Master Apprentice Archive The Beauty in the Black Quick search:

Rating: NC-17

Archive: M-A

Series: Suspension of Disbelief (Cinders and Padawans, Sleeping Master, What's In A Name? and Black Cloak, White Noise)

Categories: Q/O, AU, H/C, romance, angst. First-time. Yes, first-time.

Feedback: Yes, please.

Summary: Continuation of Black Cloak, White Noise and part five in the Suspension of Disbelief series. This is the Beauty and the Beast fic (sort of).

Spoilers/Warnings: references to rape nightmares from previous fic

Disclaimers: Someday I intend to use my own beloved, beautiful characters to write for fame, fortune and glory. Today is not that day.

Notes: Thanks to Kimdy for digging around trying to find canon on training bonds. Thanks to Alex and Helen, for basically pointing out that there's nothing canon on training bonds. Thanks many times to Catnip, who beta'ed again. And again.

/..../ thoughts and bond speak.

"I have a bad feeling about this, Qui-Gon." Mace's tone was forbidding, but not forbidding enough, he feared. He kept his voice low so that the padawan healer at the admittance desk could not hear him blowing his own Consular authority down the compactor chute.

Mace Windu and Qui-Gon Jinn faced off outside the hallway that led to the treatment rooms. Qui-Gon's stance was solid and challenging, and he was not to be intimidated by Master Windu, Councilor or no.

After Qui-Gon's race back to Coruscant with his nearly-incoherent padawan, the master had immediately regretted turning Obi-Wan over to the healers for an indefinite period of rehabilitation. Qui-Gon had instantly known that nothing that the healers did to Obi-Wan would work, but neither he nor the Council could devise a better solution to expunge the Darkness. He'd had a bad feeling about this from the outset, and now, six agonizing, nerve-wracking, rather argumentative months later, he was taking action.

That action involved, potentially, a great deal of trouble for Mace. Mace was by no means a renegade, and Qui-Gon was about to turn him into one. The idea didn't sit well with either man, but Qui-Gon could find no ready alternative.

/None, at least, that will net any reasonable result within Obi-Wan's natural life span,/ he added mentally, stifling his bitterness. Something was pressing him forward; his every instinct told him that time was growing short.

Qui-Gon stared at his friend, reining in his growing anger. "Mace, you tell Todak she can go straight to the nine hells this time. I am not leaving him to deal with this alone any longer." Sighing and dropping his chin to his chest, he stepped back, raising his hands apologetically. "Please. I can't leave him to this. All the healers will tell me anymore is that he asks for me repeatedly, and yet they won't let me see him."

Mace studied the Jedi Master, saddened by the broken sound of Qui-Gon's voice, and by the hopeless nature of the whole ordeal. Grudgingly, he tipped his head and sighed.

"You're going to get me into trouble," he rumbled, but keyed the authorization code and slid open the door to the treatment ward. Before his friend could move through, Mace tucked a slender chip into his hand.

Qui-Gon looked at it. It was the key to Obi-Wan's room.

Mace laid a hand on his shoulder. "You now have Consular authorization to be here. Please-- please be smart about this."

Looking at his friend sadly, Qui-Gon said, "I'm afraid 'smart' departed me when my padawan was taken by an unknown Sith element. But I will try."

As soon as the door slid closed behind him, Qui-Gon felt muffled and claustrophobic within the shielded hall. He slipped through them silently, looking in the doorways along the corridor. The place was sterile and white. Each of the equally sterile rooms, from what he could see through the small, square windows, was empty. The last room on the left was where he found his padawan.

Obi-Wan was on the window bench, staring out the heavily reinforced plasteel window at the south gardens. One leg was stretched out before him, the other cocked up. He had an arm draped lazily over his knee, and if Qui-Gon hadn't known better, he'd have thought his padawan was perfectly at ease.

The startled jump as Qui-Gon keyed open the lock was enough to tell him otherwise.

Obi-Wan regained his composure quickly. Too quickly, and too completely. Blandly, he looked at his master.

"Hello, Qui-Gon," he said coolly. " I never thought they'd let you come to see me."

Qui-Gon looked back steadily, trying to ignore the sterile smell of the room, trying not to wish for the smell of sun and air mingled with Obi-Wan's skin that he'd become so familiar with on V'littan.

"'They' didn't-- exactly," the master replied.

Obi-Wan let out a small smile. "Always pulling strings, my master."

The master stared, returning the smile faintly, unsure what to make of the apparent emotional flatness of the other half of his life. Obi-Wan was pale, made more so by the glaring white walls, intense lighting and white ward clothing. There was a cot along one wall, a white table with several datapads on it, and a chair. The room was overwhelmingly plain, and the only color came from the large window. It was nothing but sky from where Qui-Gon was standing; Obi-Wan gazed down at the gardens far below.

Obi-Wan was thin and had dark circles under his eyes, as though he never slept, never stopped thinking of those days, that mangled handful of days so many months ago. He radiated a weak, dark Force signature, swirling with half-hearted light, as though he hovered between the two faiths and could not make up his mind.

His hair had been trimmed back into the traditional haircut, but it looked wrong, desperately wrong: Qui-Gon had been informed that, in a fit of despair shortly after their return, Obi-Wan had snatched a small laser from a healer's tray and severed his padawan braid, declaring that he wasn't fit for it. In spite of the fact that he carried the original braid on his person, Qui-Gon was saddened to finally see with his own eyes the absence of the cherished plait that measured their lives together. He could not see any evidence of a new braid from the angle at which he stood. It made him ache helplessly all the more for the man who held his heart.

Qui-Gon had been unable to stop thinking of those days either, or the race home. He had been through no small amount of counseling himself, in spite of his insistence that they focus their energies on his padawan and not on him.

He had been allowed no contact with Obi-Wan, even though the young man had demanded to see his master repeatedly. Todak had been good enough to provide the master with daily updates; apparently Obi-Wan was sometimes violent in his demands. Yet now, there he sat, unmoving and apparently unmoved. They hadn't seen each other in months, and yet he had barely reacted to his master's entrance.

All the master had heard from the healers day in and out for the past several weeks was that Obi-Wan Kenobi was irascible, petulant, snarling. He wouldn't eat his food, he wouldn't take any medication, he wasn't interested in the mind probes anymore and would not participate in any further counseling sessions. Obi-Wan was completely uncooperative, but they dared not use the Force against him unwillingly for fear of driving him further into the Dark Side.

Qui-Gon could feel the darkness plainly, though it was certainly not as strong as it had been the day they'd raced from V'littan. He studied his padawan, his heart contracting around the love he could no longer put aside.

Obi-Wan grew uncomfortable under the intense stare. "I hate it here," he muttered, turning away from the window to face Qui-Gon, slumping over with his elbows on his knees. "The food is terrible, they always serve that tea, the stuff I can't stand, that--" he snapped his fingers and tried to recall the name but could not. Sighing, he shook his head and looked mournfully at his master. "You're the only one I want to talk to. No one understands, but at least you don't judge."

Qui-Gon was at a loss. Obi-Wan seemed so defeated, as though he'd resigned himself to this fate with a mixture of bitterness and exhaustion and now believed that there was no hope left for him. Heart clenching, the master moved to the window seat. They sat side by side, silent a moment, though all Qui-Gon wanted to do was wrap his arms around Obi-Wan and steal him away to someplace quiet. Where they could heal.

To say that "someplace quiet where they could heal" had failed them miserably was a gross understatement. He felt wrecked, and he knew it was nothing to how Obi-Wan felt. If he was shattered, Obi-Wan was scattered to the solar winds.

Obi-Wan simply sat, looking at his master's profile. The beard was a little mussed, so he reached out with his fingertips to comb it into place somewhat. It was a small gesture, but a tender one, and it gave Qui-Gon a flash of hope in spite of the fact that neither could read the other's feelings.

Qui-Gon desperately missed the bond. It had been so good for them, had helped them in his interminable sleep, had assisted them to piece together one small memory at a time when Obi-Wan no longer knew who he was beyond that he was in love. But the bond would have been removed by the healers even had it remained intact through the Sith's brutal rending of Obi-Wan's mind. It would have been equally as brutal to have Qui-Gon inside his Dark thoughts and emotions, and it might have paralyzed them both, rendering them incapable of dealing with either side of the Force.

Suppressing a sigh, Qui-Gon knew that the connection would have torn them irrevocably apart. Obi-Wan would have been incapable of rising above his own Dark tendencies, and Qui-Gon might have lost himself in the attempt to bring him back. He had already spent long hours questioning the Force; tainted by the Dark Side, he would have been destroyed. The bond would have encouraged a feedback loop between them, dragging them downward on the impetus of Qui-Gon's powerlessness and Obi-Wan's anger. Qui-Gon wanted to believe that he was stronger than this, but without Obi-Wan, he knew peace was a façade and strength a memory.

