Master Apprentice
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XXIX
Obi-Wan walked quietly across the Rotunda floor. He stirred the lump beneath the blue velvet on the floor with one bare toe. They had taken Qui-Gon away and he felt as though he had been spilled over a cliff. Aware of nothing but Qui-Gon's fading presence in his mind and his heart, he was so intent on grasping its shadowy trail he had not heard the thunder of footsteps. He had not heard Maera's clipped orders, Mace's bellowed directives, the low hum of the gurney and the life-support droids around them. He roused from his trance only when they tore the tall body from his arms, bearing Qui-Gon away to the Infirmary. No one paid much attention to him in all the confusion. Within moments, he was left on the floor, staring blankly at its intricate tiles, all but invisible to the frantic rogue forces gathering around their fallen leader.
He looked down at the pile of fabric again. They had covered the small, desiccated form with its own sea of material to be collected later by those on morgue duty. Obi-Wan cocked his head to one side, staring down at it with icy eyes. He restrained a childish impulse to kick it and walked away to look out of the huge windows. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew who lay beneath that familiar robe, but it didn't matter. He was still straining after Qui-Gon, an almost physical effort making the tendons in his neck pulse.
Something nudged against his bare foot and he gave it a little boot. It clacked gently against the window and he glanced down.
Qui-Gon's lightsabre.
A low sob caught in his throat as he bent to retrieve it, his fingers trembling along its polished length. His chest constricted but the tears would not come. He was all out of tears.
There were voices in the hallway and he slid behind a pillar, clutching his prize, quivering and wary as a cornered animal.
Sounds were rushing over the bow of the boat and Maera was clutching his hand so hard it hurt and his stomach felt tender and he shook his head when one of the tall warriors offered him a piece of bread. It was dark and cold and the wind was sharp against his face and Maera kept squeezing his hand and it hurt where her nails dug in and he bit his lip because his stomach was queasy. The air was salty and smelled rotten and the boat was rocking and his stomach felt worse and he was leaning over the side and he was sick and Maera wouldn't let go of his hand and the wind whipped the sick back into the boat and made them wet and one of the warriors laughed and wiped his face clean and then it was funny-dark with spots all over and Maera's nails hurt digging into his hand and then he couldn't feel them anymore and the dark spots got bigger...
Obi-Wan slid down in the shadow of his pillar and listened to Mace Windu talking softly to someone. His voice was calm, droning on about the fleet and targets and positions. The Republican Fleet was coming from Dantooine and Mace was talking to Jax on his comlink in a worried tone. Obi-Wan clutched the lightsabre to his chest, his eyes bright in the shadows, listening.
He heard the low voice drop and reached out with all his senses to pick up the words; the coordinates of the incoming reinforcements, the name of the leader, the position of the Republican Fleet.
He knew what he needed to do.
Silent as a ghost, he hugged the shadows of the corridor and made his way to one of the side entrances. He pulled the hood of his cloak up and walked quickly through the plaza. It was early afternoon and there were few people milling around the huge pots of flowering plants and shrubs. The usual crowds of Temple initiates, servants and Masters were all secured within the complex, leaving only a few curious citizens to stare at the lofty towers and glittering glass corridors in awe. Obi-Wan attracted no attention at all in his dark cloak and simple robe. He was merely another onlooker or perhaps a Temple guest moving through the public thoroughfares.
He went swiftly and quietly to one of the transport docking pads. The pilots of the short-transports seemed so big to him. He bit his lip in dismay, squeezing his eyes shut. This was not a good idea. How was he ever to get where he needed to go?
Through the sun-reddened dim behind his eyelids, he could feel Qui-Gon, his presence a wavering beacon. He remembered a smile, a wave of the big, broad-fingered hand; the way that people always seemed to do what his Master wanted them to do. The smile in his mind grew a little wider.
// Trust yourself. //
He took a deep breath and walked up to one of the pilots.
"And what can I do for you? Need to get somewhere? "
The man's voice was bored. Obi-Wan looked up from under the hood. His right hand gestured so slightly, the other hidden beneath his sleeve, gripping hard on his Master's sabre.
"You will take me to Quadrant 4-Q, dock 783J."
"I will take you to...."
Obi-Wan settled himself in the small aircar, breathing out a silent sigh of relief. He had done it. He watched the glittering lines of traffic rise up to greet him and forced himself to calm, finding his centre and letting it slip around him like the widening rings of a pebble tossed into a pool.
