Master Apprentice Archive Rogue Quick search:

Rogue

by Hilary (padawanhilary@hotmail.com)

Archive: Ask, or Jacynthe Demorae's: http://jdemorae.slashcity.tv/lightsaberissues/index.html

Series: no

Categories: Q/O, Qui-Gon's POV, first time, AU, dark!Obi. Oh gods! It's got a plot!!

Feedback: Dying for it, please. email above.

Summary: And to think all of this could have been avoided years ago if Qui-Gon had just taken Obi-Wan as padawan!

Spoilers/Warnings: Please know this is *not* chan-- Obi-Wan is 20 (even though Q refers to O as a "child"), no spoilers. A couple of warnings are at the bottom of the story for the *very* faint of heart (contains plot spoilers)

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

/. . . / thoughts / /. . . / / bond speak *. . . * emphasis

Dedication: To my own master Jacynthe, who bunnied this for me one night when I had no music, no ideas and no desire to finish something old. The bunny grew the more I fed it.

Many thanks to Triskell, who beta'ed this one. May she forgive my constant sprinklings of commas and my bending the English language around style. Mistakes are still mine.

Notes: It has plot, it's POV, and it's got a marginally dark Obi-Wan who *isn't* Sith and doesn't do bondage. I'm waiting for someone to step forward and press a hand to my forehead. Then again maybe I only did this so our menacing little rogue could have that fabulous long hair again.
 
 

Go to end of story for light warnings and massive plot spoilers.
 
 

I sat bound, arms and ankles, to a chair, blindfolded, unarmed, and stowed inside a small chamber that could only be described as a shielding container. My senses felt muffled and indistinct, though I could hear, and presumably see, perfectly well. The container wasn't painful to be inside the way a Force-dampening device would be to wear, but it was just as effective. I was completely incapacitated.

Trussed and tinned like a fish.

I had come to Ord Mantell to investigate some odd, eddying fluctuations in the Force that had been reported to the Council. It was quite surprising that we'd found them here. If a freighter carrying two undercover knights hadn't landed here for repairs, we might never have known. They had reported in, telling the Council that the energy patterns they had sensed fluctuated between light and dark randomly, and that the source of the energy seemed to be strong.

Ord Mantell has long lain outside the scope of the Jedi since its position on a major hyperdrive thoroughfare has been supplanted by other systems. Since its decline, it has escaped notice. It simply hasn't been a power in decades. I expected to arrive, find an untrained child and leave again, carrying a strong Force-user back to the Temple for training. I vastly underestimated the danger.

If I hadn't so plainly disregarded my own master's admonitions to take a partner, I would have had backup. If I had paid attention to that elusive nagging that told me something was coming, I might have been better prepared. If I had just taken a blaster into the second most dangerous spaceport in the Galaxy, I might have looked like too much trouble to bother over.

But that last speculation didn't fit. I was anticipated. My anonymous captor had known a Jedi was on the way. Worse, he seemed to have known I *personally* was on the way. I heard my own name muttered, nervously, more than once under the breaths of the lackeys who took me. This went quite beyond "don't underestimate a Jedi." I walked into it blind.

I spent my time centering and meditating, as best I could with the little Force I managed to gather inside the chamber. I released my speculations about what might have happened "if." I stretched my hearing out, focusing my will in that direction, out, out. flush against the walls of the containment device.

I sighed, exasperated with myself, then released that, too. It wouldn't get me out of this.

"You left his utility belt with him?" I heard, somewhat muffled as the owner of the voice came into the room. It was a cultured voice, smooth and educated, laced with disgust.

Then a female voice said, "But you said that he wouldn't be able to do anyth---

"I said I was *reasonably sure* he wouldn't be able to. I also told you *specifically* to remove all of his equipment." There was a heavy, long-suffering quality to the voice, as young as it sounded to my ears.

There were muffled scraping noises and curses, and then an annoyed, "Just get out." A door opened, then closed.

There was a pause. I assumed I was being sized up, as it were. Evaluated. Abruptly the Force chamber walls dropped, and I gritted my teeth against the tidal wave of energy crashing into me.

"Better?" My captor asked me, surprisingly sincere, his voice echoing oddly. I remained silent. His Force signature was young --- very young --- and to say that he was Force sensitive would be similar to describing me as such.

He chuckled, a brief huff through his nose, as though he heard me. Abruptly, he released my blindfold, and I kept my eyes closed to avoid being blinded by a sudden rush of light. Gingerly, I tried my vision. The room in which we faced each other was surprisingly dim and quiet, though large.

In fact, it was positively cavernous. It was a main hall in a very large house. The floor was of polished, decorative diamond-checkered green and gray marble. The windows, through which the last of the day's light drifted, were high and arched, muted by long, sheer green drapes. The ceilings were arched, and there was very little furniture, save the chair I was in and a few tables against the walls, between the windows, holding vases.

And in the middle of it all, my dark child of a kidnapper.

He stood in front of me, wearing a simple but expensive-looking dark green tunic and leggings tucked into high black boots. His weight was cocked over one leg, the other extended a little away from him. His arms were crossed and his eyes were sullen and watchful: he expected disapproval, probably in regard to his age, and already had his argument weighed out.

He really looked as though he needed to be attending a wealthy intergalactic business university on Coruscant. Or working as a courtesan. He was *that* attractive, with shoulder-length chestnut hair, bright green eyes, and soft, boyish features. His temerity was amusing: the idea of this wraith of a boy, capturing a great, lumbering Jedi such as myself, was disturbing and laughable at the same time.

"I'm twenty," he told me indignantly, tipping his chin up. I raised my eyebrows at him and shored up my opinion resolutely, then shielded. He would not have appreciated my amusement in spite of my circumstances.

I tried austerity. "I believe this is where you explain to me why I'm here, what you're going to do to me, and what your demands are of the Council."

He narrowed his eyes at me, hardening his entire demeanor with a gesture so minute and instant I thought it must terrify his subordinates. He stepped very close, leaned forward and put his hands on his knees, his face directly in front of mine.

He stared at me a moment. Then he dropped his eyes, taking in my attire, my position in the chair, and quite possibly my physical condition as well. "You're just going to sit there, then?"

I considered explaining the uselessness of untying myself when my adversary was so obviously a Force adept. I considered, also, the ethical implications of using the Force for something so trivial. It was almost a mutual decision between us that it would be ridiculous to say such things to him.

He flicked his hand at me in disappointment and half-turned away. The bonds dropped to the floor. I rubbed at my wrists and shifted my feet away from the legs of the chair. The Force energy that he used to release me was decidedly dark. It swirled about him, vaguely oppressive.

"You always did think too much." He stared at the windows, the small, black, polished tables, the deep violet and crimson flowers in the vases. He was silent a moment, then said, "My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi. You might have heard of me."

I tried to recall the name. It was familiar, but elusive.

"I was picked up seventeen standard years ago in one of your Jedi searches. You yourself found me, Master Jinn." He turned to look at me, waiting to see recognition dawn on my face. I disappointed him again, obviously: I could recall no Obi-Wan Kenobi, and I had been on dozens of searches.

He snorted, faintly disgusted. "I was an initiate until the time limit elapsed. In spite of my Force abilities and my grasp of the Code, everyone looking for a padawan refused me. Including you."

He watched recognition dawn in my eyes, and tipped his head back smugly. "There you go," he murmured, encouragingly.

I could see, then, plainly. "You're thinking to exact some form of revenge."

He put his hands on his hips and drew himself up. "Absolutely not."

I allowed my face to register my puzzlement.

"Oh --- Sith hells," he groused, running one hand impatiently through his hair. "This is ridiculous. Come with me."

I was completely confused, but I rose to follow him. He moved liquidly, completely at ease with himself and his surroundings, directly in spite of the very large Jedi behind his back. It crossed my mind that I could easily take him out at that point, but I was curious by then, I must admit. /Who is he?/

He led me down a short hallway, pointing at doors. "'Fresher . . . Larder . . . Kitchen." I was perplexed as to why he would be giving me a tour of what appeared to be his home. We arrived in a bright white and plastisteel kitchen, very state-of-the-art. Everything gleamed, and I blinked to allow my eyes the adjustment after the dimness of the main room. There were three people working there, presumably on dinner. They were all in white, with snug, white round caps on their heads. The smells drifting out of the pots were amazing.

He sat at the end of a long, bleached wood table and gestured toward the chair nearest his. I looked at him pointedly, questioning, but sat down.

"It's nicer in here. A little noisier, but warmer, and I enjoy the company." I found this incongruous with the darkness he projected, but I remained silent.

One of the cooks wordlessly set a platter of hot, round bread rolls in front of him. He took one up and held it out to me. "Have one," he offered. "It's outstanding."

I took it, bemused. His sudden congeniality was strange, to say the least. I plucked a piece off with my fingers --- it smelled light and fragrant --- and looked at it carefully. It was a white bread, with nothing scattered throughout it, but there was nothing to ensure that it hadn't been drugged, or worse. He noted my hesitation, snorted at me, and took the piece out of my fingers.

"Great Sith, Qui-Gon, must you analyze *everything*?" He put the piece into his mouth, chewed it, swallowed. He spread his hands at me as if to say, /See?/ I pulled another piece off my roll and ate it: it was as tender and sweet as any bread I have ever tasted.

The whole situation was bizarre. I sensed that he was waiting for some kind of concession before he would speak. Not to be sidetracked too far, I set the remainder of the roll on the table. "Am I to be given no explanation for why I'm here?"

He rolled his eyes at me, and I vaguely recalled him being rather fond of that gesture in the crèche; perhaps I was trying too hard to make sense of him.

"You have noticed, I am sure, the apparent difference in our energies," he said dryly.

I nodded, waiting. It was evident that the dark Force was strong with him, and yet there was something hesitant about him that I couldn't place my finger on.

He bit a small piece from the roll in his hand and chewed it thoughtfully, watching me. We regarded each other a moment. I was surprised at his audacity. He was probably surprised at my apparent docility. I was trying to plot a way out; he was trying to anticipate my moves. We were both tightly shielded, speculating on each other.

I could only assume he knew of my mission. Perhaps he realized that he, apparently, was it.

/I am here for a reason; the Force will guide me to it./ I sat back a bit, my hands resting on the table, curled up but relaxed. I opened my stance, to show my compliance. He noticed my acquiescence, and his eyes were inclement with suspicion for a moment before he, too, sat back.

This was the concession he was looking for, apparently. "Good. Now: *this* is where I tell you why you're here."

He paused a moment, and stared through the table as if he were trying to decide what to tell me. I crossed my arms over my chest and watched him. I wouldn't have guessed him to be a day over eighteen. At twenty --- if indeed that was true --- he would legally be considered an adult on most systems, old enough to move about, perform in politics, and indulge in the vices made exclusive to those who have come of age.

There was something about him that was hard and calculating, as though he'd seen a great deal of misfortune and buried it all. I doubted I would hear of that, though. He was not about to divulge anything that I might use.

"I hated AgriCorps," he began, disgust reappearing in his voice. "I hated the very idea of being anything other than a Jedi. Have you any idea how hard it is to establish an agricultural base on a planet that has none? Among people who don't understand it? Have you any concept of what it's like to be in a corps full of laborers, who look at you as-- " He broke off, and waved his hand distractedly, dismissing that line of thought curtly. He looked into my eyes briefly. He tugged another bite of bread loose with his fingers, the way I had, his gesture quick and bitter. "No," he answered himself. "Of course you don't."

He was right: I didn't. I'm sure I never will, completely. But I thought I might have had an idea what he was driving at.

There was a pause while he chewed; he was gazing through the tabletop again. I could tell he was thinking about it, deciding what to say next. He glanced up at me quickly with those green eyes. I was surprised he wasn't better rehearsed.