The silence stretched between them as Qui-Gon could think of nothing worth saying.

"Damn it," Obi-Wan hissed suddenly, and rose. He began to stalk back and forth across the room. Had Qui-Gon been in that tower for any length of time, he would have recognized this stalking as an eerie replica of Bane's dark, tormented pacing. It was the walk of someone who had forsaken patience and peace. As Obi-Wan turned, Qui-Gon was pained to see the tuft of hair growing at his right temple, barely long enough to band and tuck behind an ear, not even long enough to braid as yet.

Obi-Wan suddenly whirled on his master. "Which one are you?"

Immediately, he was shaking his head, sighing, shielding the pain in his eyes. "I'm-- I'm sorry. There are so many memories, and half of them not mine. I had my life, and then I had none, and now, I have two. One Dark, one Light. He-- he fed me memories, images. Lies. Of things you had done to me, things the Council supposedly sanctioned. And now I don't know-- I don't know where you came from. That is--" He broke off, letting his head sag toward the floor. "I know where you came from, I just can't convince myself of it. I can't trust my own memories anymore."

Qui-Gon remained still for a moment. This, too, he had heard this from the healers. Obi-Wan had talked about "memories" through a coarsely forged bond that had been shoved ruthlessly in place where the pure one had been. The amazing thing about the whole ordeal was that Bane's lies had been grounded in truth; they carried the feel of life in the Order without the factual details of Obi-Wan's life with Qui-Gon. None of the incidents had occurred, and even though Bane seemed to have known a great deal about the nature of Obi-Wan's connection to Qui-Gon, no real events had been manipulated. The orchestration had left Obi-Wan with too many impressions, too many incidents to sort. During his attempted rehabilitation, Obi-Wan had related to the healers the nature of the repeated mental rape, though he used no such word. Sometimes, it was reported, he looked back on those ravaged V'littan days almost fondly. Qui-Gon shuddered. Mental rape, indeed.

Finally, he said, "I come from your past, Obi-Wan. From your heart. I am not what he showed you. I am from long before him."

Obi-Wan threw his hands up into the air and stared at the ceiling. In spite of his roiling emotions, or perhaps because of them, the three-inch padawan braid extending from the new cut made him look naked and new, a post-adolescent crecheling.

He said, exasperated, "I don't know what before means anymore. I have too many of those. I don't know the state of my heart anymore. Your Obi-Wan is gone now, completely gone. He's from one of those mythical 'befores.' Before I became a padawan. Before I fell in love with you. Before I lost my memory. Before I embraced the Dark Side."

Qui-Gon leapt up and moved toward his padawan quickly, his voice urgent. "'My Obi-Wan' is not gone. You did not embrace the Dark Side. You had only just stepped over, and are recovering."

The laugh that burst out of Obi-Wan's mouth startled his master. "Is that what you tell yourself? I wish it were so easy for me."

Gripping the young man's shoulders, Qui-Gon bent somewhat, forcing eye contact. "If you had embraced the Dark Side completely, there would not have been anything anyone could do for you. We would not even be able to keep you here. You held back enough to save yourself."

Obi-Wan jerked away. "Stop saying things like that!" he yelled shrilly, stepping backwards. "The healers are forever trying to reach for me. 'Open your mind, let us see, share with us.' Touching me, prodding, using equipment, scanners-- your touch means nothing when you're using it to try to convince me of how fucking noble I was, or still am deep inside under 'all this,' how it's just all waiting to come out again. Well I am not noble! I'm angry and afraid and it's all I know anymore!"

Steadying himself briefly in the Force, Qui-Gon knew that to respond in anger, or even worry, would drive Obi-Wan further away.

"You said, Padawan, that I was the only one you wished to see." Qui-Gon kept his voice neutral and cool. "Is this what you wanted to tell me? That you missed me, never thought they'd let me in, but that anger is all you have left?"

Immediately the anger drained from Obi-Wan's eyes. "No-- I--" He looked away, suddenly afraid. "No. But I cannot find anything more to say right now."

Qui-Gon sighed. He moved closer, cautiously, knowing that now, this was yet a different Obi-Wan than the one with whom he'd fallen in love, and even further from the one who'd lost his memory. This one had too much anger, too much fear. Perhaps, after all, those were the only things he felt he had left.

The master knew better. He knew that Obi-Wan would not have made it this far through the ridiculous counseling and guidance sessions without his own inner strength. Qui-Gon saw that strength and could see that the walls of anger that Obi-Wan erected were crumbling under fear. Fear of what, Qui-Gon could not quite see. Rejection? Perhaps he longed for some indication that he was worthy even now, even like this.

/Oh, my Obi-Wan, what can I do to show you?/

He brushed his fingertips over Obi-Wan's cheek. He saw his padawan tense, saw him struggle to keep from pulling away again. Dropping his hand, Qui-Gon mentally cursed himself. Before he'd ever reached out, he should have recalled the reports he'd been given. Obi-Wan had told, haltingly, of the way the Sith Lord had touched him, balancing affection and tenderness with coldness and pain. Any touch now, kind or cruel, would be a reminder.

/'Your touch means nothing to me when you're using it to try to convince me of how fucking noble I am...'/

Qui-Gon drew his strength around him and allowed his need to be close to Obi-Wan rule him for the moment. He placed his hand on Obi-Wan's shoulder and simply left it there, relieved as his padawan's tension, while never leaving, abated slightly.

Deciding it would be best to move slowly, Qui-Gon dropped his hand again and stepped back toward the door.

"I am content to come here, Obi-Wan, unless you want me to stay gone. Whether or not you have anything more to say." He paused, then added, "I love you."

Obi-Wan looked at him, that fathomless pain filling his eyes. "I don't know if I want you to love me anymore." He turned away, back toward the window. He hugged his arms around his torso and stared out silently. Obi-Wan did not acknowledge the opening and closing of the door as Qui-Gon left, biting back stunned sorrow.

Qui-Gon paced in his rooms. He knew too well that Obi-Wan, by all accounts, was too unstable to be out at large. Qui-Gon also knew that containment room couldn't be doing him any good. It was too similar to that sparse, windowed room in the tower where Obi-Wan's whole life had been turned inside out in his head.

"Bloody Sith," Qui-Gon muttered. It wasn't the room. He wanted Obi-Wan back. He no longer deluded himself that things would ever be the same-- they had been through too much for that-- but he was going to try to forge something new. He needed to know that Obi-Wan would someday come home to him. The distance between them was slowly driving him crazy, for all his outward appearances of masterly serenity, but after today, he did not know which was going to be the harder: not seeing Obi-Wan, or seeing him and being stung like that again.

No, it wasn't going to end like this. He had to try, needed to try. It didn't matter how often Obi-Wan lashed out at him. Qui-Gon loved him, belonged with him, and he would either bring him back to the Light, or he would fall with him.

/You were strong enough to walk away and take him with you, now be strong enough to bring him back./

Obi-Wan was curled up on the window seat, staring out at the passing lights forming part of the ever changing cityscape, remembering the time he and Qui-Gon had spent the pre-dawn moments on the balcony in what had been their rooms here. Now, he remembered countless similar moments, thousands of contented smiles and fond times, but they were dry and bland against the raw, fresh memories the Sith had fed him. They crisscrossed in his mind like the endless traffic outside his window, contradicting each other until, sometimes, he simply broke under them.

He regretted many of the things he'd said to Qui-Gon earlier in the day. They had been true, but he wished he had kept them hidden a while longer. He was torn between missing his master's strength and the need to stay away from the man who had been so many of Bane's horrible implanted memories.

He did not know, now, if Qui-Gon would come back. Considering a moment, he amended mentally, /He'll come back. And I'll do the same thing. I'll drive him away because someone else taught me to hate him, made me question his love./

And yet Qui-Gon's love had radiated from the man's every look and breath, as plain as the stars. It had been beautiful to look at, but so, so painful because of all that Obi-Wan could not forget. Now he had too many memories and no way to sort them. There was so much he wanted not to know, and there was no way to discard the rubbish.

He suspected the healers had begun to doubt that he wanted to be helped, but in fact he was afraid. Afraid to expose the man who seemed to love him so very much to the Darkness that could swallow them both whole. The Qui-Gon he remembered from deep in his past would follow him down into Darkness to try to retrieve him.

/'Drowning,'/ that familiar voice said from a dream, and Obi-Wan shook his head. No, this was not the Qui-Gon from Bane's reality. This was the Qui-Gon who had braided his hair and told him of birthday presents. The one who had made love to him over and over in guest quarters on Lasyc Four. The one who had carried a black glove around with him for a whole day, seeking the identity of a blue-cloaked diplomat.