The little aircar stopped and hovered to Syrene's docking-tube.
"You will go back to port. You did not see me."
Obi-Wan turned to sneak a glance over his shoulder as the aircar sped away into the thin atmosphere. He grinned to himself and laid his hand against Syrene's golden door.
/ Please open for me. Pleasepleasepleaseplease. / he thought frantically, holding his breath. He let it out in an explosive exhale when the doors slid open and he was safe in her gilded belly.
It felt strange to walk her narrow corridors by himself, listening to the soft hum of the docking mechanisms as he climbed towards the bridge. He nearly tripped over one of his high-soled sandals, lying forgotten in the hall near the Common's doorway. It had probably been there for months, kicked aside after Xaennon. Obi-Wan took a long, shuddering breath. He should be frightened at what he was planning, but he only felt a dim excitement that made his fingers cold and his cheeks hot. He slid into the high command chair and laid his hand onto the rippling golden console.
Above them in the chapel, there was the humming sound of chanting in the old tongue that sounded like the hum of starting engines in Syrene's golden hull and the warriors had told them to keep quiet but he wanted to laugh and caught his sister's eye in the flickering torchlight. She grinned at him back at him.
// M'era? Silly, aren't they? //
She put her finger to her lips and he shook his dark hair out of his face.
// Why? They canna hear us. //
// 'Gon, hush up! Don't make me laugh! //
Her face twisted and she pressed his hand against her mouth trying not to giggle and the chants rose and fell above them in the cellar where they were hidden and there were spiders weaving pretty webs in the corner that he showed her and they were glad because it was warm and they were safe for the moment...
Maera watched the controls of machine wavering, the needles jumping and twitching in their circled orbs. Qui-Gon was so still, only his eyelids' minuscule movements betraying any life at all. She could feel his dreaming deep in her own mind as she used to when they were children. He wandered from past to present, locked behind adamantine shields that only she could penetrate. His heartbeat was too slow, his brainwaves jumping erratically. The broken knee was only a footnote in the catalogue of injuries that had torn his body. Whatever that thing had done to him, it had ripped through him physically and psychically. He was drifting away in dreams and didn't hear her calling and calling to him. He didn't hear anything at all.
// Obi-Wan!! // Syrene's metallic voice was faintly surprised. She almost sounded sleepy, as though he had roused her from a doze. // Ready for take-off, bright one. //
How many weeks had it been since he had sat in this place, reluctant to leave her to change his clothes and walk back into his old world? It seemed like a lifetime or two. His palm tingled at the familiar feeling of her metal heartbeat pooling around his hand. He opened his mind, heard the engines begin to purr and the great, fragile wings opened to speed them away into space. He gave Syrene the coordinates and her momentary silence spoke loudly in his mind. When she did speak, her voice was low with concern.
// Are you sure you know what you're doing, laddie? //
"Yes, I do. I have to, Syrene. Please don't fight me. It's for him. He's hurt. "
// I know. I felt it, can't you? //
He could. There were rings of darkness around the Qui-Gon-of-his-heart, the glowing green presence playing hide and seek in his consciousness.
// Master? I love you. // He sent the thought out wistfully, then turned his attention back to piloting the little ship through the currents of Coruscant's outer orbit.
// I love ya. // He remembered Auntie's smell, warm of hay and long hair washed in rosemary and the feel of her arms around them both and he felt safe, even though he knew she wasn't Mam, that Mam had gone away forever, but she was warm and Cousin Jerax would be there soon to take them further away. The Finders would never get them and Mam would know, wherever she had gone and he and M'era would be safe and the wind would stop making that funny rushing sound that reminded him of Syrene's drives pushing against heavy currents and the static of the comlink echoed like the crackle of dry hair next to the fire....
Obi-Wan activated the comlink and let his fingers punch in a code while he thought of his Master and the reinforcements. He waited until there was a splutter, a squawk and finally, a voice.
"Aye. Ranac here. Who is this?"
Obi-Wan closed his eyes. He thought of his Master. He thought of his Master's voice, of the shape of the vowels as they bubbled up through his Master's throat; the lilt of the consonants and the music in the sound of his Master's words.
"Qui-Gon here. How close are ya?"
