusem*nt curled over the master’s face. “Fortunately, Jango and his verde are still parked in the temple hangar.”

Obi-Wan raised a surprised eyebrow. “Why? I didn’t think they would have wanted to stay so close to so many Jedi.”

“Apparently, Mand’alor Fett has things he wants to discuss with the Jetii Alore and the Jetii Alorir Tsad.”

Brow furrowing in concentration, Obi-Wan tried to translate that. “Jango wants to talk to Master Windu and the-” he paused unsure, “the High Council?”

“Very good,” Ben praised and Obi-Wan smiled. Then he elaborated, “I explained a little of the hierarchy of the Jedi Order and he wants to speak to Master Windu as the Master of the Order, Master Yoda as the Grand Master of the Order – the Jetii Ba’Alor as Jango roughly translated - and the High Council.”

Biting his lip, Obi-Wan thought over what Jango could possibly want with the High Council. “Do you think-” he hesitated but continued in a lower voice, “Do you think he wants to question them about Galidraan?”

Ben was a little surprised that Obi-Wan remembered about Galidraan and Ben using the information as an incentive for Jango to assist them.

“Galidraan is probably one of the things Jango wishes to discuss with them,” he confirmed. “We’re very lucky the Haat Mando’ade left the planet before the Jedi showed up. It would not have gone well for anyone if they’d clashed there.”

Not for the first time, Obi-Wan wondered how his master could know something with so much confidence, and not for the first did he contemplate the possibility that Ben might have visions as well.

“But besides politics, Jango also said he wanted to stick around to make sure you were alright.”

Obi-Wan blinked in shock. “Me?”

“Yes, Obi-Wan,” Ben gave the bewildered boy a smile. “Jango respects you a great deal. I daresay he at least considers you a friend by this point.” Not to mention he was fairly sure Jango would attempted to adopt Obi-Wan into his aliit if Ben hadn’t already made his claim very clear.

“Oh,” Obi-Wan sank further into his pillows, his visible eye wide. “That’s-” he stopped then a shy pleased smile curled at his lips. “that’s good, because I feel the same.”

Ben just grinned, feeling pleased himself. Also amused by the irony. He’d nearly been killed by Jango in his past life. Now he and his younger self counted the Mandalorian as an ally and friend.

They were companionably quiet for a time, but soon Obi-Wan’s shoulders tensed again and his frown was back. Though this time with worry. “Master, do you know if the Council- if they will approve of our Master-Padawan bonding?”

Ben’s expression stiffened with seriousness. “Unfortunately, the Council has had other more pressing things to consider. I know for sure that your bond with Qui-Gon will be dissolved. Whether they’ll then allow me to take you on I’m not sure yet.”

“I won’t have another master,” Obi-Wan said, all his teenage defiance and determination just as present as the first time he made that declaration. “I only want you to be my master.”

“And I only want you to be my padawan,” Ben returned with utter sincerity as he stood up and moved to sit on Obi-Wan’s bed. He lifted a hand and gently cradled Obi-Wan’s head on his uninjured side. “I promise you, Obi-Wan, even if the Council refuses, I will take you for my padawan regardless. Even if we have to leave the Order.”

Obi-Wan tilted his head into his master’s comforting touch and allowed the worry and fear to dissipate. He knew, of course he knew, that Master Ben would not just give him up, he’d told Obi-Wan so while they were still on Melida/Daan. But hearing his master say the words again made something tight unclench in his chest.

Ben for his part was very serious. He would leave the Order entirely and take Obi-Wan with him if he had to. It would put a crimp in his plans to reform the Order and effect change from the inside, but he would do it. And not just because it was the Will of the Force either.

Over the months he’d been in the past, Ben had grown to care for Obi-Wan in his own right. Apart from the knowledge that they were genetically speaking the same person with much of the same history, Ben had seen how Obi-Wan grew and changed since he’d known him. In heart and mind, he was entirely his own person now, separate from Ben.

Once he’d gotten to know Obi-Wan as he was now, how could Ben not care deeply for him.

That he wanted Obi-Wan for a padawan was a little more complicated. He’d only voluntarily considered taking two padawans other than Anakin. Ahsoka and Luke.

Ahsoka was a much greater fit as Anakin’s padawan, though he would always cherish the time and mentor relationship he shared with her as her grandmaster.

And Luke, well. Ben wasn’t quite ready to unpack all he felt about Luke.

“Though, let’s hope we won’t have to go on the run from the Order any time soon,” Ben said trying to lighten the tense mood.

Obi-Wan gave a halfhearted chuckle, but Ben noticed he’d resumed his habit of tangling his fingers in Ben’s tabard.

“I might have made it worse, Master,” Obi-Wan said like it was a confession.

“How so, young one?” Ben shifted his position till he was sitting beside Obi-Wan on his bed, gently wrapping his arm around the boy’s shoulders in a half hug. The teen gratefully leaned against him, taking comfort from the freely given physical affection. Though he still had tiny voice in the back of his mind whispering it was taboo.

“When Master Windu and Master Yoda came to speak to me, I accidentally told them you’d been teaching me already,” Obi-Wan explained. “They didn’t seem exactly happy about some of the things I mentioned.”

“No, I suppose Mace Windu would not see the wisdom in some of the things I’ve been teaching you,” Ben agreed wryly.

“Master Yoda didn’t seem so disapproving,” Obi-Wan offered, then grimaced. “He wasn’t even mad when I accidentally let slip about your padawan.”

Frowning in confusion, Ben looked down into the teen’s guilty face. “I already told the Council about my padawan.”

“No, I let slip about your- um- your attachment to him.”

Confusion melting away, Ben just chuckled and gave Obi-Wan a comforting squeeze. “Not to worry, dear one. The Council is well aware I’m still quite unrepentantly attached to my former padawan. You didn’t reveal anything they didn’t already know.”

“Oh,” Obi-Wan sighed in relief. “I was worried.”

“There’s no need to be,” Ben assured him again. “Besides if anyone knows about being attached to your padawans it’s Yoda.”

“What do you mean?” he asked curiously.

“Master Yoda is known for being especially partial to his own lineage,” Ben revealed with a wry smirk. “And since he’s the Grand Master of the Order, no one’s quite brave enough to call him on it.”

Obi-Wan let out a slightly scandalized giggle as this shocking, innocent revelation. Though he sobered quickly, a contemplative expression taking over. “That explains some if it then.”

“Explains what?”

“Some of the things Master Yoda said and how he reacted when they asked me about Master Jinn,” he replied.

“Ah,” Ben nodded knowingly. “I imagine it was not pleasant for him to hear about his grandpadawan in a negative light. He didn’t make you uncomfortable, did he?”

“No,” Obi-Wan shook his head, “I could tell he wasn’t directing his reactions at me, exactly. He was reluctant to accept when I said there was no way Master Jinn and I would reconcile.”

It wasn’t a surprise that Yoda would suggest that. Leaving out the fact that he was partial to Qui-Gon already, it was usually one of the first things they tried when a master and padawan came before the Council with problems. They attempted to reconcile the two rather than uproot the padawan entirely to another master. Still, given what had been revealed by both Ben and surely Obi-Wan they should have immediately accepted there would be no reconciliation.

A thought occurred to him, and Ben frowned. “Speaking of, Qui-Gon hasn’t come to see you, has he?”

It was all over the temple by now that Obi-Wan Kenobi was returned and injured. If Qui-Gon hadn’t deigned to check up on him, it was not because he was uninformed.

A small spike of sadness and rejection made it’s way into Obi-Wan’s Force presence. “Master Che said I’m not allowed normal visitors yet, but she has been passing on messages from my friends. She hasn’t mentioned Master Jinn.”

Ben couldn’t help but feel his own hint of sadness and rejection at that. The implication that in his past, if he’d returned to the temple injured, his master would not have checked up on his welfare was unpleasant. Though, with hindsight and acceptance, Ben could acknowledge that it wasn’t for another almost two years after their reconciliation that he and Qui-Gon had truly become partners.

“I’m sorry, Obi-Wan,” Ben offered consolingly. “Even though you don’t see him as your master any longer, I know that his absence must still be hurtful.”

The teenager just pressed his face into Ben’s shoulder and let out a heavy huff of breath. Ben observed as Obi-Wan shared his sadness and rejection with the Force, returning himself to the comfort and engagement of their previous conversation.

“Thank you, Master Ben. But I will be okay.”

Ben smiled gently down at the top of Obi-Wan’s shaggy head and stroked his hand up and down the boy’s arm. “Yes, you will,” he agreed quietly, proudly.

They fell into another soothing silence then. Ben thinking heavy thoughts and Obi-Wan just soaking up as much affection and comfort as he could. An hour later, Vokara Che made her rounds and discovered them both asleep, still curled up together on Obi-Wan’s bed.

*

TBC...

Chapter 18: Not Quite Bloodshed, But Close

Chapter Text

Jango and his warriors had been loitering in the Jetiise’s hangar for almost a week when Silas finally cracked past their mid level security on their servers. They had access to everything the masters had access to, according to Silas. It wasn’t quite as much as Jango was hoping for, but it was enough for them to finally discover Ben Kenobi’s file.

Apparently he was trained as a Shadow, the Jetii equivalent of a special operator. This did not come as a surprise to Jango. Kenobi had the attitude for secret ops. Every conversation Jango had with the man made him feel like Kenobi knew more than he was saying. That he was privy to more secrets than you could possibly guess.

With the access to the Master level clearance, they were able to get an update on Obi-Wan as well. Lucinda, their Weequay squad medic, was especially pleased when they learned he would make a full recovery, only some scarring to show for his close call.

Jango heard footsteps approaching his office and he looked up to see Ben Kenobi himself appear.

“Su cuy’gar,” Kenobi offered the traditional Mandalorian salute.

Jango returned the greeting and took a moment to study him. The Jetii looked much better than the last time he’d seen him. After five straight days of sitting absolutely still in the med-bay doing Force osik to keep his ad alive. Now Kenobi looked like he’d actually gotten some sleep, had a few meals, and taken a bath at least twice.

“You don’t look like death warmed over,” Jango said earning a chuckle from Kenobi.

“Thank you,” he nodded and took a seat in front of Jango’s desk when offered. “Now that Obi-Wan is definitely on the mend, there has been a little more time to rest myself.”

It wasn’t exactly a lie either. Ben had been able to get better sleep in the temple than he had in the sewers on Melida/Daan. However, with a deeper sleep came a return of his nightmares.

“Lucinda would like to be able check up on him at some point,” Jango said and when Kenobi looked confused he clarified, “Lucinda is our medic.”

“Ah,” Ben thought, so that’s the medic’s name. “I had been meaning to speak to her as well. I can’t thank her enough for all that she did for Obi-Wan. I may have put him in a stasis trance, but he wouldn’t have been able to recover so fully without her intervention.”

It pleased him to hear one of his verde being recognized for their ability. Jango allowed himself a curl of his lips in a short smile. “Do you think the Jetii baar’ur will allow Lucinda in your infirmary to check on Obi-Wan?”

“I will speak with Master Che, our Chief Healer. She had mentioned there were some questions she wanted to ask Lucinda as well.” Ben knew that Vokara was both thankful for the Mandalorian medic’s expertise and disgruntled that she’d been able to do so much with Obi-Wan’s wounds with presumable so little.

“I gather, however, that this is not the reason you summoned me.” And Jango had summoned him. Apparently one of his large and intimidating warriors had cornered a passing padawan and politely, for a Mandalorian, asked that a message be passed to Jedi Master Ben Kenobi to come attend the Mand’alor. Needless to say the padawan was a little rattled and their master was displeased. The Council had immediately sent Ben off to deal with the Mandalorians lest there be anymore mildly concerning interactions between their peoples.

“It is time for me to return to Manda’yaim,” Jango explained. “The verde on Melida/Daan have the situation well in hand and Obi-Wan will make a full recovery.”

“You wish to speak to the Council, now,” Ben concluded, notedly with no hesitation.

“There are no other reasons to delay,” Jango agreed, and continued, demanding, “I want you there as well, Kenobi, to mediate should there be any friction between your Alorir Tsad and I,” or would have demanded if he thought Ben Kenobi was the type of man that would let anything be demanded of him.

Ben was only a little surprised by Jango’s request. Truthfully he thought the Council would be the ones demanding his presence, since the Mandalorians camping out in the temple hangar was mostly his fault.

Not that he was going to protest. If neither party asked for him he had been fully prepared to demand being in on that meeting himself.

“Give me an hour,” Ben said. “The full Council will need to convene. I’ll come back and escort you myself.”

“Jate, vor’e,” Jango nodded regally doing a great job at hiding his relief. He may be a king but there was just something about the prospect of speaking to twelve of the most powerful and important Jetii in the Order that was daunting.

Ben for his part didn’t let on that he could feel just how much his easy acceptance put the younger man at ease. He stood, saluted the Mand’alor again and left to go convince the High Council they needed to play nice with the painfully young, but scarily competent Mandalorian king.

*

It wasn’t until Ben was standing in front of the majority of the High Council trying to convince them to listen and play nice with Jango that he again realized Sifo-Dyas was sitting just off to his left. The master with far-sight was staring intently at Ben and he didn’t know what to do with that. He wondered as he was once again the focus of Master Rancisis’s grumbling, if Sifo-Dyas had already had visions of a clone army wearing Jango Fett’s face.

Now, he was escorting the Mand’alor, his intelligence officer, and the Mandalorian medic, all clad in full beskar’gam mind you, through the temple to the Council Chambers.

They were getting quite a few alarmed and wary looks from the knights and masters they passed, but fortunately only wide-eyed gawking from the younglings. Ben wasn’t looking forward to explaining to Jango how the scariest bedtime tales the children told each other most often featured fearsome Mandalorians.

Like before, Padawan Depa was waiting for them outside the Chamber. When they exited the elevator she eyed them with a mix of fascination and wariness.

“They’re ready for you now, Master Kenobi,” she said when Ben gave her a calm smile.

“Lovely, will you lead the way,” he gestured for her to go ahead.

Behind him he heard Lucinda the medic murmur to Silas the intelligence officer, “Jetii duumir ade lo jorhaa’ir ti narudar?¹”

Ben looked over his shoulder and gave Lucinda a bland smile. “Hibir Depa cuyanir kaysh Jetii verd’goten. Kaysh ge tsikala Jetii Al’verde. Depa balyc ad be Jetii Alor.²”

Said padawan jumped at the sound of her name and gave Ben a wide-eyed look.

“Medic Lucinda was asking about your presence in council,” he explained, causally. “I was just explaining that you were a senior padawan and that your Master is the Master of the Order.”

“Oh,” she blinked a little bewildered between Lucinda and Ben. She settled on giving the medic a slightly nervous smile before she schooled her expression and turned back toward the chamber doors. “This way, please.”

Depa held the doors open and Ben was slightly amused to see Silas and Lucinda nod respectfully to her, murmuring, “Alor Ad Depa,” as they passed.

Once the Council Chamber doors closed behind them, Ben stood next to Jango and bowed to the Council. The Mandalorians stayed up right, which he noticed several of the more traditional masters did not appreciate. Oh well, he sighed and stepped forward to begin introductions.

“Mand’alor, ibic gai Jetii Alor, Bajurir Mace Windu,” he gestured to the stern master sitting in his chair watching the proceedings very closely. He gestured to Yoda next. “Ibic gai Jetii Ba’Alor, Bajurir Yoda.”

He then turned to the two masters. “Masters, may I present Mand’alor Jango Fett, House Mereel.”

Yoda nodded his head regally. “Su cuy’gar, Mand’alor.”

Jango released the seals on his helmet and removed it, holding it under one arm. “Su cuy’gar, Ba’Alor Yoda,” he returned just as regally.

“Enjoyed your stay in our hangar, you have?” Yoda then asked and Ben almost groaned. Had his grandmaster always been such a troll?

Jango blinked at the small green creature for a moment then nodded again. “Your hangar staff has been very accommodating.”

Yoda responded with a twinkle in his eyes and a throaty hum. Master Windu resisted the urge to rub at his forehead.

“We must thank you, Mand’alor,” he began drawing everyone’s attention. “Master Kenobi and Padawan Obi-Wan have both told us how you assisted them on Melida/Daan. Master Che, our Chief Healer also expressed that without your medic’s help Obi-Wan probably wouldn’t have recovered completely.”

“Obi-Wan is a talented warrior and a wise young leader,” Jango responded. “Not to mention barely passed his verd’goten. We would do no less than everything we could to see him home alive.”

There was a swell of approval in the Force from many of the councilors, but there was also some confusion and wariness.

“What is a verd’goten?” asked Shaak Ti, her brows furrowed.

“It’s a Mandalorian right of passage,” Ben answered. “At around the age of thirteen or the species equivalent, a Mandalorian is given a task to complete to prove themselves as warriors. When they complete the task they are considered adults.”

“Adults? At thirteen?” one of the masters repeated incredulously.

“Adults in that they can make most decisions concerning themselves,” Jango corrected, politely. “They are still considered in the care of their parents and clan, but they are old enough to choose their path in life.”

There was some understanding among the masters, but yet some were still dubious of the concept.

“It is similar to the Gathering,” Ben offered, and the Council’s majority understanding filled the Force. At Jango’s raised eyebrow, though, he explained, “Initiates search for their kyber crystals at the Gathering. In the process they are often subject to Force-visions and illusions to test their inner most selves. After they build their lightsaber with the crystal the Force guided them to, they can then choose to remain on the path of a Jedi Knight or to join one of the Service Corps.”

“Ah,” Jango tipped his head in understanding. “Then this Gathering is much like a verd’goten.”

Ben could feel many of the masters were unhappy that he’d revealed what some Jedi consider to be secrets not for outsiders. He didn’t particularly care. The more the Mandalorians and Jedi realized their cultures weren’t wholly disparate the better for future relations.

Based on the considering expression on Plo Koon’s face and Yoda’s still twinkling eyes, they were two of the masters that caught on to what he was doing.

“Still,” Mace spoke up bringing the conversation back around, “Padawan Obi-Wan came to Melida/Daan in the care of a master of our Order. And we must acknowledge that you took on the task of helping and protecting him when we could not.”

Jango’s face darkened a little at that. “What is to be done about Obi’ika’s dar’buir?”

Surprisingly good at shielding for a Force-null, Jango’s sharp anger still seeped into the Force. Many of the masters tensed at the sudden shift in his emotions. Ben, his own feelings on Obi-Wan’s abandonment urging him, spoke up before any of the masters could get twitchier.

“Dar’cabur,” Ben corrected somewhat sharply, finding himself under Jango’s piercing gaze. “Bajurir Jinn draar ru parjir gai buir.³” While his words seemed to settle some of Jango’s anger, the Council on the other hand was unsettled by Ben’s deliberate use of Mando’a.

“Perhaps translate for us, you will,” Yoda spoke up, the twinkle in his eyes diminished and his ears slightly drooped, indicating he’d understood Ben perfectly. “Many centuries it has been since Mando’a, on the language curriculum, it was.”

His grandmaster’s demeanor and his stoic words urged Ben to share his lingering resentment and anger with the Force before he obliged his request. “There was a confusion in cultural understanding. Jango referred to Master Jinn as Obi-Wan’s parent, in the past tense. I stated that Master Jinn was not considered a parent, simply a master, though also in the past tense.”

Plo, Mace, Shaak, and surprisingly Sifo-Dyas were the only ones that gave any indication that they realized Ben had maybe omitted some cultural emphasis with his translation. Ben was well aware that the Mandalorians had absolutely understood his omission. Jango had raised his eyebrow at Ben again, whose only reply was a mask of bland serenity.

Turning his attention back to the Council at large, Jango reiterated, “I would like to know that this Master Jinn will not be allowed to abandon his a- his padawan without consequences.”

“What concern is it of yours how one of our younglings is treated by their master?” Master Yareal Poof was scowling down his nose at the Mandalorians. An interesting sight given that his neck was so long.

Jango’s posture stiffened and he met the master’s stare head on. “Children are the future,” he said grimly. “If the Jedi cannot care for their own, maybe the Mando’ade will do better.”

This is exactly why Ben had asked the Council to play nice, he thought with a sigh. Several of the masters put their hands on their lightsabers at the not so subtle threat and many more began shouting angrily. If Ben didn’t know that Mando’ade saw shouting matches as fairly common place in important meetings it would have been embarrassing. It still was a little embarrassing.

Master Yoda slammed his gimer stick down on the floor hard enough to make several masters jump and the Mandalorians twitch toward their blasters.

He scowled around the room, his expression fierce for such a small unassuming looking creature. “Failed Obi-Wan, we did. Deny this, we do not. Steps, we are taking, to ensure again, this never happens.”

Then he turned his hardened green-brown eyes on the Mand’alor. Jango’s own eyes widened slightly at being the center of the small surprisingly intimidating being’s sharp attention.

“Thank you, we do, for assisting where we could not,” but his gaze didn’t soften as he continued. “However, threaten our young, you will not. For good reason, a saying, there is: If you want to take the padawan, make sure the master is dead.*” He gaze turned piercing on Jango. “Old, I am. Old, many of us are. But by mistake, old warriors, we are not. Think on this, you should, before making ill-advised threats, you do.”