In those last hours before he had opened his mind to Bane, he had prayed Qui-Gon would find him before he turned. Then, as it had become evident Obi-Wan could not help but follow Bane to the Dark Side, he had prayed Qui-Gon would find a way to turn him back.

Now as he stared at the night, hovering on the edge of Light and Dark, he couldn't fathom allowing another into his heart, into his mind. Who could ever learn to love him as he was? Angry, bitter, lonely. He felt monstrous and ugly inside, a dark, crippled, withered shadow of his former self, turning away from the bright moments in his life because he could no longer associate them with who he had become.

He was, in fact, afraid to associate anything bright with himself, especially Qui-Gon. It wasn't the Dark Side's vision of his master that frightened him, it was the Light's. He was too afraid to allow that Qui-Gon into his heart when bright things disappeared so easily into the blackness.

Qui-Gon tried again the next day. The fact of the matter was that he could not keep himself away. Now that he had admittance, he was not going to restrain himself from Obi-Wan's presence.

Obi-Wan was not surprised to see him; neither was he very pleased. It was safest not to care at all.

"Hello, Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon greeted softly, hovering in the doorway a moment before stepping into the cell they inexplicably called a treatment room.

Obi-Wan smiled faintly, replied, "Hello," and resumed his vigil on the gardens below his window.

The master moved to the window seat, placing himself immediately next to Obi-Wan.

"Back for another round?" Obi-Wan turned to face him, his expression devoid of all emotion.

Qui-Gon opened his robe and reached into an inner pocket, retrieving a small metal box. "I brought you some of the tea you prefer." He extended the box to Obi-Wan.

A little surprised, the padawan took it. "Oh... thank you." He looked at the tin, turning the warm metal in his hand. After a moment, he said, "They have started bringing me my Academy work."

Qui-Gon nodded. "I asked them to. I hoped it might distract you. Refresh you a little."

Obi-Wan nodded silently, still staring at the tea box. He looked up at Qui-Gon suddenly and said, "Why is this so hard?"

Sighing and covering Obi-Wan's hand with his own, Qui-Gon shook his head. "You've been through too much, Obi-Wan. All I can tell you is that I'm here."

"I know." The young man, whose eyes were so terribly old, gazed at him a moment, longing to feel the way he'd once felt, and yet frightened to. "I wish I could be here, too," he laughed harshly. He looked at the huge hand covering his, wanting to turn his own hand up in it, but he did not. Obi-Wan did not wish to lead his master to believe that there was more here than met the eye.

Fighting the urge to draw his padawan into his arms, Qui-Gon looked at him. "Let me try. Just let me try to bring us back."

"'Us?'" Obi-Wan released a bitter laugh and drew away, tucking himself back into the corner of the window and turning his face skyward. "'Us.' What about my training? I wanted to be a knight someday, remember? 'Us.' Never let it be said that Qui-Gon Jinn is overwhelmed by duty. Perhaps you embrace a little Darkness yourself, Master."

The only sign that Qui-Gon had been deeply stung was the flexing of the muscle along his jaw. Smoothly, he stood.

"I have spent," he said quietly, "well onto fifty years being 'overwhelmed by duty.' I have come to learn two things, my own." He bent over his padawan and murmured, "When we are together, everything else falls in line behind us. When we are not, everything else is useless. There is beauty inside you, inside what you think is only blackness, and that is what I wish to embrace."

Straightening, Qui-Gon turned to go.

"Wait."

The master paused and sighed, bending his head a little.

"Do you mean that?" Obi-Wan asked hesitantly, the ugliness gone from his tone. The raw emotion in his voice tore at Qui-Gon's heart. "You say that like I'm the key to everything."

Qui-Gon wondered how his padawan could remember anything about their past together and not know that in his heart. "You are," he whispered, and left.

Qui-Gon went back the next day, and the day after. The visits began to run together, all of them comprised of the same chill greetings, the same lack of progress. The healers began to question his efficacy, though Todak, thankfully, did not try to prevent his entrance.

She doubted the legitimacy of his Consular authorization, but prudently said nothing. Regardless of his effect on Obi-Wan, this was important to Master Jinn's healing as well. Perhaps, she thought, it wouldn't be too much longer before he realized that his visits were merely painful exercises in futility.

Not even she knew of the small recording device planted in one corner of the room, silently marking every exchange.

"Next week is your naming day," Qui-Gon remarked quietly during yet another nameless, void of progress meeting. He had begun to wonder if he was doing any good, coming daily like this and then leaving when Obi-Wan hurt him.

Obi-Wan sat in his corner, legs folded in front of him, staring out the window. "Yes," he said, simply. He could not stop the voice in his head that mocked, "The universal equivalent of a blond joke," so he ignored it.

Moving closer, the master folded his hands behind him, adopting a relaxed stance. "I've read the reports, Padawan. I know how he painted naming days. And my gifts."

Startled, Obi-Wan faced him. "You do?"

"Obi-Wan, did you not know I would read every scrap of data they gave me? And every scrap of data they didn't, for that matter. I know everything you've told them."

The surprise drained from Obi-Wan's face as though it had never been there. Qui-Gon wondered if, indeed, he had made any difference admitting all that he knew.

The young man's gaze flicked to the Coruscant sky beyond the plasteel again. "So. Now you have all manner of insight into why I'm such a monster."

"Obi-Wan..."

Obi-Wan looked up suspiciously, then tensed when he saw the hurt in his master's eyes. "You really have no idea," he half-whispered, unfolding his legs and rising as he recalled those last days on V'littan. "The pain was immeasurable. It was everything. My world turned on it. You only saw the outward effects of the agony. You didn't feel it." He stepped slowly toward the master with each phrase, his voice growing tighter as he relived the days with Bane. His voice dropped to a whisper. "Then when you took the collar off..."

Looking down into those haunted blue-gray eyes, Qui-Gon took another risk and reached up, brushing the backs of his knuckles along Obi-Wan's cheekbone, feeling the darkness shifting around the padawan. "I don't pretend to understand what you went through. And believe me, they've done their share of picking at my head, too, trying to absolve me of the guilt."

"Guilt?" Obi-Wan snorted and smacked away the hand that was caressing his cheek. "Guilt is self-indulgent. People think when they feel guilty, that's their ticket to forgiveness." He turned away, pacing restlessly.

"I hold no such illusions," Qui-Gon told him sadly, watching his impatient tread.

"Don't you?" Obi-Wan turned on Qui-Gon suddenly, his eyes flashing angrily. "Then why do you keep coming here?"

"Because you allow me to." It was true, though they both knew it wasn't nearly the whole truth.

"You wouldn't want to be here if you'd been there." Obi-Wan slowly raised his voice until he was shouting. "How can you come here knowing that he put you in my head r-raping me? Laughing at me. Never loving me."

Qui-Gon stepped close and held out his hand, countering softly, "I come here because I know those visions were never real, and so do you. I come here to replace them with the truth."

Swallowing, Obi-Wan looked from the outstretched hand to those patient blue eyes, trying not to see the hardened, cold expression that Bane had superimposed on that once-beloved face. In some of his memories, there was comfort-- and even love-- in those eyes. Hesitantly, he extended his own hand and moved forward, closing his eyes as his fingers were enclosed in that large, warm hand. Qui-Gon pulled him into an embrace, rocking a little from side to side, feeling Obi-Wan begin to shudder, crying silently.

The master held him quietly, sending calming waves. He felt so at a loss, so confused as to how to handle this unexpected breakthrough that he simply remained silent, relishing the feel of Obi-Wan in his arms at last, after so long. So very long.

Obi-Wan clutched his master's robes in his fists, his forehead pressed against the broad chest. They had kept him in this tiny room forever it seemed, among things that were white, sterile and perfect. It was meant to be a contrast, he was sure, to the darkness that had invaded him, but it only made him feel empty inside. Hollowed out. But now, here was Qui-Gon, holding him, the way he always had before: warm and solid, a bright contrast to the darkness as well as a sedate answer to the stark whiteness all around him.

Obi-Wan cried against him for the pain he had withstood, as well as for the pain to which he had surrendered. He cried for the loss of his master, his padawanship, and the bond. Mostly, he cried for the loss of himself until he was sobbing raggedly, hitching screams ripping themselves from him and breaking muffled against the master's robe.

Gently, Qui-Gon guided Obi-Wan to the cot, pulling a cloth out of his pocket and offering it for the tears. Obi-Wan sat heavily, wiping his eyes and his nose, still drawing breath shakily.

"I do miss you," he sighed, with heartbreaking sorrow in his voice, as though the words were a death knell. "I just don't think I'm good for you anymore. I'm not ready, I don't know if I ever will be. I can't love you." He looked at his master helplessly.