"Close. Na more than a standard hour. "
"Meet me at 199.77 X35. Be ready. Full battle array. Republican Fleet. I'll bring 'em in for ya."
"Aye, sir. Ya need help, sir?"
"Nah. Just be ready. Over."
Obi-Wan was shaking. He pressed one hand over his mouth, hardly able to believe that the sounds had come from his own throat. He hoped that the reinforcements did not have voice recognition.
// It's all right. You even had the wavelength down pat. Sneaky little bastard it is that you are! //
Could a ship giggle? If so, he was sure Syrene was laughing at him. He permitted himself a smile and felt as though it would crack his face.
Obi-Wan sensed the Republican Fleet ahead of him long before it showed up on the viewscreen. His hand remained steady on the console even as his lips quivered and his whole body was drawn taut in anticipation. As the little ship approached, he dropped her down below the Fleet and slammed the shields up to battle density.
// You ready, Syrene? //
For a breathless moment, he paused, staring blindly at the viewscreens. The Fleet seemed enormous, stretching out before him like a sea. He hunched down over the console and darted up to emerge between two of the big ships, firing the torpedoes in all directions.
The mare was nearly worn out, her flanks spattered with foam, heaving with the strain. He urged her forward into a full gallop, twisting in the saddle to signal his men and raised the bow, taking careful aim at the gaudy uniformed leader. Always take out the leader first. It leaves the rest to flounder. Obi-Wan,can ye hear me? M'era? The mare stumbled and he pitched forward into darkness....
Obi-Wan dove back down to a safe distance, firing up into the huge hull of the leading ship. The air above was electric, splashed with fire that sent shards of orange light in all directions. Four of the big spacecraft drifted now, helplessly crippled as the rest struggled to maneuver in their tight formation. Syrene was a hummingbird pecking at a flock of lumbering jackdaws, all seventeen turrets blasting a continuous barrage of deadly damage as Obi-Wan steered her in and around the big ships. He was screaming at the top of his lungs, shouting obscenities in every language he knew, all the terror and rage of the Guardhouse bubbling up through him as he savaged the Fleet.
The lead ship exploded into a ball of fire, taking five more out with it and the boy's face was a mask of triumph, teeth bared, his whole body shaking convulsively as he dropped back down, narrowly avoiding a flaming tongue of blaster fire.
"DAMN YOU FUCKING ASSHOLES!! C'MON!! C'MON YOU JUST TRY AND GET ME YOU ROTTEN SON OF A BITCH. EAT THIS YOU PRICK!!!"
Syrene swerved sharply and he nearly fell out of the chair.
// Laddie, stay with me. Obi-Wan, bright one. Stay with me. //
A fierce calm overtook him and he nodded grimly. "I'm here...I'm right here. Up and to the left."
He guided the little craft to a small pocket between another four destroyers, daring them to fire on him. The tsunami of vicious curses continued, now a savage whisper between his teeth. His eyes were glittery as he opened fire again in a 360 degree arc, then darted away to attack the rear of the Fleet, leading them inexorably towards the reinforcements.
Maera was gripping her brother's limp hand, her small face pinched into a worried frown. He was still as death, his weather-tanned face almost grey-white. Even the tiny flickers of his eyelids had ceased, his breathing so shallow no one except she could have seen it at all. His shields were falling away now, like the layers of an onion peeling back to leave him vulnerable as he had not been since early childhood. Past and present had merged in his drifting mind, memories rising to connect with the now in no discernible pattern that she could sense. No one could find the boy. Maera had sent for him but he was no where to be found and she very much feared that her brother would breathe his last without Obi-Wan at his side.
"...just a little more. A little further..." Obi-Wan hissed at the viewscreen. He could sense Ranac's reinforcements. They would be within range in moments. The Fleet lumbered after him, struggling to get off a shot without hitting their own. He danced in and among them, daring them to fire, pausing for tantalising moments to aim another volley, then flit away like a taunting gnat. His voice whistled between his teeth, a soft litany of curses and jibes pouring out of him, taking with it the accumulated bile of rage and pain and suffering.
There. There they were, just a speck on the screen, growing larger with every move. He flew like a deranged insect among the huge ships, distracting them, keeping them focused on his stinging assault as the trap began to spring around them.