The tension in the air was so thick Ben was sure he wasn’t the only one holding their breath. Not very often did Yoda let his true strength in the Force to the fore. Ben had only really witnessed the small master’s true ability a handful of times during the Clone Wars. It never stopped being equal parts terrifying and awe-inspiring.

Even Anakin, for all his dizzying power in the Force, could not impress or intimidate nearly as much as Yoda’s almost nine-hundred years of experience and fine control. That Yoda was projecting the full might of his presence into the Force at this moment illustrated just how displeased he was with this turn of events.

Jango, it seemed, realized the precarious place he now stood. Even as he tried not to let on how intimidated he was by the diminutive old being, in the back of his head he acknowledged that he’d never felt so young and inexperienced as he did under that tiny green creature’s regard.

“Ni ceta, Ba’Alor Yoda.” He placed a fist to his chest in a display of respect, because though Jango had just been scolded like a youngling, Yoda had demonstrated he was willing to fight for his young. “In the future I will more thoroughly consider my audience before responding to insolent remarks.”

Sincere Jango maybe in his apology, able to let Master Poof’s comment go completely, he was not. Not that Ben blamed him. Yoda, too, did not hold his taking insult against him, merely his response.

“Think before speaking, we all should practice.”

Master Poof’s expression soured, but he could say nothing when it was his combative question that almost caused violence in a peaceful talk with potential allies.

“On the subject of Master Jinn,” Mace spoke up when it was clear tensions had finally eased. “His and Obi-Wan’s master-padawan bond will be dissolved. He is under review right now to investigate other complaints and new information we’ve only recently learned. Depending on what we find, what his mental state is like, we will make a decisions on how he should be censured.”

It was a lot of words to say, before we punish him we’re sending him to mind healers to make sure his neglect bordering on abuse wasn’t done maliciously. Ben considered that a trip to the mind healers should become mandatory for all Jedi after various traumas. That was another thing to add to the list of changes to eventually harangue the Council into.

Jango almost looked like he was going to question Mace more, but thought better of it. In the end he just offered a stiff nod of acknowledgment.

“Your concern for Obi-Wan, a credit to you, it is. Though think, I do, that Master Jinn is not the only subject, to speak on, you wish,” Yoda commented, demeanor once again calm and collected. His massive, predatorily protective Force presence once again hidden under the skin of a small, old, green master.

On the other hand Jango’s expression hardened and his scowl turned dark. “When we received Kenobi’s call for assistance, we were finishing up a job contracted by the Governor of Galidraan.” There was a new tension in the Force, several of the masters refocusing their attention on the Mand’alor with a renewed wariness. “It came to our attention shortly after learning about Melida/Daan and deciding to render assistance, that the Governor had submitted a complaint about marauding Mandalorians to the Galactic Senate and requested aid from the Jedi.”

“You’re saying you were hired by the Governor of Galidraan for a legitimate mercenary contract,” Mace repeated, expression grim.

“He claimed there were insurgents killing his people and threatening to overthrow the government,” Jango asserted. “We did what we thought was sufficient due diligence before signing a contract and found evidence to support his claim. That he would then turn around and contact the Senate with false claims of misconduct on our parts gave every indication that situation was actually a trap of some sort.”

“Know, you do, that Jedi interference, the Senate officially requested. Provided compelling evidence, the Senate did. Send knights to Galidraan, we were urged.” Yoda’s words had leading edge to them, but like he was still feeling out Jango’s reaction.

“As we were verifying our intel, investigating the possibility of a larger conspiracy, we became aware of the Senate’s communications to the Jedi, yes,” Jango replied vaguely, not wanting to outright admit to slicing into the temple servers as well as the Galactic Senate’s.

“You think there is a larger conspiracy at play than one Governor’s greedy reluctance to pay for services rendered?” Plo Koon was watching the young Mand’alor intently, his long sharp fingers stroking over his tusks in thought.

Jango dipped his head to the Kel Dor in agreement. “We were able to trace communication directly from the Governor’s personal comlink to Concord Dawn.”

Though Ben understood the significance of this perfectly, none of the other masters did.

“Would that not be logical, since the Governor hired you?” Sifo-Dyas spoke up then, his eyes almost unnervingly intent on Jango. “Concord Dawn is a planet in the Mandalore sector, is it not?”

Once again Ben felt unsettled by the master’s attention. There was too much he did not know about the visions that supposedly lead to Sifo-Dyas’s extreme actions. He knew much too little about the master’s motivations.

Jango eyed the dark haired master for a moment before answering. “The True Mandalorian Supercommando mercenary company operates out of Keldabe on Mandalore proper. That he was receiving calls from Concord Dawn, the current base of operations or the terrorist group known as Death Watch is extremely suspicious. That we traced the calls through known Death Watch channels was evidence of betrayal enough.”

Adi Gallia had been one of the least outspoken masters in the several meetings Ben had been privy to since coming back to the temple. Now she sat straighter in her seat. “You consider Death Watch to be a terrorist organization?”

Ben was mildly impressed she didn’t quell under the incredulous look Jango shot her. Even through their beskar helmets, the other two Mandalorian’s less than pleased reactions to the implication in her question could be felt in the Force.

“Tor Vizsla, the leader of Death Watch, and all who follow him are dar’manda,” he answered darkly. “They are demagolka. They twist the tenets of the Resol’nare and know almost less about being Mando’ade than the New Mandalorians do.”

There was a clang of truth in the Force, an echo almost like war drums, at the Mand’alor’s words. Ben felt dizzy when a call through the Force, like hundreds of voices chanting in incomprehensible Mando’a, whispered past his ear.

He didn’t realize his eyes had closed as he strained to understand what those voices were saying. Not until Master Gallia’s voice broke his concentration.

“I’m not sure I understand,” she had a serious expression on her face. She could tell she’d perhaps stepped on another landmine with their guests, but was determined to understand nonetheless.

“What Mand’alor Fett is saying, Master Gallia, is that the Haat Mando’ade, the True Mandalorians, do not consider Death Watch to be Mandalorian,” Ben explained, the sound in the Council Chamber rushing back to him suddenly. His voice almost too loud in his ears for a moment. “Demagolka means that they are abusers of children,” he said to the shock of some of the masters around them. “They kidnap and brainwash children into being loyal soldiers for their cause.”

“As I understand it, one of the major tenets of the Mandalorians is the care and protection of children,” Master Plo added knowingly. “Death Watch’s actions would indeed make them ‘no longer Mandalorian’.”

Ben wasn’t surprised that Plo had caught enough of the sparse Mando’a sprinkled in the conversation to infer the meaning of dar’manda. It also confirmed that he’d picked up on Ben’s earlier sanitized translation.

Mace, who had been closely listening to Jango’s answers, made a logical leap in deduction. “Mand’alor Fett, your investigation into the false allegations against your people lead you to the conclusion that the Governor was working with Death Watch to frame you to the Senate. Am I understanding that right?”

Turning back to the stern Jetii Alor, Jango confirmed it. “We also think the Governor and Death Watch might not have been the only ones involved.”

Master Windu’s eyebrow shot up. “You think someone in the Senate was involved.”

“You stated yourself that the Senate provided you with compelling evidence that Mando’ade were slaughtering civilians,” Jango pointed out. “In our investigation we were able to find the original request from the Governor to the Senate. It had no such evidence, only a written statement and the required bureaucratic forms.”

This information was so concerning that none of the masters either noticed or felt bothered to point out that Jango’s words implied there had been some Mandalorian slicing into confidential Republic Senate servers.

The revelation of Senate complicity, while indeed concerning, was not surprising to Ben. He’d long since come to the conclusion that a great many tragedies in the galaxy, even before his appointment as Chancellor, were most likely orchestrated or at least aided by Darth Sidious in his pursuit of Galactic conquest. Looking back on it, it was apparent that a fair number of the tragedies seemed to have Jedi involvement as well. It had been disheartening to realized that the downfall of the Order had been much longer in the planning than any of Council had ever thought.

“When land on Galidraan, our knights did, and no Mando’ade were found, investigate they did,” Yoda’s throaty voice broke through the unsettled shock a number of the masters were leaking into the Force. “Inconsistencies, a great many they discovered. Suggest misconduct on the Senate’s part, the mission leader did.”

Ben’s eyes widened a little in surprise. Master Dooku had been the mission leader. That fact had also been an incentive for Ben to prevent the tragedy of Galidraan, since it was held as one of the defining events that pushed the Count to lose faith in the Jedi and leave the Order. Ben not being the only one surprised by Yoda’s words, told him that maybe Dooku hadn’t voiced his suspicions to the Council at large, but to his former master privately.

Perhaps it was a sign that Dooku still trusted at least Yoda’s judgment if not the entire Council’s.

“Prevented a great tragedy, I fear, has been. Fortunate, we all are, in the timing of Master Kenobi’s call for aid.”

There was a knowing glint in the troll’s eyes when they met first Jango’s and then Ben’s gaze. Several of the masters caught Yoda’s meaning and turned more considering attention on Ben. Though, Jango and the Mandalorians only understood half of the old master’s implied meaning.

Still Jango nodded in agreement.

“It’s obvious this situation could have ended very differently.” Mace looked like he was fighting a headache, whether from the thought that someone in the Senate was plotting against the Jedi and the Mandalorians or from a shatter-point, Ben couldn’t tell. “How can we ensure this does not happen again?”

Oh, Ben had so many ideas and opinions. But for now he settled on just voicing one. “Putting the less immediate issue of the Senate to one side, might I offer a suggestion?”

Mace let out a heavy sigh, but he waved a hand at him anyway. “Go ahead, Kenobi.”

Ben didn’t in fact grin at the long suffering Master of the Order. He pasted on his mask of Jedi serenity as he said, “It has come to my attention that both Master Che and Medic Lucinda would like to speak further about Obi-Wan’s healing and recovery.” Said medic co*cked her helmeted head at the mention of her name. “Could it be possible that more than just our healers might find interest and benefit from an exchange of knowledge?”

From the unimpressed deadpan look on Mace’s face he saw exactly where Ben was going with this. But the floodgate had been opened.

Plo gave a metallic hum of consideration. “You are suggesting a greater understanding and closer relationship between our people would prevent future opportunities for outside manipulation and needless conflict.”

Having become very practiced at the Jedi art of leading one to the desired conclusion, Ben gave the master a neutral smile. “We have in the past contacted accused parties directly when allegations of wrongdoing had been made, but evidence was circ*mstantial or against character.”

That this was information normally only privy to the Council, and as a regular Jedi Master Ben should not know this did not go unnoticed by the Council. It raised a few eyebrows since Ben had neglected to mention that he’d been a member of the Council in his past.

Jango, while not versed in the nuances of Jedi politics, was astute enough to realize that Kenobi was manipulating the Jedi Council to his desired conclusion and the Council knew he was doing it too. Or at least the Jetii Alor, Ba’Alor, and the Kel Dor knew what was happening. Also that Ben had some kind of a vested interest in better relations between their people.

Sifo-Dyas spoke up then sending the hairs on the back of Ben’s neck tingling again. “Master Nu, our Chief Archivist, was complaining to me the other day that the section on Mandalorian culture and recent history in the Archives was very sparse.”

Once again having to tamp down on his knee-jerk suspicion of the seer’s contribution, Ben dipped his head agreement. “An updated language module for Mando’a would not go amiss. As Master Yoda said, the language of Mandalore hasn’t been on the curriculum in a very long time.”

Jango was quiet for a long moment as he weighed the pros and cons of a closer more open relationship between the Jetiise and Mando’ade. It wasn’t like there had never been precedent. Tarre Vizsla was perhaps one of the most famous Mand’alore and had been a fully trained Jedi as well.

Not to mention that Jango was not unaware that the New Mandalorians were gaining more and more political support in the Republic Senate. If the Haat Mando’ade could claim to have gained the friendship of the Jedi Order, well, that was influence Jango was not going to sneeze at.

Especially since the Jedi Order was generally more well liked throughout the galaxy than the Senate. Having the favor of the Jedi would hold more sway with other neutral or less influential systems when approached for trade agreements or mercenary jobs.

“I will have to discuss this further with the Clan Heads, but I am not opposed,” was Jango’s diplomatic response. “Since I plan to keep in contact with Obi-Wan, I’m sure Kenobi will be able to bring you more details once I’ve brought this proposition before my council.”

That was an altogether not subtle and slightly high handed appointment of a Jedi ambassador to Mandalore, Mace Windu thought as a headache finally started to pound at his temples. Well, at least that was one more decision he didn’t have oversee with the Council. Keeping the wise Masters of the Council on topic was like herding tookas. Frustrating and needlessly time consuming.

If letting the upstart Mandalorian king pick his own liaison saved him from having to suffer through the decision making process, Mace wasn’t going to complain. Of course the nonnegotiable way Fett stated he was going to keep an eye on Obi-Wan was not ideal, but since Kenobi seemed not to worry about it, Mace was fully prepared to throw the time traveler under the hover-buss when this connection inevitably caused problems

Ben for his part was actually mildly surprised that this meeting had gone so well. No blood was shed, doubt was cast on the Senate, Mandalorians and Jedi were possibly becoming allies, all in all, a better outcome than he’d originally planned for.

“I would be happy to facilitate further discussion,” Ben said with a polite nod to Jango. “If there is nothing else you wish to speak of with the High Council,” he trailed off questioningly.

Jango shook his head. “I have said all I wanted to say.”

Ben smiled at him. “Then I shall escort you to the Halls of Healing so you can see Obi-Wan before you leave. He will be happy to see you again.” He turned his gaze on Lucinda’s visor giving the illusion of meeting her eyes. “Ba’jurir Baar’ur Che copaanir jorhaa’ir ti gar, balyc, Baar’ur Lucinda.⁴”

Jango was just able to offer Master Windu and Master Yoda formal goodbyes before Kenobi began ushering the three Mandalorians toward the doors.

Ben felt his luck had held long enough and wanted to end the meeting on a high note. Before either the Mandalorians or the masters could attempted to put their feet in their mouths again, he had the Mandalorians already out the doors and into the hall.

The doors slammed behind them leaving a mix of relief and foreboding in the Council Chamber.

“Think that went well, I do,” Yoda commented lightly after a long stretch of silence. Padawan Depa, who had been observing the entire meeting with varying degrees of shock, concern, and bewilderment, stared at the Grand Master with a look of incredulity.

Mace just leaned forward on his knees and rubbed at his temples. Trouble, nothing but trouble, would Ben Kenobi be, he just knew it.

*
TBC…

Chapter 19: Beads and Reunions

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan stood in the fresher of his room in the Halls of Healing, staring into the mirror. There was still a bandage over the ridge of his right eye, the crest of his right cheekbone, and the middle of his right jugular. The rest of the wounds he’d received from the slugthrower projectile were mostly healed, still a little pink around the edges with new skin, but healed nonetheless.

Before the majority of his bandages came off he’d tried not to dwell on just how bad the scarring would be. Now looking at his exposed skin, Obi-Wan thought they didn’t look so bad. For the most they almost blended into his freckles, only distinguishable by having the rough shape of tiny starbursts with trails of healing tissue running horizontal across the right side of his face. Truthfully they kinda resembled shooting stars.

Sighing to himself, Obi-Wan straightened up and fiddled with the side part in his newly trimmed hair, attempting to make it as orderly as possible. He was once again thankful Master Ben didn’t require him to have the traditional padawan nerf-tail. Unlike the braid it served no purpose other than birth control as the senior padawans liked to joke - whatever that meant-, and it was just plain silly looking. Instead he’d let Obi-Wan choose how he wanted his hair cut. He’d chosen to emulate Master Ben’s own style, though his was much shorter at the back and sides, and not quite as long on top.

Master Yoda had come to speak with him and Master Ben yesterday. To give them the Council’s decision on their master - padawan bond.

“Substantial objections, there are none,” the little master said. “Trial period, you will have. Observe how you teach and learn, we will, before a final decision, the Council will make.”

While Obi-Wan had not been thrilled by the implication that their bond could be severed at any time should the Council decide it, Ben on the other hand had accepted with little resistance.

“I’m a relative unknown to the Council, Obi-Wan,” he’d said when Yoda had left them. “I don’t mind the extra scrutiny if the Council has decided to take your well-being more seriously.”

And Obi-Wan couldn’t really argue with that. He knew how Master Ben felt about the Order’s alternately lacks and strict attitudes toward the circ*mstances of the younglings. If his heretical master could suffer the judging eyes of the Council with serenity then so could Obi-Wan. Mostly.

Mentally declaring his hair as neat as it was going to be, Obi-Wan stroked a hand down the front of his clean robes and stepped out of the fresher.

“Much better.” Master Ben smiled, giving him a look up and down. “I will say, the patient gowns they force on us in the Halls are not flattering on anybody.”

Rolling his eyes, Obi-Wan came to stand in front of his master for a closer inspection. Ben put his hands on the teen’s shoulders and studied his healing face intently.

“Master Che and Medic Lucinda did a good job,” he declared. “I believe the scars will fade even more with time.”

“They’re not as bad as I thought they’d be,” Obi-Wan agreed as he poked at his still slightly tender cheek. His master lightly slapped his hand away.

“With the hair cut and the clean robes you look much less like a ragamuffin than you did.” Ben ruffled his fingers through Obi-Wan’s neat hair grinning when the boy attempted to dodge scowling at him.

“Come along, then. It’s time to put your braid in.” Ben took a seat on the infirmary bed and patted the spot on the mattress next to him.

Obi-Wan’s stomach gave a nervous flip. He was excited, of course he was excited, to wear a padawan braid again, for Master Ben to weave it into his hair. He was also slightly anxious. Master Jinn’s violent severing of his last braid effected him more than he liked to admit.

Ben gave the suddenly quiet boy a reassuring smile. “You’ll have to bear with me, it’s been a very long time since I’ve made a padawan braid.”

Sitting down with his right side toward his master, Obi-Wan returned the smile with a tentatively cheeky grin. “I promise I won’t complain if it’s horrible, Master.”

Snorting, Ben chuckled. “That’s a bold faced lie. All padawans complain about their masters’ horrid braiding skills. Now, sit still for me, I don’t want to tangle it up.”

The jagged lock of hair behind Obi-Wan’s right ear had been tidied up yesterday when he’d gotten his hair trimmed and the burnt curled ends were finally gone. However, even after months of his hair going untamed, there wasn’t enough length to make a sufficient braid.

Master Ben had no problem coming up with a solution.

With surprisingly nimble fingers, Ben picked up three thin white ribbons and securely tied them around the two inch long lock of hair as close to Obi-Wan’s scalp as he could. When they were securely in place, he began to weave the short red strands into the ribbons. He also gently entered Obi-Wan’s mind with a soft knock against the boy’s mental shields. By the time he was past weaving the first inch or so of the braid, Ben had begun laying the foundations of a brand new Master - Padawan Force-bond into Obi-Wan’s mind.

It was tradition to construct the bond while making the braid, not required though. Force-bonds only needed consenting parties and open minds to build upon. There were many different kinds of Force-bonds, but they all began with the same base structure. Bonds naturally evolved over time depending on the changing relationship of the beings involved. So while the Force didn’t require a strict procedural structure in making bonds, part of the ceremony of taking a padawan and receiving a master was building the bond and the braid together.

As Ben continued weaving the ribbons into a tight sturdy braid, he also connected their minds. By the time he reached near the end of the ribbons the braid was just past the Obi-Wan’s shoulder and their Force-bond was firmly rooting in their minds, strong but still dormant, ready to slowly awaken and change as they grew into each other.

Feeling suddenly like his feet were firmly on the ground for the first time in months, Obi-Wan opened his eyes to see Master Ben was nearly done with his braid. Dipping inward to examine their new bond, he quickly found its foundation and poked at it curiously. It was very different from the bond he’d had with Master Jinn.

His bond with Master Jinn had been thin, translucent. It wavered at every sway and eddy of the Force like the tall grasses on the windy plains of Bandomeer. Sometimes if he’d concentrated on the nature of the bond too closely it would almost feel like a gust of the Force could pick him up and carry him off like a leaf on the wind.

In stark contrast, if Master Jinn’s bond had been insubstantial plains grass, Master Ben’s bond was a deeply rooted tree so wide you couldn’t put your arms around it. Even still dormant it radiated safety and comfort. As he concentrated on it Obi-Wan felt like he was firmly planted in the mortal plain, no chance of him being accidentally carried off into the Force if he wasn’t paying attention. It felt like the Force could batter and rage against the bond and it would still remain solid and secure, like a strong tree weathering a thunderstorm.

Tension he hadn’t even realized was present finally melted away and Obi-Wan let out a sigh, a small smile curling at his lips as he waited patiently for Master Ben to tie off his braid.

Out of the corner of his eye, Obi-Wan saw Ben take something from his pocket and slipped it into the braid before he tied off the ribbons. When his master pulled his hands back, Obi-Wan lifted the braid curiously to examine it.

The white of the ribbons, Obi-Wan knew, meant new beginnings in Mandalorian tradition. Master Ben had explained that to him when they’d talked about how to solve the problem of his too short hair. Obi-Wan agreed readily when Master Ben had commented that he thought putting Mandalorian colors on his Jedi braid was fitting. The Mando’ade, after all, were not an insignificant presence in the time they’d come together, as well as having played a huge part in their survival and success on Melida/Daan.