Qui-Gon looked down at his hands. "Then tell me you don't. Tell me to go away, Obi-Wan. Tell me the Darkness took hold and you cannot dislodge it, and you never want to see me again."

Obi-Wan looked him squarely in the eye and for a terrifying moment, Qui-Gon feared his padawan was about to say just that. Obi-Wan opened his mouth to speak but froze, his voice caught. Finally he looked away, sighing.

"You know I can't say those things."

Barely veiling a flood of relief, Qui-Gon sighed. "Then there is hope." He reached up and cupped Obi-Wan's cheek softly, and Obi-Wan tilted his face into the touch.

Suddenly Obi-Wan was leaning forward, taking Qui-Gon's face in his hands and kissing him, soft, hesitant kisses, asking. Qui-Gon knew that kiss too well, and Obi-Wan offered it as though he fully expected it to be turned away.

The master was no less susceptible to it for that. He replied in kind, delicately, mouth trembling. Oh, how he had missed this-- he hadn't even realized how badly. It was soft and warm, but too beautiful to last.

"Master--" Obi-Wan broke the kiss, gasping, turning his face away slightly. "I can't-- I'm sorry, I can't."

"I know," Qui-Gon sighed, releasing him and sitting back and silently cursing his own weakness. "I should be the one to apologize."

Shaking his head, the padawan nevertheless turned away. "I think you should go."

There was a moment of silence before Obi-Wan heard Qui-Gon stand.

"Yes, perhaps I should."

Looking up plaintively, Obi-Wan wanted to argue now, wanted to change his mind. /Don't go. Stay with me, or take me with you. Don't leave me here alone again./ But he did not know whether he wanted Qui-Gon or just anyone, so he said nothing.

Pained, Qui-Gon took a step backward. "I will come again tomorrow, if you like."

"Yes."

Nodding tightly, Qui-Gon slid his hand along Obi-Wan's arm to his shoulder, then squeezed briefly-- enough to connect, but not enough to rekindle that flare. He knew it would be too easy to allow it to consume him, and that would be dangerous. Qui-Gon took another step. Obi-Wan looked so haunted again, so terribly alone, and there was nothing the master could do, no way he could help. He wanted to stay, desperately, but Obi-Wan had had enough of people acting against his will. Tipping his head down, Qui-Gon left, swallowing around the hard, painful lump that had formed in his throat.

Obi-Wan slumped onto the cot, curled up on his side and cried, clutching in his fist the handkerchief Qui-Gon had left behind.

Obi-Wan did not sleep that night. Neither did Qui-Gon.

Lying awake in his bed, the master stared at the dark ceiling, his fingers laced together across his stomach. He wondered if Obi-Wan had found rest, but somehow doubted it. He doubted Obi-Wan slept much at all since returning to the Temple.

Rising, Qui-Gon moved to the comm unit and keyed in the frequency that would have come to him even in sleep.

"Hmph," the receiver responded gruffly. "After zero-three-hundred it is, Qui-Gon. Obsessing over your padawan you are, hm?"

Qui-Gon bit back a sigh. "Yes, Master. I'm afraid I am quite at a loss."

"Hmph," Yoda said again. "Come for tea, you may not. Learn to handle this you must."

Putting his head in his hands, the junior master spoke heavily. "Master, please. I am afraid I can do no more for him. Help me find the key." It was unlike him, unlike any Jedi, to plead with a master for assistance, for answers. Qui-Gon no longer cared what was un-Jedi-like.

There was a long pause before Yoda answered softly, almost tenderly. "When wilting the flower is, give it water you should. Find all the elements, you must. Find what he lacks. Look to yourself, you do. Good this is, but enough it is not. Light alone helps not the flower to live."

Qui-Gon closed his eyes, wishing, not for the first time, that his master would give a straight answer. He felt like a padawan himself again. Water. What did water have to do with anything? He stifled an impatient retort and reined himself in, thanking his master softly for his advice and closing the call.

By the morning, his knees ached with meditation and he had come no closer to the answer.

A handful of days later, Qui-Gon Jinn was summoned before the Council.

"You can't keep going on like this, Master Jinn."

Qui-Gon kept his posture relaxed and his expression serene and cool as he faced Master Piell.

"What do you suggest, Master? Obi-Wan is my apprentice, and it is my duty to see that he is recovered from these events." It hurt him to so casually refer to the horrific nature of the "events" in question, but he stood his ground calmly, waiting.

Master Gallia spoke, filling in the gap left by Piell's rather terse silence. "We cannot keep him any longer. He is unhappy, yet he cannot be released. You are unhappy, and you cannot continue to stay here and observe his abiding in the Dark Side."

Qui-Gon's composure cracked minutely. "He does not abide in the Dark Side. He is beginning to pull against it. I have seen it. I have felt it."

"There is no quantifiable way of determining his internal actions against the Darkness in his Force presence," Master Poof interjected, and Qui-Gon had to restrain himself from whirling around in anger.

"My word as his master, my confidence as a Jedi, is not quantifiable enough?" Qui-Gon asked, turning slowly and controlling the pitch of his voice.

"Without a training bond," Poof continued, "nothing is verifiable. The previous trauma is too severe for any psychological assessment to be valid, and you yourself have been through too much to adequately judge. We have recordings displaying his lack of ability to calm himself, to control his emotions."

Paling, Qui-Gon pulled in a breath. "Recordings."

Master Poof nodded once in acknowledgement. "For some time now. We can see that there is no love in his heart, no Light. Not even for you, Master Jinn."

Qui-Gon drew a mantle of forced calm around his roiling pain at the callous delivery of such a verdict. In a plain breach of protocol, he turned from Master Poof and back to Yoda.

"He kissed me. Did the camera see that?"

"Physical reactions after long periods of celibacy do not measure emotional response," Master Poof said, ignoring the fact that Qui-Gon had turned away.

"What would please the Council by way of quantifying my padawan's progress?" he asked tightly, shielding his growing anger.

"We are past that point," Master Windu interceded, and there was a sadness to his tone. He looked at Qui-Gon pointedly, and it became apparent that he longed to be anywhere but where he was, speaking in any capacity but this one.

Softly, he went on, "The healers have proposed that we neutralize the midichlorians in Obi-Wan's system."

Qui-Gon almost took a step back in his shock. His gaze trailed away from Mace's face. "Neutralize..." he breathed, unable to finish. "The Order is all there is to Obi-Wan. What else is he to do? He has no memory of his homeworld, no family. He was disowned because of the Jedi's claim on him." Imploring, he turned to Yoda.

The old master swiped a hand through the air to stave off Qui-Gon's protests. He, too, was terribly sad but unyielding. "Perform this procedure tomorrow the Master Healer will, Qui-Gon. In this state, let him free we cannot. Bad for him as a Jedi it is. Worse for him as a Darksider. Yet worst of all is it for him as a human."

Yoda allowed the implications of his words to steep a moment, knowing they were irrefutable. Then he went on: "Use this method we would not, Qui-Gon, if a better way presented itself. Without the midichlorians, without the Jedi, be lonely he will, but remain in the Dark Side he will not. Worse things there are than loneliness, hm." The little master closed his eyes. "Yes, yes. Much worse things."

Qui-Gon's throat clenched tightly around his words, straining his voice. "That is my padawan. The Council is well aware of the love I bear for him, not to mention my responsibility to him. I will not allow this to happen."

Turning where he stood, he strode from the rotunda, ignoring the ripple of surprise that went up behind him. If the Council could be no more help to him than this, then he would find another way.

Qui-Gon spent the day and the evening poring over medical texts, over the last known references to the Dark Side's influence and how it could be counteracted. The Sith had been out of existence, to the knowledge of the Order, for so long that their methods had almost become mythological, and the means of counteracting a Sith's control were more so. Lists of possible treatments ran like an ancient world's home remedies for sneezing. Here, there were references to purging the emotional demons caused by the Dark Side's hold on the heart. There, a list of methods by which the victim could be regressed mentally to an age prior to the turning. In another citation, the master found physical activities (which were quite ludicrous) once believed to literally sweat the Dark Force out.

Closing the databank in disgust, Qui-Gon sighed. The only common thread he had found at all was the barest of ideas that somehow, the individual had to willingly let go. There had to be a trigger, some kind of mental mechanism by which that desire came about. But Qui-Gon had been so long in trying his own methods-- talking, physical contact, displaying his love in small ways-- that now he was completely at a loss.

He struggled to squelch the desire to steal Obi-Wan away from the Temple again, to disappear completely without the knowledge of the Council or the pair's friends. The idea frightened him and yet calmed him at the same time. A course of action. He needed a course of action, and if no other solution presented itself, then disappearing would be it.

He was about to contact Transportation and book passage off Coruscant altogether when he was surprised to receive a holo comm. Puzzled, he stared at the unit. It was the middle of the night.