There were dirty patches of snow piled up outside the hut but it was warm by the fire and his face felt hot. M'era found a friend and played by herself in the corner while he stared at the fire and wondered how long it would be before Cousin Jerax came back and took them away from the big men who sat at the table, smelling of whiskey and grease from their dinner. The door opened letting in a gust of cold air and another big one stumbled into the room, making grunting noises. Maera held out her friend and he grabbed it and threw it against the wall and she was crying, holding the dead rat that had been her friend and he felt the anger rising in him like a storm tide. His eyes felt hot and wide and the firelight flickered and Maera cried for the dead rat that was her friend and the big man was yelling and he stared up without seeing. Then the man was against the wall and there was a streaky stain where his head slid down the wall and his eyes were open but they did not see and Maera still cried, holding the dead rat and he grabbed her hand and pulled her out the door away from the big men who stared at the other one who was looking at nothing...
A sudden jolt threw Obi-Wan forward against the console with rib-crushing force. He gasped at the pain, Syrene's metallic shriek echoing deep in his mind. Her voice was a gibbering murmur as he struggled to maneuver. The port sail was badly damaged and she began to list dangerously. He strained to keep focused on the console, reaching underneath to free the manual controls. Another blast buffeted the little ship and he was cursing fluently.
"C'mon. C'mon, Syrene. We can do this. We can DO it." He reached for the crystal spire controls. "Just one more blast. One more."
He began to sink his mind into the Force, pulling it through him to surround Syrene in a wide, hazy circle.
"If we're going down, I'll take you lot with me, you bastards."
Then conscious thought stopped and the bright ring of Force-energy expanded, growing denser and more brilliant. There was a sharp burst of blue-white light and Obi-Wan sagged forward over the console. There was a dull roar in his ears, a shaking in his limbs, then nothing but the silence of space.
XXX
Maera pried gently at her brother's fingers. They were locked around her hand in a death grip that threatened to break the small bones and it finally took a Force-push to free them. Flexing her aching knuckles, she brushed the sweat-damp hair back from his forehead. He was still unconscious, but no longer drifting dangerously between now and the hereafter. For a horrifying moment, she had felt him drag hold of her mind and tear her into his delirium, expending a huge wave of Force energy, then lapsing into still oblivion. It was the dead of Coruscant's hazy midnight and she couldn't bring herself to leave his side.
Mace, supervising the search teams that tore through erstwhile Senator Palpatine's tower home and keeping order in the captive Senate had felt it as well: a fireball of Force that nearly buckled his knees and pulled at his own energy sources like a huge magnet. Through the darkness of his closed eyes, he had a brief vision of blazing blue eyes searing light outward like a star going nova. Then absolute blackness. He swallowed his worry that what he had felt was Qui-Gon's death, reasoning that Maera would have contacted him. When he did not hear from her at all, he grew concerned enough to put Tryyl in charge of the search parties, leaving the Warrior Guard to mind the Senate and rushed to the Infirmary.
Qui-Gon was not dead, nor was he in imminent danger. He was now locked behind his steel-trap shields in dreamless slumber. He was waiting. They looked at each other in silence and waited with him.
Ranac shielded his eyes from a blue-white blast of rippling energy that tore up and outward into the Republican Fleet. Blinking madly, he strained to see the viewscreen through dazzled eyes. The Fleet froze and seemed to float in a pulsing shimmer of light that quivered and rolled, a tidal wave of pure energy. Like an aurora borealis, it streamed with colour, shading from green to blue, then paled to silver-white and abruptly disappeared. The Fleet disappeared with it, leaving only the crippled Syrene drifting awkwardly in sudden darkness. Ranac groaned and pulled himself up to his knees, dizzy with the Force that had torn through him, dragging him with it, then releasing like a bow letting an arrow fly. "Wha' the bloody hell..." he muttered, turning to his officers.
All were affected, some fallen to the deck, others staring blankly at the now-still viewscreen.
"Wha' was that?" The engineer picked himself up off the floor to struggle into his seat.
"I dunno, but that's Jinn's flagship. Get a boardin' party down there and send the repair ships over."
Two of the big cerusin repair ships closed in on the drifting, golden Syrene, came up from under her, cradling her upright between them. Ranac watched the viewscreen intently as the sentient metal began its welling repairs to her damaged sail. No matter how often he saw this, he never tired of its magic; never wearied of watching the delicate gilded ribs melt into shape, the pale sail's ragged edges flow into wholeness. He smiled and turned to his comlink, delivering a stream of orders in Remwaran.