The bead Master Ben had added near the end of the ribbons, however, was one Obi-Wan had never seen on another padawan’s braid before. Made out of a deep ebony wood, it was a cylindrical shape about 3/4 of an inch long. Carved into its surface was a silver inlaid living sunrise and winged blade of the Jedi Crest. Obi-Wan rubbed his thumb over the symbol feeling the cool metal and smooth wood.

“What does it mean, Master?” He looked up to see a solemn Ben watching him. “I’ve never seen this achievement bead before.”

“That’s because it hasn’t been used in a very long time,” Ben replied.

He’d argued with himself if it was wise to award Obi-Wan with this bead. It didn’t escape his notice that in two lifetimes he’d be the first master in almost a century to weave it into his padawan’s braid. Anakin had been the first padawan in a hundred years to earn this bead in the first couple months of the Clone Wars. And unfortunately he hadn’t been the last. Ben even had the dubious honor of witnessing Anakin add this bead to Ahsoka’s padawan silka bead chain not three months into their partnership.

Despite his reservations, in the end the Force told him it was Obi-Wan’s right. “It’s a Battlefield Achievement bead.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes widened in surprise. “Battlefield Achievement?”

Ben nodded with a wry twist to his mouth. “You mustn’t forget, the Jedi have fought in many wars over the thousands of years we’ve survived. At one point in our history, battlefield leadership and prowess was just as highly prized as diplomacy and negotiation.”

Not sure how he felt about that, Obi-Wan glanced back down at the bead with a slight frown. It might have been prized among their Order at one time, but now the violence one needed to survive on the battlefield was looked down upon. The Jedi herald themselves as peacekeepers, not war makers.

“I didn’t give you this bead as a warning or a harsh reminder,” Ben dipped his head so he could meet the quiet boy’s unsure gaze. “What you went through on Melida/Daan with the Young was a trial of both your conviction and your adaptability. Very few of the masters in the Order today can claim to have experienced even half of what you went through. The hardships and the pain you endured to follow your heart and the Will of the Force should be recognized.”

Obi-Wan glanced back down at the bead on the end of his braid. When he looked at it then he saw what Master Ben saw, an acknowledgment that though he’d had to fight and kill for it, he’d helped bring peace where there had been war. He stood beside the Young and through their blood, sweat, and tears, paved the way for a better future.

“Thank you, Master Ben,” he murmured turning his bright eyes back on his master. “I will wear this bead as a sign of my achievement as your student and I will carry this lesson on my path to becoming a Jedi Knight.”

Smiling as the boy’s traditional response, Ben gave his padawan’s braid a gentle tug. “I’m proud of you, Obi-Wan.” The teen’s formal demeanor melted and he grinned. “Now, let’s go find our new apartment. I had to requisition an entire set of furnishings. The Quartermaster was not impressed.”

Grinning, Obi-Wan hopped off the bed and followed after his master, one hand still fiddling with the bead on the end of his braid. Not for the first time he thought he was so, so lucky the Force lead Master Ben to him on Melida/Daan.

*

When they finally found and unlocked their apartment, Obi-Wan looked around and shrugged. It was exactly like the one he’d shared with Master Jinn, just with the notable absence of potted plants in every corner.

“We’ll have to pick up some things to decorate the walls with,” Ben murmured as he examined the entryway, living, dining, and kitchen. He’d spent years in spartan living quarters on a star-destroyer then twenty years in the desert with nothing but sand and sky to stare at. No way was he going to leave the walls of this apartment barren and beige for much longer.

Obi-Wan slipped past him and wandered down the hall toward the padawan bedroom, usually smaller than the master’s room and sharing the guest fresher. The first thing he noticed upon entering the room was that all his personal effects fit in one box. A distant part of himself was thankful someone had packed up his meager belongings from Master Jinn’s apartment for him. He didn’t want to take the chance of seeing his former master again so soon.

The single box of belongings wasn’t what had Obi-Wan paused in the doorway though, it was the window that looked out over the outdoor training fields. At least the room will get some natural light. He had started to feel claustrophobic in the sewers on Melida/Daan.

“Obi-Wan, come here for a moment.”

Turning back toward the living room, Obi-Wan walked in to see Master Ben seated on their brand new - to them – couch.

Taking the seat on the other end of the couch Obi-Wan turned to him curiously.

“Before I came to pick you up from the Halls of Healing this morning, I went to the Gallery of Sabers.”

Obi-Wan’s breath caught as his master pulled a lightsaber from his outer robe pocket. It was Obi-Wan’s lightsaber, the saber Master Jinn had confiscated from him after severing his braid. As he stared at it, he could hear the familiar way it sang in the Force, its crystal chiming with its own individual tune.

Slowly he took it from his master’s hand and just held it in his own, listening to it’s song. It was familiar, of course it was, but the kyber crystal inside no longer quite touched that deep personal part of his heart. Obi-Wan’s shoulders sank when he realized that he’d outgrown his crystal. Melida/Daan and Master Ben and the Mandalorians had all left marks on his soul and he no longer sang exactly in tune with his crystal.

“I don’t think this kyber crystal will work as well for me anymore,” he said sadly.

Ben hummed. “I thought that might be the case.” And he had. In his previous life the lightsaber he’d had through his entire padawanship had taken almost as long to fit him again as it had taken him and Qui-Gon to become partners. It was probably worse for Obi-Wan who had a new master, survived a life endangering injury, and become practically family with the Mandalorian king. All while separated from his lightsaber and the kyber crystal within.

Obi-Wan had grown, but the crystal had not.

Turning his gaze back on his master, Obi-Wan let his fingers stroke over the cold metal of the saber hilt absently. “What should I do, Master?”

“Well,” Ben rubbed at his beard thoughtfully, “there are several things you can do, young one. You can continue to use the lightsaber and the crystal will eventually evolve to match you once again. Or you can keep that saber as a back up weapon. We can either travel to Jedha or join the next Gathering of initiates to Ilum and you can search for another kyber and build a new lightsaber.”

Neither of those options seemed to appeal to the teen. There was something holding him back from agreeing to go on another kyber search.

“You’re more than welcome to continue using my former padawan’s saber,” Ben added, when Obi-Wan didn’t answer. “You can still keep your lightsaber as a back up and use my padawan’s saber as your main weapon.”

That was better, Obi-Wan thought looking back down at the saber in his hands. “I want to keep the crystal, but I don’t think it wants to stay in the hilt.” The moment the words left his mouth he knew they were true, he knew that’s what the Force was trying to tell him.

Raising an eyebrow at that, Ben stared at the lightsaber in thought. “I have an idea. Why don’t you take the saber apart while I go look for some supplies.”

Obi-Wan watched his master disappear into his bedroom before he turned back to the saber and slowly levitated it using the Force. Taking his old lightsaber apart took a lot less time than building it in the first place. In a matter of seconds all the components were separated on the low table in front of him and the kyber crystal floated gently into Obi-Wan’s palm.

When Ben came back out, Obi-Wan was examining his naked kyber crystal with a thoughtful expression. Making his way back to the couch, Ben had a coil of copper wire and a spool of dark blue ribbon in his hands. At the time, he hadn’t known why he’d grabbed them from the Quartermaster’s storeroom, but now he did.

“Let me see the crystal,” he asked as he resumed his seat and dropped his supplies next the scattered saber components on the low table.

Obligingly, Obi-Wan dropped the kyber into his master’s hand.

Ben took a moment to just look at it. It’s been over thirty years since he’d heard this crystal’s song. It was high and sweet and sang of the beginnings of the journey out of childhood. About an inch and a half long it was a light icy blue color with blunt faceted ends, and smooth faceted sides.

Unrolling a length of copper wire, Ben wrapped it around the crystal making loops and twists until the kyber was secure and there was too rings at each end where he could thread the ribbon. Snapping off the wire from the rest of the coil, Ben then unspooled the ribbon. It was a heavier weave than the ribbons he’d put in Obi-Wan’s hair and about an inch wide. He slid the ends through the copper hoops and cut the ribbon from the spool. Overlapping the ribbon, he tied each end into secure tandem sliding knots around the opposite length. He’d learned that knot style from the Tusken Raiders.

“Here,” he turned to his padawan, “give me a wrist.” The boy offered his left, and Ben slipped the bracelet over his hand pulling on the knots to tighten it. “Does that seem satisfactory?”

Obi-Wan stared down at the ribbon and wire bracelet now securely sitting on his left wrist. He twisted his hand this way and that to test how secure it was. When the kyber remained firmly seated against the back of his wrist, his couldn’t help but grin a little. The song of the crystal was still out of sync with him, but the weight of it was comforting and the Force felt calm and pleased around the kyber.

“It’s perfect. Thank you, Master. I would never have thought of this.”

Ben shrugged, watching his padawan fiddle with the bracelet. “I didn’t realize I would think of this. The Force guided me to the wire and the ribbon and I suppose this is why.”

His comm beeped and Ben looked at the screen with a grimace. “I’ve got to meet with the Council again,” he sighed and stood up. “It’s about mid-meal time, why don’t you go early and meet your friends in the refectory. I know they’ve been anxious to see you.”

“I’ve wanted to see them too,” Obi-Wan admitted with a smile. He’d missed his friends terribly.

“Which of your friends are you meeting today?” Ben asked as they locked the apartment door behind them and started off toward the elevators.

“Bant and Luminara are still initiates so they’ll definitely be there,” Obi-Wan said. “Garen and Siri are on missions with their masters, and Reeft has the stomach flu, but Quinlan is in the temple right now so he’ll be there.”

Ben stopped abruptly and turned to his padawan. “Quinlan is your friend with Force-psychometry, correct?”

Having almost walked into his master’s back, it took Obi-Wan a second to register the question while he danced to the side to avoid the collision. “Oh, um- yes. Quinlan’s master is working on his control, but he can still get lost in the memories so he wears gloves most of the time.”

“Obi-Wan,” his master’s voice had an edge to it that made the hairs on the back of Obi-Wan’s neck stand up, “You can never allow Quinlan to handle your lightsaber without his gloves. It could be very bad for a young untrained psychometric like him to be exposed to what is imprinted on that saber.”

One hand moved to his belt and touched the saber in question and Obi-Wan felt a flash of apprehension at the thought. This was the lightsaber of a Fallen Jedi, the crystal was still Shadowed, and it had no doubt been an instrument in terrible deeds. No, Obi-Wan thought, he didn’t want his friend to touch this lightsaber at all.

“Yes, Master Ben,” Obi-Wan nodded gravely. “I promise I won’t let that happen.”

Ben felt some of the tension ease. Quinlan Vos had been one of his very best friends. He’d also Fallen to the Dark side and had a tragic, unhappy ending. He didn’t want to risk sending this young, innocent version of his rebellious friend down that same path by accidentally tainting him with the violent, gruesome impressions that were surly connected to Anakin’s lightsaber.

“Good.” He gave Obi-Wan’s shoulder a comforting squeeze. “Now, hurry up. You don’t want to miss your friends.”

Obi-Wan gave him one last nod before he jogged off down the hall toward the elevator bay that would take him to the refectory. Ben watched him go with a distant yearning to see his old friends again, even if they were not the friends he’d known. Seeing them young and alive and so very innocent would be both a joy and a heartache he knew.

*

Obi-Wan just stepped into the refectory when he was tackled from both sides. A gust breath was squeezed out of him and he wheezed as two sets of arms fought each other for the privilege of hugging the stuffing out of him.

“Guys, I can’t breathe!” he gasped with a nose full of dark dreadlocks and his chin jammed against the top of a red, domed forehead.

“You deserve if for scaring us, Obi-Wan Kenobi!” Bant Eerin grumbled scoldingly as she lifted her wayward friend an inch off his feet.

“Bant! Put me down!” Obi-Wan yelped as her webbed fingers dug into his ticklish side. “Quinlan, help!”

“Nah,” his traitorous friend drawled an audible grin being smothered into the top of his shoulder, “I’m enjoying the cuddle time.”

“I do believe Obi-Wan just got out of the Halls of Healing,” came the lightly amused tone of their third friend present. “Maybe we shouldn’t put him back in there so soon.”

The pressure around his ribs lessened and Obi-Wan sighed in relief, giving his savior a grateful smile, “Thanks, Luminara.” She just raised a green skinned eyebrow at him and smirked.

Bant huffed and dropped Obi-Wan back on his feet taking a step back while surreptitiously wiping at her large teary eyes. “Of course we don’t want him back there,” she scowled and smacked him on the arm. “Stop getting injured, Obi!”

“Ow!” he yelped again and rubbed at the offending spot. “Then stop hitting me.”

“Aw, Obi,” Quinlan grinned as he leaned most of his weight on Obi-Wan. He wasn’t hugging anymore, but he’d draped an arm across the shorter boy’s shoulders instead. “She’s just embarrassed I caught her trying to sneak past Master Che to check on you.”

“It was your idea, Quinlan,” Bant glared in protest.

Obi-Wan sighed as his two friends devolved into a good-natured squabble. He smiled at Luminara. “It’s good to see you, Nara.”

She smiled, her dark chin tattoos stretching with the expression, then her eyes caught on something by his shoulder and they widened. “Obi-Wan!” she gasped. “What happened to your braid?”

Bant and Quinlan’s argument abruptly halted and all three pairs of eyes darted toward the ribbons trailing from behind his right ear.

Covering her mouth with her webbed fingers in shock, Bant stared at his braid wide-eyed as Quinlan gently lifted it from his shoulder turning the bead over curiously.

“What’s this? I’ve never seen a bead like this before?”

A heavier, deeper sigh, escaped him and Obi-Wan felt his shoulders slump. “I’ll tell you all about it, but not here. Let’s get our food and go somewhere else.”

His three friends quietly followed him as he made his way through the food line then out of the dining hall to find some privacy.

When they finally settled under a large tree in the courtyard outside the refectory, Obi-Wan looked at the three other teens watching him intently. “So, how much do you know about what happened to me?”

“Not much,” Quinlan admitted with a put upon frown. “The Council’s been pretty tight lipped.”

“Rumors are pretty out there, though,” Bant said. “First, when Master Jinn came back without you and with Master Tahl injured so badly, everyone thought you were dead,” she sucked in a sharp breath and Obi-Wan felt guilty to see how upset the prospect made his friend. “Then it was going around that you quit the Order.”

“None of us believed that,” Luminara assured him. “You’d worked so hard to be a padawan there was no way you’d just leave like that.”

“No one would say anything about it though,” Quinlan huffed. “Then Master Tholme and I had a mission and we didn’t get back till last month. I didn’t have much time to try and investigate before you showed back up again.”

“And made quite the stir,” Luminara added wryly with only a hint of amused disapproval.

“Everyone was saying you were flown in on a medical emergency,” Bant’s voice was high with an echo of her worry. “That you were escorted by a mysterious Jedi Master no one had ever even heard of and that was strange enough, but then suddenly there’s Mandalorians taking over the hangar and demanding an audience with the Council and-”

Hurriedly Obi-Wan reached over and grabbed her wrist putting a halt to her rapidly devolving flow of words with a comforting squeeze. “Well, none of that was exactly wrong,” he concluded dryly to his friends’ displeasure, “except for the me being dead part.”

When he was met with unimpressed silence, he conceded. “Alright, it all started when Master Jinn and I landed on Melida/Daan.”

Throughout his retelling of his life for the last six or so months, his friends had a variety of reactions at different points.

“Oh, next time I see that overgrown bully I’m going to- grrr!” Bant was usually such a sweet, mild-mannered person. Until someone messed with one of her friends.

“That must have been so difficult, Obi-Wan. I cannot image having to fight in a war like that.” Luminara was solemn through most of his story.

“I can’t believe this Ben guy fought the king of the Mandalorians to a draw. He sounds like a badass.” Quinlan though sympathetic and protective in his own way, was predictably impressed by the prospect of a rebellious Jedi Master.

Obi-Wan told his friends most everything about his time away. What he didn’t tell them were some of the heretical things his master had said or about his master’s former padawan. He explained that Ben had given him his former padawan’s lightsaber, that he was one with the Force now, but he didn’t tell them that the padawan had Fallen.

That was Master Ben’s business and no one else’s.

By the time he got to the part where he woke up in the Halls of Healing with the entire right side of his face and neck bandaged, his friends had fallen into worried silence.

“You’re okay, now, though right?” Bant asked with concern as her large eyes darted over his lingering bandages and the fresh scars.

“I’m fine,” Obi-Wan assured her. “The Mandalorian medic and Master Che did a very good job in patching me up.”

“And you’re now Master Ben’s padawan,” Luminara affirmed with a slight frown on her brow, nodding her head toward his padawan braid. “The Council approved.”

Tugging on it lightly in a nervous gesture, Obi-Wan nodded. “We’re kind of on probation with the Council, to see how Master Ben and I work together, but pretty much, yeah.”

“He sounds like a hell of a better Master than that nerf-herder Jinn,” declared Quinlan much too loudly for Obi-Wan’s liking seeing as there were several other groups of padawans, knights, and a few masters milling about relaxing and eating.

“Master Ben is really great so far,” Obi-Wan tried not to sound like he was gushing. “He’s so kind and generous and clever. You should have heard him when we were negotiating with Jango that first time. It was amazing. And he’s a really good with a lightsaber. Like scary good. Watching him spar with Jango was downright intimidating.”

While Quinlan and Bant traded amused looks, Luminara listened to Obi-Wan with a smile on her face. “I’m glad you’ve finally found a good master, Obi-Wan. If anyone deserves to have the best master it’s you.”

Blushing lightly, Obi-Wan ducked his head. “Thanks, Nara, but you all deserve the best as well. There’s nothing special about me.”

All three of his friends scoffed and rolled their eyes at that. Sometimes it could be so trying being friends with someone as wonderful and amazing as Obi-Wan when he had the self-esteem of a naked bantha.

“So what’s up with your braid, Obes?” Quinlan cut in before Obi-Wan could question their reaction. “I get the ribbons ’cause your hair’s too short, but I’ve never seen a bead like that before.”

“Well, the ribbons were Master Ben’s idea,” he said. “They’re white because in Mandalorian culture the color white means new beginnings or a fresh start.”

“That’s very clever,” Luminara commented. “Especially since it sounds like the Mand’alor pretty much adopted you as a little brother.”

Obi-Wan couldn’t really deny it either, Jango pretty much had adopted him into his family. Not formally of course, because politics complicated everything, but it was implied.

“The bead is- well,” he rubbed it with his thumb, taking a strange bit of comfort from its solid shape and the weight of on his braid. “It’s called a Battlefield Achievement bead.”

Though all three of his friends were surprised, Luminara’s widened eyes also held understanding. Quinlan leaned forward to get a better look, intrigued. And Bant bit her lip in concern.

“What- what does that mean, exactly?” she asked.

“Master Ben told me that when it was more common that the Order was involved in warfare, battlefield leadership and prowess was considered just as important as diplomacy,” Obi-Wan explained, figuring it would be better to paraphrase his master. “He said that what I went through and the things I learned on Melida/Daan deserve recognition even though the Jedi no longer prize the types of skills needed on the battlefield.”

“Gotta say,” Quinlan broke the silence that had fallen after Obi-Wan’s revelation, “I’m a little envious. You’ve gotta be the first padawan in a hundred years to earn that bead.”

“As awful as the circ*mstances were, I am glad that your master isn’t going to shy away from acknowledging your experiences,” Luminara was solemn, but accepting.

Obi-Wan turned to Bant and saw her still unreadable expression. “Bant?”

Her gaze finally peeled away from his bead to meet his eyes. Then her face cleared and she gave him a smile. “I’m proud of you, Obi-Wan. You’re going to be a great Jedi.”

Feeling warmth and happiness filling him up with his friends’ easy companionship and acceptance, Obi-Wan smiled brightly at them.

They’d always stood by him. When Bruck would bully him, when their clan master would single him out, when the knights and masters rejected him over and over again, they were his stalwart supporters. They never once stopped believing in him. Truly he had the best friends.

The four teenagers spent the rest of the afternoon catching up and having fun. Just enjoying being young and being in each others’ company. When they eventually went their separate ways sometime before the late-meal, Obi-Wan did so feeling light and happy and finally like he was home.

*

TBC...

Chapter 20: Swamp Tea is an Acquired Taste

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan has been out of the Halls of Healing for a couple days and was started back in the regular classes for his age group. Now, Ben was waiting patiently in Master Yoda’s living room for the old master to serve him swamp tea so they could have a much needed discussion.

As an adult, Ben could admit that he’d run to Yoda for advice and reassurance more than once, especially in the early days of Anakin’s padawanship. Some of the Grand Master’s advice was better than others, but just that he had someone to go to was a weight lifted from Ben’s shoulders.

So as it happens Ben had spent many an evening and afternoon in his gandmaster’s apartment choking down swamp tea. Truthfully, Ben thought as he took his first sip of the stuff in twenty years, it was an acquired taste and he was a bit chagrined to admit he’d acquired it.

“Like my tea, you do,” Yoda commented with a probing gleam in his eyes. “Not many, grimace can they hide, when experiencing it the first time.”