"Maste' Jinn, oh I am so sorry!" Othaina began without preamble as soon as he received her. She had obviously having spent a long night fighting tears. Without delay, she stopped fighting them.

He watched her awkwardly, utterly thrown. /Damn the grapevine,/ he thought irritably, and then calmed himself and scrubbed a hand over his eyes. He would much rather have been able to tell her himself, but he hated to admit that after so many months of dealing with the aftermath, she had never crossed his mind; neither had Obi-Wan mentioned her to the healers.

She cried briefly, then almost as suddenly brought herself under control. Haltingly, she began to tell him what she'd heard, which, to his horror, was almost everything.

"I'm sorry," she sighed, wiping her eyes and sniffling, staring at him in the wavering holo. "I only found out tonight-- I was away--" She shook her head and made a low, mournful noise in her throat. "What a terrible thing, terrible." Her accent was thick with her distress, and her eyes were swollen and red-rimmed. She looked ashen through her dark skin.

Qui-Gon tried to force a smile. "It will all be well in the end," he assured her, but she was not fooled. Her eyes filled again.

"Oh, I canna' imagine what you're feeling! How awful!"

"Shh, Othaina," Qui-Gon sighed. "Please, do not worry about me. You must allow yourself some peace by knowing he's safe."

Her eyes slid closed and he was faintly proud of her; she centered herself briefly and then opened her eyes, calmer.

"What will happen?" she asked hesitantly. "He's been in there so long." She fought her sorrow again, remembering that the last time she'd seen Obi-Wan had been on a sparring date, the day before his fall from the training catwalk.

"I don't know," Qui-Gon told her honestly. "He has not been receptive." He did not tell her that the comm calls placed from the Sith Lord's transport on V'littan had been traced back to Coruscant. He also did not tell her that it had become plain that they were targeted specifically: that Obi-Wan had been targeted specifically, for reasons they had yet to discern.

/'He's already mine...'/

Qui-Gon shook his head minutely, clearing away the image of the Sith's cold certainty in the instant before he'd died.

Othaina leaned back in her seat and hugged her arms around her torso. Qui-Gon felt her sorrow. There was no keeping from her the fact that he'd omitted more than he'd told, and he had no doubt she would try to find out herself, in her own sideways manner, what those things were. For now, she took comfort, and gave it as best she could.

"I was the one who got him into the Ball," she whispered, apropos of nothing, and her voice caught as she choked back a sob. "How could this happen? Where was the meaning? Where was the Force?"

"I don't know," he replied, and watched helplessly as she began to cry again, happy memories too much to bear in the face of such a dark present.

Qui-Gon almost wished Obi-Wan could see her just so that he would be reminded that there was someone else who loved him that much. Othaina had gone to great risks to get Obi-Wan into the Presidential Ball. While Qui-Gon had disagreed severely with her methods and her meddling, he had come to believe in the means to the end: strangely enough, Othaina had provided the avenue that had brought Qui-Gon and his padawan together.

Eyes widening, he sat back, his chair creaking under the sudden shift in weight.

"What?" she asked, confused at the sudden brightness in the master's eyes.

"That's it," he breathed, and leaned for the comm control. "My apologies, Padawan T'rel. I have to go." He switched off, then rushed to dress.

"Mace," Qui-Gon called through the Councilor's doorway, his voice firm and sure for the first time in months. "I have an idea."

Mace Windu palmed open the door, his expression somewhere between exasperated and indulgent. He was fully dressed, wide awake even at this time of morning, and not in the least bit surprised.

"You have an idea," Mace repeated flatly, staring at Qui-Gon.

"I have to get in there. Get me past the guard-- the room key isn't going to be enough this time. This is my last chance."

Mace's jaw tightened, and he considered a moment. "If you don't pull this off--"

Qui-Gon sighed. "Then I'll need transport off the planet. I'm not going to let them do this, Mace."

Bowing his head, the Councilor sighed. "Only if you'll put me in the cargo compartment." He raised his head, face set and determined. "Only for you, Qui-Gon."

Gratefully, Qui-Gon nodded.

They moved through the Temple hurriedly. Mace made short work of the guard at the entrance to the ward simply by appearing before him. The guard admitted them, but as soon as they were in the long hallway that led through the ward, Mace warned his friend, "Time is short. I am sure the guard has notified Master Yoda. Once the Council finds out you're here at this hour, they will see you hauled off, and Obi-Wan--" He broke off; he did not want to remind Qui-Gon of what they had in store for Obi-Wan, but the cautionary look in his liquid-brown eyes warned of plenty. "I can only stall them for a moment. This had better be good, Qui-Gon. And fast."

Qui-Gon keyed Obi-Wan's door and stepped into the dark room, leaving Master Windu in the hallway.

Obi-Wan stirred on the cot, then woke, peeling the blanket back and sitting up.

"Qui-Gon?" He asked blearily, his voice suspicious. "What are you doing here?"

"I have to talk to you," the master told him, stepping forward and turning on the lights, causing Obi-Wan to wince and shield his eyes. "I have your birthday present."

Shaking his head and rubbing his face impatiently, Obi-Wan muttered, "And it couldn't wait until daylight?"

"No." Qui-Gon looked toward the door, seeing Mace's tense concern. He stepped forward, pulling a single black leather glove out of an inner pocket of his robe. He handed it to Obi-Wan, who stared at it a moment, then closed his eyes and swallowed.

"Why did you bring me this?" he asked, and opened his eyes to show Qui-Gon his hurt. "It's only a reminder of when things were simple. When I was a Jedi."

Qui-Gon stepped close, and he could see Obi-Wan struggling against the urge to pull away. The master raised his hand to caress the remnant of the padawan braid and said, "You are a Jedi. That was never taken away from you, and it never could be. Nor could your memories-- your true memories-- of the way things were." He closed his hand over Obi-Wan's, around the glove. "That is yours, is it not? The first night we kissed, the night of the Ball."

Obi-Wan's eyes slid closed again, and Qui-Gon knew that he had reached something that had lain dormant. Whether he was harming or helping he could not tell, but he pressed onward recklessly, knowing at this point, there was nothing to do but go forward.

"Listen to me. Pretend, at least, that you want your life back. Pretend that you believe it's possible. I can't promise you that life would revert back to normal, but you must see that he didn't steal everything from you. Nothing he fed you corresponds with real events, Obi-Wan. He invented new memories, but he did not replace the old ones. He couldn't get in that far. There was something inside you blocking him, even when you thought you had abandoned everything. For what little he knew, there was so, so much that he did not. That evening you and I shared at the Ball, the missions we've been on, the day I took you as my padawan-- they're all safe, Obi-Wan. They're still yours."

He pulled Obi-Wan's padawan braid from the pocket that had housed the glove. Staring at it sadly, he handed it to Obi-Wan, who stared at it morosely. It symbolized everything they'd lost: the bond, their happiness, their security together. He wished that it could be reattached, rewoven seamlessly into the whole it had been.

Obi-Wan's mouth opened in a gasp. "What made you keep this?"

Qui-Gon smiled sadly. "What wouldn't make me keep it? It was a part of you, Obi-Wan. It was the thing you would have given me the day you were knighted. It represented you, and everything we had."

Sighing, Obi-Wan repeated, "What we had." He stared at the braid, lying limply in his hand next to the glove. He saw it as what they'd lost, but to Qui-Gon, it was the joy they had shared.

Obi-Wan touched the warm, soft leather of the glove and remembered that night, remembered his disappointment that he could not go to the Ball, remembered bracing himself for a dull night in their quarters as he stitched up filthy cloaks and oiled their boots. Then Othaina had arrived. For no other reason than because she could, she had sent him with a stolen invitation to the Presidential Ball.

His hand closed around the glove and braid. He had fallen in love that night, hard and with unshakeable certainty. He had kissed his master for the first time, terrified and thrilled that he might be discovered. That same terror and thrill shook him now, though how he feared and welcomed the happiness that had eluded him since after Lasyc Four.

The padawan realized slowly that the memories he held of the Ball had remained his alone. Bane had never seen them, never known, and so they remained untainted. The idea was so precious and bright that he nearly broke under it. For all of Bane's terrible intelligence, his hold on Obi-Wan's mind was slipping away. Now, Obi-Wan felt the weight easing from his heart because of it. Here was his truth, his trust, the first of many: that shining night that had brought him into his master's arms, the night that had lain untouched in his memory, unnoticed until now.

Obi-Wan's heart filled to aching as he looked at his master, watching with a forlorn smile on his face. He could see the last threads of Qui-Gon's hope, and Obi-Wan saw with new eyes the man who had come every day for so long now, beginning the instant he'd been granted access and never stopping even when Obi-Wan deliberately hurt him.