Obi-Wan heard a babble of incomprehensible gibberish and raised his head groggily. He winced as he moved away from the console, his ribs stabbing painfully. He pushed the chair back and found his left hand locked into the pulsating depression of Syrene's spire.
"Hey, lemme go." he murmured. There was more gibberish and he realised that there was more than one voice.
"Syrene?" // Syrene? Can you hear me? //
He could hear her voice dimly but couldn't understand the words. He sent a pulse of a question to her and nearly fell out of the chair.
// She's damaged. Repairin' her...patient. // The mental voice was definitely another ship, and it was deep, male, its Standard lilting and thick.
Obi-Wan shifted uncomfortably, sucking in a breath at the pain in his left side. He dragged his head up to look at the viewscreen. The Fleet was gone and there was nothing in front of him but space. The sidescreens each showed other ships, too close to be more than magnified portholes and gleaming metal. He could feel the pull of the golden vessel through his mind and his hand and let her tap into him, too exhausted to stop the flow.
The last thing he remembered was his suicidal initiation of the spire at wide-range. Then something had happened. He had felt a crackle of energy in his mind, then he seemed to fly upward although he knew he was still crumpled over the console. He had felt Qui-Gon. It was almost a physical feeling, but more, as though his Master was not only holding him but engulfing him, inside and out. In his mind's eye, he had been lost in the laser-blue eyes that burned into his, his own blazing back until they seemed to ride a crest of eternity, locked together, his hands tangled in Qui-Gon's hair, their souls pouring into one another. Bursts of light exploded around them, wider and paler until they were swallowed in a pillar of shifting brilliance, consumed and consuming. Then it was gone.
Syrene's sucking pull on him slowly ceased, the pooling metal around his hand eased to stillness and he tried to stand up, groaning.
// Obi-Wan? Bright one? You did it. Warrior-child, bright flame... // There was infinite satisfaction in Syrene's soft voice as she drifted away, back to healing communion with the other ships.
He slid down to the deck and leaned against the console, gasping for breath when the bridge door opened.
There were boots, like Qui-Gon's boots, but smaller. There were strong legs in rough homespun, a dark tunic and dark eyes amid darker hair. The beard moved and there were lips.
"Who th' hell are you?"
Obi-Wan felt himself yanked up by one arm and gritted his teeth. He Force-shoved the hand away.
"Don't touch me!!" he hissed, then straightened, his chin up. "I'm Obi-Wan Kenobi, Padawan to Qui-Gon Jinn."
The head of the boarding party eyed him dubiously, wary enough of that push not to get too close.
"Where's Qui-Gon?"
"In the Infirmary at the Jedi Temple. Please take me there." A lifetime of steel etiquette kept his back straight against the pain that laced through him with every breath.
"Dinna give me any shite, boy!! Where's Qui-Gon? Wha've ya done wi' him?"
Obi-Wan watched him with quiet eyes. "I told you. The Jedi Temple."
"Wha's goin' on here? Qui-Gon contacted us."
He raised an eyebrow at Obi-Wan, searching for a way into his mind and coming up against shields of enormous power.
"I need to see Maera Dubh. And I must get to Qui-Gon. Now." It was not a request.
"Oh, ya do?"
The dark man pulled himself up from the far wall in shock. His sarcasm had been met with another Force-shove that left him sprawling.
The young man's green eyes glittered under their lowering amber brows.
"Just do as I say. I'll explain to Ranac on the way."
Mace listened to the increasing roar of the huge Senate dome in dismay. With Qui-Gon unavailable, the situation was becoming explosive and he worried about keeping order. His comlink beeped insistently and he snapped it on.
"What?!" he growled.
"Mace, Ranac's forces are here. We're secure." Jax's voice fairly breathed relief.
"And the negotiating teams?"
"On their way t'ya now. At least they can snow th' politicians f'awhile". Mace could hear Jax' smile and the tension in his shoulders relaxed. Hard as he and Qui-Gon had worked to smooth the tribal warfare among the Rogue Fo rces, they had laboured harder the past twenty years raising a crack group of their most gifted to handle negotiations. It was time to bring in the ringers. Mace punched in Kal's code.
"Kal. It's time. How long before you can get them all together?"
"Not long. A few hours." Kal paused, pursing his lips. "It's been a long haul, hasn't it?"