I gestured around the kitchen, but encompassed the whole of the estate. "You seem to have pulled out of it well enough," I observed, dryly.

He arched an eyebrow at me, and anger sparked in his eyes. "My family has money," he bit out. "A great deal of money. They bought me freedom from the slavery that is a failed Jedi's life." There it was: the canned tone and cultured words that summed up his acrid past and made it palatable. And that seemed to be the end of my background information: he put his bread down and leaned forward on the table.

"I had you brought here," he said then with open eagerness, and his look was frank. His eyes were clear and receptive, and he was checking my reaction. I was surprised, but masked it quickly. There were too many unknowns here; I didn't want to give up anything usable any more than he did.

He sighed at me. "It must tire you to be so reserved all the time," he said, tilting his head and smiling a little. He ate another bit of bread, but his eyes never left mine. "Yes, I have friends, I made arrangements. Manipulated the Force at just the right times . . ." He waved his hand. "You were the only knight appropriate for this mission. Isn't that odd?" His eyes held on to the smile.

I leaned back and folded my hands over my stomach. "Why?"

"I want you to complete my training."

I tipped my head up, stunned.

"I have had enough strength and focus to get by on my own, to expand on what I got from the crèche," he told me. "Now I want the rest of it. I want the fine-tuning, the knowledge. You can give me that."

All I could do was stare, wondering how he thought to manage this. He seemed to draw from Force energy that had no denomination. After he'd spent years working with a segment of the Force that was so apparently dark, I wondered at the implications of my teaching him the way of the Order. Perhaps he needed a master; I thought it might save him, in the end, and others.

This thought made my decision for me. I could not let him continue on his own, no matter how unorthodox the situation appeared to me. But there were other considerations to be made. He claimed to have arranged for me to be sent here, and yet no mention had been made, when I accepted the mission, of training anyone. I was here to pinpoint the source of the Force fluctuations, nothing more, according to my master. Now, it had turned into a veritable kidnapping. I kept my expression neutral as I wondered at the rationale behind it all. Nevertheless, it was plain to me that Kenobi could not be left untrained.

"I will have to contact the Council," I informed him.

His expression changed from mildly expectant to mildly pleased, and I wondered if it tired *him* to be so reserved all the time.

His com unit was large and very impressive. I turned his story over in my mind, and it made passable sense in a selfish, childish sort of way, but there was something misty about it. It was all I had though, and I decided to bide my time.

"Contact them," he ordered me, waving at the com. "Go ahead."

I set the call, and waited. After bouncing through a few channels and relaying repeatedly, I reached my master.

I apprised him of the situation quickly, detailing my capture and strange detainment. He looked bothered, but certainly not alarmed, as I might have expected. I hoped that it was simply because he recognized that I was in no danger. "Grave, this is," he said. "Send a team to bring you back, we can," he said, deliberately, though I knew he was aware that Kenobi was sitting right there.

I glanced over at him. He pointed to a blaster on the console and sighed theatrically, tucking stray strands of hair behind one ear.

"I believe that would escalate the situation, Master," I said into the com, though Kenobi and I both knew that the blaster was purely display: he wasn't about to try to kill me. "There are distinctive dark forces here," I continued. "Although Kenobi does not seem to be completely overcome." I could see where this was heading. It was not in a Jedi's place to walk away from someone who might be retrieved from the dark side. I resisted the urge to sigh heavily. If I didn't say this, my master would, little though I liked it. "If I can set him on the right path, we might circumvent a great deal of pain."

Master Yoda grunted again. "Taken a partner, you should have," he told me, and sighed. "But knew, I did, that you would not." His ears sagged. "Bring him to the Temple, you could," he suggested. "Safer, it would be. For both of you." This last puzzled me, but when I shifted my glance to Kenobi again, he shook his head once, firmly.

"He is refusing."

Yoda sighed again, and there was something inscrutable in his gaze. "Like this, I do not. But set him firmly on the path to the light, you should. Yes, yes."

He paused. I looked at him expectantly. Master Yoda's pauses generally yielded to monumental announcements.

"Done well, you have, Qui-Gon. Sorry I am that we had to put you in that hazardous position. Determine, we needed to, how dangerous he was, how serious."

I was astonished at his words. "Master, I was set up for this?"

"Look at me like that, you should not," Master Yoda groused at me. "Reasons, we have, for what we have done. Train him." He switched off.

I swiveled the chair to face Kenobi, and stood. Whatever was happening here, my role in it was set.

"Obi-Wan Kenobi," I said coolly, suppressing my misgivings, "I take you as my padawan learner."

My initial speculation on Kenobi's apparent reservation seemed completely unjustified as I came to know him.

I was astounded by his abilities. He had managed to pick up a great deal more in the crèche than most, and I puzzled at how he had managed it. His skills, of course, were rough at best. But the *scope* of his knowledge encompassed more than I could have hoped. After I had been there a few days, gauging his abilities with light exercises, I intensified his training and pinpointed his problem areas. He took to the increase in the difficulty and length of the training sessions. He wanted to be knighted as soon as possible. He was not, however, prepared for the amount of work that attaining knighthood would require.

First of all, it seemed to pull much more time than he needed from his enterprises, which seemed to center on meetings with people who arrived unannounced and unplanned-for, and who left just as abruptly. I seldom saw the same person twice, and never spoke to any of them. Kenobi would come out of those meetings ready --- sometimes --- to resume whatever training we had been working on, but it was inexpedient to have our exercises interrupted at odd hours and for unknown lengths of time. The most difficult aspect of this was in the fact that he would often come out irritable, if not downright angry.

Second, as was characteristic of those who worked with the dark actively, his tolerance was very limited. It was only after we had begun his training that I discovered how impatient he really was. Though he was willing to study the philosophies laid out by the Order, he seemed to grow frustrated easily when it came time to work with them. He regarded the Code as largely theoretical, with no practical application whatever. He constantly questioned my judgement in ethical matters and matters regarding emotion and pleasure.

He was a hedonist; sometimes I wondered why he wanted to be a Jedi at all. I did my best to maintain my focus, but found myself becoming increasingly frustrated alongside him. I privately questioned how he had appeared so reserved on the day I had been brought here. He certainly did not maintain such a display as the days turned into weeks.

I asked him, frankly, how he had come to be so familiar with the dark energy he so effortlessly played with. He shrugged. "I work with what comes to me," was all he said. It made the situation seem that much more dangerous to me. He had no idea the strength of the dark forces he was dealing with, and he didn't seem to care.

Permeating all of this was a vague sense of unease. I kept Master Yoda updated on the boy's progress, but he would cut me off when our conversations turned toward my own questions about the situation. Why were we here on Ord Mantell when we should be at the Temple? Why was the very Council allowing itself to be ruled by the judgement of one very obviously immature and impulsive man? Why, indeed, was I able to stay away from my regular duties for such a long period?

Certainly, given the boy's difficulty with the ethical standpoint of the Jedi, it would take a good while for him to attain a state fit for Trials. It seemed very strange to me that I was given no particular timetable where Kenobi's training was concerned, or when I would be required to return to Coruscant. The open-ended nature of the undertaking bothered me.

Nevertheless, Master Yoda insisted that there were no other missions requiring my attention, indeed that there were plenty of liaison teams available to make up for my absence. I trusted my master's judgement, and I trusted the Force. One way or another, I was going to see Kenobi trained. It was my duty.

By the time I had been there two standard months, we had established a reasonable pattern to our days, breaking up the training into manageable but intense sessions. Still, at the end of our training day, I watched him shed most of what I was teaching him, reverting to an attitude of childish indifference to his instruction. He seemed capable of marginal dark Force use without falling, and I constantly struggled with him in regards to this. It was quite disturbing. He had no compunction about controlling the minds of the people around him, and paying off those he couldn't control. He played with the Force, using it for his amusement. We debated incessantly about it: he wanted to be a Jedi knight but he was not willing to make the changes it would take to become one. Slowly, gradually, our debates turned into arguments as my restraint progressively slipped from my grasp.

Once, I caught him sitting at the kitchen table levitating teacups, spinning them in the air. The kitchen help was impressed. I was not.

When I looked at him, I could see the man he might become, if I could only keep him to the light. When he would insist, sometimes vehemently, that he *was* a man, I simply held my tongue. In his prolonged stubbornness to avoid following the Code, he began to display quite a profane streak, and to my own dismay, I had picked it up. Often, I found that if I didn't keep myself tightly in check, I ended up saying things that would never, under ordinary circumstances, have come out of my mouth.

So often I wanted to lash out at him irritably that was *not* an adult, no matter what star systems he could purchase alcohol in. We brought out the worst in each other: I resented him, and he found me stodgy and unyielding. We worked without a training bond, which made things that much more difficult. Worse: we remained constantly shielded from each other, both of us distrustful and edgy. I had no solution. It seemed that as soon as I released my agitation, he would aggravate me further.

Master Yoda thought it was good for me. "Patience, patience," he chuckled over the com. "Know now, you do, how I felt training you." He thought a moment, and said, "Teach him not your defiance."

"His own defiance he already has," I quipped.

We began work on Kenobi's 'saber. He returned mine to me, seeming to understand that were I to attempt to escape, or hurt him, I could already have done so on any one of a hundred occasions. No, now I simply intended to see out his game, for that was all I could think of it as.

After a while, he began to call me "Master" in deference to my rank, but I could not bring myself to call him "Padawan." I knew the inequality of terms bothered him. Nevertheless, his stubbornness and his ease with dark elements of the Force kept me from thinking of him as my true apprentice. He had brought me here by manipulative means. I had not chosen him.

Worse, he continued to play silly games with the skills he had learned, though I admonished him to stop. He told me that a staunch traditionalist such as I should be on the Council, so brainwashed was my thinking. For the first time, he provoked true anger in me. His sheer nerve had seemed merely precocious until he insulted me, indeed, the entire Order with it.

"If I were such a reactionary," I ground out, my voice quiet and cold, "you would have seen me *die* before I trained a dark force user in the ways of the light."

That stunned him into a sullen quiet for several days. His contrition was plain, but I pulled my reserve about me and distanced myself from him further. This was, still, dangerously near a hostage situation, and I struggled to keep myself calm and forward thinking until I could determine what he was up to. Though I had nothing to base it on, I had a very distinct feeling that I was here for something other than his training.

"Center not on your anxieties," Yoda admonished me. "Your responsibility he is. Not this nebulous feeling you have of something wrong elsewhere."

My master's words made sense, but they felt inaccurate to the situation in a way I could not place.

The rooms Kenobi had designated to me were positively extravagant. I had a bedroom larger than any I had ever been allotted during my away missions, even when the Jedi were allowed to stay in palaces with the royalty we assisted. The bed was tall, with posts at each corner. The coverlet was sumptuous. The 'fresher was huge, also, with double sinks and a sunken bathtub. The floor was of the same marble as the main hall, but the curtains were a creamy gray. I was possibly the luckiest kidnapping victim in the galaxy.

I had unpacked my things into an armoire in my bedroom. The place was no longer quite as alien to me as it had been when I arrived, but I could not completely relax. There was a disquieting sense of impermanence about the situation.

I sat on the floor of my room one afternoon, legs folded, in front of the fireplace. I had torn a hole in one of my cloaks, and the weather was getting colder as the moons drew closer to the planet. Soon, it would be too miserable for much outdoor training. /Much./ I found myself perversely enjoying the thought of Kenobi grousing as he tried to meditate in the rain, then squelched it, a little appalled at my own negativity.

"I told them to make stew for dinner." He appeared out of nowhere, leaning casually in my doorway. "What kind of bread would you like?" He pushed his hair back from his face, a fidget he seemed to enjoy.

I regarded him distantly, then bent back to my stitching. "Whatever you like, Kenobi."

I felt a flash of irritation from him, remembered my shields, and drew them up. He stood in the doorway of my room a moment, at once oddly uncertain. I looked back up at him.