Ben sent the old master a wry smile as he shifted and got comfortable sitting on his knees on a mossy-green cushion around the low table in Yoda’s living area. “It took me a couple of years to appreciate it,” he confessed, “but eventually it grew on me.”

“Mmm, like fungus, perhaps,” came the little creature’s reply, eyes still glinting with humor in the low light of the room.

Huffing a quiet laugh, Ben shook his head. “Is that what you put in it? You never would tell me.”

“Secret recipe, it is,” Yoda claimed wisely. “Restorative properties, it loses, when ingredients are revealed.”

“Of course,” Ben nodded with an utterly straight face. “In that case, please don’t ever tell me what you put in this.”

That sent the little green master into a high pitched giggle, his long ears wiggling with his mirth. “Right, you are. This secret, I must keep.”

Hiding his own amused smirk with his clay mug, Ben took another sip of the overwhelmingly earthy, a tad spicy, a smidgen chalky, but still really green flavored tea.

After his giggles had ended Yoda turned knowing green-brown eyes on Ben. “Come for my tea, I think you did not.”

“No, Master.” Ben set his mug down. “I’ve come to discuss some worrisome things I’ve just been made aware of concerning Obi-Wan.”

Yoda’s brow furrowed curiously. “About young Obi-Wan, know everything, you do, I would think.”

Sighing, Ben’s expression stiffened. “It’s different when it’s me,” he claimed. “When I was looking at my files I didn’t really consider it a cause for concern, but when I looked at his files from an outside observer’s perspective I realized something was really wrong.”

“Tell me, you will, what has worried you so,” Yoda ordered kindly, but seriously.

“The last time I looked at my own personal file I was a fresh knight, my master had just been killed, and I was overwhelmed with the prospect of teaching such a challenging padawan,” Ben explained. “I didn’t see anything that I thought was inaccurate or at least was unexpected. I can admit I did not have a very realistic view of my own worth at the time.”

Wary concern floated around Yoda, but he let Ben speak.

“When I looked at Obi-Wan’s personal file just a couple weeks ago,” he continued, “even though intellectually I know that our files up to that point would be identical, that I was viewing it as his made its contents disturbing.”

“Admit, I do, that read Obi-Wan’s personal file, I have not,” Yoda said. “Academic file, I have seen, but thought no insight his personal file could give, that observe myself, I could not.”

That revelation was a weight lifted off Ben’s chest. To have confirmation that the old master he looked up to was ignorant to the abuse he’d suffered. That Yoda hadn’t actually known and was just ignoring it.

“Let me show it to you, Grand Master,” Ben offered picking up the datapad he’d brought with him. “Read it and tell me if you see why I am concerned.”

Yoda straightened his posture and his expression tensed. Ben had invoked his official title in the Order, he was not showing Yoda this as an informal request. He wanted the Grand Master of the Order to confront the problem.

Taking the datapad, Yoda tapped the screen and began scrolling through the file already pulled up.

Because this was the first time Yoda had seen its contents it took him longer than it took Ben to work his way through it. He was very thorough, Ben observed as he sipped his tea and shared his anxiety and impatience with the Force. Yoda would scroll down, then scroll back up and read that section again. He knew there were parts that were more concerning to the old master because of the number of times he’d reread them, but Yoda kept his emotions and internal reaction completely out of the Force.

Finally, Yoda turned the screen off and set the datapad down on the table between them. “Correct, you are, that deeply concerning, this is.” Ben stayed quiet sensing that he wasn’t finished speaking yet.

“Wondered, I had, why other knights or masters, approach me, they did not,” he murmured almost to himself, his ears drooped.

Frowning, Ben set his mug down. “What do you mean?”

Lifting his sad eyes toward the younger man, Yoda confessed, “Lay a claim on Obi-Wan, I did. Desire him in my lineage, I do.”

His breath caught in his chest. “Is that why none of the masters-”

“No,” Yoda shook his head, raising a clawed hand to halt his words. “Informal, it was. Should a master or knight believe, for them a padawan is, approach prior claimants they may. Discuss it between ourselves, we would. Bring before the Council, if be resolved, it could not. Informed of the situation, the padawan would be.”

Slumping a little, Ben nodded. So his numerous rejections hadn’t been in anyway because Yoda’d had an eye on him.

“Young Ben,” Yoda called, gaining the younger man’s attention again, “Explain the truth, you could, in this file.”

“I can, Master,” Ben agreed, but inquired, “You won’t think it biased? That I’m not impartial?”

“Many years, I think, since experiencing these events, you have,” Yoda commented knowingly, tapping the datapad’s dark screen in demonstration.

Humming, Ben let a wry grin quirk at his mouth. “Over forty, Master.”

Yoda gave a throaty hum of his own. “Enough time, I believe, to trust your hindsight.”

“Very well,” Ben conceded, with a tip of his head. “Where do you wish to start?”

Yoda tapped on the datapad and scrolled till he found what he was looking for. “Comments from his Clan Master, most concerning they are. Your insight, I wish to have.”

He stopped scrolling and read off the screen, “‘Initiate Kenobi is disruptive at night and has alarmed his clan mates with inappropriately scary stories.’” It was weird to hear modern grammar spoken in Yoda’s pebbly voice, but Ben quickly brushed the thought aside as the master continued. “Mentioned, young Obi-Wan has, that nightmares, he suffers. Mentioned also, that visions, he sees.”

Sighing deeply, Ben confirmed it. “I did have nightmares as a child, but they were more a product of the disturbing things I would witness in my visions,” he explained. “When I got a little older I figured out that if I told someone about the visions the urgency and the alarm in the Force would dissipate. My friends would let me describe my visions to them so that the Force would calm down and stop pushing at me.”

“Fortunate, you and Obi-Wan are, to have such friends,” Yoda observed, kindly.

Ben felt a small flash of grief that he shared with the Force before giving his grandmaster a small smile. “Obi-Wan has very good friends,” he agreed, but with the tone of a correction.

An understanding sympathetic hum left the old master. “Consider, I did not, that as you last knew them, now they are not.”

He just nodded in acceptance of the master’s apology. Ben didn’t mention that by the time he’d returned to the past all his friends had been at least twenty years dead.

“‘Initiate Kenobi is quick to resort to aggression when met with peer criticism,’ and ‘Initiate Kenobi is prone to feelings of anger and unfairness when disciplined,’” Yoda read off once more. “Sense these are connected, I do.”

Suppression a groan, Ben confirmed it. “There was a boy in my clan- sorry- there is a boy in Obi-Wan’s clan, that bullied him. He would lie to the instructors and masters when caught and blame Obi-Wan for any wrong doing. More often than not he was believed, especially by our clan master. Even if the other initiates would protest, Obi-Wan would still be punished.”

There was an unhappy sound in the back of Yoda’s throat, almost like a growl, no longer a hum. “Beginning to suspect, I am, that Clan Master Vant, be reviewed, she should.”

Ben sipped at his tea and didn’t say anything to that. The old master wasn’t wrong. Through the eyes of an adult it was very easy to see that for some reason Master Vant had a dislike of Obi-Wan and it effected how she treated him. And even more, it had effected the course of his life.

“This other boy,” Yoda was saying, “be questioned as well, he should. Unbecoming behavior, it is, maliciously lying about your peers.”

For the second time since coming to the past, Ben thought about Bruck Chun and the tragedy of that boy’s short life.

“Bruck Chun needs help more than he needs censure,” Ben was almost surprised to hear himself say.

At a prompting look from Yoda, he continued, “I won’t give you the details, but looking back on it, I realized that while, yes, he is a bully, he’s also just a scared little boy. He was slated to go to the Corps as well and the worry and fear of being kicked out of the only home he’d ever known made him lash out even more.”

Yoda’s brow furrowed in a confused frown. “No shame, there is, in joining the Corps.”

“Of course not, Master Yoda,” Ben agreed patiently. Still he continued, “But when all you’ve ever been taught and worked towards was to be a Jedi Knight, when the only home and environment you’ve ever known is the Temple on Coruscant, being abruptly shipped off without much of a say is terrifying.”

It was times like this that Ben had to remind himself that Yoda was over eight hundred years old. It has been a very long time since he was the species equivalent of a frightened insecure pre-teen.

Yoda spent a long moment thinking his words over. “Truly fear, the initiates do, leaving us to join the Corps?”

“I had nightmares,” Ben admitted quietly. “My friend Bant used to find a corner in the Room of a Thousand Fountains and cry. Reeft started to bite his nails and Siri almost overworked herself into exhaustion trying to bring up her grades in the hope that a master would choose her.”

“In previous years, seen this reaction in initiates, I have not.”

Ben simply raised an eyebrow at that. “You are not a Clan Master, Master Yoda. And I know for a fact that the only advice the Clan Masters are taught to give to the initiates is to release their anxiety into the Force, to meditate on their shortcomings, to trust in the Force.”

He could see that Yoda wanted to protest the implication that this was bad advice. Ben understood. There was a certain amount of good sharing your emotions with the Force and meditation can do. But when you’re a scared child, when the source of your anxiety and fear was a very really, very imminent threat, neither of those things would do jack squat.

“Meditate on this, I will,” Yoda finally said after a long moment of thought. “Speak to the initiates, I should. Speak to the Clan Masters, I definitely will,” there was a hint of anger in his tone. “If persistent this issue is, reported to the Council, it should have been.”

“If I might, Grand Master?” Ben waited for Yoda’s nod before continuing. “When did the Council implement the age restriction for padawans?”

Yoda’s brow furrowed as though he actually had to think to come up with an answer. “Two centuries, it was,” he finally said. “Too many initiates, too few knights or masters, we had. Trandoshan plague, to Coruscant, it had come. A third of the adult population, it took.”

That, Ben thought with a blink of surprise, was not something he’d ever heard of before. He didn’t even think it was covered in his Jedi history class. Truthfully, if the Council picked a reason to create an arbitrary cut off age, a planet wide plague was a valid one. Still, that was over two hundred years ago. Their population issue had since reversed.

“Was the age restriction meant to be a permanent change?” Ben asked. “Because for the last seventy-five years or so our population as been two thirds adults and less than a third initiates.”

Yoda’s eyes widened if that was possible, then they narrowed. “Thirteen and equivalent we chose, because easiest to teach, more open to learn, initiates are at that age.”

Something came to mind that Ben had heard in his youth, the one time he’d met Count – then Master Dooku before he’d nominally retired and began the process of leaving the Order.

“When the status-quo becomes harmful and a change must be made, there will come a time when we face the choice between what is right and what is easy.*”

Yoda got a very distinctly disgruntled look on his wrinkled green face then. “Quote my padawan to me, you are. Know his opinion on many issues, do you?”

For all that Dooku had been evil and a Sith and had lost his way, he wasn’t wrong about the stagnation of the Order and the stranglehold the Senate had on the Jedi.

“I’ve had a conversation or two with my grandmaster,” Ben said vaguely. “It wasn’t until I was exiled to the desert that I really started to understand some of his wisdom though.”

Yoda gave a deeply put upon growly hum at that. Apparently he and Dooku were clashing on politics already. Then, Ben could have sworn the old master rolled his eyes, before saying, “Perhaps speak with my old padawan, I will. More insights, I’m sure, he will have.”

Ben wisely covered his grin with this tea mug. “As you say, Master.”

Harrumphing, Yoda grumbled under his breath and took a sip of his own tea.

“Return to young Obi-Wan’s file, we will,” Yoda declared after a moment of silent contemplation and grumbling. “He and Initiate Chun, help they should have been given. Attempts, were there made?”

“No, Grand Master,” he knew his expression displayed frustration, but he didn’t try to school it. “Even if the comments in Bruck’s file didn’t reflect his behavior issues, Obi-Wan’s file has enough red flags he should have been sent to a mind healer himself. From there the issues with Bruck would have come to light and he could have gotten help, as well.”

He was mixing his tenses, Ben knew, but it was hard when he still so vividly remembered reaching down to Bruck, begging the other boy to let him help, and Bruck refusing. Letting himself fall to his death.

“So the question, Master Yoda, is even if the entirety of Obi-Wan’s file was without falsehood, why hadn’t he been sent to a mind healer or brought before the Council of Reassignment for an evaluation?”

“Troubling, this is,” Yoda acknowledged, as he tapped his clawed fingers on the table next to the datapad. “Correct, you are, that Obi-Wan’s file, a troubled youth, it reflects. Though, true it is not, to the Council of Reassignment, he should have been called. Evaluation, they should have made.”

He lifted his large eyes from the datapad and Ben could see a deep displeasure, bordering on anger in their depths. “Responsibility of his clan master, this was. This neglect, effect not just young Obi-Wan, it did.” A deep sigh escaped the master as he added, “Disturbed, I am, to think that more younglings, suffering this mistreatment, they are.”

“It’s even more disturbing to realize that all of Obi-Wan’s instructors were privy to this information and not one of them reported it to the Council or even brought concerns to his clan master.” Ben met the old master’s gaze. “What else, who else has fallen through the cracks like Obi-Wan almost did because the masters and instructors charged with their care were neglectful, purposefully or not.”

A deep frown etched into Yoda’s brow as he studied Ben’s words and tone. “Not just from your experience, do you speak. Your first padawan, mistreated, he was?”

Ben looked away while he answered. “He was bullied, because he was different. He was much older when he came to the temple, he didn’t speak Basic fluently or read it at all, children can be cruel. But I discovered masters can be cruel as well,” he said darkly. “One of his instructors deliberately ignored and even encouraged some of the children’s cruelty towards him. They justified their neglect by claiming that the bullying was a test of my padawan’s forbearance and an object lesson in not letting your emotions control you.”

Yoda’s ears drooped almost touching his shoulders. “Wrong, that is. Test initiates this way, we do not. Teach lessons this way, we do not.”

“That wasn’t the only time I’d had to step in during my padawan’s formal education either,” Ben said. “I discovered it was an on-going problem, instructors and masters neglecting to discipline the younglings when they had conflicts with each other. Every time the instructors justified their inaction by sighting a lesson in perseverance or emotional detachment or something the like.”

“Not our way, this is,” Yoda just muttered shaking his head.

Ben pushed on trying to drive the issue home. “Something about our system and how we approach teaching younglings needs to change, Grand Master. I was not the first and I was not the last youngling to be mistreated by a Jedi that was supposed to care for me.”

“Much, we have spoken on,” Yoda said at last after a long moment of heavy silence. “More, I sense, you wish to say on this subject.”

“Yes, Master,” Ben conceded. “I spent twenty years in the desert with nothing to do, but reflect. There is a great deal I wish to discuss.”

Yoda hummed, a deeper sound than his customary throaty trill. “Speak to the Council, I will. Write a report, you should. More detailed it should be, about problems and improvements you wish to address.”

Well, Ben thought, there was an awful lot he wanted to change. More, perhaps than can be effectively addressed in a strictly person to person conversation. “It may take some time to complete a more comprehensive report,” and maybe a few days haunting the Archives, “but I will have one ready to present to the Council.”

“Good, good,” Yoda muttered as he stood up and grabbed the clay tea pot from the table. “More tea, I shall brew. More things in Obi-Wan’s file, I wish to discuss.”

“Of course, Master.” Ben downed the last chilled mouthful of earthy tea in his cup. And waited patiently for the old master to return with a steaming pot. He also brought a plate of suspiciously gooey looking cookies with him.

“Cookies for me,” Yoda announced with a scolding tone when he saw Ben eyeing them, “not for you. Not made for humans, these cookies are. Need them, I will, for the rest of this conversation.”

“Ah,” Ben swallowed thickly as he spotted what looked like an amphibian foot of some sort poking out of the one of the cookies. “I’m fine with just the tea then.”

Sitting down, eyes still glaring at Ben as if he expected the younger master to try snatching one of his frog cookies, Yoda made himself comfortable and poured them both more tea.

“Await your report, I will, before anymore of Obi-Wan’s childhood, we discuss,” Yoda concluded, but there was something about the tilt of his ears and the pinched look between his eyes, that gave the impression of guilt and sadness. “Speak of Bandomeer, we will, know the full story, it appears, I do not.”

Ben was almost reluctant to tell the story. Yoda had taken the mistakes and missteps of his grandpadawan with more grace than Ben would have expected. But looking back on this part of his life as an adult Ben could admit that Qui-Gon did not handle the mission or Obi-Wan’s presence on it well.

He began with the troubles between the Hutts and the other minors on the freighter out from Coruscant. And immediately he noticed a slight spike of guilt in the old master’s Force presence before it was squashed and shoved back behind his intimidating mental shields. Whatever was going through his mind, though, Yoda always did love a story and Ben had a negotiator’s knack for telling a compelling one.

Ben took the story through the industrial sabotage, pirate attacks, crash landings, and endless attacks by draigons. When he got to the planet of Bandomeer, however the story became less of an adventure and took a much darker turn. He told about mysterious messages, hidden explosives on AgriCorps land, being captured and put into slavery, the despair and pain and fear that was the deep sea mine, and finally his late rescue by Qui-Gon. When he got to the part of being trapped in the mines and offering to use his still attached bomb collar to blow the door, Yoda’s presence in the Force was so locked down it was almost like he wasn’t there.

When he finished his story with Qui-Gon finally, grudgingly taking Obi-Wan as a padawan, Yoda was silent for a very long time.

“Apology, I owe you and young Obi-Wan,” Yoda finally spoke sounding his age for once. “Put you on the freighter to Bandomeer, I did. Saw the potential for a great partnership, I did, between you and Qui-Gon. Mistake, I made, underestimate, I did, the scars Xanatos left on him. Desired you in my lineage I did, too old I am, to take another padawan. Help Qui-Gon heal, I thought, a padawan would. Believe I did, that with time, choose you of his own will, Qui-Gon would.”

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Ben was not exactly surprised. He knew his partnership with Qui-Gon had come about with some amount of meddling from Yoda, but the extent of the old master’s thought process and his reasons was not exactly comforting.

Letting out a deep breath, Ben told him, “Qui-Gon never let his guilt and anger go, Master Yoda. He couldn’t heal, not really, not while he still blamed himself for Xanatos’s Fall, but refused to actually acknowledge his own culpability.”

“Blame yourself, do you, for your padawan’s Fall?” Yoda asked, not accusatory, but genuinely.

“Yes,” Ben replied truthfully. “But I also had four years of my padawan as a Jedi Knight to look back on. I had twenty years in the desert to reflect on what went wrong, how I could have prevented his Fall.” He paused before he said, “I accept that the reasons for my padawan’s Fall are partially my fault, but I also acknowledge that he made his own decisions. And I believe that Falling is a choice, just as remaining in the Light is a choice. No one, no matter their flaws or character defects is destined for darkness.”

The implication being that Qui-Gon believed otherwise made Yoda’s lips purse in displeasure. “Feel that Qui-Gon expected you to Fall, do you?”

“For the first few years of my padawanship,” Ben answered. “Especially after Melida/Daan. It took a very long time for Qui-Gon to trust that every hint of my temper or question I asked about the Code, was not a sign I was slipping.”

“Deeply saddened by this, I am,” Yoda murmured. “Wished only the best for you and Obi-Wan, I did. Failed you terribly, I have.”

Biting his lip, Ben felt his heart ache for the pain hanging around his great-grandmaster. He knew that Yoda cared about him a great deal, that the old master was not so subtly attached to his lineage, that he would never purposefully endanger a youngling, especially not one he cared for. Seeing the painful mix of sadness and guilt around the small master, Ben couldn’t let him think that it had all been bad.

“Master Yoda,” he called softly, catching the master’s wide green-brown eyes. “Our beginnings may have been painful and rough, some of the things I learned in my padawanship may have not been the wisest, but we did become partners. We did become friends. By the time of his death, Qui-Gon and I cared about each other very much. Having him as a master shaped me into the man I am today, I would not give up that experience for anything.”

A small smile curled at Yoda’s thin lips. He reached a clawed hand across the table and wrapped it around Ben’s wrist. “Glad, I am, then, that regret your time with him, you do not.” His smile turned a little sterner as he continued, “But my mistake, I will accept, in believing a padawan, fix a master, they could, or a scarred master, able to care for a padawan, they were.”

Ben couldn’t disagree with that. Instead he said, “I don’t want you to feel guilty, Master.”

Yoda raised an eyebrow at him. “My guilt, it is, to feel or not. Diminish my responsibility, you should not.”

Chastised, Ben offered him an apologetic smile. “As you say, Master.”

Snorting, expression a little lightened, Yoda gave Ben’s wrist a squeeze before releasing him. Refilling both their tea mugs, the old master said, “Hear, I would like, more stories of your padawanship. Talented, you are, in telling tales.”

Ben grinned wryly at that and sipped at his tea. “Shall we take a break from our previous conversation, then?”

There was a low throaty hum of consideration as his answer. “Much to meditate on, I have. Many people there are, to speak with, I should. Wait, I will, to continue our previous conversation, for the report to the Council, you will make.” He gave the younger master a wry grin of his own. “Old, I am. Attention span, what it once was, it is not. Declare, I do, a break I need.”

Ben laughed and smiled. “Fair enough.” The old master’s presence in the Force was still tinged with guilt and sadness, but it was lighter than before, and Ben intended to help it stay that way. “Should I tell you about the time Qui-Gon was given a mysterious egg as a gift by a primitive tribe’s chieftain?”