Mace nodded at his comlink. "It has. The negotiators are on their way. Meet them in the Senate ante-rooms."
Kal smiled out over the darkened city. His double life was finally at an end. For two decades, he had been grooming Padawans, the keeper of the Jedi Creche. All during that time, he and the brightest and best former Padawans had used their talents and their hard-won freedom to create a powerful collective of trained Force-sensitives on Coruscant itself, patiently honing their abilities in social and political mechanics for this moment, when the Temple would be freed and their services necessary to reorganise both Senate and Jedi. The culmination of more than two hundred years of secret organisation, fraught with peril and intrigue, buried so deeply beneath the facile exterior of the Temple's training ground, these were the sharpened edge of the Rogue Jedi's sword. They knew the Senate, the Senators, the endless levels of machinery governing the Republican Alliance. They knew every trade dispute, every dirty deal and secret, and the time had come to use that knowledge, when and where it became necessary. The long years of hiding were finally over.
Obi-Wan marched between his guards, his head covered by his hood, hands buried deep in his robe. His lips tightened against the pain in his side, but he refused to consider asking them to slow down. Ranac had almost believed him, enough to take him down to the Temple under guard in search of Qui-Gon. The leader of the reinforcements still wondered at the voice that had so perfectly imitated their leader, couched in the slim body of a youth whose beard was still an auburn drift of down framing lips still childishly rosy. Obi-Wan's quiet dignity was certainly impressive and Ranac had known that Qui-Gon possessed a Padawan. Still suspicious, it was only when Obi-Wan showed him the emancipation scroll with Qui-Gon's signature and lowered his shields had the young officer sent him back to the planet with an armed guard.
Obi-Wan paused outside the Infirmary doors and was eyed by his watchers cautiously as he took a long breath and bit his lip, hidden beneath his hood. He could feel Qui-Gon's presence but it was dim and dampened. He pushed his chin out and the doors whooshed open for him.
Maera met him at the threshold. She raised an eyebrow at the guards.
"Wha' the hell are you lot playin' at? Got nothin' better t'do?"
They all knew better than to answer her back when she used that tone.
"Obi-Wan, I can just imagine where ya've been. Go on. He's na awake yet."
Qui-Gon lay on the narrow bed, pale and still. To Obi-Wan's eyes, he seemed the sarcophagus of a great, ancient king, a frozen effigy of quiescent power. His face was a carved mask. One eye was covered with a patch of bacta, a faintly pink scar streaking along one cheek down to his chin. His hands lay limp across his chest and Obi-Wan lifted one to his face, feeling the calloused broad fingertips against his lips, his eyes blurring.
"Oh, Master..."
Somehow, he managed to curl himself half-on and half beside the tall, motionless body. His head resting in the hollow of Qui-Gon's shoulder, he clasped the still hand against his cheek and lay there, silent and staring at nothing.
Maera peeked into the room, turned back and gestured to her aide to roll in the second bed. She didn't want to move Obi-Wan yet. Hours before, her aide had tried to pry the boy away from Qui-Gon and received a violent elbow in the ribs for his trouble.
"Poor laddie. He's exhausted." she murmured to herself, reaching out a hand to touch her brother's forehead. Qui-Gon was still deeply unconscious, but it was a healing sleep, one she could sense he shared with his Padawan. She knew Obi-Wan had a few cracked ribs, but they weren't too serious and could wait until he woke naturally. She had no desire to be Force-shoved through the window by rousing him too abruptly. She raised her head, suddenly aware of another presence.
Mace laughed softly from the doorway. "You know, you look exactly like Qui-Gon when you do that. Like a wolf sniffing the wind."
Maera shot him a mutinous look. "Runs i'th' family."
She went into the hallway and collapsed into a chair. "Mace, wha' the hell is happenin'? An' wha' did that lunatic child do out there?"
Mace pulled up a stool and sighed into it gratefully. "The negotiators and Kal's group have called an emergency meeting of the Senate. It'll probably go on for days." He grinned at her, teeth flashing against his dark skin. "From what I can tell, that child is no child at all!! He must have gotten the coordinates eavesdropping on me. Then he got to Syrene somehow---I don't even want to guess---went out there and blasted a big hole in the Republican Fleet. After that, I don't know. Ranac says that Syrene's spire was activated wide-range." He shuddered. "Virtual suicide. Then, pouf, nothing. I felt it, though. It was Qui-Gon."
