Chapter Text
Obi-Wan had begun to get used to being a youngling again. (A youngling who was treated as a slave, who was called freak and girl, and who was routinely beaten.) Her use of the Force had not been strong enough to change the thoughts and habits of her body’s relatives. (They were not her relatives, and they never would be. Her relatives, her family, were the Jedi and the Clones, and always would be. Not these beings.)
She was too physically weak to use the Force to change their attitudes, but she was able to utilise it to hide herself stealing food and making certain she was not subjected to punishment for trying to get enough sustenance to not pass out. She suspected that nearly a decade of near starvation had made her body too weak to survive much longer, and the Force had decided to let her mind, (the mind of a Jedi Master, of a High General, of an adult who could reason how wrongly these beings acted,) awaken to make certain her body survived.
Obi-Wan was a person of morals, she was a Jedi who had sworn to not allow her personal feelings interfere with her duty, to not allow her personal prejudices to prevent her from offering help, to not allow her own morals and ethics prevent her from seeing another point of view. However, one thing she had never understood or accepted, and never would, is abuse.
She had never been able to comprehend why someone would harm a youngling they were responsible for. She understood that fear could make people do things they would not normally do, and she could see and sense the fear that Petunia and Vernon tried to cover with anger and hatred. They were terrified of her and the secondary power she held. (She could only imagine how terrified of her they would be if they knew what she could do to them if she chose to.)
She had seen the memories that had occurred before she had woken up, and she was honest enough to admit to herself that if she did not have the bond with Mace and Cody, she probably would have done something she might never regret, but she would feel ashamed over later to these people.
She spent as much time as she could meditating, both to work on her temper and strengthen her bonds to Cody and Mace. She had also discovered that one of her other bonds was no longer black; she couldn't entirely tell which one, but it was one of her lineage bonds, which meant it had to be either Qui-Gon, Yoda, Ashoka, Feemor, or Dooku.
She was glad she had always enjoyed working in the Gardens of the Temple and had mastered a form of wakeful meditation many decades earlier. She was able to get small memories off Cody and Mace now, even as she cared for the gardens in this place.
It appeared that Cody was once again in a big family, only this time as a younger brother. He had parents that seemed to love their children very much, even if they did not have enough time for them. Benign neglect, Cody called it. Mace appeared to be an only child, to a woman who was his grandmother. He found her hat with the stuffed, yet still moving, bird on it both hilarious and concerning.
They still could not talk to one another, none of them were strong enough yet, but they could pass memories and impressions to one another.
It was the only thing keeping her sane.
Well, that and trying to talk with the sliver of soul that was apparently in her scar.
She wasn’t sure how a sliver of soul could become lodged into a scar, but she suspected that the strange second power she had, had something to do with it. The first time she found it, she had yelped aloud in shock, and had been slapped across the face by the horse woman for it.
Obi-Wan had quietly returned to her chores after that. She knew how to play a long game. She had undertaken enough under cover missions prior to the war to know how to bide her time.
Patience had eventually become her best virtue, after many years of seeing where recklessness would get her.
She had begun to gently probe the soul sliver. It had originally felt like a Sith artefact she had once come across. Then, she realised the evilness seemed to be a defence mechanism. Once she looked deeper, she could see the fear that inhabited the soul sliver.
She could see the Dark.
She had never feared the Dark. It had never tempted her. Yoda once said she was too stubborn, too cagey, and too patient, to ever Fall, because the Dark could offer her nothing she wanted, as she knew she would be able to get whatever it was with hard work and time instead.
She had never been tempted by the short cuts. She had struggled with patience when she was younger, yes, but she had never wanted to get something without putting the work in.
She was Bonded to a man who routinely used the Dark Side, but never Fell because he was too self-controlled. Her own Master had been a man who had come close to Falling on numerous occasions, and she had managed to shoulder his Darkness, and never be consumed or tempted. She had helped her Grandmaster to always come back from the edge of madness. Even when he had been trying to get close to the Sith Lord, her bond with him had kept him from Falling.
Sith Hells, the reason she had become Anakin’s Master was because the Council had wanted her to keep him stable. And she had, for many years, she had shouldered his Darkness without once being tempted.
At least, until he became a SITH because he wanted to and nothing Obi-Wan had been able to do would have stopped it. (Until he murdered younglings in their home, the one place they should have been safe in.)
Darkness had never scared her; she honestly believed that Dark and Light were necessary for a healthy Force. It was only the Sith, aberrations and cancers on the Force, which needed to be wiped from existence.
So, when she felt the Darkness in the soul sliver in her scar, she did not revile it, she did not attack it, she did not fear it.
She tried to coax it into talking to her.
It was slow going. It did not trust her. It was too afraid to trust.
But patience and time were both something Obi-Wan had plenty of.
She would continue showing the soul sliver kindness and compassion, just as she had always shown others, and eventually it would pay off.
Just as keeping her temper and not killing these utter dar’buir mother kriffers would pay off.
She did not know enough about this world or who this body was to be able to simply leave yet and staying with these kriffing beings would simply have to do for the moment.
She had none of this world’s currency, and she had picked up enough to realise that people look at younglings on their own with concern. (Even if for some reason no one looked at a youngling being treated as a slave with concern. She wasn’t certain as to why the double standards yet, but she would discover why before she left here.)
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Obi-Wan was meditating, sharing her pain with the Force. Apparently, the whale man had taken displeasure with a perfectly prepared and cooked meal and decided to beat her. She had been a slave on more than one occasion, so she knew that he had simply wanted to kick the hell out of her.
She let the pain, the anger, and the fear flow through her and around her, sharing them with the Force. She once again acknowledged she was not perfect, she was sentient and therefore could not be perfect, and she allowed the Force to sooth her frayed nerves. She was allowing the soul sliver to see her memories as she meditated.