"Why don't you respect me?" he asked, trying hard to sound as though he didn't care.

I snorted. "I haven't much reason to." I placed two more stitches.

"I know you don't want to be here," he said, surprising me a little, "and I know that were it not for your sense of duty, you would have left a dozen times. But I've followed your training, and you don't even recognize me as your apprentice."

I looked up at him. His eyes were lonely. It seemed such a contrast to the irritable petulance I was usually forced to deal with.

"You aren't my apprentice," I told him, my voice chilly. I saw him flinch: it stung, but I pressed on, mildly irritated. "You only do what I ask when it suits you. You're spoiled with ideas of ascendancy that don't align themselves with the light. When you gain a little maturity, there might be more to you. For now, while you play your games with power and keep your secrets, you are a rogue Force-sensitive, nothing more."

I glared at him as he stood there, and his eyes reflected his hurt. I was surprised at this. We had argued on innumerable occasions, and I had never managed to actually *hurt* him before. There was a long pause, dense with tension, as he sought words.

"You don't know me," he finally said, taking a step backwards out of the doorway. His eyes were narrowed with pain, and then for a moment something skittish and indistinct crept in as well. He disappeared down the hall.

I sighed, "Sith hells," and closed my eyes. Before I realized what I was doing, I was going after him.

He was in the kitchen, as I had anticipated. He was sitting at the table, spinning a napkin ring. With his fingers, no less. He looked up at me accusingly. The hardness was back in his eyes.

"What?" he demanded, and slapped his hand down on the ring, hard, to stop its twirling.

I stared at him a moment, not sure what I had followed him for. To apologize? This was his doing. I was here on this planet, in his house, more-or-less trapped, waiting for something to happen, for the other boot to drop, as it were. It made me feel frustrated and claustrophobic, the very thought of it.

"You want me to train you. You call me 'Master,' and you want my respect, but you don't accord me the respect that is my due as your teacher."

He looked at me, but the accusation in his translucent eyes was slowly fading to remorse. He looked away, down at the napkin ring on the table, then back up again.

"Respect, Kenobi, starts with honesty. You're going to end up with a thin façade of knighthood if you can't learn that first. Before we go further in your training, I want to know why I'm being held here. And don't give me any thrice-damned bantha shit about how I'm only here to train you because you deserve to be a knight. Even if that *had* ever been the truth, it certainly hasn't been lately."

I stopped, stunned at my lack of control.

It took him a moment to find his voice. He swallowed. "Please," he said, quietly, surprising me further with the fearful note in his voice. "I- I need this. Please, teach me, just a little more, and then I'll --- I swear I'll tell you everything."

I stood in the middle of the floor, silent. Something was going on, something big enough to scare this boy straight out of his bravado. He was in a lot of trouble, that much I could see. He looked vulnerable and frightened, and I wondered how I had missed it before. He had wrapped up his fear and his anger together, making them indiscernible from each other to the untrained eye.

I moved to the table, and sat next to him, in the spot I'd taken the day he'd brought me here. It had become my place at the table, for meals, for lessons, for 'saber construction. I realized I had longed all this time to be fond of him, but he would not allow it. He looked at me with those sea-green eyes, wide with hope and nervousness, no trace left of the angry indignation.

"It would be very, very bad for me if you left," he whispered. "Please trust me a little longer." He looked at the napkin ring and began to fidget with it a little bit. I put my hand over his to stop his squirming. He jumped a little, his eyes flicking from my hand to my face.

"I have never trusted you, Kenobi," I told him, but softly: for the first time, I felt a real desire to be kind to him. "Give me a reason to."

Silently, he nodded.

Things improved greatly after that. He stopped playing, essentially. He began to attempt to make amends for his behavior, took his exercises more seriously, and seemed much more willing to work toward his goals.

I daresay we grew to be friends.

He still struggled with his anger, but he stopped flailing about for something to blame, and began to look to the source of it. He would not share this one thing with me, though I believed he knew what it was. His constant irritability and feigned hardness slowly gave way to a deep, perpetual unease. I was concerned for him, but could do nothing to help him until he finally determined that it was time for me to know his great mystery.

Sometimes, he looked at me strangely from behind his shields. I might have been eating, or oiling my boots, or pointing out a method to resolve a wiring problem in his 'saber. I would raise my eyes to meet his to find him gazing at me distantly, a question in his eyes. If I asked if there was something he wanted to say, he would look away and shake his head, or tip his head down and let his hair fall into a curtain around his face.

He continued to receive periodic visits, and the most he would ever volunteer where they were concerned was the fact that they were couriers of some kind. His demeanor after these meetings however, reflected the marked improvement in his training. Where he used to be snappish and harried, now he would carry on as though they never happened. I learned to respect this, and keep silent.

/In due time, Qui-Gon,/ I would remind myself.

We finished his lightsaber, and began to spar. Slowly, we began to work through the katas he was familiar with, mirroring each other. He was quite good at them by this time, and was able to center himself fully, and release his aggression.

Here he was: my half-desperate little kidnapper. A snappish little wraith too wealthy and hardened for his own good, he had been too free with the Force, it seemed, to know light from dark. Now, I could see the shining, living Force moving through him. I watched him, really stepped back and *watched* him, and it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

I dropped my shields fully and felt him: he was completely at ease, his 'saber moving as an extension of him, the Force flowing along his arms and legs, wrapped around him and through him gracefully. Step, spin, parry. His eyes flashed with it, his hair shone, his body, even through his clothing, glowed. Thrust, feint. I was so taken with his movements, with the sudden perfection of the dance, that I fell in with him, igniting my own 'saber and matching him. I slipped in slightly behind him to avoid disrupting his concentration.

I could feel eddies of light moving through him, radiating from him. He melded with the energy. He was lost in concentration, more peaceful than I had felt him since my arrival.

But I *hadn't* felt him since my arrival. Suddenly I realized he was no longer shielded. He allowed the Force to move along him, unimpeded, as I did. He had it. It had us both. It was perfection.

We flowed through the kata together until it was finished. He held the final position a moment, centering again, and then straightened, turning to me.

His eyes were bright with a fire that I could not place. He licked his lips quickly, his breathing quick after the exertion, and then dropped his eyes.

"Is it always like that?" he asked, softly.

"It can be. If you allow it to be."

He nodded, still looking at the floor. I tipped his chin up, forcing him gently to meet my gaze. I raised my eyebrows.

"What is it?" I asked him.

He tore his gaze away, that strange distant gaze he adopted sometimes, then extricated himself from my touch. "I- I've never felt anything like that before."

I smiled. "Welcome to the light, Rogue," I murmured teasingly, still a little surprised at what I had seen, and he looked up at me again.

"That was it, then? Just light." He sounded half-sarcastic. He ran his hand through his hair, tipping his head to the side slightly.

"Of course it was light. Were you expecting something more?" I asked him honestly, confused.

He stepped close to me then, too close, but I felt no desire to move myself away from him, as was my wont with others. He was directly in my personal space, and comfortably so, as though there were a scooped-out place in my aura that he filled. I shook off the mental image and looked at him expectantly.

"I don't know, Qui-Gon," he admitted quietly. "Should I not expect something more?" He licked his lips again, his tongue appearing, swiping, disappearing, and I found myself staring at his mouth. I dragged my gaze back up to meet his.

"I am your teacher," I told him inanely.

He looked at me a moment, studying me, then backed away from me and left.

I stared after him, but did not follow. We had made such great strides, but I did not want to think that he had begun to develop a padawan's crush on me.

Dinner was strained. He would not look at me. We ate stew again, presumably because he had discovered I liked it, but he pushed his around inside his narrow bowl and said nothing. When I had finished with my meal he rose, leaving his untouched on the table.

"I'm retiring early, Master," he said, quietly, and moved around the table.

I caught his wrist and tipped my head back to glare up at him. His look was disdainful. No, I wasn't as dense as that. "Do not allow what passed between us today to hinder your progress, Kenobi. You had an outstanding training session today. You should be very pleased."

He snatched his arm away from my grasp and wrapped his opposite hand around the place I had touched him, rubbing it. His eyes were stormy and hurt. "Don't tell me how I should feel," he snapped, and I groaned inwardly: were we back to square one again? "Nothing *passed* between us today. I had a bit of a judgement lapse. That's all."

"No," I told him, and meant it. "I want to see you to knighthood. You're so close." I was no longer staying out of a sense of obligation to either the light or to the Order, but because I cared about him.

He blinked, and a tear dropped onto his cheek, sliding down to his chin. He tipped his head down and scrubbed the heel of his hand over his face.

"I want you to let me help you," I said, low, stepping close to him. "I want you to quit fighting me at every turn. Just when I think I have broken through your damned barriers, you throw another one up in my way."

He laughed brokenly but did not raise his face. "You know, they had been reciting the Code at me for quite a while in the crèche by the time I realized I was developing feelings for you. I knew I wasn't supposed to ---" He broke off. I stared at him, surprised. He sniffed, hard, and let out another bad laugh. "I am not going to make it to knighthood. I'm too much of a 'rogue.' And a hypocrite."

"Obi-Wan," I sighed. I was completely at a loss. I recalled the questioning looks and sudden mood changes, and how at certain times he might have been hoping for something more from me. Placing my hands on his shoulders, I said quietly, for lack of anything better, "Your feelings are not wrong, but you must not allow them to rule you."

He looked down at his hands. "That's all I seem to want to do, since---" He faltered and looked up at me, his eyes reflecting a terrible disappointment, and then he turned and left abruptly. Again, I found myself staring at his back as he walked away, with no idea how to bring him back.

I rubbed my hand over my eyes. It seemed clear to me then, and I couldn't imagine how I had missed it for so long. Of course he was struggling against his own emotions. Especially when he was required to live by a Code that seemed, to him, to forbid love altogether.

He avoided me for the next few days out of awkwardness rather than anger. I allowed it. My chest ached vaguely, and I rubbed at it, unthinking. It was almost as though I were feeling the pain he was putting himself through. I set the thought aside. With both of us shielded as tightly as we were, it was not possible.

We ate at opposite times. We brushed past each other in the hallways, and though I tried to catch his eye, he never looked up. I wanted to talk to him but was at a complete loss. Lectures on love not being part of hypocrisy were not going to help him. He wanted reciprocation, and that was the thing I couldn't give him. Not now; not with secrets hanging between us. I didn't know how deeply his feelings for me went, but I was sure that I could not share them. I could not allow myself to become vulnerable to this man who drifted back and forth between light and dark.

I meditated on it. Oh, did I meditate. But I received no answers from the Force, no epiphany that would suddenly allow me to see past the dark seal around him and into the heart of the man I was trying to save. I tried to think of his eyes, when they shone after 'saber practice, of the fluidity of his movements when he let the Force flow through him instead of trying to do it, stubbornly, on his own. I tried to keep in mind the pleasure he took in his accomplishments. I wondered what he was waiting for, what would be the one thing that would make him open up to me. I wanted to help him. I wanted to *love* him as I suspected he did me, but I didn't know how.

I was on my way back to my rooms one night, after taking a very late meal, when I heard it. His sounds, soft and predatory, coming from his bedroom. I froze in the hallway. Someone else.? But no, I could feel no other presence in the house but ours.

I sensed his need spilling out of him, unchecked. Force help me, I was instantly hard, the pit of my stomach clenching in nervousness and arousal. My chest burned. I rubbed at it and placed my hand on the cold wall to steady myself. Another moan drifted through his half-open doorway --- light protect us both, he *wanted* me to hear him --- and the realization surged through me desperately. I took a step toward his doorway, then another. My mind was blank and senseless but for his sounds and the lust pouring through me.