“Interesting, that sounds. Eager to hear this, I am.” Yoda snatched a toad cookie from the plate before him settled down to listen like a crecheling at story time.

Smiling, Ben began the adventurous tale of the six weeks he spent as a surrogate mother for a baby krayt dragon. Great-grandmaster and padawan spent the rest of their tea time enjoying their shared company, learning – and relearning- about each other, and leaving their troubles to the side, if just for the rest of the afternoon.

*

TBC...

Chapter 21: Held Together by Glue and Stubbornness

Chapter Text

They’ve been home in the temple for over a week now. Obi-Wan’s bandages have all come off and his scars were already lightening. Ben had sat down with him and gone through all the classes available to junior padawans and they’d worked out a course schedule. One with classes that Ben thought would be the most useful with his knowledge of the future - and all the crazy situations that seemed to follow both him and Obi-Wan around- as well as classes that Obi-Wan found interesting.

This was a good thing. Obi-Wan’s training was beginning to lift off the ground now that Ben had the temple resources to utilize. Not to mention that Ben had missed this aspect of having a padawan. He hadn’t realized almost until he was sitting in the living room pouring over a course list with Obi-Wan that he’d enjoyed being able to help guide a student on the path to reach their potential.

He’d done this with Anakin. They were some of the his most fond, sweet memories, he cherished them. Teaching Anakin to read Basic, assisting him with research projects, nagging him about his class assignments, being proudly presented with top scoring tests and essays. Those were the least double edged memories, almost completely free of the taint of Sith Lord manipulation, as obvious in hindsight as they had been. Unlike their arguments about the Code, or Anakin’s increasingly angry teenage rebellion.

It wasn’t just Anakin that Ben had these wonderful memories with. Ahsoka had quickly realized that Anakin was horrible at research left on his own, so she’d begun coming to her grandmaster. He’d spent many an afternoon with her while planet side sitting in the Archives assisting her in writing a research paper, or finishing her class assignments.

As he helped Obi-Wan debate between classes for wilderness survival or emergency spaceship repair, Ben realized he was looking forward to creating new memories with his young padawan. After years of leading men into battle, and decades of wasting away in the desert, Ben was eager to just be a teacher again.

While Ben was glad that Obi-Wan was beginning his training in earnest he was less pleased with some of the consequences for himself. It seemed that he could no longer use the excuse of needing to care for his padawan to get out of a full medical examination with Healer Che.

Logically he knew it was important that the temple healers had an accurate and thorough accounting of his physical health, but truthfully, he just really disliked the Halls of Healing. So it was with a heavy sigh and ruthlessly squashed grimace that Ben walked through the doors of the Halls of Healing to begin his appointment with a merciless Vokara Che.

Being the temple’s Chief Healer, Master Vokara Che had been read in to the whole time travel situation by the Council. She’d taken it all in stride and promptly demanded a full medical work up. And since everyone in the temple had a healthy fear of upsetting Master Che – even Yoda- the Council compelled Ben to comply.

“You’re late, Master Kenobi.”

Ben flashed the scowling Twi’lek healer an apologetic smile. “Obi-Wan got a late start this morning,” he replied, shamelessly using his padawan to avoid her wrath.

Judging by the unimpressed expression on her face, it hadn’t worked. “Take off your clothes and get on the cot,” she simply ordered.

Sighing, Ben did as she said and stripped down to his underwear. Jedi as a general rule weren’t particularly body conscious, and Ben was no exception. Hopping up on the cot he laid down and waited as Vokara fiddled with the medical diagnostic machine. It started up soon enough and scanned him from head to toe, capturing images of his bones, muscles, organs, blood vessels, all his internal processes.

“You, Master Kenobi,” Healer Che said after flipping through the holo-images on her extra large medical datapad, “appear to be held together by glue and stubbornness.”

“Is that your vast medical knowledge speaking?” Ben asked sarcastically as he sat up.

She scowled at him and snapped back, “No, that’s my incredulity and horror speaking. What have you been doing? I’ve never seen so many different healed fractures and internal scar tissue from such a spread out time frame. Usually when I get patients with this kind of internal topography they’d been in sometime kind of massive trauma.”

Curious, Ben held out a hand, “May I see the images?”

Reluctantly, Vokara let him take the datapad, watching him closely as he flipped through the scans.

It wasn’t exactly a surprise, the injuries and past damage displayed on the screen, but Ben was thankful that his body was truly the same as when he’d had it the first time he was this age. If all the injuries and neglect he’d suffered in the Tatooine desert had for some reason transferred over he wasn’t sure he’d last very long in this time.

His experiences in exile had aged him greatly. The average life expectancy for a standard human was at most 115 years, for a Force sensitive it was upwards of a 140, give or take. And as he was Stewjoni, a human variant, his specific natural life expectancy, barring sickness and debilitating injury, was approximately 160 years of age.

When he’d saved Luke from the Tuskens and began their journey to Alderaan, Ben had known his body was quickly reaching its end. If he hadn’t met Vader on the Death Star he guessed he would have only had ten maybe fifteen years of acceptable quality of life left.

Looking at the medical scans of his current body, Ben could see all the physical trauma he’d accrued through his time as a Jedi Padawan, a Knight, and a High General. But none of the suffering he’d endured as the Wizard of the Wastes.

Handing the datapad back to Healer Che, Ben confirmed, “That’s accurate to my physical age.”

A blank expression came over her face, but a dash of concern fell into the Force before she brushed her feelings aside and put her professional mind on task. “In that case, walk me through it. I need as much detail as you can give me. And if you leave anything out I will know.” She tapped on the datapad and pulled up Jedi Master Obi-Wan “Ben” Kenobi’s blank medical file.

“I’ll do my best, Master Che,” Ben replied with a wry twist of his lips, “but it has been twenty years since I’ve had this body. You’ll have to prompt me if I miss anything.”

Huffing, Vokara pinned him with a look. “Trust me, I’ll be asking you plenty.”

“Lovely,” Ben sighed, but like with most trials in his long life, he soldiered on. “Where should we start?”

It went on for an hour and a half. Ben would list as many injuries and their causes as he could remember in as close to chronological order as he could get while Healer Che thoroughly grilled him for the details. It wasn’t the injuries, the illnesses, or poisonings that alarmed her through the interrogation, though, it was the slapdash medical care.

“Really, my dear, we were in a war zone. What do you expect?” Ben replied when she’d squawked indignantly after he’d explained how the clone medic on hand (though he left out the clone part) had used an armor repair staple gun to close up a stab wound on his side.

“What do you mean you just chewed on the roots?!” she’d burst out in the middle of a story of how he and Qui-Gon had gotten poisoned by the local flora and the indigenous peoples instructed them to chew the roots of the plant as a cure.

“Well, the tribe’s witch doctor said it would work,” Ben explained, fairly reasonably he’d thought.

Then of course there was the time his heart had stopped after drowning on some planet covered in rivers and Separatist droids.

“You let an astromech defibrillate you with its electromagnetic power charge arm.” Her face was so flushed with outrage that her blue skin was an objectively lovely shade of indigo.

“I was unconscious, Master Che, I don’t believe I had much of a say,” Ben said calmly, only mildly bewildered by her displeasure. He’d obviously survived, so what was the problem?

Vokara looked at the man sitting serenely in front of her and wanted to strangle him. How sweet little Obi-Wan grew up to be this infuriating man, she will never know. And she was ever thankful Ben Kenobi was no longer that boy’s fate.

Finally after as thorough a recounting of his dubious medical history as the Chief Healer could ring out of him, Ben was back in his clothes and Vokara was nursing a headache.

“I have no idea how you lived to be knighted much less long enough to become a master,” she muttered as she saved his alarmingly large medical file to the Halls of Healing private servers.

“I’ve asked myself that question more than a few times, Master Che,” Ben replied with a wry humor that said master did not appreciate.

“Get hell out of my Halls. I don’t want to see you for another six weeks when it’s time for everyone's yearly immunizations.”

Ben suppressed a laugh as he bowed to her, “Have a nice day, Master Che,” and obligingly turned and fled the exam room.

Despite his best efforts however, Ben did not in fact escape the Halls of Healing just yet. As he was making his way for the doors, a wave sorrow and frustration and anger wafted through Force. Pausing in his steps, he tilted his head and spread his presence out searching.

That tangle of negative emotion was coming from the extended recovery ward. Ben was reluctant to intrude on another Jedi’s privacy, especially if they were already dealing with the trial of a long, likely difficult recovery, but the Force was gently, quietly tugging on him. It wasn’t an insistent demand like the Force had made when he’d come to the past, it was more of a presenting of an option.

His mission to teach Obi-Wan and subsequently save the galaxy wouldn’t be overly effected if he didn’t explore this option. But the Force was laying out a slight detour he could choose to explore. Seeing as he had another couple of hours until Obi-Wan was finished with class and nothing else to do, Ben turned in the direction of the pain steadily streaming into the Force. After all, he was never one to ignore a sign or message from the Force.

When he reached the source of the pain and underlying sorrow, Ben found a recovery room. The door was open and the blinds on the window were raised to let in a pleasant amount of natural light. Pausing in the doorway, Ben stood stock still as he took in the sight before him.

There sitting on the bed weeping into her hands was Master Tahl of Noori. Her dark honey toned skin was sallow and pale, her wrists and shoulders too thin and fragile looking, her long dark brown hair was tied back in a tangled, messy braid. And her sorrow was almost a physical thing hanging in the room.

It has been decades since Ben had seen Master Tahl. After he and Qui-Gon had reunited post-Melida/Daan, she’d been somewhat of a mediating influence in their partnership. Her frequent presence in their apartment and joining them around the temple had kept their relationship as master and padawan from completely dissolving. Master Tahl had been a friend to him in those difficult years, her advice and ready listening ear had been a comfort when he felt isolated and unwanted.

Her relationship with Qui-Gon had been somewhat strained, but she’d remained a steadying influence on his master. Even if they’d never resumed their previous closeness, they’d remained friends.

It had hit Ben almost as hard as it did Qui-Gon when Master Tahl had died.

He must have made a noise, because there was a spike of alarm in the Force and Master Tahl’s head jerked up toward the door.

“Who’s there?” Her eyes were a milky green color, the skin around them inflamed not just from the tears, but from her slowly healing wounds. The torture she’d endured on Melida/Daan had blinded her.

Clearing his throat, Ben took a deliberately noisy step into the room. “My apologies, Master,” he called, having a difficult time taking his gaze off of her. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

Master Tahl’s posture had straightened at the sound of his unfamiliar voice and her attention in the Force sharpened defensively. It was a reminder that even after she’d been blinded, she was a formidable warrior.

“I don’t recognize your voice,” she said sternly, then demanded, “Who are you?”

Ben felt her send out a questing tendril in the Force and allowed some of his presence to meet it. By this point in his history he hadn’t spent longer than a day in her presence while she was feverish and half delirious. He wasn’t concerned she’d be able to recognize the foundations of Obi-Wan underneath the growth and change of his fifty-sum-odd years of life.

“My name is Ben,” he said. “I’ve only recently returned to the temple after many years away.”

Tahl clumsily used her Force presence to examine him physically as well, to get an idea of what he looked like. It was normally frowned up, how she was using the Force to map him without permission. He let her. Had he felt offended or threatened he could have slammed down his shields or even batted her away with his own Force presence, but she was hurt and afraid and he’d greatly respected and cared for her in his last life. So he allowed her question fingers to prod at him with the Force.

His words made her tilt her head in thought, her brow wrinkling reflexively, though the expression sent a slight spark of physical pain into the Force.

“You’re the mysterious Jedi Master everyone has been gossiping about,” she asserted, as she withdrew her presence away from him but didn’t attempt to raise heavier shields of her own. Ben imagined her mental defenses were weak from her wounds and her exhaustion.

“It’s possible,” he replied lightly, stepping further into the room. “What has the temple gossip mill been saying about this mysterious master?”

Her unseeing eyes were pinned unerringly on his figure as she regarded him. “That you and a group of Mandalorians brought Obi-Wan back to the temple, injured but alive.”

“Well, in that case, I suppose I am the topic of said gossip.” Ben studied her as she had studied him. He’d already observed that she was too thin, her pallor sickly, and her appearance disheveled. Now he could see that backbone of steel he remember just beginning to peek through the hurt and despair.

“I’m not sure if you know, but I was on Melida/Daan as well,” she said, anger and guilt becoming the more dominant emotions in her exposed Force presence. “Obi-Wan was sent with his master to rescue me. I-” she stopped and her brow wrinkled deeper, her lips pressed together thinly. “I remember some of that last day on the planet. It’s hazy, confusing, but I know that Obi-Wan stayed to help the children. There was nothing I could do to stop him, to help him.”

Frustration burst into the air between them. “I’ve been unconscious in a bacta tank for months, or I would have demanded they send someone to retrieve him. It wasn’t until a few days ago that I found out that Obi-Wan had been abandoned on that Force forsaken planet.”

Ben knew this. Of course he knew this. Tahl had begged his forgiveness and offered him comfort when he was a traumatized fourteen year old war veteran.

“I have no doubt, Master Tahl, that if you had not been so gravely injured you would have done all you could to help Obi-Wan.” Ben’s solemn acknowledgment rang truthfully in the Force and Tahl’s stiff guilty posture relaxed if only incrementally.

“How bad was Obi-Wan hurt?” she asked with deep concern.

“He’s completely recovered now,” Ben assured her, reluctant to add to her distress even unintentionally. “He was injured deflecting a slugthrower. It was a serious injury, but with the diligent help of the Mandalorian medic, I was able to keep him alive until Master Che could work her magic. So to speak.”

Her breath hitched in relief though there was some lingering alarm with the confirmation of the severity of the boy’s wound. She bowed her head deeply. “Thank you, Master Ben, for protecting and helping Obi-Wan when I failed to.”

“You did not fail him, Master,” Ben declared firmly. “You were gravely injured and in dire need of help yourself. Obi-Wan’s situation was in no way your fault.”

Tahl silently accepted his words, though Ben knew she would hold onto her guilt for sometime yet. At least until she was able to speak to Obi-Wan herself.

“How did you come to be on Melida/Daan?” she asked, curiously. “As I understand it after Qui- after I was brought back to the temple the Council banned further intervention on the planet.”

“May I sit?” Ben gestured to the guest chair by her bed out of habit even knowing she wouldn’t be able to see the motion. At her nod, he pulled the chair closer to the bed and sat. “I was stranded on the planet while following the Will of the Force,” he explained. “My first day there I discovered Obi-Wan and the Young. It quickly became apparent that my task was to assist Obi-Wan in anyway that I could.”

“You didn’t just bring Obi-Wan back to the temple?” she asked, a scowl now pulling at her healing features.

“Aside from the fact that I didn’t have a ship, Obi-Wan was following the Will of the Force himself. He was not going to leave the planet while the Young were still fighting for peace. My duty was to assist him, not drag him back against his will.”

Ben paused at the end of this speech and had to take a mental step back. During the numerous and exhaustive Council meetings he’d been summoned to he’d spoken much more sternly and scoldingly to the old, disapproving masters interrogating him. Comparatively, his words to Tahl hadn’t been nearly as harsh but there was something about taking a sharp tone with her that made him flinch.

Before he could apologize, though, her thinned mouth relaxed, curled to one side wryly and she dipped her head. “You’re right, Master Ben. I allowed my feelings of guilt to control my words. I apologize.”

Exhaling, Ben shook his head though she couldn’t see the motion. “It’s alright, my dear. I didn’t intend to speak quite so harshly with you. I’ve been questioned many times regarding the choices I made during the last few months and I’m afraid my patience isn’t what it should be.”

She nodded in acceptance as well. A tentative, searching expression came over her face. “Will you tell me about the Young? When I arrived on planet they were just beginning to organize. I haven’t spoken to anyone that would know if- if they were still fighting.”

Of course, Ben thought fondly. Of course kind, caring, determined Master Tahl would be concerned by the fate of the child soldiers on the planet that blinded her. He smiled softly and was momentarily saddened that she could not see the expression.

He projected his pride and his happiness for the Young into the Force so she could feel its echo. “I’m pleased to inform you, Master Tahl, that the Young have achieved peace with the Melida and the Daan and are now in the process of restructuring their government and rebuilding their lives.”

Tahl sucked in a sharp breath and a single joyful tear escaped her unseeing eyes. To Ben’s gaze it seemed like a dreadful weight was lifted from her heart. He was so very glad he could bring her this comfort.

“How?” she asked her voice slightly raspy with her surge of emotions. “How were the children able to accomplish this?”

“It’s a bit of a story,” Ben said, allowing an impression of the exhaustion, worry, grim accomplishment, and relieved joy of this life’s memories of Melida/Daan to breeze into the Force for her to observe. “If you don’t find my company objectionable, I’d be happy to tell it to you.”

A short rusty chuckle escaped her and she leaned back against her pillows completely relaxing for the first time since he’d stepped into the room. “I have absolutely nothing else to do, Master Ben, and your company is a welcome reprieve from my grim future prospects.”

For some reason, it hadn’t occurred to Ben that Master Tahl would be anything other than the confident, capable, talented master he remembered. But now, he looked at her tear stained face, her messy hair, her tired defeated posture and realized that she is a regular person, with fears and doubts and insecurities. She’d survived a life altering injury, one of her senses had been completely stripped away from her, and she was terrified of what that would mean for her future, but she was still alive.

And though she didn’t believe it now, Ben knew she would rise from this trial with a perseverance and wisdom that would rival even the oldest, most powerful masters of their Order.

He didn’t say any of this to her, however. No matter how much he wished to reassure her that she would heal and she would continue to be an amazing Jedi, Tahl didn’t know him. He was a stranger to her. His words would be empty platitudes. Instead he would tell her a story.

“In that case, my dear, I suppose I should begin my tale when I stumbled across a group of children scavenging for supplies…”

*

It’s been another week in the temple and Ben was back in the Halls of Healing. Not for himself and not by himself. With her permission, Ben had visited Master Tahl several times since they’d first met. After their first conversation and Ben’s detailed retelling of his and Obi-Wan’s months on Melida/Daan, most often they spoke of nothing particularly important. Tahl had much on her mind as it was, attempting to physically recover and relearn how to care for herself without the use of her eyes.

Ben kept their topics of discussion light depending on how frustrated and angry she was when he arrived. The last couple of visits he’d noticed that while she would bathe, she hadn’t been grooming her hair.

When he was Obi-Wan’s age, he remembered that Tahl always wore her hair in tight warrior braids, traditional for Noori, her planet of origin. They were not quite as complicated as the Nabooian hair styles, but they did require a mirror or at least vast amounts of practice if done completely by feel.

Seeing her so downtrodden and so unkempt was like a vice around his heart. So Ben had resolved to fix it. And so here he was with Obi-Wan and Bant Eerin following him through the Halls.

Obi-Wan had been reluctant to see Tahl. The lingering shame and guilt for her situation effecting his decisions. Ben knew it would be good for him though. He remembered holding guilt for wanting to stay while Master Tahl had been so gravely injured. He also remembered how she’d alleviated his guilt and made his path of acceptance and moving on easier.

Obi-Wan’s friend, Bant, - Ben’s Bant had been gone a long time – was coming along because Ben couldn’t leave well enough alone and he saw no harm in a little matchmaking. Master-padawan matchmaking, that is. Tahl had been a wonderful master to Bant and Bant had been a sweet, restorative presence in Tahl’s life, before her death.

“Master Kenobi, are you sure Master Tahl won’t mind my presence?”

Giving the nervous Mon Cala teen a smile, Ben said for the fifth time, “Initiate Eerin, I told you it’s alright to call me Master Ben.”

Her prominent brow creased stubbornly. “Master Kenobi, I told you I don’t mind you calling me Bant.”

Obi-Wan sighed on Ben’s other side, but Ben couldn't help chuckling. He had missed Bant. “Very well, then, Bant. I’m sure that Master Tahl will appreciate some company other than myself and her healers for the afternoon.”

Bant bit her lip and shared a shrug with Obi-Wan. “If you say so, Master Ben.”

He covered another chuckle with a cough, then turned to his padawan. “Master Tahl has been asking after you, Obi-Wan. She’s been worried about you. I believe speaking with you will help her.”

When he’d first brought up visiting Master Tahl with Obi-Wan, Ben had told the teen these things when he’d initially been reluctant. Through their steadily awakening bond, Ben can feel his padawan’s anxiety and hesitation. He figured a reminder of his previous words wouldn’t hurt.

They’d gotten to Tahl’s room by then and Ben knocked on the doorjamb announcing their presence.

Inside the room there was a residual mist of perpetual frustration and sadness, but Master Tahl’s face was schooled into a neutral expression. She sent out a bit of her Force presence and lightly brushed against Ben’s. Immediately her face relaxed and she smiled.

“Ben, come in, please.” She co*cked her head when she heard the two other sets of hesitant footsteps. “Who have you brought with you?”

He’d asked her if he could bring his padawan and one other last time they’d spoken, but it seemed she was in the mood to be a little bit playful.

When neither teen looked like they were going to speak up, Ben did it for them. “Obi-Wan and his friend, Initiate Bant Eerin, decided to come along with me today.”