"Master," he breathed, shaking his head, an incredulous expression on his face as his voice broke. His eyes filled with tears. "I never--"

A sharp rapping at the door startled the three. "They're coming," Mace said urgently.

"A moment," Qui-Gon said calmly, never taking his gaze from Obi-Wan's. He could see the light straining against the darkness behind his padawan's eyes, waiting.

"You always came even though you know how... how lost I am-- and now this." Obi-Wan whispered, looking at Qui-Gon.

"No," Qui-Gon said at once, catching Obi-Wan's hand and squeezing it. "I love you. I am not willing to lose you. Your heart was never taken, only your mind. You retained what you needed to keep from being turned completely."

Now they could hear the beginning clatter outside the room as Council members and guards poured into the hallway, demanding that Mace stand aside.

"You cannot keep us out, Councilor," the Master Healer said calmly, and Obi-Wan's eyes widened. "It's time to end this pointless dragging on of Padawan Kenobi's struggle with the Dark. Let me pass."

"A moment," Qui-Gon said again, loudly. Through the small window, he could see Mace standing firm, but he knew his friend couldn't last much longer.

Stepping forward, he held out his hand. "Time is short." Qui-Gon shook his head, the reality of what awaited outside the door crashing home. There was a weight to his voice that he was past hiding. The magnitude of his failure as a protector and a Jedi struck him full-force.

"They mean to destroy the midichlorians in your body, Obi-Wan," he said quietly. I should have taken you away. I've failed you yet again, and now it will cost you everything."

Obi-Wan was stunned. "Why would they...?" But he knew. In the Order's view, it was better to be outside the Force than one with the Darkness. Obi-Wan sensed then that Qui-Gon, though it might never have crossed his mind, stood to lose a great deal, much more than just an apprentice. In addition to losing the one he'd wordlessly promised his life to, he would face censure and possibly expulsion from the Order for his disobedience and inability to keep a padawan. While Qui-Gon would willingly leave the Order for him, Obi-Wan knew that he would never be happy again without him. Qui-Gon's padawan was, in his eyes, indeed the key to everything.

Obi-Wan's gaze lifted to Qui-Gon's, suddenly filling with expectancy.

"They won't have a reason to remove me from the Force," he said quietly, scarcely knowing what he meant to do before he was stepping close to his master. Obi-Wan embraced him, wrapping his arms around the master's neck and wasting no time, pressing an insistent kiss to the surprised mouth.

Qui-Gon let his eyes slide closed, his own arms going about the younger man's waist. Hope flared painfully in his heart, even as he could hear Mace's adamancy losing ground outside the door. The kiss was sweet and warm, and it tore at the master's strength. He felt the Dark Force receding almost reluctantly. Gradually, he began to feel Obi-Wan pushing it away, admitting the Light that had waited in the recesses.

The kiss that they had shared days before had frightened Obi-Wan. It had been a kiss borne of need and confusion, and of the search for answers that would not come. But this kiss... Qui-Gon held Obi-Wan tightly, his mouth moving over the soft, yielding lips under his, tongue no longer questing hesitantly but claiming firmly. This felt as though they had never kissed before, and it carried love in it. Love, warm and real, and Qui-Gon could feel it growing between them, as though Obi-Wan's very lips carried it. Bond or no bond, he could feel Obi-Wan embracing the Light as he embraced his master, yielding to the mouth and the heart that had always captured him so sweetly.

Always. Memories that had held no meaning rushed to the foreground, given a shape and reality in this kiss. Qui-Gon's scent and warmth and solidity were almost overwhelming, filling Obi-Wan's senses. However many memories he had seen or been given, none had reached him, truly, until now.

It exploded in Obi-Wan's consciousness suddenly: a solar flare of Light burning the Dark away, a rush of bright memories of laughter and love, of friendship overcoming fear, of Othaina's irrepressible grin as she'd handed him the gloves, and Qui-Gon's eyes, shining brightly with happiness. Still the kiss went on, breathlessly, lips and tongues lost in each other, hearts beating too quickly, breath coming fast with the knowledge that this, at last, was Obi-Wan's triumph, his homecoming, his return to himself.

But Mace, at the door, was fighting a losing battle.

"Enough!" Yoda said loudly, levitating himself to Mace's height. "Pass, I will, Master Windu." And although Mace's firm, unyielding expression did not change even in the face of the old master, he could do nothing but comply.

The two Jedi were only beginning to separate, small, light kisses replacing the heat of the one great one. Reluctantly but surely, they pulled apart, clasping hands to face the little green master, now descending back to the ground and staring between the two.

"Expected you to try something, I did, Qui-Gon," he said, staring at the two Jedi, who presented a surprisingly united front. Yoda studied them speculatively, gripping his gimer stick. "Gone too far, you have. Face disciplinary action now, you do."

Slowly, a handful of Council members trickled into the room. Yarael Poof and Depa Billaba entered, followed by Mace and Master Yaddle. The small room was filled with Jedi, all of them staring back and forth between Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon. The Master Healer stood off to one side, a hypo in one hand and a bemused look on his face.

Obi-Wan bowed low, then dropped to one knee.

"Master Yoda," Obi-Wan greeted quietly, and Qui-Gon was stunned at the humility in his voice, and the sorrow. "My Master should not be punished, nor should Master Windu. They were only--"

"Our own counsel we will keep on who is to be punished, hm?" But Yoda pressed a small, blunt hand to Obi-Wan's forehead and closed his eyes, then drew back in surprise. He turned to the Councilors behind him.

"Gone is the Dark influence from his mind. Beaten back the Dark, he has." His voice carried something like stunned disbelief, a tone Qui-Gon had never heard coming from the being who was ostensibly the head of the entire Jedi Order.

Master Poof muttered, equally surprised, "This requires the verification of the Consular body." Mutters of agreement went up around him. This was, as far as anyone knew, a completely unprecedented event.

"A quorum we must have," Yaddle stated, but Yoda swiped his stick.

"Enough there are to do a Proving."

Qui-Gon knew to what they referred; it was an ancient ritual, outwardly a simple one, but a well-known requirement that would ascertain that Obi-Wan had recovered himself from the Dark Side of the Force. It was also a very difficult rite, requiring delicately balanced concentration and strength.

Qui-Gon stepped forward. "My padawan has seen enough trial of late. He should be allowed to rest--"

A hand tugging at his made him stop, looking down. Obi-Wan looked up at him, calm in his eyes for the first time since before he'd been taken.

"Let them, Master," he said quietly, and pulled Qui-Gon's hand down to rest against his cheek.

Qui-Gon stifled his worry and knelt. Obi-Wan immediately wove his fingers through Qui-Gon's and looked up at Yoda. "I am ready, Master." He did not know what the Council had in store, but suddenly he knew that this was his last chance. He had marked the presence of the Master Healer and his hypo, understanding that his moments with the Force were numbered if he did not act quickly.

"Hm." Shuffling to Obi-Wan's side, Yoda took the hand that was free. Holding his hand out, he beckoned to Master Billaba.

She stepped forward and took Yoda's hand, crouching down to do so, holding her hand out to the next Councilor. One by one, the small circle of Jedi were joined, with Mace at Qui-Gon's left hand.

Qui-Gon knew what was to follow, though he had never participated in a Proving. Master Yoda would send Force energy through himself to Depa, who would gather that energy and send it, intact, to the next link in the chain. It was a ritual that required peace and concentration, and only those truly centered in the Light could keep the energy from being polluted as it was passed on.

Slowly, the cluster of bright Force energy made its way around the circle. Qui-Gon forced himself calm, struggling to hold back his fear. If his padawan had not fully recovered--

Qui-Gon looked at Obi-Wan, who gazed back calmly, true peace in his eyes. /I am ready,/ they said, and then it was time for Qui-Gon to take up his place in the circle.

Gathering up the energy that Mace passed to him, he held it a moment, then sent it easily to Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan passed it with the ease of one born in the Light, indeed the ease of one who had never tasted Darkness at all, back to Yoda. Suddenly Qui-Gon knew the significance of this ritual: far beyond being a simple test of Obi-Wan's fitness, it was an inquiry into those who had judged him. Everyone in the circle would have been assessed, as well.

Yoda opened his eyes. "Completed is the circle. The Light is untainted." He dropped Master Billaba's hand and Obi-Wan's, moving around to face the padawan, who still knelt.

"Unusual circumstances these are." He raised his voice slightly. "By Consular Order, reinstated to service you are, Padawan Kenobi, apprentice to Qui-Gon Jinn." He squeezed Obi-Wan's shoulder briefly, then turned to the rest of the circle, now letting go of each other's hands and watching with the calm borne of years of training, though the puzzlement was fairly palpable in the small room.

Master Windu made an impatient dismissive gesture; the Master Healer put the hypo away.