The moons shone above his window, and the light spilled to the floor before it reached the bed. There was enough of a glow that I could see his body, silhouetted darkly. He was on his bed, the blankets tossed about him, stroking himself. He'd thrown his other arm over his eyes, and the sight of him trying to pleasure himself, alone, trapped me. Waves of hungry black sadness drifted from him.

"Obi-Wan," I heard myself say hoarsely, and he started and yanked the sheet over himself, jerking to a sitting position. I stepped into the room and toward him, baffled about what I was doing there.

How absurd of me. Of course I knew what I was doing there.

"What are you . . . Qui-Gon ---" His voice hitched with his breathing and shook with his erratic heartbeat, so greatly had I startled him. I crossed the wide floor and stood in front of him. He was a gorgeous, smooth sculpture of a man, shocked still in the moonlight, heat emanating from him. His hair was tangled and strewn about his face, his eyes wide, lips parted in embarrassed astonishment.

He saw that I wasn't moving, so at last he did. His fingers shook as he reached for my tunic, and I could do little more than watch as he untied my sash and slipped the garment, thick and heavy, from my shoulders. His breathing sped up as he moved to my leggings, and his tongue shot out and swiped at his lower lip. He looked up at me, disbelieving, and set the sheet aside. He pushed my leggings down, his hands sliding smoothly down my legs, and he knelt to tug them out of the way as I stepped out of them. Then he stood, his hands pulling my face down to his.

Never in my life have I been claimed like that. His lips were soft, so unbearably soft, but they ravaged mine completely, his tongue slipping past them into my mouth, and he challenged me, dared me to pull away. I pulled his hips against me, showed him I wanted him, and he moaned into my mouth, thrusting toward me.

I felt the need and the darkness buried under it. It was then that I tore my mouth from his, staring at him.

"Don't," he pleaded with me, his hands on my chest. "Don't leave me alone with this, please." He put his palm over his heart and hitched in a breath. "You don't have to love me, I know you can't, just stay, please. Please." His strength disappeared; his shields dissolved. The ache in my chest reached an unbearable pitch.

The danger was plain to me then: there was a bond growing between us. I felt a moment of real fear, and stepped back from him, rubbing at my chest again. How could I allow myself to be bonded to someone who only half-embraced the light? It was astounding, frightening. His eyes searched mine, looking for any answer, and I faltered.

I could not think with those wide eyes, dusky and frightened in the dark, staring at me, begging. I had a vague understanding that I should open my shields, consummate the bond by willingly exchanging energy, memories and thoughts with him.

Suddenly, it was all I wanted. Everything I had ever learned had come down to this gray place with a promise that was more of a threat, and I didn't care. Love could come later, the Force would know its own, and I needed him, and wanted him, even if I did not love him. It was enough.

I moved to him and pulled him to me at the same time, dropping my shields and pushing my mind into his. He gasped and his balance wavered, and I pressed him back onto the bed. Dimly I knew that he was not aware of what was happening to him, but I could never have stopped if I'd tried. My need was primal and urgent. This was greater than some copulation imperative. It had to do with our souls on a level that even transcended emotion.

"Return it," I instructed him, stripping my clothes off as quickly as I could. He stared at me, confused, still breathing too hard. "Send it back to me, please," I breathed. I had never felt anything like this before. It burned terribly, in my chest and in my mind, and I knew the only way I could find relief was for him to do what I had done, push. But he hesitated, damn his fears about his secrets.

I lay beside him, and he cleaved himself to me, shoving his leg between mine, wrapping himself around me physically. I didn't know how to rephrase my instructions, I didn't know how to make him see it wasn't about sex anymore. He kissed me savagely, rolled over me, and began to writhe down my body, enflaming me wherever we touched.

"Obi-Wan," I groaned, shivering, and he took the sound of his name falling from my lips as approval, his tongue sliding around my nipples, his teeth worrying at my skin. I groaned again, burying my fingers in his hair. It tickled my chest and stomach as he moved lower, his mouth following the dip of my stomach, and then the sensitive skin at the juncture of thigh and hip. All I could do was quiver and hope he wouldn't stop, even as the unfulfilled bond burned in me.

His mouth pulled my shaft in and I was lost, blind, floating. My hands tightened in his hair. He moaned, and it vibrated over me with terrifying intensity. His tongue shot fire through me with every pass over my hardness. When his throat closed over me and his mouth drew on my erection, hard, I cried out something unintelligible and came, shuddering, arching my hips up into his waiting mouth. Then, abruptly it was too much and I was pushing down into the bed, immediately desperate to get my oversensitive skin away from his hot, wet, moving mouth. He climbed up over me, his eyes glazed with need, and I simply pulled on his hips, guiding him toward my mouth.

Force forgive me, I fall a little every time I remember how he looked. He was grasping the headboard, kneeling over me, staring down at me with desperate eyes and wide, gasping lips. His hair hung and tunneled his face, darkening his features. His body was taut with anticipation. He was quite possibly the most exquisite thing I had ever seen.

I took him into my mouth, pulling, and his sounds spilled down over me with the growing moonlight. He was overheated and rigid, and his scent was drugging. I drew at him and wrapped my tongue around him, and he thrust into my mouth. I held his hips, stroking as his buttocks flexed and pushed, and pulled him in as his moans turned into a coarse shout, his orgasm rocking through him and over my tongue.

I stole a look at him again. He was tensed, every part of him hard and shivering, his hips bucked forward and the rest of him lit and shadowed, silver and dark, the light rippling over his sinewy body. His head was tipped back in his mindless pleasure, his hair falling away from his face, and then he curled forward and looked at me as I released him. I turned my head to kiss the inside of his thigh, sliding my tongue out to greet his warm skin, grazing it with my teeth.

"Qui-Gon, Qui-Gon," he murmured, descending over me, climbing down, still hard. I was hard again, too, and the pain in my chest had worsened. He tucked himself against me, his hands roaming over my skin, and I shivered and sighed. I was on fire, mentally and physically. Slowly, delicately, he opened himself to me and opened his mind. The ache abated as I received murky images and light ones, half-remembered dreams and sharply clear events. What had begun as a hesitant trickle became a stream, then a rushing wave of thoughts, emotions, and great, overwhelming love. He had no control over it. There was something there, something edgy, looming in the background, but I didn't examine it.

I should have, but it was too late by then. I was already lost, and the bond sealed closed around us.

I pressed my forehead to his, my hand curled around the back of his neck. His love was deep, and my eyes burned with tears. I couldn't return it, whatever tenderness I might feel in the wake of the involuntary forging of the bond. He still didn't trust me; this had been a reflexive act of lust. Bonds like this made themselves happen; they were manifestations of the Force. I wanted it to mean that there was something between us or that we might be able to open up to each other, but I knew it had only been involuntary. I had spent so much time wanting to like him, wanting to feel *something.*

He sighed, and tilted his face, kissing me. I kissed him back, needing the feel of him against me too much to let go.

We didn't even trust each other, and yet the Force bonded us. What could it mean?

/ /This is enough,/ / he whispered at me, and sorrow snapped through me.

/ /For how long?/ / I wondered, and he had no answer for me, only kisses and dark, desperate desire. I returned it. If he said it was enough for him, then I would at least trust that much, for now.

Master Yoda noticed that I had undergone a shift in my disposition toward my would-be apprentice.

"Keeping something back, you are," he observed. "More than just training happens now, hm?" His eyes were bright, but he did not smile. I had always taken Master Yoda's words at face value, but for the first time, I looked at him with a critical eye.

"We have forged a bond, quite involuntarily," I told him cautiously, and carefully gauged his reaction. He wasn't in the least bit surprised. He looked neither pleased, nor bothered. "Master, this is in spite of the fact that there is something going on here that he has yet to explain to me, and we don't really trust each other," I elaborated. "How is this possible? He hasn't fully accepted the light side."

"Hm," was all I could get from him.

I leaned back in the com chair and swiveled it sideways, putting one booted ankle over the other knee. My posture had become quite insolent, I noted, but did not move. /I've been away from the Temple too long./ Then I corrected myself, /I've been with Kenobi too long./

"Relaxed, you are," my master muttered. "Good for you, this is, I can see. Get carried away, you should not," he added, and though I expected to see a smile, or hear one, there was none. He switched off.

I tipped my head back against the top of the chair and folded my hands over my stomach. I closed my eyes a moment, wondering at the odder-than-usual behavior of my master and the nagging feeling that I was missing something crucial. If Obi-Wan would simply trust me, I would have a much better chance at helping him with whatever trouble he was in.

I sighed, opening my eyes. It was then that I caught sight of the folder, resting on top of a cabinet that cleared the ceiling by about a hand's span. The folder sat at an angle, as though it had been tossed up there haphazardly, a corner of it peeking over the edge. /Odd. Strange place for papers./ Especially since I had seen datapads scattered about in the com room, and paper was a strange enough occurrence in its own right.

I rose and retrieved them, flipping the folder open, casually curious. My piqued interest carried through the bond, and I received a questioning probe in return, but disregarded it for a moment, reading.

The first page was a list of shipment dates, transport allotments, and export authorizations of some agricultural product. The next page was a list of destinations and contacts. Several of the contacts were shady at best: a few Hutt clans were listed, as well as two systems that had been rejected for Republic status because they engaged in slave trade. The odd thing about the export site was that it wasn't on Ord Mantell, or even on a Republic planet known for its ground crops. It was being shipped out from the Southern Hemisphere of Belsavis, whose agriculture was largely hanging silk gardens.

I hovered between relief and disbelief: I seemed to have tripped on Obi-Wan' s secret, but it was certainly disreputable enough. I had a disagreeable feeling that this wasn't half of it.

He appeared in the doorway, and blanched as he saw me holding the papers. I held the folder toward him. "Smuggling, is it?" I questioned blandly.

He narrowed his eyes. "Where did you find that?"

I kept my expression and voice flat. "I imagine you *would* want to know." I pointed to the top of the cabinet. "I should think with so much to conceal you would come up with better places to hide the evidence."

He stepped forward and snatched the folder out of my grasp, then shuffled through the papers, presumably to make sure they were all there. I folded my arms over my chest and watched him silently, waiting.

His eyes were hard and his voice tight when he said, "I suppose it's time for you to know."

"Well then. I'm glad we agree on something."

He shot me an ugly look and stepped over to the com, keying in a password and punching some buttons. Several log files came up, further detailing the shipping data listed on the papers. He looked at me, and I moved to stand next to him to read. What I saw stunned me.

"You're shipping luthro?" I asked, incredulous. Luthro was known throughout the galaxy as one of the more dangerous psychotropic drugs. It was mildly hallucinogenic and created a euphoric state, but the addictive nature of it made it particularly problematic.

He swallowed, and nodded. "I'm getting out," he said, barely above a whisper. "I'm having the crops destroyed."

I reeled. "You're *growing* luthro?"

He closed his eyes and leaned on the com. I stared at him a moment, then turned away, paced a few steps, then turned back to him. He didn't move, didn't speak.

"You're getting out," I said, by way of asking him to confirm what he'd told me. I had to hear it from him again. I had to hear that he knew how wrong this was.

He nodded, his eyes still closed. He tipped his head down and let his hair fall around his face, hiding. I prodded at him through the bond. It was plain: he had come to hate the business, and truly wanted to leave it behind. I looked at the com, then at the floor. His anxiety was funneling through to me, coupled with something more, a greater fear. He fully expected me to walk out.

My twenty-year-old rogue Jedi apprentice was a drug czar.

I stood in front of him and gripped his shoulders, forcing him to look at me. "*Swear* to me you're getting out."

"I am, I swear," he said quietly, looking into my eyes. "There are some things I have to do first, but the exporting has been stopped. There are . . . loose ends to tie up. Then it's done."

His eyes were wide, apprehensive, and sincere. I believed him. I relaxed my hands, realizing my fingers had been digging into his shoulders. He stepped close to me, and I held him against my chest. He clung to me, his hands fisted in my tunic. I rested my cheek on the top of his head. "I'll help you," I said into his hair, and he held me tighter.