“Oh!” Tahl sent out a much less invasive tendril into the Force and gently touched the very surface of Obi-Wan’s presence before retreating again. “I’m so glad you came, Obi-Wan,” she said and was able to feel the boy’s surprise in the Force. “I’m sure your master has mentioned it, but I’ve wanted to speak with you.”

Obi-Wan took a step forward at Ben’s silent prompting. “I’m glad you’re healing, Master Tahl,” he said, still somewhat hesitantly. “I’m so sorry you were injured and I’m sorry I didn’t assist Master Jinn in bringing you back to the temple.”

“Don’t you dare apologize, Obi-Wan,” Tahl ordered sharply. “Don’t ever be sorry for trying to save the lives of children. You were exactly where you needed to be and had I been conscious at the time I likely would have demanded that Qui-Gon stay as well.”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Obi-Wan protested hurriedly. “You would have died if you’d stayed.”

“I would have died protecting and helping children and that is not a bad thing,” that she thought it might have been preferable went unsaid, but the heavy silence that followed Tahl’s reply was telling. It drew a concerned look from Bant and a frown from Ben. He’d noticed in the course of his visits that Tahl was not dealing with her new physical limitations well. It was beginning to worry him.

In a startling move of maturity and wisdom, Obi-Wan responded, “Had you died, Master Tahl, it would have been a great loss for the Order and for the galaxy. There are many of us who would grieve for you. It’s a blessing that we don’t have to.”

The heavy truth in his words seemed to shock Tahl for a long moment. Then her expression shifted and a small smile curled at her full lips. “Thank you, Padawan Kenobi. I will take your words to heart and remember them in the future when my injuries cause me to doubt.”

The solemn air around her lessened then as she chose to shift from their serious conversation. She turned her head toward her third as yet silent guest. “And you, Initiate Eerin, what brings you to visit me today?”

“Oh! Um- you can just call me Bant, Master Tahl.” The girl scooted closer nervously, but her kindness and concern was slowly dissipating the frustration still lingering in the Force.

“Bant, then,” Tahl corrected with a nod and gestured the teen closer patting the edge of her bed in invitation. “Tell me about yourself.”

Bant hesitated for just a second before she took a seat next to Tahl’s knees and fidgeted with her webbed fingers. “Well, I’m really not all that interesting, Master.”

“Everyone is unique and interesting,” Tahl contradicted with a smile. “You just have to find the right topic of conversation.”

Ben put a hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder and guided them to the side. “That was elegantly put, Obi-Wan,” he said softly so he wouldn’t disturb the two women getting to know each other.

The boy flushed a little. “It was the truth, Master,” he replied earnestly. “I would have never forgiven myself if Master Tahl had died.”

“If she had,” Ben told him, “it would not have in anyway been your fault, young one. Everything must die eventually. If it had been Master Tahl’s time to join the Force, then you would have grieved, eventually accepted her loss, and then rejoiced for her that she was one with the Force.”

Obi-Wan’s brow furrowed and he bit his lip as he stared down at his feet. Ben tapped him under the chin so he’d raise his head and their eyes could meet. “As it is, she is alive and she is recovering and we will rejoice that we have the chance to get to know her and she will be a part of our lives.”

The tension in Obi-Wan’s shoulders released and he gave older man a smile. “You’re right, Master.”

“Of course I am, everything I say is brilliant,” Ben said with levity, earning himself a huff of a chuckle from his padawan.

Obi-Wan rolled his eyes good-naturedly. “As you say, Master.” Then he and Ben turned back to rejoin Bant and Tahl.

They paused in their steps blinking at the sight before them. Bant was kneeling on the bed with Tahl sitting cross-legged in front of her, the girl carefully weaving a complicated braid into the master’s long dark hair.

“I’m not sure how well this will turn out, Master Tahl,” Bant was saying her brow furrowed and her lip caught between her teeth in concentration. “Mon Cala don’t have hair, you know. I’ve only really have practice fixing Obi-Wan’s hair and with his I just had to run a comb through it.”

A light blush tinted his padawan’s cheeks and Ben suppressed a smile as memories from his own childhood resurfaced. For someone with no hair herself, for some reason Bant had always insisted that he comb his hair every morning and would attack him with a comb whenever she caught him trying to sneak away with disheveled hair.

“I’m sure however it comes out it’ll be much better than what I’ve been able to do so far,” Master Tahl reassured the young girl carefully tugging and twisting at her hair. “I haven’t been able to wear my traditional braids in a very long time.”

Bant made it to the bottom of the thick braid cresting over the top of Master Tahl’s head from her forehead all the way down the back of her head and to the ends of her long hair. “Hair tie, please.”

Tahl raised a hand over her shoulder holding out a hair tie to Bant. The girl tied off the bottom of the main braid then leaned around the master’s shoulder. “Let me see the picture again.”

Lifting the datapad from her lap, Tahl held it just a little crookedly and much too close to Bant’s face. The girl didn’t say anything however, she just shifted her head away from the screen and studied the image of a Noorian warrior displayed.

“Okay, it’s two small braids on each side of the big one, now,” Bant muttered to herself, and turned back to focus on Tahl’s hair.

Well, Ben thought wryly, he didn’t have to manipulate the conversation around to the braids after all. He remembered that one of the things both Tahl and Bant had cherished during her padawanship were the calm moments when Bant helped her master with her hair. Tahl eventually learned to do it herself by feel, but the two women had always enjoyed the companionship of these moments.

Taking a seat in his customary chair, Ben smiled at the two women knowing they weren’t paying any attention to him. “How did this come about?”

Obi-Wan took the seat next to him and watched the scene curiously. “How do you even know how to braid, Bant?”

“Initiate Bant kindly offered to fix the tangle that was my previous braid,” Tahl stated calmly as she sat, back straight, head forward, patient and perfectly still for the younger girl. “It had been annoying me to no end so I couldn’t very well turn her down.”

Bant on the other hand huffed at her friend and shot him a light scowl from the corner of her eye. “While you were,” she paused then settled on, “away I started to help out in the creche. It made me feel better and the younglings with hair enjoyed letting me practice on them.”

An understanding look came across the boy’s face and he smiled as his friend. “It looks like you got good at it, at least,” he commented.

“Indeed,” Ben added, his smile at the two women was soft and more familiar than perhaps his presumably short acquaintance with them warranted, “she’s doing a wonderful job, Master Tahl. You look lovely.”

A slight smirk of amusem*nt curled at the woman’s lips, but it didn’t manage to cover up the trickle of pleasure that escaped her into the Force at the compliment. “Are you saying I wasn’t lovely before?” she asked teasingly.

“Oh no, my dear,” Ben returned, his smile shifting with his own amusem*nt and joy at her playfulness. “I’m fairly sure your hair could look like a porg’s nest and you’d still be lovely.”

Tahl laughed a bright happy sound causing a pleased smile to break out over Bant’s face and a flash of triumph to streak through Ben. Obi-Wan on the other hand was staring at his master like he’d grown a second head.

Was Master Ben- was he flirting with Master Tahl? Obi-Wan thought, incredulous and slightly scandalized.

“Well, luckily for me, Initiate Bant, it seems, is very talented,” Tahl said when her laughter faded, but her smile remained, brightening her expression. She ran a hand lightly over her head, feeling out the finished braids Bant had twisted into her hair with the tips of her fingers. “This feels perfect, Bant,” she turned to face the girl even though she couldn’t see her, “I can’t thank you enough.”

“Oh, you don’t have to thank me!” Bant burst out, a blush turning the coral color of her cheeks darker. “I’m just really glad I could help.”

“And help me, you did,” Tahl said with a softer tone of voice, “in more ways than you know.”

Ben watched the interaction and felt relief and happiness. Already he could tell that Tahl’s emotions were lighter, her outlook on the future just a little bit brighter, and her sense of self beginning to mend. In his life it would be almost another six months before Tahl asked Bant to be her padawan. If these two women became master and padawan months earlier, it would be a very minor change to the timeline that in the end wouldn’t effect much, other than his friends’ happiness.

It was as Bant was scrambling off Tahl’s bed that Ben suddenly became aware of a dampened presence observing them. Turning his head he realized that Qui-Gon Jinn had been standing in the doorway silently watching them interact. How long he’d been there, Ben didn’t know, but the inscrutable look on his face was not encouraging.

Standing, Ben gave the older master a polite nod. “Master Jinn.”

His abrupt move had startled Obi-Wan and Bant, and his greeting had caused Tahl to stiffen in alarm. She hadn’t heard anyone join them and when she sent out a questing tendril of the Force she realized Qui-Gon was intentionally shielding.

“Qui-Gon, you didn’t tell me you were going to visit today,” she said trying to cover for her unease at his sudden appearance.

Turning his sharp eyes away from Ben, Qui-Gon’s expression softened slightly as he looked at Tahl. “I thought you might like some company, but I see that you already have visitors.”

His observation just made his purposeful ignoring of Ben’s greeting more obvious and the two teens in the room shifted nervously.

Tahl, though she was blind, was not ignorant of the shifting mood in the room. Her old friend's standoffish almost rude demeanor was the culprit.

“Yes, Obi-Wan and Bant here were being very kind in coming to see me,” Tahl said trying to lessen the tension in the room. “I’m not sure either of you have met yet,” she continued and made a gesture in the general direction she could feel Ben was standing. “This is Master Ben Kenobi. He’s the Jedi that brought Obi-Wan back to the temple.”

Qui-Gon’s icy blue eyes turned back on Ben and there was a long pause.

His former master’s demeanor was throwing him off more than he wanted to admit, but Ben was a fifty-something time traveling Jedi Master High General. He’d faced off against much more dangerous opponents than Qui-Gon Jinn. At least that was what he told his insecure inner teenager.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Master Jinn,” Ben finally broke the silence with his natural defense of politeness. He could feel the anxiety and tension fairly thrumming through his padawan and he sent a calming, reassuring pulse down their bond. Obi-Wan’s inner turmoil lessened only just.

Qui-Gon however had not been the one to teach Ben his courtesy. “I doubt that,” the older master responded, with a tinge of resentment in his words. “You’re the master that lodged complaints against me with the High Council, are you not.”

It was not a question and Ben pasted a mask of serenity on his face lest he frown at the man’s deliberate rudeness. “I hardly think we should be discussing Council matters in causal company.”

The implied scolding from a much younger, unfamiliar master made Qui-Gon’s expression pinch. But he wasn’t wrong, the Council had declared the investigation into his conduct was not to be common knowledge. That reminded him though of another person in the room.

Qui-Gon looked then at his pa- his former padawan. “Initiate Obi-Wan, I’m relieved to see you recovered and that the Council allowed you to return to the temple.”

Obi-Wan’s face paled at his former master’s words, then he flushed bright red in a mix of anger and shame. He wasn’t able to keep the emotions from leaking into the Force and Master Jinn raised an eyebrow of disapproval. That just made the jumble of emotions worse and Obi-Wan was only able calm when Master Ben placed a hand on his shoulder in support. Hurriedly, the boy shared his feelings with the Force and gained enough equilibrium that he could respond relatively evenly.

“I thank you for your concern, Master Jinn, but I must correct you. My place in the Order was never truly in jeopardy and I am not an initiate. I have a master, that makes me a padawan.”

Eyebrows shot up in surprise at the boy’s words, Qui-Gon then scowled, misunderstanding the boy’s meaning. “I am no longer your master, Obi-Wan. You rejected my teachings and the Council dissolved our partnership.”

A fierce expression came over the teen’s face then and Obi-Wan straightened his posture standing proudly with his master’s hand still holding his shoulder in support. “You mistake my words, Master Jinn. While I do appreciate the time and effort you put into teaching me, I was not referring to you as my master.”

He tipped his chin up allowing his ribbon padawan braid to slide into view from behind his shoulder in a rather unbecoming display of defiance for a Jedi. “Master Ben Kenobi offered to take me as his padawan and I accepted.”

The shift of emotions across Qui-Gon’s face was quick and varied ending in a look of resolve before that was gone too and the man’s mask of serenity overtook his expression once more. However, there was something about his still shielded presence in the Force that left Ben feeling uneasy.

He had a bad feeling about this.

*

TBC...

Chapter 22: Master and Padawan

Chapter Text

Their short confrontation with Qui-Gon in Master Tahl’s recovery room left Ben with many mixed feelings. He had to keep reminding himself that the man that had looked his nose down at his younger self was not the man that had died in his arms on Naboo.

Like Obi-Wan was a different person from Ben, so too was this Qui-Gon Jinn a very different person from who his old master had been. Over the years of their partnership, Qui-Gon had lost a great deal of the arrogance and self-righteousness that had tainted many of his interactions with others. He had grown as a person as all beings do over the course of their life. At the time of his death, Qui-Gon had been much like his best friend, despite the friction that colored their relationship the last few days before Naboo.

Obi-Wan’s former master on the other hand, was still struggling with the betrayal of Xanatos and was stubbornly clinging to his rather narrow view of what made a good Jedi much less a good person.

Ben had been able to pack away all his mixed feelings by the time they’d walked Bant back to the Initiate Dorms and returned to their apartment. He could work through his conflicted feelings in the dead of night, right then his padawan needed him.

“I’m sorry, Master,” Obi-Wan said as they took seats on their couch, a frustrated twist to his mouth, “I know I shouldn’t allow my emotions to dictate my actions, but Master Jinn’s words- they just-” he cut off and harshly blew out a breath.

“It’s quite alright, padawan mine,” Ben assured him with a small smile as a streak of happiness escaped the teen’s control at the endearment. “I dare say your display of defiance got the message across in any case.”

Blushing, Obi-Wan reached up to fiddle with his ribbon braid, the same one he’d practically rubbed in his former master’s nose. “Still, such a blatant display of pride was unbecoming of a Jedi.”

Ben hummed, amusem*nt glinting in blue-green eyes. “Well, I don’t think Bant or Master Tahl will tell on you, and I certainly won’t so let’s put it down as a learning experience and move on.”

Chuckling lightly, Obi-Wan’s tension finally eased with his master’s nonchalant attitude and continued unwavering support. “As you say, Master.”

Amusem*nt shifted to concern, Ben caught his padawan’s gaze in a more serious expression. “Tell me truly, dear one. How are you feeling?”

Slumping back into the couch cushions, Obi-Wan sighed heavily and shrugged. “It still hurts, Master,” he confessed, but instead of sadness his tone was one of frustration. “The way he just dismissed me. Even all the time we’d spent together he still didn’t think that another master could want me. It hurts and I’m angry that it does.”

Ben blew out a breath as well and regarded his padawan patiently.

“And he lied, Master,” Obi-Wan continued, when Ben didn’t interrupt him. “He didn’t even try to deny that he lied to me about the Order kicking me out.”

That was true, Ben thought. He couldn’t begin to guess what was going through Qui-Gon’s mind, but his stubbornness about this entire situation was concerning.

“Even though your relationship with him is over, your feelings of betrayal are completely valid, Obi-Wan,” Ben told the boy with genuine seriousness. “You looked up to him, you were in his care for over a year. You felt grateful to him for taking you as a padawan after you’d been assigned to the AgriCorps. His abandonment and dishonesty should absolutely cause feelings of hurt and anger in you.”

The teen’s expression darkened and he bit his lip, deep in thought. The older man knew he was trying to reconcile Ben’s total acceptance of his emotions with the lessons of detachment and stoicism that had dominated his entire life so far.

Finally, Obi-Wan blew out another long breath and he nodded. “It’s difficult, Master, to acknowledge my feelings about this.”

“I’m sure it is,” Ben replied in sympathy. “Would you like to meditate together so I can help you with this? Once you work through your emotions and understand them it’ll be easier to move past them.”

Obi-Wan gave his master a relieved smile. “Yes, Master. I would like that.”

“Come on, young one,” Ben stood up and ushered his padawan toward the bright sunlit corner of their living room where he’d set out the meditation mats. “Let’s get started. You still have chores to complete today after all.”

The teen let out a groan at that, but still folded himself into a comfortable pose and readily sank into the meditation with his master.

A couple hours later when the teen had shuffled off to start washing the dishes, Ben had watched him go with apprehension and concern still sitting inside him.

Though Obi-Wan was once again relatively happy and calm, Ben could still feel that niggling in the back of his mind warning of something to come.

Grimly, Ben thought that this wouldn’t be the last time he’d come face to face with a hostile Qui-Gon Jinn.

*

It was three days later that Ben got the summons.

He and Obi-Wan were in the Room of a Thousand Fountains practicing multitasking with the Force. Obi-Wan had already tumbled into the pond of water below him three times. Apparently holding a handstand while levitating three fist sized rocks and Ben’s outer robe was a little too much for him to juggle just yet. Especially when he was precariously balanced ten feet in the air on a stone pillar in the middle of a pond.

Still, when they’d first started this admittedly ridiculous looking training exercise Obi-Wan couldn’t even levitate one rock while in his handstand. Now he could keep them perfectly still hovering around himself while balancing on his hands. Progress.

Of course this whole exercise was easier if nothing distracted him, so when Ben’s comm started chiming, he startled, tipped over, and tumbled into the water. Again.

Breaking the surface, Obi-Wan shook the water out of his face and blew out a frustrated breath. “I was doing good that time.”

“Yes, you were, Padawan,” Master Ben replied somewhat distractedly from his cross-legged seat atop another pillar as he peered down at his comm.

Treading water in place, Obi-Wan stared up at his master curiously. “Something wrong, Master?”

His question pulled Ben from his thoughts and he snapped his comm shut turning his head to look down at Obi-Wan. “Not to worry, young one. The Council just summoned me once again. We’ll have to put this lesson on hold for now.”

Obi-Wan watched a little concerned as Ben stood up and agilely jumped from pillar to pillar till he landed on the pebbly beach and began pulling on his socks and boots. Grabbing his master’s outer robe as it floated by him, Obi-Wan started swimming to shore, touching his toes down in the shallows and walking the rest of the way out of the water.

“Should I continue the exercise, Master?”

“No,” Ben answered, clipping his lightsaber back on his belt and straightening his tabard. “You still have make-up work to do for you lessons. Return to the apartment or go to the Archives and get started on some of it.”

“Yes, Master,” Obi-Wan murmured biting his lip. He didn’t particularly like how tense his master’s brow was or how much of a hurry he seemed to be in. “Shall I take your robe back with me?”

Ben paused and eyed the dripping wet brown robe hanging from his padawan’s hand. His lips twitched and his eyes twinkled with a spark of humor. “If you would. I don’t think the Council would appreciate me drip-drying in front of them.”

Letting out a breathy chuckle, Obi-Wan nodded. “As you say, Master.”

Ruffling the teen’s wet hair, Ben gave him a smile. “I’ll see you for late meal.” Then he was gone and Obi-Wan was left watching after him with a strangely apprehensive feeling in his gut.

Ben made his way toward the Council Chamber with a grim expression on his face. He was unsure what this summons could be about. Oh, he had a few guesses, none of them particularly pleasant, but nothing concrete. The Council surely wasn’t going to interrogate him about the future or the changes he was beginning to advocate for. It had been generally decided that the less people knew about the details of the future the better and the Council hadn’t wanted to hear about anymore criticisms or changes until he’d completed the report Yoda had assigned him.

He was reluctant to assume, but there was only one other thing he could think the Council would summon him for without warning.

Padawan Depa was waiting at the doors as always, and she gave him a slightly hesitant smile as she silently ushered him inside the Chamber.

When he stepped through the doors Ben immediately knew that this was not going to be a pleasant conversation. The Force in the room felt tense, angry and uncomfortable. There were eight members of the High Council present, Mace Windu and Yoda included, and every single one of them had rock solid unreadable expressions on their faces. And standing in the center of the room with his long hair loose, his posture stiff, and his hands in his robe sleeves was a displeased looking Qui-Gon Jinn.

Ben flicked his eyes around the room before he bowed. “You summoned me, Masters?”

“Master Jinn has exercised his right to confront the one that has lodged complaints against him,” Sifo-Dyas spoke up from where he was eyeing the two Jedi standing before the Council. “That is why we have summoned you.”

Ben shut down the anger and frustrations that surged up inside him. He knew his expression was almost forbiddingly blank as he responded to that. “I did not think the Council would consider accusations of child abandonment and negligence of duty simple complaints.”

Normally Ben would try to be more diplomatic, he’d try to use his words to deescalate the situation, to calm tempers and maybe turn the circ*mstances around in his favor. But he knew Qui-Gon Jinn, had learned a great deal of his negotiation strategies from the man. For a man that was hailed as one of the best diplomatic and mediating envoys of the Jedi, he stubbornly refused to compromise or negotiate when met with resistance himself.

There were many and varied instances of Ben having to smooth things over for his master after Qui-Gon obstinately arguing with the Council, or he’d stampeded over foreign dignitaries and uncooperative beings on their missions. It gave Ben a thorough understanding of just what was to come now that he had presented himself as an obstacle for the Maverick Knight – as most of the Council and temple called him.

It was highly unlikely Ben was getting out of this conversation without a fight. Whether it was a strictly verbal one or something else would greatly depend on how righteous Qui-Gon thought his cause to be.