Yoda looked at the master and padawan a moment. The Force ran strongly with Obi-Wan once more, as brightly as it ever had. He did not know to what to attribute this miracle other than Qui-Gon's tenacious need to break rules.

"Celebrate we should, but sleep we will instead. A Sithly hour it is."

Master Poof suppressed a sigh. An incident of groundbreaking proportions had just occurred, yet Yoda was dismissing it in favor of his bed. "Master, with all due respect, we have just verified Padawan Kenobi's recovery from the Dark Side. Who was here to perform it? Who oversaw it? We must have an explanation for this."

Qui-Gon rose from his knees, struggling to keep his voice from displaying his sudden impatience to be gone. "Padawan Kenobi 'performed' his own recovery."

The Councilor was hardly convinced, but before he could argue, Yoda broke in again.

"Discuss this tomorrow we will. Out, out." He waved his hands at them as, blinking, they began to shuffle out.

Qui-Gon watched his padawan, the man he had not been with, meaningfully, since V'littan. That time now seemed eons ago. Obi-Wan walked around the quarters now, different thought they were from the ones he'd shared so long ago with his master. He stared, touching things, bringing them to his face, studying them. Everything he experienced had new meaning now in light of his fall and recovery, and he could not shake the idea that it might yet disappear if he turned his head or closed his eyes.

Qui-Gon was overcome by the sight of his padawan wandering aimlessly, looking at surroundings that were anything but that white, textureless void he'd been living in since V'littan. The quarters were more sparse than they ever had been-- everything they'd owned had been left behind in Qui-Gon's haste to return to Coruscant-- but Qui-Gon had picked up a potted plant here and a book there in a desperate attempt to claim the new quarters as his. He had insisted, demanded even, that they give him a master/padawan suite, and he'd suspected that Yoda had pressed the accommodations unit to defer. No one had ever believed Obi-Wan would actually come home. No one except Qui-Gon.

"I have some tea, if you like," Qui-Gon offered, somewhat at a loss in the face of Obi-Wan's newness.

Obi-Wan nodded almost absently, moving toward the kitchen. "Yes, tea."

He stopped, puzzled, and looked at his master.

"This is real, isn't it? I'm here; we're in the Temple. I am a Jedi. I'm not being sent away."

Qui-Gon nodded. "It is real." He paused, and moved closer to Obi-Wan, still concerned about upsetting the delicate emotional balance they had created. Gently, he placed a hand on his padawan's shoulder.

"There was a time not so long ago that you no longer wished to be a Jedi, Obi-Wan. You have a lot to consider now, more so than many ever face. I ask you this now as your master, not for an answer, but to give you one thing more to think about: Is this what you want?"

Glancing away, Obi-Wan placed a hand over the one on his shoulder and whispered, "The memories are all still wrapped together in places. I might be a long time picking them apart, and some of them might never come undone. Master Yoda always says that once you are touched by the Dark Side, it affects your destiny forever." He closed his eyes and shook his head. "Whether that is true or not, I cannot fulfill my destiny anywhere but here." Opening his eyes again, he added, "With anyone but you."

Gratitude flooded the master's heart. There was still a long road ahead, a bond to be forged again, trust to be rekindled, and memories and nightmares that would need to be handled with delicacy and compassion. There would always be the matter of Bane's insinuation into his mind. It could not be undone; it could only be dealt with.

Qui-Gon pulled Obi-Wan close and wrapped his arms around the still-too-slender body. "I am so glad you are here, my Obi-Wan," he breathed against his padawan's hair before considering that perhaps this might be still too overwhelming. He began to pull back, but Obi-Wan held him there.

Sighing into his master's shoulder, Obi-Wan clutched his robes. "Sometimes I look at you and I still see what the Sith put there. I ask your forgiveness for the things I've said, Master."

Qui-Gon shook his head. "If that is what you need, then you have it, but there is nothing to forgive."

As if he hadn't heard, Obi-Wan whispered, "I can't believe you remained with me. I accepted the Dark Side, and yet you stayed."

He turned his face toward Qui-Gon's, and they were a scant breath apart when the master whispered, "I could do nothing less than stay with you, Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan caught his master's lips with his own, wishing the bond were still there, wishing he could undo his own weakness and defeat in the face of so many lies. But those were self-destructive thoughts, he knew, and he released them to the Force. He wished he still felt as secure and centered as he had during the brief proving ceremony, but he knew that true stability within himself would be a long time coming.

Qui-Gon cradled his padawan's head, his lips softly brushing Obi-Wan's. The younger Jedi clung to him, almost desperate to replace the memories of the Sith's touch. Even without the bond, Qui-Gon was well aware of what Obi-Wan was trying to do.

"Please," Obi-Wan breathed against the kiss, "take it away."

Pulling back, Qui-Gon shook his head. "Obi-Wan... I wish it were so simple."

"Then just be with me, Qui-Gon."

Slowly, tea momentarily forgotten, they moved together. Obi-Wan held Qui-Gon as though he feared his master would disappear, clinging with fists full of tunic as they kissed. Qui-Gon accommodated him, holding him tightly, staying close but keeping his distance, afraid to put pressure on his padawan. But Obi-Wan clung desperately, trying to ignore the remembered flashes of the Qui-Gon that Bane had created in his mind.

"Talk to me," he pleaded softly, fighting his growing fear of the past. "I need to hear your voice."

Qui-Gon kissed him gently, then whispered, "I am not that one, Obi-Wan. I never was. I have loved you from the beginning. I would no sooner hurt you than myself, and that I failed to protect you will be something I must live with until I join the Force. But I am so grateful that you're here with me... so grateful."

His voice had a gentleness that stunned Obi-Wan. /I nearly threw this away,/ he thought, and a deep sigh escaped him as he tried to hide his pain. Qui-Gon was instantly soothing him. He cradled his padawan, stroking his hair, kissing his forehead, using soft, constant, gentle touches. Obi-Wan did not speak; he was not sure he could. He sought to release the fear, but it was not going easily.

The master understood, and remained quiet for a while. After a few moments, he said, "Obi-Wan, you must believe me when I tell you that I would be here, Dark or Light. It makes no difference to me."

Shaking his head, Obi-Wan closed his eyes. "Respectfully, Master, I don't think you realize what you're saying, but it means everything to me that you believe it."

Qui-Gon wanted to clarify, wanted to explain that he had so much faith in his padawan's heart that he knew they could beat back the Dark together. Even had it been a question of following him, Qui-Gon knew now that he would have been willing. He decided this was a topic for another night, though, perhaps one in which the need for closeness and comfort was not so pressing.

He kissed Obi-Wan again. In response, Obi-Wan immediately pulled his master to him, making fists in Qui-Gon's tunics in spite of the lightness of the kiss. It was undemanding, a way for Qui-Gon to grow to feel his lover again without benefit of the bond. After a few moments, the master pulled back reluctantly.

"Slowly," he said, and Obi-Wan nodded, but then immediately shook his head.

"I want us back," he said quietly, sliding his hands into Qui-Gon's tunic, just to feel that warm skin under his touch again. "I want all of that gone. I want to be myself again, before I ever learned to be afraid of you." The words stung as he said them, but Qui-Gon only made a soft sound and stroked his hair.

"That will never be gone," Qui-Gon said sadly, "but you will overcome it. I'll be right here to help you."

Obi-Wan nodded, wanting to believe. He pulled back after a few moments, smiling as best he could.

"Tea?" he asked, and Qui-Gon replied with a faint smile.

They sat for a while at the common room table in silence. Qui-Gon couldn't remember the last time he'd felt content simply to be. He realized only then the depth of the danger he'd been in. Had Obi-Wan continued to hover between Dark and Light, Qui-Gon would have felt too drawn to resist; he would have sunk into the same state of despair Obi-Wan had found, if for no other reason than they could not find the love that had bound them so firmly before. They were connected, bond or no, and that would never change.

Almost as though he'd felt Qui-Gon's certainty, Obi-Wan started to speak. He began haltingly, abruptly opening the tale of how he'd been taken, knowing that Qui-Gon knew it all from the healers. He told of his initial thoughts that he could solicit help from one of the farmers, and then of Bane's first appearance. He grew shaky in his relaying of facts then as he remembered the terrible, overwhelming pain. Qui-Gon sought to stop him, but Obi-Wan knew that he would never transcend Bane's ghost unless he told the entire tale directly to the man who had saved him.

When he was done speaking of the events Qui-Gon had seen and heard about, Obi-Wan told of the emotions he'd locked away all these months. He spoke of his desperate, inadmissible need for Qui-Gon to retrieve him or run away with him, and his desperate fear that even that, even a return to the Light, would never help. He told of all of the nights he'd lain awake, wishing for the love that he feared he would never get back, only to have his wishes swept away before dark nightmares.