"There's nothing more to be done. The process is already underway."

I hesitated, then nodded. We stood there for a long time. He was worried. I didn't blame him. Getting out was going to be harder than getting in could possibly have been.

I had a bad feeling about this.

He continued to take appointments from his runners, who would go with him to the com room and discuss, presumably, the closing of the operation. I was still not privy to those discussions, however, I was sure there was no need for me to be. He seemed very relieved to have that out in the open between us, and this lightened his spirits considerably. Still, in spite of the fact that he was no longer hiding his involvement with the luthro trade from me, I nevertheless sensed anxiety over it, as though he expected me to change my mind and leave. Or turn him in to the authorities.

I had his greatest secret in my hands and still he did not trust me. He did not realize that I saw such great things in him, this young, reckless rogue Jedi --- for that was what he was, regardless of my training or not training him.

I even offered to take him back to Coruscant, but he would not hear of it. I thought once he could ensure the closing of the shipping operation, the destruction of the last remnants of his criminal life, then, only then, would he go. I intended to take him back with me, and see him knighted in the Temple.

We continued his training. He still had problems with the Code, though I knew that it must have been from residual guilt over his illegal and dangerous activities. Sometimes he had trouble releasing his fear, which was more dangerous to him than his anger had been. We worked on it continuously, and in between meditations, we ran through katas and maintained his maths and electronics skills. I tried to reassure him that he would soon be done with it all, and that if he could just give himself over to the light side, he would be safe.

Something held him back though: to me, it felt like a belief that he didn't deserve to be safe. It was as effective as a wall between him and happiness. He could not release his fear, and so he hovered on the line between light and dark, sometimes stepping back and forth.

He balanced it precariously. And while he danced on that line, he pulled me closer than I have ever been to the dark. The bond kept us connected. I may have prevented his falling, but he drew me down with him, equalizing us. I clung to the hope that it would be just a little longer before he would consent to come back with me to the Order. If I could just resume my life, if I could get him out of here, I could finally see us both safe. He was so close to knighthood, there would soon be nothing more I could do for him other than take him away.

The closest he ever came to happiness was at night when I came to him. We wrapped ourselves around each other, strengthening the bond automatically. It almost felt, sometimes, as though the bond were sentient, drawing us together for its own benefit. He was sensual and receptive, and his constant, soft hunger moved me. It was easy to believe it was right when we were tangled together, our mouths and bodies joined, buried in each other.

There were nights when I could see clearly into his mind and his memories. But there was a place there that he still shielded from me. It taxed him. The stronger the bond became, the harder it was for him to keep pockets of himself hidden away.

Once, he pulled me into a dream with him. It was dark and ugly, terrifying, and I was confused by it. We woke together, and he burrowed against me, breathing shallowly and trying to shake off the remnants of something that had no meaning for me.

"Tell me," I whispered, and felt him tense. "Tell me what that dream was," I insisted, and eventually, he did.

"When I was in AgriCorps, there was another 'Corps worker who wouldn't leave me alone. He was . . . bigger than I, and stronger. His Force-use was almost as strong as mine was, but not as focused. We were on Belsavis." I received jagged images and sensations, then, of a large, blond-headed boy with huge, strong hands and too much anger.

"He was jealous of how easily I assisted the crops. He used to say things like, 'How can someone so pretty be so useful?' It took me a long time to realize what he wanted from me when he looked at me. When he first came at me, it took everything I had to keep him off. We were reprimanded for fighting and fitted with Force-restraints as punishment."

He shivered, and I pulled him closer against my chest.

"It hurt. It hurt a lot. Th-that's why I didn't use them on you. Why you had a chamber instead. At least then you weren't cut off from what you had inside you." I nodded against his head. He paused, and considered a moment.

"He lied to get out of the restraints before I did. He told them, 'Kenobi started it.' All I knew after that wa-was that he was bigger than me a-and he didn't have the c-collar." His breathing had begun to catch, and he was shaking and stammering. Images flew across the bond with the memory of great, searing pain.

"Shh, Obi-Wan," I soothed. "I'm here, you're safe now, shh . . ."

But he raised himself from me, levered himself up on one arm and stared down at me, his eyes large and glittering even in the dark. "I'm not safe," he argued. "All it takes is one person to turn me in, to find files like the ones you found, an-and then I'll have a collar on until I *die.*" His terror at the idea was palpable between us.

I guided him back down to me, and placed my hand on his head, stroking his hair softly, sending calm through to him as best I could. It was difficult, and he rejected it. I centered, and tried harder, and finally he stilled, his breathing evened out, and he relaxed against me.

"I am not going to let that happen, Obi-Wan," I told him, firmly. "Do you believe me?"

He hesitated. "I love you," he murmured against my chest.

"Do you *believe* me, Obi-Wan?" I persisted.

He rose again, and looked at me a while.

"You have no idea what it means to me when I hear you speak my name."

I put my hand on his cheek. He didn't believe me. He kissed me, softly, his fingers in my beard and hair. I let it go. He didn't have to trust me, any more than I had to love him. But even then, some part of me knew I already did. I think some part of him knew, too.

His toughest challenge had always been levitation. Even more so than meditation, it required absolute serenity and concentration. It frustrated him to the point at which I was afraid he might never learn it, simply because he had convinced himself he could not do it.

I had spoken with Master Yoda, briefly, telling him of Obi-Wan's progress. I considered telling him of my apprentice's past dealings, but thought that it was something we should cover later. When we were safe at the Temple and that part of his past was far enough behind him, he could learn to let the guilt go, and then we would give explanations and clear the air. When my master saw the flash of worry cross my face, he said, "Trouble, have you, with his training?"

"He has . . . some trouble believing in his own abilities," I said, and left it at that.

"Hm. Work with him on his levitation, you should. The hardest thing, that was, for *you* to learn. Gain confidence, he will, with that behind him."

/Among other things,/ I thought darkly, and closed the conversation.

But that was, indeed, what he needed the most work on. I suggested it to him. Immediately, reflexively, he grew defensive.

"Don't," I warned him. "Let it go. Just try for me, Obi-Wan."

He closed his eyes, sighed, and centered. "For you," he promised quietly, and my heart tightened.

Three hours later, he was still sitting grimly on the ground, cross-legged. His frustration was blocking him. I knelt down before him and reached through the bond.

/ /Look at me./ /

He opened his eyes.

/ /Concentrate on me. Levitation is like a kata. Your body moves with your will, and with the Force. The Force moves with your body, as well./ /

I stared into his eyes, and felt him grow calm.

/ /Everything you've learned is only another way to use the Force to assist the luminous self contained within your body. It is within your grasp, Obi-Wan. You have felt the Force, and you know it's more real than *this.*/ / I patted his knee, and then the ground.

I closed my eyes and opened to him, feeling the energy gathering around him. I did not try to assist him, but I could see the Force pooling under him. I could feel it, at last, bearing him up. It began slowly, tremulously, and then gained certainty as he did. My heart soared.

If he believed in himself enough to fly, then perhaps . . . just perhaps.

"Well done, Padawan," I praised, pouring hope, pride, and happiness into him. He rose until he was able to unfold his legs under him, gracefully, to stand, and then he took my hand and pulled me up before him.

He put his hand behind my neck, pulled me to him, and kissed me. There was nothing of the sorrow he usually carried, not then. He was grateful, relieved, and in love. And Force help me, I was in love, too.

We sat in the kitchen, eating some kind of native waterfowl and bread. I had come to cherish the feel of him through the bond, and the way he smiled when I reached for him. I did so then, sliding a tendril into the bond and relishing his warm grin as he looked up at me.

He picked at his fowl, and his smile faded. "When you're done training me," he began, and uncertainty shivered between us, "and that will be soon --- you're going to go back home." It was not a question.

I sighed and looked at him, chewing. I sipped at some wine and swallowed, looking down at my plate a moment. "Yes," I told him. He would get nothing from me if not the truth.

He nodded, silent, and pulled at his bread, tearing off a piece he didn't want to eat.

I put my hand on the arm he was resting on the table. "I want you to come back with me," I told him. His eyes darkened, and he would not look at me. We had been over this, and I could feel his gnawing worry as I persisted.

"When you're finished with the business, there's no reason you shouldn't. There's so much more you can learn, and you can be knighted properly. You can learn the way the light works without fear, and worry, and all this . . ." I waved my hand abstractly, floundering for words. Then I simply said, "You're still too close to the dark. I have to get you away from that, Obi-Wan. That's the reason the Force brought me here. I *will* not let you fall."

"*I* brought you here," he said guiltily.

I tipped his chin up, ducking my head forward so that he would meet my gaze. "Obi-Wan. Do you really think you could have brought me here against the will of the Force?"

His eyes clouded, but he shook his head.

I dropped my hand and wondered yet again what he was so afraid of.

"When all this is done," he whispered, looking at my hands, then taking them in his own, "and if you will still have me, I will go back with you."

I squeezed his hands, and smiled.

I heard murmuring voices from the com room, and I paused. I hadn't realized anyone had come into the house. I could sense agitation and tension from Obi-Wan, and I queried him silently, standing in the hallway outside the door.

He drew his shields up, muffling the bond to a painful silence. I rubbed at my chest. I had respected the privacy of his meetings so long, and yet there he was, still shutting me out. Shutting the bond down. It was enough. Quite enough.

I pushed at the door, but it was locked. I gave it a nudge with the Force, and walked through.

Obi-Wan stood casually, his calm but closed posture belying the stony anger I had come to recognize in his eyes. The two other men were in Fleet uniforms --- I masked my surprise at the sight --- and one of them had a blaster. He put his hand on it when I entered, looking at me with naked suspicion, but Obi-Wan waved him down, his calm expression hiding the panic I knew he must have felt.

"No," he said to the man with the blaster, though I didn't know if it was an order not to brandish the weapon, or an extension of the conversation they had been having before I arrived. His voice was calm in spite of the roiling anxiety in the room. He looked at me a moment in the harsh pause. His eyes were the cold and hard eyes I had first looked into, such a marked change from the calm I had seen so often of late. He seemed to notice that I wasn't going to intervene, so he returned his attention to the Fleet officers. "I'm done," he said, coolly, tossing his head defiantly so that his hair fell back away from his face. "I've been done a long time. Carry *that* message back to your employer."

"It doesn't work that way," one of them bit out. "You can't just walk away."

"I can, and I have," my apprentice countered. "I've already given the order."

"The Prime Minister is going to have more to say on this," the other officer said angrily, and gathered up some datapads from a chair, preparing to leave. "The Belsavis office is *not* pleased. And the Senate ---"

"Get out," he hissed then, his eyes narrow and angry. "Take your offer back where it came from."

They faced off for a moment, Obi-Wan and these two Fleet pilots. Then the officers were storming out of the room.

I crossed my arms and studied him, long after they had gone. Pain squeezed my heart. He would not meet my eyes.

"Belsavis," I said. "Where you were stationed in the 'Corps."

"One of the places," he muttered, closing down the com.

"Odd," I said, and looked hard at him, wanting to believe him if he spun a lie, but knowing I probably couldn't. "And what was that about a Prime Minister?"

He was tucking files and datapads away, fidgeting. Urgency and fear thrummed between us, emanating from him into the very air.

"Damn you, Kenobi," I spat, and he finally looked at me, startled. "There is more to this, isn't there?"

He was still and pale, but I could see the growing decisiveness in his eyes.

"Yes," he murmured. "There is more to this." He took a breath, resigned himself, and something inside the bond felt like he was letting go. It startled me, and hurt. He started pulling out all the papers and files he had just put away. He opened the databank of the com again.