“Master Jinn has accused you of exaggerating these allegations in an attempt to commandeer his padawan.” Plo Koon’s expression was as inscrutable as ever, but the way his Force presence was so tightly controlled gave Ben a clue as to how displeased he was with this entire situation.

Ben blinked at Master Koon then slowly turned his eyes onto his former master, the man his former master had once been. “What part of abandoning Obi-Wan alone and weaponless in a war zone where children were dying would you consider exaggeration, Qui-Gon Jinn?”

The tone of his voice and use of the other master’s full name sans title caused a few eyebrows to raise and Qui-Gon himself to scowl.

“Obi-Wan chose to stay on Melida/Daan,” Qui-Gon said stiffly. “I gave him the option to return to the temple with me and he refused. I took that to mean he was renouncing his place in the Jedi Order.”

“You lied to him,” Ben accused through gritted teeth. “You gave him an ultimatum that was not within your power to give. You took his braid and his lightsaber and you left him in the middle of a war zone. Whether you gave him a choice or not is irrelevant.”

“He was disregarding the life of a fellow Jedi,” was Qui-Gon’s insistent rejoinder. “Master Tahl would have died had I not left the planet then and gotten her back to the temple. Obi-Wan refusal to heed my orders put her life at further risk.”

Ben felt a little like he was staring at a poorly made facsimile of his old master. Logically he knew that the Qui-Gon that had died in his arms was a wiser, kinder Jedi Master that cared for him deeply. But it was hard to remember while a younger, more broken version of the man was righteously defending his abandonment of a child in his care.

“Your attachment to Master Tahl caused you to ignore violence being perpetrated against countless children,” Ben burst out, with more vehemence than was really acceptable for a Jedi Master. Though none of Council members silently watching this back and forth spectacle gave any visible reaction.

“Obi-Wan was placed in your care,” Ben stated anger causing his eyes to narrow and his lips to thin. “You were responsible for his health and welfare. You were supposed to teach, guide, and support him. But you left him there!” He needed to lower his voice, he knew he did, but his old master had always been capable of getting a reaction out of him like none other, not even Anakin.

“He was half starved and terrified out of his mind when I found him. He’d been surviving on his own in that hell hole for months, acting as a leader for over a hundred kids all younger than him. He’d had to watch children as young as five years old bleed out under his hands. He’d had to kill with his bare hands to save the lives of his friends.”

Pausing, Ben sucked in a deep breath and tried to reign in his emotions. He knew they were leaking through his shields, that he was practically projecting his guilt and horror and sorrow into the Force for everyone to observe. It was becoming progressively harder to separate out his experiences from Obi-Wan’s. He figured he was lucky he’d kept his pronouns straight. If he’d slipped into speaking in the first person Ben couldn’t imagine how this conversation would turn.

As it was, from the dark stony looks on Yoda and Mace’s faces they knew he was speaking more from his own memories than Obi-Wan’s.

“Obi-Wan saw and experienced tragedies and bloodshed not even half the masters in this room have and that is on you.” Ben finished his speech with his shoulders back and a simmering look in his eyes.

By the flaring of his nostrils Qui-Gon did not appreciate having the full weight of the blame for Obi-Wan’s trauma piled on his shoulders.

“Your emotions betray you,” he finally said after a moment of charged silence. “A Jedi’s duty is to weather and overcome every trial and test the Force puts before them. If Obi-Wan cannot move past his trials on Melida/Daan then I was right to first refuse him for training.”

Ben’s entire body tightened in cold anger, but Qui-Gon continued before he could speak.

“The boy is too emotional, too aggressive and quick to anger,” Qui-Gon stated and Ben was hearing echoes from his own frantic desperate days before Bandomeer. “Through this entire interaction you have made it abundantly clear that you have no more control of your emotions than the boy does.”

Well, he wasn’t wrong, Ben thought darkly. He’d noticed that the cold, controlled and calculating anger he’d cultivated through the Clone Wars had faded in the desert. The return to his wartime body had not returned his inner discipline to him as well. He was back to utilizing the strategies he’d developed during his padawanship, faking it till he made it. Obviously, he’d failed even in that during this confrontation with the unstoppable force and immovable object that was his former master.

Of course, just as he’d acknowledged his short coming and made moves to rectify it, Ben’s former master opened his mouth again and said:

“Obviously, it would be too dangerous to leave a padawan already prone to dark tendencies in the care of such a volatile master. I implore this Council to immediately remove Initiate Kenobi from Master Kenobi’s detrimental guardianship.” He bowed his head toward the Councilors seemingly respectfully, then finished with, “I’m willing to forgive the boy’s transgressions and take him back as my padawan to hopefully rectify any undue influence Master Kenobi has already had on him.”

There was a ringing in his ears, Ben noted distantly. The Force had ground to a halt around him. He wasn’t even breathing he realized. The room was quiet, but inside himself Ben’s mind was almost completely silent. He felt as if all his roiling emotions were so far away and so distant as to not even be a part of himself.

He’d only experienced this kind of disconnect three times in his life.

When Maul stabbed Ben’s master in front of him while he was stuck helpless behind a laser gate.

Held down on his knees while Satine was choked and murdered before his eyes.

As he walked away from Anakin’s hatred filled screams of agony while he burned.

He wasn’t quite sure why he was reacting so strongly to Qui-Gon’s threat. And it was a threat. Perhaps it was that the stress of time travel and exile and grief were finally getting to him. Maybe it was because he perceived this as an attempt to take away someone he cared for.

Either way, for the first time since he’d walked into the Council Chamber, Ben was in total and complete control of the burning cold anger inside of him.

When he spoke, his voice was cool and calm and it unnerved many of the Councilors that had observed the split second flip in his Force presence from boiling emotions to the sharply calculating stillness it was now.

“You want to retract your last statement, Qui-Gon Jinn,” Ben said lowly. “Obi-Wan is my padawan and he will remain my padawan. No amount of twisted words or seemingly reasonable arguments from you will change that.”

Qui-Gon raised a challenging eyebrow at him. His demeanor, unlike the minute discomforted shifting from some of the Councilors, was confident and calm. He hadn’t spent enough time with Master Ben Kenobi to realize that he’d practically stabbed the sleeping krayt dragon with a spear, not just poked it with a stick.

“You would challenge the Council’s decision on this?” he inquired mildly.

“They have made no such decision,” Ben negated. “Nor will they. I chose Obi-Wan and he chose me in return. There is nothing you can say to the Council that will change that.”

Qui-Gon’s eyes narrowed. “You are arrogant to think you can dictate how the Council will rule.”

You’re one to talk, consummate Council ignoring maverick knight Qui-Gon Jinn.

“I do not dictate,” Ben refuted icily. “The Council already granted me the privilege of taking Obi-Wan into my care, a privilege which you callously threw away, and I will not allow it to be taken from me.”

“I repeat myself, you are arrogant if you think your words alone will overrule a decision from the Council.” Qui-Gon sniffed and look down his crooked nose at Ben.

“For having first accused me of such, you are the one that is trying to take my padawan from me, not the Council.” And what he hoped to accomplish by doing so, Ben did not know. Qui-Gon hadn’t even wanted Obi-Wan in the first place. Why was he working so hard to get him back?

“You would fight me, then?” Qui-Gon asked with sardonic curiosity. “Since you insist on painting me as the villain in this entire situation.”

“If you are going to persist in this farce, then yes, Qui-Gon Jinn, I will fight you for Obi-Wan,” he declared boldly. “As our wise Grand Master said to the Mandalorian King: if you want to take the padawan, make sure the master is dead.”

There were gasps from a few of the Councilors and alarm radiating into the Force from others. There was also disapproval and a flicker of quickly swept away humor. Apparently, only Yoda really appreciated Ben taking his wisdom to heart.

“Are you offering me a Challenge for Obi-Wan’s padawanship?” Qui-Gon was scowling now, the violence inherent in Ben’s words wrong-footing him.

“For Obi-Wan’s padawanship, the Challenge cannot be,” Yoda spoke for the first time since Ben stepped into the room. “Returned to your care, Obi-Wan will not be. Decided this already, the Council has. Neglected your padawan, deny it, you will not. Abandoned children in danger, you did. Lied to this Council multiple times, you have.”

His wrinkly green face looked to have aged decades then, but Yoda’s steady gaze silenced his indignant, angry grandpadawan when he opened his mouth to protest. “A Challenge you may issue, a Challenge you may accept. Regardless, be Obi-Wan’s master again, you will not.”

There was a long tense moment before Qui-Gon finally nodded in acquiescence, an unhappy curl to his mouth. “As the Council decrees.”

Ben almost snorted at that. Qui-Gon said it like recalcitrant padawans mutter, As you say, Master. The undertone not being a flattering one.

“If Obi-Wan’s padawanship is not in question then I won’t pursue a Challenge,” Ben said feeling some of the cold clarity fade away, now that the threat to his padawan was mitigated.

Qui-Gon however was not to be satisfied. “The Council may have decreed that Obi-Wan will not return to me, but you are still a detrimental and inadequate teacher for the boy.”

“What are you saying, Master Jinn?” Ben lips thinned, his posture once again tense.

“I issue a Challenge for your place as his master,” Qui-Gon declared like he was drawing a line in the sand.

“Explain, Qui-Gon,” Mace spoke for the first time, his scowl dark and his frustration evident. “We just told you that Obi-Wan will not ever be your padawan again.”

Waving the reminder away with a hand, Qui-Gon continued, “Regardless of whether I’m his master or not, he should not remain in Kenobi’s dubious tutelage.”

Out of everything that was said and implied in this conversation that should not have been the thing that hurt, but it did. Ben quickly shared the pain caused by his former master’s denial of his adequacy as a teacher with the Force.

“What would you propose then, Master Jinn?” asked Sifo-Dyas, who had watched the entire confrontation with a disconcerting look of intrigue.

Straightening to his not inconsiderable height of over six feet, Qui-Gon outlined his proposal. “Should I win the Challenge Master Kenobi releases his claim on Obi-Wan and the boy is given to another master to teach.”

So this whole debacle wasn’t about Obi-Wan at all. Not really. Qui-Gon did not take the investigation into his conduct kindly. One of the things about his old master that Obi-Wan disliked the most, was his bullheaded insistence that he was always right and if he pushed hard enough even the galaxy would bend to his whims. Ben had despaired that Anakin had some how, in the two weeks they’d known each other, inherited that trait from Qui-Gon.

Ben had called Qui-Gon’s righteousness into question and so Qui-Gon was hitting back at him, whether consciously or not.

A deep scowl on his brow, Ben eyed the other master with piercing blue-green eyes. “And should I win, Master Jinn, what would your concession be?”

Qui-Gon graciously offered for Ben to put forth a suggestion.

“A mind-healer,” was the first thing out of his mouth and it caused raised eyebrows and curious blinking around the room. “If I should win the Challenge, Master Jinn, you voluntarily attend appointments with a mind-healer, the number of which will be at the healer’s discretion.”

Whether Qui-Gon would actually allow the healer to give him the help he’d needed so desperately since Xanatos’s Fall was yet to be seen, but Ben had learned negotiation from Qui-Gon and opportunism from Anakin. He saw an opening to maybe help his old master, regardless of how hurt, betrayed, and angry he was with the man. Qui-Gon was still, at his foundations, a good person and a good Jedi. For Ben’s fond memories of the man he’d known, he couldn’t pass up the chance.

The full of extent of his declaration was met with a wide-eyed, infuriated, but grudgingly accepting nod from Qui-Gon.

“Very well, Master Kenobi,” he said once again calm and stoic like the master Ben remembered. “The terms are set, then.”

There was a wave of frustration and disapproval leaked into the Force from the Councilors, but Yoda simply nodded, his expression stoic and his presence impenetrably shielded.

“Issued, a Challenge has been. Accepted, it has been also. To the Theater of Challenges, we will go.”

Ben blew out a breath and shared all his apprehension and anger and hurt with the Force. He had to be clear headed and ready for the Challenge ahead. It wasn’t just Obi-Wan’s padawanship with him that was in jeopardy should he lose. When he’d told Obi-Wan he would never abandon him and was ready to leave to Order if he had to, Ben had been utterly serious.

Should he lose, not only would he and Obi-Wan be forced to make their way through the unkind, Sith filled galaxy alone, but it would put a crimp in his plans for the Order, as well.

*

TBC...

Chapter 23: First Blood

Chapter Text

Obi-Wan was knee deep in Archive datapads and old flimsy texts attempting to finish a very overdue research project for his Galactic History class. He’d finally found what he thinks is the exact dry as dust history book he needs when the door to the Archives burst open. Startling enough to drop his stylus, Obi-Wan looked toward the commotion.

Quinlan Vos was getting roundly scolded by Master Nu, the Chief Archivist, but he was barely paying her any mind as he stood on his tiptoes searching the Archives for something. His eyes landed on Obi-Wan and he darted over, now completely ignoring Master Nu’s steadily reddening face.

“Obes! Obes!” He slammed into Obi-Wan’s table upsetting the precarious stack of books and datapads to scatter across the tabletop. “Get up! Get up! We’ve gotta go!”

“What?” Obi-Wan protested bewildered and somewhat afraid of incurring Master Nu’s wraith as well. “What are you talking about, Quin? I’m studying!”

Quinlan grabbed Obi-Wan’s arm and yanked him out of the seat. “It’s your master, Obi!”

Jerking his head up, Obi-Wan stared at his friend, “What about my master?”

“Padawan Vos, you will stop this raucous immediately!”

Quinlan talked right over Master Nu as he rushed out, “I heard from Luminara, who heard from Reeft, who heard from Tiplar, who heard from Tiplee, who bumped into Depa outside the Council Chambers!”

Having been dragged away from his table and towed past an infuriated Master Nu, Obi-Wan shot her a sheepishly apologetic look, as he yanked his arm out of Quinlan’s gloved hands. “Heard what, Quinlan? What are you talking about?”

“Your master,” Quinlan said as he spun around to face Obi-Wan, a look of glee on his face, “accepted a Challenge issued by Master Jinn and they’re probably already in the Theater by now. So come on!”

Obi-Wan blinked at his friend wide-eyed for a long moment then his stomach sank and his heart sped up.

Challenges were dangerous business. They came few and far in between and they were always lightsaber duels to the first blood. It was an old tradition from before the last Jedi-Sith war and because they were so dangerous, they were only issued when there was a serious issue between two Jedi that couldn’t be solved by intervention from the High Council. And even then they were only allowed when a majority of the Council approved.

The last Challenge was almost a decade ago. Obi-Wan didn’t know what it was about, he was too young, but he remembered the scandal and the gossip that floated around the temple for a month after it was over. One of the participants had lost a hand in the duel, because when a Challenge was issued it wasn’t fought with sabers on sparring intensity. No, they were full strength and entirely lethal.

There had been talk that in other Challenges in long years past Jedi had even been killed.

And now Obi-Wan’s master was fighting a Challenge Duel against Master Jinn. Normally Obi-Wan wouldn’t be worried. He’d seen his master’s fighting skill and knew he was an exceptional fighter. But he’d never seen Master Ben pit against another Jedi. He had however been Master Jinn’s padawan for over a year. He’d seen Master Jinn spar in the temple and fight on missions. Master Jinn was a master in Ataru and while Ben knew that Master Ben had nearly expert knowledge in all the forms he didn’t know which one he mastered in, if he mastered in one at all.

All Obi-Wan had seen of his master’s fighting style was an intense sparring match with Jango, their training sessions, and fighting the unskilled foot soldiers of the Melida and Daan. He knew his master was a good fighter, but was he good enough to win against another Jedi Master, one with over a decade’s more experience?

Obi-Wan blinked and stared at Quinlan in a dawning horror. “Come on, Quin. Let’s go!”

“Finally!” Quinlan burst out and both boys took off like a shot Master Nu’s angry shouting following them into the hallway.

*

When they arrived at the Theater of Challenges, there was a surprisingly large number of Jedi- masters, knights, padawans, and initiates milling around. The buzz of excited and anxious conversation echoed off the Theater’s high domed ceiling and Obi-Wan looked around with his lip pinned between his teeth and a furrow in his brow.

It seemed like a third of the temple’s population had shown up to witness the spectacle. The entire High Council was seated on the first row of the tiered spectator seating closest to the field. The expressions on their faces were all disconcertingly stoic and neutral.

“Obi-Wan! Quinlan!” Turning toward the shout, the boys spotted Bant about four rows higher in the stands above the High Council.

Hurrying toward their friend, Obi-Wan had stepped onto the row before he realized that Master Tahl was sitting next to Bant.

“Master Tahl,” Obi-Wan greeted as he took a seat next to the blind master.

“Obi-Wan,” the woman gave the anxious sounding boy a smile. “I see the gossip spread throughout the entire temple. We heard the commotion while on our walk in the Room of a Thousand Fountains and followed it here.”

“Do you know exactly what’s happening, Master?” Obi-Wan asked, his eyes darting around the gathering crowd and the still empty field hoping to spot his master.

“We met Depa on our way in,” Bant spoke up. “She didn’t tell us all the details, but she did say Master Ben and Master Jinn had a really unpleasant disagreement in a Council meeting and Master Jinn issued a Challenge to Master Ben.”

“You don’t know what the terms are at all?” Obi-Wan glanced back at his friend.

“Before the Challenge Duel begins the terms of the Challenge will be announced,” Master Tahl told them with a calm demeanor that Obi-Wan slightly envied her for. He was about to vibrate out of his skin the anticipation and worry was getting to him.

“What did we miss? Has it started yet?”

Turning toward the voice, Obi-Wan saw Luminara, Reeft, and Siri – finally returned to the temple with her master - scooting into the row behind them and seating themselves on the stone benches.

“It hasn’t started yet. We haven’t even potted Obi’s Master or that nerfherder Jinn,” Quinlan answered plainly.

“Quinlan! Don’t be rude,” Bant scolded leaning around Master Tahl and Obi-Wan to scowl at the boy.

Quinlan just rolled his eyes.

“Garen will be disappointed he missed this,” Reeft commented as he glanced around the Theater curiously.

“All Challenges are recorded on holovid, young one,” Master Tahl said, drawing the interested attention of the teenagers seated around her. “Besides having the footage in case the duel cannot be decided without reviewing it, it’s also used in training purposes. I believe some of the holovids you watch in the more advanced padawan lightsaber classes are of past Challenges.”

Quinlan and Siri, the only padawans in the group besides Obi-Wan, shared a grimace. “I didn’t realize those were Challenges,” Siri said, “Though I probably should have. I doubt Jedi would have wounded their opponents so badly in a normal sparring match.”

That didn’t make Obi-Wan feel any better at all.

Before they could continue their conversation Master Cin Drallig, the Temple Battlemaster, stepped out into the center of the field, Master Jinn and Master Ben coming to stand on either side of him.

The murmuring crowd grew quiet and Master Drallig projected his voice using the Force.

“Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn issued a Challenge to Jedi Master Ben Kenobi,” he said. “The terms of which are as follows: Should Master Jinn win the Challenge Duel, Master Kenobi will release his claim as Master to Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

There was small swell of furious whispering and Obi-Wan felt like he was going to throw up. He would have no other master than Master Ben. What was he going to do if his master lost the duel?

A wave of calm and reassurance swept through him cool and gentle from the bond he shared with his chosen master. Obi-Wan met Ben’s gaze even as far away as they were and he knew that no matter what, Master Ben wouldn’t abandon him. The Jedi Master sent his anxious padawan a small smile. Win or lose, they would be together. They’d both promised that.

Master Drallig continued speaking and the whispering quieted. “Should Master Kenobi win the Challenge Duel, Master Jinn is to attend sessions with a mind-healer, the number and duration of which is up to the discretion of the healer.”

That made even more furious whispering break out through the crowd of shocked Jedi. Obi-Wan himself was confused. Before he could form a question however, Master Tahl let out a surprised, but considering hum.

“What is it, Master?” Obi-Wan murmured to her.

“It’s just that we’ve all, Qui-Gon’s friends that is, have been trying to get him to see a mind-healer for years. He’s always outright refused. Even his former master could not convince him to seek help after…”

She didn’t finish the sentence, but Obi-Wan could figure out what she would have said. After Xanatos.

Realization smoothed out Obi-Wan frown and he couldn’t decide whether to be proud or frustrated with his master. Of course. Of course, his generous, heretical, kind master would use a dangerous and potentially life threatening duel as an opportunity to coerce a soul-wounded Jedi to get the help they’re too stubborn to seek for themselves.

Master Drallig finished by stating, “The Challenge Duel will end and the victor decided at first blood.” Then he and the two participants bowed to each other and he stepped off the field.

The silence in the Theater was oppressive and the Force was thick with anticipation.

Obi-Wan watched as the two masters assumed their individual ready stances. There was a long moment of tense waiting where it seemed neither Jedi was inclined to make the first move. Then suddenly Master Jinn leaped forward and attacked Master Ben in a powerful over head strike.

Which Ben blocked with a move so fast it was done in the blink of an eye.

The masters were a blur of motion after that. Qui-Gon leaping and jumping and flipping high in the air in his practiced Ataru acrobatics, appearing to come at Ben from all angles without pause. It was a skilled and furious attack strategy, but Ben blocked, parried, and dodged each and every one without a hint of strain or hesitation.

Within the first few minutes of the match it became clear to the audience that the mysterious, little known master’s preferred form was Soresu. And he was very, very good at it.