Neither of them knew when it had been that Obi-Wan moved close enough to become wrapped up in his master's arms, but suddenly he was there, his mouth against Qui-Gon's in a demand for connection. Qui-Gon responded, instinctively pushing love to the blank space where the bond had been before he remembered he did not have that luxury.

"Tell me what you want," he breathed against Obi-Wan's cheek, planting small kisses on a path to his jaw.

"I want us back," Obi-Wan said, a refrain. "Burn away the memories, at least for a while." He stood and extended his hand, and Qui-Gon took it, following him into the bedroom, pausing in the 'fresher to retrieve something Obi-Wan could not see. Obi-Wan stretched out onto the bed, waiting, half-expectant and half-afraid.

Qui-Gon untied his tunics and pulled them off, then removed their boots and lay down. He longed to cover Obi-Wan's body with his, to profess his desire never to see his lover out of his sight again, but was mindful that it might yet be too much, too soon.

Obi-Wan sighed and shifted closer, then thrust one leg between his master's, wrapping it around Qui-Gon's calf and pulling the lean body against his. He pressed close until he was almost burrowing himself in Qui-Gon's warmth, and breathed deeply of the scent of skin and hair and heat that he only now realized he'd needed all along.

Memories, carried on that scent, were jostling into place. They interlocked and folded themselves together in a way that could not be displaced again, Obi-Wan knew. The body against his felt alien and yet familiar. He had come to know Qui-Gon's shape, his touches, every scar and swell of muscle intimately, but that had been just over eight months ago. Now the padawan felt strange: his life had made so little sense since just after Lasyc Four, and now with answers flooding in he felt as though he was only beginning to understand himself and the warm reality of the man next to him.

Fear gripped him. How could he be assured of anything again? Obi-Wan stared at his master and brushed away a strand of hair that had caught in his beard. Qui-Gon was the same man, only tired and too thin. But those blue eyes gazing into his were the same as he'd always known. Obi-Wan simply looked, waiting for them to change, afraid they might become the dark, angry eyes of the master in his enforced memories.

"Remind me of who you are," he said, his voice urgent.

Qui-Gon kissed him hotly, cupping his face firmly. Obi-Wan could feel the tense desire lurking beneath the kiss, barely restrained. He claimed his master's mouth firmly, driving his tongue between Qui-Gon's lips, dragging out an almost involuntary moan. Qui-Gon tasted his padawan's desperate need to reconnect and responded with his own. They clung to each other tightly.

Immediately Obi-Wan climbed over Qui-Gon, straddling his hips and pressing himself downward, kissing greedily. He pulled back only long enough to breathe, "I want this. I want you. I want us back."

Qui-Gon pulled him down hard, fingers digging into the tunics between them. Obi-Wan lost all patience and yanked them off, hearing something tear and not caring. He remembered the desperate need he'd felt on Lasyc Four to wake his master from that terrible sleep, and now it was as if he waited to be awakened himself.

But he didn't want to wait any longer, and his own sudden need pulsed too strongly for him to keep it at bay. Rising, he moved down Qui-Gon's body and parted the long legs. He leaned far over his master's body to reach the place where Qui-Gon had always kept the oil, to find nothing there. Qui-Gon reached over the edge of the bed and held up a small bottle of bath oil in a scent Obi-Wan had once liked.

"It's all I have," he said quietly. Obi-Wan stared a moment, stunned, before he flung himself over his master again, devouring.

Obi-Wan pulled back and looked into the blue eyes that reflected his desire. There was no anger, no censure, none of the things he had seen in the visions, only a half-mad need for reconciliation.

Qui-Gon whispered, "Now," his own breathing coming quickly and his own wants visible in his eyes. He spread his arms out, palms down on the bed: an offering. Obi-Wan kissed him again, fumbling with the oil in his haste. Kneeling upright, he uncapped it and squeezed a bit onto his now-shaking fingers. More than once, he looked up to his master for confirmation that this was, indeed, what he wanted.

Slowly, he trailed his slick fingers down Qui-Gon's erection to the entrance to his body, then massaged in small circles until Qui-Gon was breathless and pleading. Obi-Wan's eyes grew bright at the sounds: pleading. His master. Panting in need for him, his body relaxed in complete, utter trust. Qui-Gon was waiting, too, to be awakened from the nightmare of the past months, to be brought back to that time on V'littan before they had ever been separated-- perhaps even to be brought back to that time before Obi-Wan had lost all memory of himself.

Obi-Wan stared down at the long body in front of him, memorizing it. He studied the way Qui-Gon's nipples hardened under his touch, the way his ribs rose and fell with his breathing, the paleness of his skin and the thinness of the muscles that had only seen the barest of keeping since their return. Obi-Wan suppressed a wave of worried longing and drew on the hunger he knew Qui-Gon was feeling. Bending to kiss his master's stomach softly, he pressed a finger inside him, moving it gently.

"Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon groaned, opening his eyes and looking at his padawan, unable to believe that they were here together. He was afraid to find he was dreaming, afraid now to awaken from the nightmare for fear it would still be going on around him. His erection flagged, his fear suddenly at the fore.

Obi-Wan saw. "No," he said, the word coming out as an order. He added a second finger, pushing it inside quickly, pressing and twisting. Qui-Gon shouted and gripped the bed linens, head thrown back, hair fanning over the pillow. His mouth was open and his chest heaved unevenly with his sounds, in time with Obi-Wan's movements. He cried out when Obi-Wan withdrew his hand; neither was able to wait any longer.

"I want us back," Obi-Wan gritted out again.

"Yes," Qui-Gon hissed, and Obi-Wan was lost. Qui-Gon made a harsh noise when Obi-Wan pressed against him and pushed forward. The master reached down to the small of Obi-Wan's back and gripped him, pressing his hips up and taking his padawan in.

Obi-Wan sighed raggedly, overwhelmed by the heat, too overcome by the searing pleasure and the noises Qui-Gon was making. His thrusts became quick and hard, and his master angled his hips upward in time with him, almost arching off of the bed. Obi-Wan caught his meaning and took the long legs over his arms. Qui-Gon wrapped his hand around his erection, his movements directed by Obi-Wan's thrusting. The rhythm built fast, too fast, but they were helpless, caught up in it, searching.

"Mine," Qui-Gon breathed, and Obi-Wan sobbed a "Yes" in response.

The vow sent Obi-Wan careening over the edge. With a broken, half-screamed cry, he came, thrusting hard, and Qui-Gon's release followed immediately behind his. Finally, the master let go of his own tears after so many months of half-buried fright.

Obi-Wan sank over him, sobbing into his shoulder. Crying openly together, they alternately mourned and rejoiced what had been lost and regained: time, togetherness, emotion, as well as their love, thanking the Force and each other that their paths had not led them too far apart to reunite.

Gradually, tears subsided to calm, slow breathing, and Obi-Wan rose and padded to the 'fresher, still sniffing. He came out with enough tissue paper for both of them, and Qui-Gon couldn't help but chuckle at the picture they must have presented: both Jedi, rescuers of the galaxy at large, rendered teary-eyed, sniffling and grinning in mingled embarrassment and empathy.

When they had calmed again, Obi-Wan leaned his head onto Qui-Gon's shoulder and said quietly, "I know the bond is gone, but... will you meditate with me, Master?"

Qui-Gon closed his eyes, the words filling his heart. "Nothing would make me happier, my Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan hit the chime on the door and waited a moment. When it finally opened, he savored the stunned look and the grudging smile before he said quietly, "Hello, Othaina."

Othaina threw herself into his arms, squealing. "Guh! You boy! You didn't tell me you were coming!"

He laughed a little. "You mean there's something you didn't already know?"

Pulling back, she studied him critically, then fingered the stub of hair at his temple.

"I hear you been a pill," she said quietly, looking at him, and then threw her arms about him again. "And your master?"

"He's fine," Obi-Wan told her as she pulled him into the quarters by the hand, sitting him down on the sofa. She watched his eyes darken as he amended, "As fine as he can be."

"And you?" Othaina's brown eyes searched his face.

Obi-Wan glanced away. "Nothing's simple anymore," he said. "There's no black and white, it's all shades of gray."

Othaina looked away, too, then down at her hands. "Maybe lighter shades of gray then?"

He smiled mirthlessly. "Lighter shades of gray. Yes."

They sat together in silence, and Obi-Wan reflected privately that she, too, had gone untainted by the Sith's influence: none of his memories of her had been touched by his manipulations. He smiled faintly, this time with true happiness. For all his fear that he'd been left with nothing, Obi-Wan found that he still had a great deal.

After several moments, Othaina cleared her throat. "Maybe it'll get lighter as time goes," she said, and looked at him again.

He took her hand and wound his fingers through hers, smiling with his eyes and thinking of his master. "I think it will."

End.

(Only one more installment!)