"You could ask any one of a number of people what more there is," he said quietly, and for the first time in months, he was steady and fearless, like a man with a terminal disease at last embracing death. "The Prime Minister of Belsavis, yes. A good deal of Spacefleet: no, they weren't exactly here in an official capacity. About a quarter of the Senate. Half of your Jedi Council."

I stood, staring at him, shaken to my very core. "Liar," I breathed. I had wanted to shout it, but could find no voice; only an accusing hiss of air would leave my throat.

His eyes were hard, and filled with sorrow at the same time. "I wish it were so." He pointed to the console.

I sat down to read. My shock turned to dismay and I stared at him. He had brought up logs of conversations, transcript upon transcript, and plans, diagrams and maps.

He even had transcripts of conversations with Yoda, conversations that had happened before my arrival.

"Explain this to me," I demanded hoarsely, and pointed at the com logs.

He dropped his eyes. His voice became lonely and monotonous, as though he had rehearsed this in his mind on a thousand guilty nights.

"I was one of the best initiates in the crèche. That translated, later, to my being the best member of AgriCorps. I was shuttled from planet to planet until I found . . . a sponsor, is what they call it, unofficially. On Belsavis. It took this sponsor a year and a half to find me, but by then I would have done nearly anything to get away from the other 'Corps workers."

He shivered and paused, and I knew he was thinking of the blond boy who had called him Kenobi. "I found myself protected and well fed. I was above the government workers, immune to them, for the first time since I'd been in AgriCorps. After I had been shuttled from planet to planet, my life was suddenly stable. I had steady employment at the Prime Minister's plantation, and a wealthy sponsor who'd have killed almost anyone for doing me any harm, such was my worth. To be picked up by a private citizen was like something out of a dream," he whispered, then steadied his voice again, with great effort.

"I had been there a while; six, eight months, not long at any rate when I overheard talking. I discovered that I was using the Force to assist a drug crop. Luthro plants. I went back to my sponsor, and told him I would go straight to the Jedi with it if he didn't offer me something better than glorified crop work. I didn't know what I was talking about; who knows what the Jedi might have done. Possibly nothing. There is nowhere but AgriCorps for marginally trained Force-users.

"I had no idea, then, just how interested the Jedi might be in what little information I had. If I had given it over then, I might have saved a lot of trouble . . ." His eyes went distant a moment as he remembered. He shook his head, and went on.

"It was enough to scare him though, or make him respect me, one of the two. He immediately offered me a percentage. Not a large one, and certainly not a change in position. I was nothing to him if I wasn't raising the crops. However, his exports were so huge that I could have supported myself grandly for a year on that first voucher. Yes," he said in response to my stunned look, "that is my 'family' money."

He plunged on. "I worked for him for another year. That was all it took. He had enough money then to retire to any resort planet he wanted to. He parceled out the crops, making even more money on the sales, and I was released from his service. He gave one of the parcels to me. I could either sell it or operate it distantly, whatever I desired. For a while I operated it, shoring up my accounts and ensuring that I would never have trouble financially. I should have sold it off and never looked back." He closed his eyes, and swept his fingertips over his forehead, regretting. "We made each other's fortunes, and then we parted ways.

"But he grew careless after he had retired. He began to brag about his little Jedi cropmaster and his trade and all of his money. Then he ran for a Senate seat. Moved off his home planet, took up residence on a small, out of the way, provincial one, and represented that planet rather than his homeworld. Then, he got greedy. He went back into the business. His success was legendary, so it was easy for him to get several people under him."

He noted my disbelief, and nodded his head. "Yes. A Republic Senator. Back on Belsavis, when I had threatened to inform the Order, I had been speaking on my own behalf. How ironic that he would create a situation in which he compromised the Order itself. He made contacts, and by the time the operation reached its peak, he was manipulating half of AgriCorps to further the trade."

My eyes grew wider than before and I pulled in a breath, amazed beyond words.

"He was buying 'Corps members straight out of the crèche and shuttling them off to his planets, in systems that would otherwise never have required the service of AgriCorps. I'm sure it was the best thing to happen to those kids, but it doesn't exactly bode well for the Crèche Masters, does it?"

I searched for a voice to deny the very idea. I clenched my hands into fists. "This cannot be true," I breathed, barely a whisper.

Ignoring me, he went on.

"The Republic is everything to a politician. He made a deal with the Fleet: my name was to be turned in, paperwork forged, and I was to be pinned with a good deal of it, along with the Crèche Masters. It didn't matter that I had stopped assisting with crop growth long before my sponsor became a key player in the Senate. It didn't even matter that I wasn't affiliated with the Order. It was about to go down in history as a Jedi operation. I would have spent the rest of my natural life on a prison planet. Probably Delrian. And after my time in the 'Corps --- after that *one* time in a Force collar --- there was *nothing* I wouldn't do to avoid it.

"The rest of them were meant to get out of it immediately. My former sponsor --- the Senator --- arranged to have two Jedi waylaid here, the ones who reported the fluctuations in the Force to the Council. It didn't take much, just a bribed pilot and some engine trouble. I was to be found, implicated, and turned in."

"As soon as I felt them hit the planet, I contacted the Jedi myself."

Pain crossed his face as he recognized he was hitting too close to home, and my eyes must have reflected my astonished anger, but he went on. "The Order offered me asylum if I would expose the Senator in charge of the operation. Probably it frightened them, too, that I might fall if I went to Delrian.

"Their intention was to single out the Crèche Masters, punish them for their transgressions, replace them, and probably eliminate half the staff involved with the crèche. Then, they were going to deflect as much of the damage away from the Jedi as possible, emphasizing that it had been the actions of individuals, not entire bureaucratic bodies. While they did this, they hoped to minimize the damage to the Senate as well, recognizing, of course, that the Jedi are answerable only to *that* worthy organization.

"I was afraid the Senator or the Prime Minister might send someone after me, so I asked for protection. That's where you came in." He opened up the bond then, and I felt regret from him, terrible, overwhelming regret. A voiceless, useless apology. "I wanted you here because I remembered how strong you felt, to me, as a child. How badly I wanted to be your padawan. I hoped that you would remember me, and somehow make me safe. I was terrified, but what did I have to lose? I told them send you, or no one. They gave me that 'You're in no position to bargain' speech. I made it plain that if I went to prison, they would have nothing, only one more Force-user fallen to the dark side, and the operation would go on unproven and unchecked.

"So, they agreed. They told me to come up with a cover story that would keep you here until I had enough information to expose the officials in charge of the trade operation. You were never meant to know until the whole thing was resolved, and I was completely out. Qui-Gon, I swear I was going to tell you, I just wanted to wait a little longer. My operation is closed, I just wanted to see the data safely to the Temple so that they could handle it from there. I didn't expect that it would take so long. Of course, once my former sponsor had a chain under him, he no longer felt indebted to me in any way and would not take my correspondence. I've had people shuttling from here to Naboo trying to---"

He broke off abruptly and I felt sick at his words. "Naboo," I said, my voice a tight accusation. "Senator Palpatine, arguably next in line for the Chancellor's seat, is at the head of this entire operation?"

He nodded, his head hanging, a curtain of hair obscuring his face. With every word out of his mouth, it was costing him more. I could feel how heartsick he was, but I couldn't even find pity for him now. Then I realized the whole *thing* had been about the cost to him.

"Sith take you," I hissed. "Why didn't you tell me? I could have helped you, I could have found a way---" / /I could have avoided a bond, I could have prevented losing my entire soul to you./ / I had no voice for the thoughts, but they went through, and he flinched visibly.

"How could I?" he said, low, his voice breaking. "Would you have believed me? How could I tell you your very Council was involved in the largest drug smuggling operation, possibly the largest indentured servitude trade as well, in the history of the known galaxy? When the values they emphasized, the very Code they enforce, mean everything to you?"

"*You* mean everything to me," I choked out, and my anger grew and loomed over me even as I realized sickly that it was true. "If you had trusted me ---" I tore my eyes away from his. I rubbed at my chest, and then closed shields around myself.

I walked away. He had to have known I was leaving him. He didn't try to stop me.

I packed my things. I went to the spaceport, vouched as a Jedi for passage to Coruscant (how dry *that* tasted when I said it) and left. All the way back to Coruscant I struggled with my pain and my quiet rage. I could not eat, sleep, meditate; I was grateful beyond all else I didn't have to pilot. My anger burned bright yellow with hurt.

Every time I thought of him, every time I thought of Yoda on the Council, of the crèche, of the stupid, angry blond boy, of the fact that I had refused a padawan seven years ago. And every time I thought of how hard I had worked to train Obi-Wan in spite of his fluctuating light, my rage burned cold, white and uncontrollable, the heat of betrayal. I felt supremely, sharply used.

Disembarking, I hefted my bags and came face-to-face with Master Yoda. I brushed past him wordlessly. Kenobi must have contacted him; I didn't care. My vaunted Jedi control seemed to be left back on Ord Mantell along with the better half of my personality.

When Yoda showed up at my door I admitted him but did not stop what I was doing. I was packing everything I owned, minus the Jedi paraphernalia, and leaving. I was renouncing the Order. I could feel the aching sadness he radiated.

"I take it you're not particularly interested in hearing my side," I observed without preamble, not bothering to keep the pain from my voice.

"Hm."

I nodded once and closed one of my bags. "You understand why I'm leaving."

"Flawed is the Order, yes. But remains, it does, the best way to serve the light. Like this, I do not, but judge the entire Order you must not by the actions of a few."

"A 'no' would have been sufficient," I snapped, tiredly rubbing my temples. Then the last of my control broke. "A few," I snorted. "A few! When you know that a body as corrupt as the Senate tugs on the very strings that move the Council. And when the man who is responsible for all that corruption is poised to take over the most important seat in the Galaxy? Surely you don't expect to sit back *then* and argue that it is 'a few'?" Yoda caught the brunt of my anger, deflecting it with ease. "You," I choked. "You, Master. You knew."

"Strong, young Kenobi is not," he said, ignoring my tirade. "Allowed fear to guide his actions, he did. Repair some of what he has done, you could, if you were together. But apart? Hmm." He shook his head slowly and leaned more heavily on his stick. "Need you, he does."

I shook my head. It wasn't the point.

"A choice you have, Qui-Gon," Yoda said, low, unwilling to address the issue of his own involvement in this. "Go to him, you can. Stop him. Bring him here. Proceed with the exposing of the Senator, we will, and deal with the crèche as well. Protected will you both be."

He paused, and I stared at him, waiting.

"Or, bring him here, we can, and you as well, and keep you here, under Force-dampeners." This thought made Yoda even more miserable than before, and it horrified me. "Keep you from the dark side we will, somehow, my padawan. Our most important task in the light, that is." He looked at me a moment, and then turned and shuffled out of the room.

I sat on the bed, my knees weak. The aching burn still resided in my chest, apparently to remain a fixture for the rest of my life, or for as long as I remained shielded from the bond. I leaned forward and sank to my knees on the floor. I centered myself. It took a long time, so broken was my focus, but I managed it. Then I drifted into a shallow meditative state.

"There is no emotion, there is peace." I pushed, pushed . . . tried to release my anger, my pain, and my sense of betrayal. It would not go. It felt wrong, to recite the Code that I had used to try, unsuccessfully, to give strength to Obi-Wan. I drew in a breath, relaxed my hands, my arms, and the knots in my shoulders . . . I walked back through the first relaxation methods I had ever learned. I centered, much more readily this time.

"There is no emotion, there is peace." I felt the anger give, just a small shift. I took another breath, sank deeper, and pushed.

The ugly dark anger left me in a great black wash, jarring me.

Obi-Wan's actions had been directed by fear, by the fear of remaining in a glorified slave state, and by the fear of going to a prison colony, where things were assuredly worse than even he could imagine. Later, he was driven by the fear of discovery, by the fear of losing me, and later still, he was directed by the fear of *my* emotions when I discovered the depth of the conspiracy he had unwittingly set loose. Every lie he had placed, every deception was out of panic and apprehension, and I had been wrong: not all of it had been for his self-preservation. Some of it had been for mine.