Maera nodded. "I know. I think he knew wha' was goin' on. Tha' he tapped all of us for the energy. He must've redirected the spire-beam, but tha's impossible. No one could do tha'."
"Don't underestimate him. Or them. Was he conscious?"
She shook her dark head. "I was pulled into his mind an' I saw them both, together. Then it stopped. He's been like tha' ever since."
Mace looked down at his feet for a moment, then back up at her. "Will he be all right?"
Her blue eyes were tired, dark circles around them making them too big in her small, worn face. "I don't know. I think so. The lad's got a few cracked ribs. Seems he did a perfect imitation of 'Gon to Ranac o'er the comlink." She snorted with laughter. "I'd say he's a quick study, aye?"
Mace grinned. "Oh yes! I'd say he is. And certainly not the little pampered plaything. Ranac's field officers said he was darting around the Fleet blasting like a madman." He stretched out his legs and arched to crack his back. "I'll be glad of a rest after all this!"
Maera glared at him. "Rest? Ya think there'll be any rest for you lot now? You've a bloody galaxy to govern an' a Temple to run. You can rest when yer dead!"
Mace stood up and yawned. "True, but I could use a bit of sleep first. What about those two?"
Maera shrugged. "We wait. "
Obi-Wan dreamed. He was clinging to the spire atop Syrene as she floated in a storm-tossed sea. Then he wasn't clinging, he was bound to it and he struggled, screaming uselessly against the roar of the waves. The spray stung his face and he pulled against unseen bonds as the deck rocked violently and the darkness grew and grew around him.
"Obi-Wan." The low voice cut through the wind and the rain.
"Obi-Wan, can ya hear me?" Qui-Gon's voice, warm in his ear and clear as a bell.
"Yes!! YES!!" he was screaming against the the storm, his words caught and spat into the gusts that sent the little ship into flight on the smoke-grey clouds.
"Qui-Gon!! QUI-GON!! MASTER!!" He was sliding up the spire towards the crystal, glowing above his head at a crazy angle, closer and closer until it engulfed him completely and he disappeared into blue-white fire.
Qui-Gon's eyes smiled down into his, their blue depths softer than he'd ever seen them.
"Are you all right now, little one?"
Obi-Wan felt his chin jerk up despite the warmth of being enveloped in his Master's arms.
"I'm not little."
Qui-Gon laughed and lifted his face. "Ya'll always be little t'me."
Obi-Wan's arms crept around his neck. "Wretch."
"Brat." Qui-Gon murmured against his ear. "We've got t'go back. To them."
Obi-Wan shifted closer, twining around Qui-Gon like a vine. "I know. I wish..."
"What do ya wish, my love?"
"What did you call me?" The grey-green eyes were wide.
Qui-Gon smiled down at him. "My love. You are, ya know." Obi-Wan pulled the long hair to meet his Master's lips.
"But will you say that when we're awake? I wonder...."
Qui-Gon opened his one good eye experimentally and blinked like an monocular owl at the light. He groaned softly and dragged himself up to sit against the pillows.
"Well, well. Sleepin' Beastie returns!!" He didn't need to turn to know it was his sister.
"Where is he?"
"I'm right here." Obi-Wan was next to him in a moment, smiling down at him.
Qui-Gon raised a hand to touch the red-down cheek. "Look at ye!!" he murmured in wonder. "When did tha' happen?"
Maera poked another pillow behind him. "It's usual, ya know. Happens over a few days."
He glared at her.
She grinned back at him. "Ya look marvellous. I should get ya one o' those tropical birds t'sit on yer shoulder."
She fled as the pillow hit the wall and Obi-Wan dissolved into laughter.
"Master?"
"Uggnnnnnnnggggh." Qui-Gon stretched hugely, then touched the patch over his right eye gingerly. "I hope tha'll come off soon."
Obi-Wan regarded him critically. "I don't know. I rather like it. It's very...rakish."
"Brat!"
The young man pushed against Qui-Gon gently. "Move over." He sat beside the tall Remwaran, watching him with a slight smile.
"Well, what now, Master? Don't you have an ending to this story?"
Qui-Gon grimaced. "Aye. They spent years and years tryin' to figure out what in hell they'd done and died overworked, underpaid, and unappreciated."