Many of the Jedi in the stands raised their eyebrows at his skill. A true master of Soresu was rare. The endurance and patience needed to truly wield Form III to its full potential was hard to find even among the Jedi. Based on the speed, accuracy, and unfaltering movements of Master Kenobi, it was clear that he was perhaps the most skilled Soresu practitioner the Order had seen in the last decade at least.

The true test of a Master of Form III, however, would be if Kenobi could keep up his impenetrable defense while making an opening for himself to-

There it is! The masters and knights in the audience were surprised and impressed as Kenobi went from the tight, economy of motion defenses of Soresu to striking sharp, precise attacks at Jinn’s momentarily open guard in a skilled display of Makashi. Then he transitioned back into Soresu so smoothly that Jinn faltered in his footwork, taken aback by the lightning fast change and the sudden need to defend himself.

On and on it went. The duel would look almost entirely one sided to the untrained eye, the taller, older master raining blows down on the shorter master, forcing him to stay on the defensive. Master Jinn coming at Kenobi from four sides, the strength and skill of his attacks plainly evident. But if one was paying attention, it would be noted that no matter how fast, or how sudden, at what angle Jinn moved on Kenobi, Kenobi blocked or deflected each and every attack.

The longer the duel went on the more it seemed like Kenobi could predict exactly where and how Jinn was going to attack him and react accordingly. The longer the duel went the more apparent it became that Kenobi, in true Master of Soresu fashion, could in fact keep up his defenses almost indefinitely.

Something which Jinn could not do. Ataru was not a form meant for such a long drawn out battle. Even with the Force flowing through him to assist in his acrobatics, Jinn was beginning to slow down incrementally somewhere around the fifteen minute mark of constant intense dueling.

It, of course, did not help that Kenobi would seemingly at random go from defending to attacking, and always with Makashi, all timing and precision and very effective. Every time he made the abrupt transitions, Jinn would be wrong footed, his rhythm of attacks thrown off.

Neither master had scored first blood or even come close as of yet and almost twenty minutes into a very skilled lightsaber duel that was very unusual.

But then in a series of heartbeat quick, strong, muscle straining attacks, Jinn spotted an opportunity and slashed his lightsaber at Kenobi’s chest.

There was a gasp of anticipation through the audience that went unnoticed by the two masters still utterly focused down on the field. Obi-Wan, however, was torn between gaping in awe or tearing at his hair in anxiety. He had never seen such a display of skill and prowess before. Even when masters would spar in the outdoor sparring rings allowing others to watch. Obi-Wan had never seen anything like what Master Ben and Master Jinn were doing.

It was amazing and terrifying and Obi-Wan was sure his heart stopped when Master Jinn’s saber looked to have sliced right through Master Ben’s chest.

Twirling his blue saber in a blur of motion, Ben knocked Qui-Gon’s return attack away giving himself time to employ a so far uncharacteristic Ataru back flip and gain some distance.

With faded memories of his clone medic ranting about battle adrenaline hiding the pain of serious injuries, Ben darted his eyes down toward his chest. His robes were singed and blackened where Qui-Gon’s green lightsaber had cut through them, but the skin underneath was unharmed. If he had been a hair’s breadth too shallow in his dodge the Challenge would have been over.

Darting his eyes back up at his opponent, Ben took note that Qui-Gon’s breathing was heavier and his long hair was sticking to his face and neck with sweat. Then his former master lunged forward again and Ben returned to defending against shockingly brutal attacks.

It seemed Qui-Gon was tiring and had chosen to put his remaining energy into physically overpowering Ben. He’d come to realize that he was not getting past the younger master’s defenses for a clean victory and that Ben would certainly be able to outlast him at the pace they were going. Unfortunately for him, though Qui-Gon was taller by several inches, he was not stronger than Anakin and Ben had mastered Soresu defending against his padawan’s knee shaking, arm straining, dominating, powerful Djem So.

He saw an opening, a slight falter in a landing from an aerial spin, Qui-Gon’s stamina finally declining. Ben broke his defensive wall, thrust forward and twisted his blade sharply with a flick of his wrist. Qui-Gon’s lightsaber snapped out of his hand and went flying.

Before the older master could register being disarmed, Ben struck at him so fast that there was a long moment of stunned silence before anyone realized what had happened.

Qui-Gon was frozen, panting for breath and blinking at his opponent’s calm, almost serene expression as he stood before him in a Soresu guard stance. Then the pain hit him. Raising a hand, he found a long cauterized laceration running halfway across his neck just under his jaw. It was shallow, only skin deep, but the implication was clear to Qui-Gon and every single Jedi watching this spectacle.

Kenobi had extreme, little seen precision and control of his weapon, because if he had overextended that move even a fraction Jinn would be dead, his head likely to have gone flying like his lightsaber.

When it became clear that the duel had come to an astonishing if abrupt end, Master Drallig stood from his place next to an intrigued, twinkly eyed Yoda and announced:

“Master Ben Kenobi drew first blood. He wins the Challenge.”

As if his words were a cue, the entire audience burst in loud conversations and debates and awed exclamations.

“That was the coolest most terrifying thing I’ve ever seen.”

Quinlan’s voice did little to shake Obi-Wan out of his wide-eyed open mouthed stare.

“I’ve never seen a spar go on for that long,” Bant murmured shocked, she looked at the time on her datapad. “It’s been over thirty minutes!”

“Holy crap, Obi-Wan!” Reeft burst out. “Your master is insane.”

“I want a copy of that holovid,” Siri muttered too loudly to be just speaking to herself. “I need to study like every second of that duel.”

Luminara shot the girl next to her an agreeing look. “I never realized Soresu could be used quite like that. It always seemed like such a passive form, but the way Master Kenobi used it was devastatingly effective.”

“Obi-Wan,” Master Tahl’s smooth voice finally pulled his attention from staring at the field, “how did the duel end? I attempted to follow the fight by observing the currents of the Force, but I’m very unpracticed at it. I kept losing track of what was happening.”

“Um, well,” Obi-Wan hesitated, knowing that though there seemed to be some tension between Master Tahl and Master Jinn, she was still his friend. “Master Jinn slashed through Master Ben’s robes, but didn’t hit skin. Then he began attacking Master Ben really heavy and fast, but somehow Master Ben slipped through his attacks and disarmed him. Then Master Ben made a move so fast I honestly almost didn’t see it, and he sliced one side of Master Jinn’s neck.”

The master’s brows furrowed and Obi-Wan caught a flash of alarm from her Force presence. He hurried to assure her, “It’s really shallow, though! From here it looks like Master Ben only gave him a flesh wound. Master Jinn seems fine.”

Relief, then a swell of consideration escaped her before she steadied her still shaky mental shields and she was the serene master once again. “That’s good. Thank you for describing that for me, Obi-Wan.”

“Of course,” Obi-Wan returned with a slight smile though he knew she couldn’t see it. “I’m just sorry you couldn’t watch the duel for yourself. It was really amazing.”

Master Tahl’s lips twitched a little ruefully, but she gave him a smile nonetheless. “I’m sure I’ll be regaled with a blow by blow at some point in the future. From the sheer raucous these Jedi are making, this duel won’t be forgotten anytime soon.”

Obi-Wan looked around when she gestured to crowd still in the stands with them. She wasn’t wrong. There were Jedi clustered together in pairs and groups loudly discussing the fight, or arguing about it some of them seemed to be. Even the Masters on the Council were murmuring to each other, varying degrees of intrigue or disgruntlement on their expressions.

Turning his eyes back on the field Obi-Wan saw Master Ben was now standing calmly, lightsaber once again clipped to his belt, discussing something that looked serious with Master Windu and Master Yoda.

“Why don’t you go and congratulate your master, Obi-Wan,” Master Tahl suggested knowingly. “I’m sure he’d like to see you after all this.”

Agreeing hurriedly, Obi-Wan climbed around his still loudly exclaiming friends and tried not to appear as though he was jogging down the stone steps toward his master.

When he got the lowest stone tiers of the stands, Obi-Wan jumped down the six foot drop landing on the dirt field in a crouch. Master Ben had apparently spotted him coming because he broke from his conversation immediately and was ready with his arms open when Obi-Wan slammed into him. Wrapping his arms around his master’s waist Obi-Wan squeezed hard, the side of his face pressed against Master Ben’s chest, his eyes shut tight, not caring that physical displays of affection between masters and padawans were generally frowned upon.

“I’m so sorry about all this, Obi-Wan,” Ben murmured into the top of his padawan’s head. His own arms were steady and firm around the teen’s shoulders and back. “I swear to you I had absolutely no intention of letting you go, regardless of the outcome of the duel.”

“It’s alright,” Obi-Wan muttered, his voice muffled against the singed cloth of Ben’s robes. “You won anyway so it doesn’t matter.”

“Of course it matters,” Ben argued. “I promised I wouldn’t abandon you and then I end up in a duel to potentially decide your fate. You are fully within your rights to be mad at me.”

Obi-Wan frowned at that and tilted his head up to look into his master’s concerned face. “I’m not mad at you, not really.”

Studying the boy’s expression and the feelings of awe, concern, and relief in his Force presence, though there was an undercurrent of harsh frustration and exasperation Ben finally nodded. “We’ll talk about it more later then.”

Obi-Wan’s nose wrinkled and he opened his mouth as if protest, but he was interrupted.

“Impressive, your master’s skill is.” Finally releasing his hold on his master, the teen turned around and hurriedly bowed to Master Yoda. “A Master of Soresu, I have not seen in many years.”

“The duel was amazing to watch, Master Yoda,” Obi-Wan agreed, shooting his master an awed look. “I didn’t realize Soresu could be used like that.”

“It’s interesting that you chose to partner Makashi, a form primarily used in lightsaber to lightsaber conflicts, with Soresu, which was developed as an answer to rapid blaster fire,” Master Windu commented from where he stood next to Yoda, a heavy considering look on his face.

“Hmm. Those two forms, though closely related, rarely combined are they.” Yoda had an intrigued gleam in his large eyes. “Interesting, your experiences must have been, that this strategy, a form of its own, you almost made it.”

Ben shot the small master a wry look. “Well, it certainly wasn’t boring.”

“I’d like to spar with you sometime, Kenobi,” Master Windu didn’t so much ask as demand. “I’m curious to see how your Soresu holds up against my Vaapad.”

Blinking in surprise, Ben bowed his head in acceptance. “I’d be happy to, Master Windu. Though I don’t think you and I will be quite as evenly matched as Qui-Gon and I were. You are a formidable duelist.”

Master Windu snorted and gave Ben look. “Somehow, I doubt that.”

“Return to our tasks, we must,” Yoda spoke up again before Ben or Mace could continue their verbal sparring. “Though a diverting break this was, many hours in the day, there are left.”

The Theater was rapidly emptying out so Obi-Wan and Ben bid the two masters goodbye and made their way back to their apartment. With a short stop off to collect Obi-Wan’s forgotten things from the Archives of course.

Though they were delayed for a time by a scowling lecturing Master Nu, they finally made their escape and breathed a sigh of relief when the door to their apartment closed behind them.

“I’m going to go change my robes,” Ben said as he pulled at the singed, slashed front of his current set. “Why don’t you set out whatever you were working on in the Archives and we’ll take a look at it together.”

Obi-Wan watched his master disappear into his room and sighed heavily. Truthfully he didn’t know how he felt about the Challenge between Master Jinn and Master Ben. A part of him wanted to be angry and scared and demand explanations and another part of himself wanted to just put it behind them and be thankful they didn’t have to go on the run from the Order to be master and padawan.

Consequently, he’d been so lost in thought that by the time Ben came back out in a fresh set of robes, Obi-Wan was slumped on the couch frowning at the low table in front of him, his project things haphazardly strewn across the top.

Sensing the roiling contradictory emotions floating around his padawan, Ben moved into the kitchen and made a quick pot of tea. When he come back into the living room and sat down on the couch, Obi-Wan had at least organized the mess he’d dumped out of his bag.

Offering the still frowning teen a cup of tea, saucer and all, Ben sat patiently waiting.

“I’m not mad,” Obi-Wan finally burst out after a couple sips of tea. “I’m not! I just- I just need you to explain. What happened in the Council meeting that ended in a Challenge over my padawanship?”

That wasn’t quite true, Ben knew, there was a thread of anger in the numerous emotions Obi-Wan was leaking in the Force. “I’m not sure what Qui-Gon’s ultimate goal was, but he exercised his right to confront the person that lodged complaints against him.”

“What do you mean?” Obi-Wan’s eyes widened and a conflicted look crossed his face. “You went to the Council and complained about him?”

Ben looked into his padawan’s eyes with seriousness. “The way Qui-Gon treated you was wrong. I know I’ve said this to you before, but I need you to understand that the things you experienced while in his care, both before and after taking you as a padawan, were unacceptable.”

Obi-Wan looked down at his tea, biting his lip. “But I’m not his padawan anymore, so it doesn’t really matter now.”

Putting his cup down on the low table, Ben grabbed the teen’s shoulder and forced him to raise his head so their eyes could meet. “Even if you never see him again, your time with him will affect you for the rest of your life. Not only that, but his conduct towards you indicates much deeper problems.”

Obi-Wan knew that Master Jinn hadn’t gotten over Xanatos’s Fall and betrayal, but it seemed like Master Ben was talking about something else. “What kind of problems?”

Breathing out a long breath, Ben answered, “Qui-Gon not only abandoned a child – you - that was in his care in the middle of a war zone, he lied to the High Council about it, and he omitted the presence and true circ*mstances of the Young from his report. I read his report from Bandomeer and it doesn’t cover even half of the things you told me, and I know you left some things out.”

Obi-Wan wanted to explain or deny leaving parts of that story out, but Ben continued.

“It’s not just about the omissions from the official mission reports or the lying to the Council, however. Qui-Gon doesn’t seem to show any remorse or awareness that what he’s done was wrong. That more than anything is a very large warning sign.” Ben’s words sent the hairs on the back of Obi-Wan’s neck to stand on end. “The Council needed to be made aware so that they could investigate and hopefully get Qui-Gon the help he needs to return to being the great Jedi and the good man he once was.”

“Do you think Master Jinn could Fall?” Because that was what it sounded like. Obi-Wan, even though he was no longer Master Jinn’s padawan and didn’t want to interact with him any more than necessary, didn’t want the man to experience the suffering of Falling to the Dark side.

“I think eventually Qui-Gon would have mostly healed on his own,” Ben answered truthfully, that was after all what had happened in his past life. It was a long and often painful road, but eventually Qui-Gon had healed. “But the path there would have been a lot slower and more difficult, than if he could get the help he needs, now.”

Hearing that made Obi-Wan feel a little better, both about Master Jinn’s future and his own situation, the misting of guilt gone from inside him. He had a feeling that if he had been forced to stay as Master Jinn’s padawan the burden of the master’s healing would have mostly fallen on his shoulders. Obi-Wan was glad he wouldn’t have to struggle under that weight.

“So, Master Jinn wanted to confront you about the Council investigating him,” Obi-Wan concluded from the sum of all that Ben had said.

“It seemed like that at first,” Ben agreed. “But the conversation quickly devolved from there.”

“How did that lead to the Challenge?”

Ben sighed and debated on how much he should tell Obi-Wan. Finally, he decided to omit the aspects of his argument with Jinn that the teen would find more personal. “I’ll admit that I let my temper get the better of me and Qui-Gon used that as evidence that I was unfit to be your master. That my lack of emotional restraint would adversely affect your training.”

Obi-Wan’s mouth dropped open indignantly. “That’s bantha-sh*t! You’re the best master I could ask for.”

Chuckling, Ben scolded, “Language, padawan.” Then he smiled at the scowling teen. “But thank you, your confidence in me means a great deal.”

The teen huffed, but a pleased flush tinted his cheeks. “It’s true.”

“The Council didn’t seem inclined to follow Qui-Gon’s logic, either,” Ben offered.

A furious scowl suddenly creased Obi-Wan’s expression as he guessed, “So, Master Jinn issued you a Challenge because the Council wouldn’t take me away from you? Why would he even care? He didn’t want me to begin with.”

“That I do not know,” Ben answered, though he had theories. None he was going to burden Obi-Wan with, but he could make a guess based on what he knew about his stubborn old master. “And it doesn’t matter anyways. Besides the fact that the Council stated you wouldn’t be sent back to Qui-Gon regardless, even if I lost the duel I wouldn’t have let them take you away from me.”

This was a prime example of potentially dangerous attachments, but Ben didn’t particularly care. And by the quick burst of happiness from Obi-Wan, he didn’t care either.

It also appeared that he knew Ben better than he’d thought, because Obi-Wan then said, “And of course you had to take the opportunity to help Master Jinn, even though he made you mad and tried to separate us.”

Feeling a little sheepish under the teen’s knowing stare, Ben shrugged. “I figured if we were going to go through with this farce something good might as well come out of it.”

Sighing, very put-upon, Obi-Wan just nodded. “I understand, Master. You’re almost too nice for your own good.”

“Well, I’m not sure I’ve ever been accused of that before,” Ben commented wryly. Though that wasn’t strictly true. Anakin, Ahsoka, and Cody had all lamented more than once that he needed to stop attempting to compliment and flirt the evil dark-siders and Separatists into submission.

“Speaking of the Challenge, though, Master.” Obi-Wan suddenly perked up and turned eager eyes on Ben. “You were amazing in the duel. I’ve never seen anything like it before. It didn’t seem like anyone else had seen Sorecu and Makashi combined like that before, either. Will you teach me how to fight like you do?”

Picking his tea up from the table, Ben sipped at it. “I developed that fighting style under very specific circ*mstances. Ones I’m not sure will ever be repeated.” And wasn’t that a disturbing realization.

Already, Ben had affected so much of the past that he wasn’t even sure the future would be recognizable to him within the next decade or so. Jango, for one thing, was not a vengeful, rage filled slave on a spice freighter at the moment, so the chances of him being the progenitor of a massive clone army were a mystery. Though Ben knew that the Separatist vs Republic war had been decades in the making. He highly doubted Jango’s altered fate would be enough to derail it much less delay it for any significant amount of time.

And of course, clones or not, battle droids were still very much a thing and he fully expected dark-siders to continue coming out of the woodwork.

“But,” he continued before Obi-Wan could attempt to convince him, “I suppose we could fit my combined Soresu-Makashi fighting style into your schedule. You can never have too many skills in your back-pocket as it were.”

Grinning, Obi-Wan enthusiastically thanked him. “You’re the best, Master, really.”

“Well, now you’re putting it on a little thick,” Ben retorted with a grin of his own. “Is there anything else you’d like to discuss, or are you ready to walk me through your Galactic History project you’ve been putting off for the last week?”

Huffing, Obi-Wan gulped down half the tea in his cup drawing a sound of disapproval from his master, before setting it aside to began pawing through the datapads, texts, and scattered notes on the low table. “I haven’t been putting it off that long, Master. And besides, I think I’ve got all the research I need. I just have to write the essay.”

“Show me, then,” Ben ordered kindly. “We’ll start the outline together.”

The rest of the afternoon went by in a companionable, pleasant manner. Ben reveled in the time spent helping his padawan grow and learn and Obi-Wan fairly flourished under such genuine attention.

It was a contrast to how badly the day had started out. Ben knew he’d have to meditate on all that had happened before he could really put it behind him. Especially the concerning disassociation he’d experienced when Qui-Gon threatened Obi-Wan’s presence in his life. In his last life he’d only reacted with such cold detachment when someone he loved had been in life threatening danger. A verbal argument in the middle of the Council Chamber was not life threatening.

His extreme reaction had made Ben realize that perhaps he wasn’t as mentally or emotionally stable as he would like to believe. After all, almost four years of constant war, the genocide of his entire Order, the Fall and betrayal of his padawan – his brother -, and twenty years in social isolation ending in two weeks on the run culminating in his abrupt and violent death did not lend itself to a healthy mindset. If he really thought about it, Ben was surprised he’d functioned for these last months without something worse happening than a relatively short lapse of emotional control.

Watching Obi-Wan diligently talking his way through the research he’d done and his ideas for his essay to come, Ben thought then that maybe he shouldn’t be so surprised after all. After Qui-Gon died, Ben realized that he found grounding and stability in having someone to care for. Anakin had carried him through his grief for his master. Anakin, Ahsoka, and his clone troopers had carried him through the war. And Luke had carried him through his exile.

And now Obi-Wan was carrying him through reliving and hopefully changing his past.

It hadn’t really occurred to him until that moment, sitting on his couch listening his teenage self rant about the difficulties of history essays, that his attachments were just as central to his being as they had been for Anakin. He didn’t know if that was something to be concerned about, probably it was considering what Anakin had done in fear for his attachments, but at the moment his attachment to Obi-Wan was keeping his head above water.

He was content, he admitted. Maybe for the first time in twenty years. He had goals to work towards, a padawan to care for and teach, and every single one of his dead were alive once more.

So, yes, there were problems he’d have to address, eventually. Obstacles he’d have to navigate if he wanted to fulfill the Force’s second chance. Problematic aspects of his history he would have to confront.

But right now, he was helping his padawan with a history essay. Everything else would just have to wait.

*

End.