For even though there were flaws in the Order, it remained the best way in which to serve the light.

In the end, he had wanted to protect me, along with himself, from the staggering enormity of what had happened around me.

I found myself reaching for him. Through the shields, or over them, it didn't matter. I let them drop. He was there, instantly. A sense of guilt and sorrow permeated the bond. I also sensed strong determination. Horror dawned within me as I realized what he was doing: he was about to turn himself in.

My transport raced toward Ord Mantell. I had to stop him, had to convince him he could do more to remedy things by making public his knowledge and proof of the scope of the operation. I tried to reach him mentally, but he would not respond to my fervent demands through the bond.

I heard nothing more, felt nothing more from him until two days later, when an agonizing flare bolted through me. The bond snapped closed under the crushing strength of a Force inhibitor.

I stayed my course, blocking out as much of the pain as I could.

When I arrived at the household, it was completely abandoned. No gate guards, no kitchen staff. Then I saw something in the kitchen doorway: a singed streak. Blaster fire? There was another large, black burnt place that seemed to have been caused by blaster fire rebounding off a corner of the floor and into the wall. I sped to the com room.

Every datapad, every paper was gone. I hit the com switch, but it clicked uselessly. I looked at the far end of it: it was not only charred and caved in, but gutted as well. Then, near the com, I found his lightsaber, casing split and burnt, obviously blasted.

Obi-Wan was, most assuredly, *not* in the hands of the authorities. I could do him no good from Ord Mantell.

As soon as I reached my ship and powered up to leave, I sent a transmission home. As the voice of the dispatch reached me, I opened my mouth to demand a patch through to the Council. Then, I changed my mind.

"Give me the offices of the Supreme Chancellor."

For three days, I waited. I paced about the Temple, uneasy and alone, hurting from the place where it felt like the bond had been ripped bodily out of me. I waited for a 'concession to investigate' from the very political machine that had inadvertently put Obi-Wan where he was. I used what weight I had as a senior Jedi with a successful diplomatic record to gain audience before the Supreme Chancellor. Then when secretaries balked, I used the weight of my own master's position on the Council to ensure that the audience was strictly private.

I manipulated my way straight to the top with a lack of regard for others that astounded even me. But the unscrupulous nature of my actions against my master and the Order would have to be addressed later: now, I feared for Obi-Wan's life.

I relayed everything I knew to Chancellor Valorum. I talked until there was nothing more to say, until I felt the veneer I had placed about myself cracking under the strain of scrutiny, even doubt. I dropped every name, every location, even what information I could recall from the paper file I had seen. I ended with the Belsavian Prime Minister.

Supreme Chancellor Valorum regarded me from behind his large, curved black desk. He was silent a moment before he reached into a drawer and retrieved a credit chip and a data chip. He slid them over the polished surface of the desk toward me. I looked at him quizzically.

"The Council, specifically Master Yoda, has already contacted me, Master Jinn," he told me, as I picked up the items in amazement. "Obi-Wan Kenobi is, indeed, on Belsavis. I have received information from several Fleet operatives that he is being held on the Southern Hemisphere. There is only one way that you might retrieve him." He faltered. "It will require some gratuitous and rather unscrupulous actions on your part."

I gestured for him to go on. That no longer concerned me. I dropped my eyes, reached for strength from the Force, and listened.

"Landing clearance granted," the female 'droid's voice intoned. "Proceed to pad oh-three-seven, and welcome to Belsavis." I guided my small craft down to the specified pad, positioning it exactly between the wide yellow strips and blinking lights.

As I emerged, a tall, dignified man who introduced himself as Peln greeted me. He wore one long, smooth robe of a deep blue color: the uniform of a planetary Senator.

"We are deeply honored, Master Jedi, in your interest in this most grievous criminal investigation. The Prime Minister---"

"---Is the only one I will speak to concerning this situation," I told him gruffly, waving him silent. I shot a hard look at him, and he bowed his head in acquiescence.

I followed him through the spaceport to a shuttlecraft, which sped us to the capital. He did not try to question me, as I had assumed he would. We arrived at the capital quickly, and he directed me through the halls and chambers, bearing me directly to the gubernatorial offices.

Prime Minister V'grill was as unctuous as I might have expected. He was a rotund humanoid with sickly white skin and small, pale gray eyes. He rose from his large chair as I entered the office.

"Ah," he smiled broadly. "Master Qui-Gon Jinn." He extended his hand to me, and I shook it, displaying warmth and good humor I did not feel.

"This is all," he said quietly, "a very unfortunate business. Looks very bad, for everyone involved." He pursed his lips and folded his hands behind his back, looking at me closely. "I hear you have something for me," he prodded when I said nothing.

I held my hand up. "First, I wish to see him. He is no good to me dead."

"Dead!" He looked indignant, even disgusted. "I never. His sponsor required this. I was merely holding him here until arrangements had been finalized."

"Consider them so, and bring him out," I said firmly.

The man's eyes leapt. "Perfect." He moved to the desk and hit a com switch. "Bring him," he said toward the desk.

He turned back to me, leaning back onto the desk and folding his arms. "You have the data chip then?" he pressed, as we waited. "And the money?"

I nodded curtly and produced both. His smile gleamed whitely, a politician's smile, as he took them from me. As he slid the data chip into a processor, two guards brought the prisoner into the room, splitting my attention.

Obi-Wan fairly hung in their arms. His tunic and leggings were soiled and abraded in several places, his leggings torn halfway up along one seam. His hair was tangled and filthy, his eyes glazed and empty. He had a Force-restraint around his neck, and his hands were cuffed snugly in front of him. When he saw me, his eyes cleared in shock and hope.

It made me hate the thought of what he was about to witness.

I pushed, then, hard, aiming at the Prime Minister. I sent more Force suggestion into that man's head than I have ever used in my life on a single person. I pushed until I was nearly dizzy with the effort.

"Good, good," the Prime Minister was fairly panting, after he had read a moment. "It's all here. Shipping dates, destinations, even the clearance codes assigned to him. Proof that he's been responsible for all of it. Senator Palpatine will be very pleased to hear his venerable name is cleared."

I cast a cold, disdainful look toward the man the guards were holding. "Yes," I said simply, and watched him slump in their hands, his hope vaporizing under my stare.

The Prime Minister turned away from the view screen. "I intend to ask Senator Palpatine to turn this in at the next session," he told me eagerly.

I smiled at him blandly. "It is my most fervent wish, Your Eminence, that you will see the perpetrator exposed."

But then he looked at me with what felt like suspicion.

"Master Jedi, please do not misunderstand my curiosity. I am greatly appreciative of your . . . contribution. However, I cannot help but wonder: are you here in an official capacity? What is your interest in the conclusion of this operation?"

I raised my eyebrows. "I have my own interests to protect," I replied smoothly. "I stand to lose a great deal if the wrong information is released. I could be considered an accessory after the fact: I continued abetting him long after I was aware that he was involved with the crop production." I paused thoughtfully. "And no. I am not here on official business," I added. "I act of my own volition, outside the authorization of the Council."

The Prime Minister rose from his desk, mirth lighting up his eyes. "A rogue Jedi! Well, I never." He chuckled a moment, glancing at Obi-Wan, who stared with glassy despair.

"Well then," the politician smiled, conspiratorially, winking at me. "You are free to take him. Shall we remove the Force collar for you, first?"

"Absolutely not," I protested, keeping my voice even. "I'll not have him fighting me on board my own ship."

The Prime Minister chuckled, and I allowed him to make of it what he would. I shook his hand, burying my abhorrence under decades of Jedi training. Jovially, he waved the guards forward. They released Obi-Wan to me, and I grabbed him by one arm and hauled him out of the offices to the shuttlecar.

He was silent, deathly so, and his eyes were deeply resentful and despondent, but I could say nothing to him. Not yet.

The shuttlecar dropped us off on the docking ramp, and I pushed Obi-Wan before me, displaying great irritation with his slowness. He stumbled on the boarding ramp, and I huffed at him and yanked him on board. I drew up the ramp and closed the doors behind us, shaking with relief. It was done. No one who had seen me could vouch for anything other than my complete disgust for the prisoner they had been holding.

He slid to the floor, looking away with desperation and dread, and whispered something I couldn't hear. I bent over him.

"Bastard," he repeated himself, his voice weak and coarse.

Great Force, what had they managed to do to him in less than a week's time? But I had no time now to explain or defend myself. I rose and fumbled out of my brown robe, draping it over him hastily, murmuring an apology. "I have to get us out of here, Obi-Wan."

I moved to the cockpit and powered up the ship, hoping. Hoping I had been able to push enough of a suggestion at the Prime Minister. Hoping no one else would look at the datachip's contents. Hoping I could get us out of here before Obi-Wan, enraged, attacked me. I piloted us into orbit, then set coordinates for Coruscant. Breathing a great sigh of relief, I engaged the hyperdrive.

My fear of an attack coming from Obi-Wan was unwarranted. He was unconscious, slumped against the hull where I had left him. I lifted him gently, carrying him to a cot at the back. Then I went to work.

I used a small laser and a flat opener to remove the collar. I dropped it on the floor and kicked it to one side, revolted. The bond flared to instant wakefulness, relieving the fiery distress in my chest immediately. Even unconscious, he sighed. I was partially thankful that he was oblivious: it would have hurt him a great deal to have all that Force presence bounding back into him so quickly. I pressed into the bond, pushing on it, and felt a trickle of consternation returned to me. He was afraid even through his unconsciousness, but alive, and that was enough for now.

I cut his filthy clothing from him and bathed him as best I could. I cleansed his wounds, and Force, there were so many! He had vivid, flushed stripes across his chest, back and the backs of his legs, rope burns at his throat and wrists. Rope! What kind of barbaric detention had he been in? And his knees . . . I shuddered. His poor knees. Still, it was nothing to the terrible intimacy of the worst ones, and Force only knew if he had internal injuries as well. Sickened, I washed the wounds clean as best I could and covered them with bacta.

I felt the creeping, slow burn of fury again. The implication --- hell --- the *fact* of what he had endured made me miserable with a violent, black desire to vindicate him. As I covered him with a light sheet, I found it very, very hard to let go of that desire.

At the healers', I sat beside his bed, leaning my head on my hand. I had been dozing in the chair for several hours: his condition was stable, and his signs had normalized, but no matter how the healers prodded me, I would not leave. Occasionally, I would query through the bond, met with little more than fluctuating darkness.

I woke to find him staring at me, his eyes bleary, guarded, and tired-looking. I straightened in my chair and leaned forward, surprised, and eager to speak with him. I immediately reached for his hand. He pulled it away from me, weakly, before I could touch him. He looked like death: his eyes were ringed darkly, his skin was sallow, his hair hung back flatly. From nowhere, I suddenly felt a distinct longing to see him fidgeting with his hair again.

"What---?" he croaked feebly, and closed his eyes in frustration at the sound of his own voice, foreign and weak.

"Obi-Wan," I greeted him, but my heart was too full for me to find any other words. Just that he was awake, alive, was a gift.

"Get---" he said, just above a whisper, and pointed at the door.

That strengthened me enough to speak. "I will not," I told him. "Not until you listen to me, Padawan."

He rolled his eyes at me, and I could feel a wash of anger from him. I poured a cup of water and held it out to him, and he gritted his teeth, tensing his jaw a moment, before he yielded, nodding. As I cupped his head and helped him drink, I spoke.

"I should never have left you. I can see now how wrong it was, how I allowed my anger to blind me."

He waved his hand at me, and murmured, "Get out," and his voice was stronger, because of the water or his growing agitation with me, I didn't know. I ignored his order, and went on.