Obi-Wan laughed softly. "Yes, it will be a lot of work, won't it? Why didn't you tell me, you fool! It would have been so much easier." He waved any answer away. "It doesn't matter. The whole Republic to reorganise. The Temple to reclaim."
Qui-Gon rolled over, wrapping himself in his robe and got to his feet. "Ah, that feels better. Can't stand layin' about like tha'."
For a long moment, they stood side by side looking out over the cityscape, its lines of traffic twinkling in the sunlight.
"Tha' was a brave thing ya did, Obi-Wan. Daft, but brave."
Obi-Wan looked down at his clasped hands and smiled, tucking them into his sleeves.
"Thank you, Master. I believe I had help from some delirious lunatic who kept poking ideas in my head."
"Ah, well, ya know, you shouldn't pay too much attention to the semi-conscious. They're na always competent."
Obi-Wan's lips tightened and his shoulders began to shake. He turned and threw himself into Qui-Gon's arms.
"Oh Master!" He didn't have any other words and just clung desperate fingers. // I thought I'd lost you. Then I knew what you wanted. I...I don't know. I just wanted....//.
He looked up at the scarred, hawkish face with its single blue beacon warming into him. "I love you."
The bright eye softened, then closed briefly.
Obi-Wan crested his head against the big hand that slid around to brush the soft fuzz of his hair.
"Do ya miss it, love?"
"What? Oh, that." he shrugged. "I suppose it'll grow back. I miss my braid. "
Qui-Gon pulled him closer, cupping his face. "Why? Why on earth would ya miss that?"
"Because it meant I was yours."
"Ya're not anymore, Obi-Wan. Ya're free."
Obi-Wan smiled softly. "Free? Free of what? Ownership or love?"
Qui-Gon bent and kissed him. The kiss deepened, the youth's arms locked around his neck, then, suddenly, he felt the involuntary stiffness of the slender body. "It's all right, love. There's na hurry f' any o'that."
Obi-Wan nestled against him. "I'm sorry. I don't know why that...."
"Shhhhh...it'll take time. It'll all take time."
Qui-Gon sighed, rubbing his cheek against the ruddy head. Time...perhaps an enemy, as always. He could only hope there was plenty of it. There was so much to do, so much work, so much change. So much love to share with the young man beside him whose journey was just beginning in a world of beginnings. He smiled out at the dazzling traffic. A thousand years ago, he remembered, there had been another Obi-Wan. The story was that he had been the last of the Jedi before the New Jedi Order: the omega before the Empire, before the millenium of hide-and-seek with evil that had brought down the New Republic; its fall, orchestrated, he now knew, by the same evil that created the Empire. It had lain in wait, silent and deadly, biding its time until it created the Mariginata Wars and destroyed the Jedi. It had been clever, playing its cards so deftly that no one had known it was the same evil. It had manipulated and plotted and ruled from beside and beneath. All things end. And this Obi-Wan was the alpha, the first of a new Jedi, an order waiting to be reborn from the twin remains of the old. The social toys and the barbarian warlords would come together to forge, once more, the great order, the dream of another ten thousand years. He was its nativity, its first bright flame.
Qui-Gon tightened his grip around the strong, slender shoulders. His hardest trials were now ahead: the trials of the mind. All the bloodshed and pain of his life had led him to this moment, to this task. He hoped he would be up to the change and the challenge.
Obi-Wan turned in his arms, the late afternoon sunlight sculpting his face with fire.
"Well, it's a far cry from blackmail and raiders, isn't it? Quite a change, isn't it, Pirate?"
Qui-Gon grinned. "Aye, and a change for you, Padawan! Ya game?"
Obi-Wan buried his face against his Master's shoulder. "Just keep holding me and we'll be all right."
The red sun gleamed in the silver of Qui-Gon's beard, in the flame-touched bristles of Obi-Wan's hair, bathing both faces in glorious light, ending one day and beginning a new one. Somewhere, on a fog-shrouded shore there was a tree whispering in a late winter breeze, sending shivers across the midnight lake waters that echoed with the laughter of a youth, mirrored the taut lines of growing limbs, licked at the stones that paved a road long-imagined and hard-won. The wind sighed across the water, waiting for the dawn when the youth would return a man, standing shoulder to shoulder with he whose strength was forged in the hills. The first full moon that heralded spring danced on the ripples in anticipation.
FIN