"There is no use going back and wondering what might have happened if I had been with you when they came for you. My only desire when I went back was to keep you from turning yourself in. But you must understand, Obi-Wan, I had reasons for everything I did on Belsavis. I know that might be hard for you to see now, but you'll just have to trust me."

"Why?" His eyes were hard and gray in the overly white lighting of the healers' wing.

"Because you never have before. Now is the time." I put the water glass down and looked at him. He was white and thin, with dark circles under his eyes and his hair limp about his face. I wanted to touch him, to push a stray strand of hair back from his cheek. I restrained myself with great effort.

"Wasn't going . . . to authorities." He looked at me, hard, and closed his eyes. / /I was coming to find you./ / His voice through the bond was even weaker than through his throat. / /Now, I see./ /

But he did not see, and I could not explain. If any members of the Council were to question him, he *could* not know what I knew. I tried to send him reassurance and love, but he would have none of it, and shielded, though it obviously tired him.

"You may save . . . benevolence for when I . . . am on Delrian, rotting," he whispered, and closed his eyes, turning his face away from me. "Get," he pointed at the door, "out."

I bowed my head, defeated and in pain. Scrubbing my palm over my chest where the ache had reseated itself, I left the room.

I drew myself up. I stood in the presence of my master, who had arranged for me to virtually steal Obi-Wan from certain death. I could have done little without him, and though there was much to be done to repair the damage done within the Order, he was right: service to the light was well done here. I opened my mouth to thank him, to apologize, to ask his forgiveness.

"Questioned him, they have," my master told me, before I could get a word out. "Nothing does he know. Tells them, he does, of how you will turn him in."

I nodded my head, stilling my features and drawing in a breath to speak.

"Bothers you, the bond does," Yoda observed, closing his eyes.

I nodded again, then opened my mouth, again, to try to express regret for my actions.

"See to that, the healers will, when finished we are with this business. And see to your padawan's knighting ceremony we must, as well." "Yes. I just wanted to say ---

"Talk too much, you do, young Master Qui-Gon. Late for the Senate meeting, you will be."

His eyes were smiling.

I sat in the Supreme Chancellor's Senate platform, immediately behind him, hooded closely. The Senate dome was teeming with delegates. I banked my nervousness as best I could.

He wasn't here.

I had expressed the crucial nature of the Senate session to the healers, had told them it was of utmost importance to Obi-Wan's wellbeing in the light for him to be here. I had even gone so far as to ask them specifically not to mention my name. If Obi-Wan never spoke to me again, I would have him, at least, see this day out.

The Chancellor nodded to me as he stepped onto his platform. He prepared to steer it into the chamber, but I placed my hand on his arm, begging his pardon and asking him to wait just a moment more. He nodded tightly, but I knew it would be hard-bought time.

My moment came and went. He didn't come. My heart ached terribly.

The Chancellor steered his pod out into the center of the dome, and I was stranded there with him, with no Obi-Wan to witness what could be triumph or calamity.

"I call to order this emergency session of the Republic Senate," his voice intoned. I searched the platforms within my range of vision while the Chancellor conferred formalities, but the vast hall held so many, and I had no idea where the Belsavian pod might be.

Soon enough, I had no more need to wonder.

"The chair recognizes the honorable Senator of Belsavis."

"Your Honor, a matter of grievous importance has come before us," said the Senator, whom I did not recognize. "We have uncovered a great smuggling ring, shipping, stocking, and supplying planets all over the galaxy with luthro. Most unfortunately, we have found that its ring leader is Jedi."

A ripple of astonishment moved through the chamber.

"Order!" the Chancellor demanded, then redirected his attention to the Senator. "Have you proof of these allegations? This is a dangerous accusation you make."

The Senator bowed. "I present to the Senate the esteemed Prime Minister V' grill of Belsavis." He bowed again, then stepped back as the Prime Minister moved to the microphone.

"Your Excellency," he wheedled, and my nerves grated at the very sound of his voice. "I have here a datachip with information on it which is best shared via viewscreen. If I may beg such an indulgence . . .?"

The Chancellor nodded, and the lighting within the dome dropped to safety standards. A massive, reflective view column dropped from the ceiling, and the Prime Minister fumbled with the datachip before his Senator rose to help him insert it into the projector. The Senator steered the pod to a position so that most would be able to see the material as it was presented.

The projector beamed its contents onto the first screen, and the information was relayed around the column. I tucked my hands into my sleeves and held my breath.

The first table of data was as I had seen it: shipping dates, export information. The next was, as it had been, a list of recipients. The third screen consisted of monetary exchanges --- huge sums of money for varying amounts of luthro. Following that was a list of Jedi initiates who had been pulled directly from AgriCorps entry at the source: the Temple crèche. This screen named the two Crèche Masters involved with the ring. Stunned murmurs went up.

The fifth screen was contact information. Listed among the top five contacts were those I expected: two Hutts, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Prime Minister V'grill of Belsavis, and Senator Palpatine of Naboo.

A shocked roar went up, not the slightest contribution being made by the honorable Prime Minister himself. He simply stared, flabbergasted. He turned on his platform and gawked directly at Senator Palpatine, who was across the hall. He himself looked ill and pale.

"*Order!*" The Chancellor fairly screamed to be heard over the din.

"I beg --- time!" the Prime Minister was screeching, barely audible. "This --- *no!*" he struggled against his Senator, who was trying to get him back into his seat. He dashed back up to the speaker. "This is wrong, this is not the correct data! I was given a datachip with completely different ---!" He broke off abruptly, wide-eyed and gasping. His Senator gripped his shoulders firmly and pressed him back onto the bench.

The Senate remained in an uproar. Amid the chaos, the Supreme Chancellor paged security. Then he turned to me, his expression dry. "I daresay you owe me a political favor for this, Master Jinn."

I nodded once, under my hood. "I remain at your service," I smiled.

The Chancellor turned back to the chamber "*ORDER!*" he boomed.

The meeting ran terribly long. After the Belsavian and Nabooan platforms had been removed and their delegates placed in custody, the Chancellor began to observe forms I had long forgotten existed. New delegates had to be nominated, a commission was to be appointed to investigate the tracing of the original shipping routes for the smuggling operation. Papers were to be drawn up, more accusations were to be made. The process was more involved than the actions would be. And then, finally, something was said that caught my attention and held it tightly.

"As Supreme Chancellor, it is my right and privilege to offer pardon for crimes committed. It has come to my attention that in this regrettable situation, one of the parties mentioned in the datachip is almost solely responsible for the dissolving of the ring, and the apprehension of the leaders."

Another surprised chorus of shouts went up, this one decidedly friendlier.

"As is within my power as Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Senate, I hereby grant full pardon to Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi, of the Order of the Jedi."

I closed my eyes, sagging with relief.

The platform whined to a stop at the bay door. My tension had been so great, I felt as though my legs would not bear me. Still, I rose, put back my hood, and shook the Chancellor's hand in both of mine, most gratefully. I felt as though I might have hugged him, were it not so undignified to my stature, and his. He murmured a few platitudes, then moved off toward his offices.

I turned away from the platform and saw Obi-Wan standing there in a Jedi tunic and leggings.

I concealed my astonishment and moved toward him, tucking my arms into my sleeves. I nodded to him, unable to think what to say. He looked weak and drawn but markedly well healed.

He noted my veneer of calm and adopted his own. I tilted my head in the direction of the dome exit. "Come with me?" I invited. He nodded.

We found a shuttle and headed back for the Temple, both of us unsure of how to break the tense silence. Finally, after several minutes, he remarked, dazedly, "I've been pardoned."

"Yes, Obi-Wan."

He looked at me then, his eyes wide. "What will happen to me? Where will I go?" Such uncertainty felt alien from one so self-sufficient, and I wondered at him. But it was time to pay the shuttle driver and go into the Temple.

I guided him to my rooms, gratefully peeling off my robe and hanging it on a hook by the door. Then I turned to him.

"You may go wherever you want to go," I told him quietly. "However, I wish you would stay here, with me."

He said nothing. I dared to step close to him. I raised my hand to his hair, rubbing a lock between my thumb and two fingers. He had become so important to me, and I no longer wondered when or how I had fallen in love, I only knew that I had. I was in love with every part of him, every aspect. The dark hardness in his eyes had displayed his strength. The way that he hid behind his hair with his face down showed his fragility. His every look and touch had become so endearing to me. After so nearly losing him, I could do nothing for long moments but stand and drink in the sight of him.

I cupped his face in my hand and reveled in the feel of his skin. "I love you, Obi-Wan," I whispered, overcome.

He closed his eyes, and opened his shields wide.

The blinding rush of relief and love was staggering. Suddenly, by releasing himself to me, he was free. He opened his eyes, and I was amazed at the warmth there. Warmth, love, gratefulness, relief, too many emotions to count. The hardness I had come to know in his green eyes had disappeared at last.

His face crumpled then in the wake of the emotional outpouring, and he squeezed his eyes shut tightly, clutching my hand to his cheek and pulling me to him, tugging on my tunic to get me close. He gripped the lapels of my tunic in clenched fists, burying his face against my shoulder. As I wrapped my arms around his tense body, sobs began to break from him. I held him as he cried raggedly, whispering into his hair that he was safe now, at last. He clung to me, shaking in the aftermath of the trauma he had undergone and hadn't had a chance to face. All I could do was stroke his hair and his back, hold him and speak softly, reassuring him that it was finally all over.

I did not ask him what they had done to him; I wished to avoid putting him back through that. I had seen the grim evidence all over his body. What other explanations could I need? That coupled with his hoarse sobs made me realize desperately, again, that I should have been there when they showed up to get him.

Nevertheless, I let the remorse go and sent waves of calm over him, my Obi-Wan, my lost rogue. I could deal with my residual anger later, and my own grief and regret were unimportant now. I soothed him, rocking him a little, promising him I would be where he needed me in the future.

He quieted slowly, relaxing into me. After a little while, he released me, palming his tears away and then laughing in mild embarrassment as he looked around for something with which to wipe his nose. Smiling, I retrieved him a cloth and sat on my couch, patting the place beside me. He scrubbed at his nose and grinned, looking at his knees.

A moment passed and we sat in silence, comfortable somehow, though nothing had been said. There was so much I wanted to explain to him, but I wasn't sure, now, that it was needed. I sat back, stretching out, and he leaned into me, tucking himself against my side.

"I should have been there," I said quietly, before I realized I was going to speak. I did not elaborate. I put my arms around him, sighing.

He stroked my cheek, brushing his fingertips through my beard. "I should have told you everything from the outset," he countered softly.

"I should have taken you as my padawan when you were thirteen." Ah, I could see we were going to get very good at releasing regret to the Force.

He fell silent a moment. Then he said, "I am not sure that would have been such a good idea. I- I had strong feelings for you. Even then."

I tightened my arms around him, mentally dismissing regret altogether. "And now, here I am. The esteemed Jedi himself." I chuckled again. Holding him here, safe in my own quarters --- *our* own quarters, hopefully soon--- made me grateful and light-hearted in spite of myself. I kissed his forehead.

"The Chancellor mistook my rank," Obi-Wan said quietly.

I told him, "I doubt that the Council could demand a more excruciating Trial, Obi-Wan, than the one you went through. All that you lack is the ceremony."

He tipped his face up to mine, his eyes shining, and drew me down to him. That kiss was sweet and soft, his lips hesitant against mine. I stroked his hair, his cheek, and kissed him in earnest. I flooded him with love and acceptance as he had done me.

When we pulled apart, he gazed at me a moment before whispering, "I am no longer a rogue."

I kissed him again and whispered, "You will always be a rogue. I wouldn't have you change."
 
 

End.

Spoilers follow
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Implied rape of Obi-Wan; Drug references (dealing, not using)