She had begun doing so when she realised it was confused about her. She thought showing the soul sliver who she was, who she had been, was a way to show it that she would accept it.
She was allowing the Force to flow around her, and she realised her connection to Mace had gotten strong enough to share a few words with each other when he spoke.
“Love, are you alright? I feel your pain.”
“I am with dar’buir. They don’t like me much.”
“Obi, where are you? I will come for you.”
There was silence for a moment, and Obi realised the connection had faltered once again. She could feel his distress and helplessness, and she tried to send back feelings of love.
$$You are getting closer to remaking your strange bonds.$$
Obi was shocked to realise the soul sliver had spoken to her. She smiled even as she channelled the Force into a Healing Trance to fix the broken ribs.
$$I am.$$ She replied simply, curious to see if it would continue. The voice was masculine, but that did not mean the soul sliver considered itself masculine, so she would stay with neutral pronouns until she learnt otherwise.
$$Do you know who I am?$$
$$I am afraid not. Should I?$$
$$Hmm, I suppose not. But who are you?$$
$$My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi, she/her, although I suppose I also go by Bobi Potter, also she/her. I prefer Obi or Obi-Wan. May I ask your name, and your pronouns?$$
$$Reincarnation? That was one I had not thought of. You may call me Marvolo. He/him I suppose. Why did you ask about my pronouns?$$
$$It is only polite to know how a fellow being wishes to be addressed, Marvolo. As a Jedi Master, especially on the Council, being polite was expected, and I will not allow sixty years of manners to be thrown away simply because I am now in a strange position. It is one of the strangest things that have happened to me, I will admit, but if an intergalactic civil war was not enough for me to give up my manners, I do not see why reincarnation should.$$
Marvolo was silent for a few minutes, and Obi-Wan let him be patiently. Just before she settled in to sleep, he spoke again.
$$You are a strange woman, Obi-Wan Kenobi. I look forward to seeing more of what you are like.$$
Obi smiled as she fell into peaceful slumber.
She looked forward to seeing more of what Marvolo was like as well.
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
A few days after the first time, Marvolo realised he was curious enough to speak to the strange Jedi, General, woman, child, person, once again.
$$Will you punish the horse woman and the whale man for the way they are treating you?$$
Marvolo had to admit, to himself, that he had cackled when she had picked up an illustrated children’s encyclopedia for the first time and saw a picture of a horse and a whale and immediately began calling her relatives that due to their resemblance. He was reasonably certain she had forgotten their names by this point, as anytime she had to speak to them, she called them sir and ma’am. (He had seen enough of her memories to know that it was a method she used to prevent her temper from flaring. She had been held as a slave at least four separate times, and she knew how to act meek and broken even while she was plotting.)
She was silent for a few moments before she answered.
$$No, I will not. Mace and Cody will probably insist on it, but until I know more of this world and its’ laws, I will refrain from bringing in the authorities.$$
$$I meant you could use your Force and punish them that way.$$
(Marvolo knew she probably wouldn’t. She wasn’t the type to seek revenge, but he was curious.)
$$No, I can’t. Well, no, I could, but I won’t. Revenge is not the Jedi way. I may be a Jedi in name only since the purge, one of the last, but I am still a Jedi. I have never been tempted to Fall, and if I have never been tempted by the Dark, why the hell would I follow the steps a kriffing Sith would take? Sith are cancers that harm the Force, and I will never do that. I will never use the Force in that manner.$$
Marvolo fell silent, watching her do more garden work. He was confused by this Jedi General. She was so powerful, yet she went out of her way to appear so harmless. It was a good strategy, but he was beginning to realise it wasn’t a strategy for her.
It was simply her.
She cared for people so much, even her enemies.
$$What if it was another youngling being treated in this way?$$
Her reply was immediate.
$$They would no longer be here, and the authorities would have already been called.$$
$$But not for yourself?$$
$$I can manage it. Plus, I am patient. As long as I can see a way out, I will endure anything. This, quite frankly, this is nothing more than a minor inconvenience while I gather enough intelligence to see a path forwards.$$
Marvolo was not entirely surprised. He knew he was something of a sociopath (that had only gotten worse with each time he had split his soul), but even he could see that some of the things she had been forced to do and endure were wrong.
(If he could have gotten his non-existent hands upon that Qui-Gon Jinn, he would gladly torture and kill the oaf for teaching her that she was only of use if she were willing to die for others. It seemed that Mace, her Bonded which Marvolo thought might be something like a spouse, had done his best over the years to reverse those thoughts, but they were deeply ingrained.)
Marvolo honestly was not sure why he cared so much, but this Jedi was intriguing. He would eventually tell her the truth.
He just did not want to fracture the trust he appeared to have with her by telling her he had tried to kill her and had killed her parents.
%%%%%%%%%%
Obi-Wan knew that Marvolo was not a good person, but she was still drawn to the soul sliver. He was interesting, and she knew he was assessing her with his questions. They had had five civil conversations so far, and she could honestly say she was coming to view him in the same way she had Ventress: someone who had made decisions they regretted but could not see a way clear to a new path. She had no doubt Marvolo would never be what most would view as a good person, he was too sadistic and simply Dark for that, but he also was not evil. She did not know what he had done to his soul, but she wished to help him, if he would allow it.
She was gardening once again, in the heat of the summer sun. After nearly twenty years on Tatooine, the heat of this sun was gentle, but she was in a youngling’s body, not her own body that was used to such conditions. Still, with being able to use the Force in small ways to hide her stealing food and using a meditative trance each night, her body was getting stronger. She thought that perhaps in only a couple of months she would be strong enough to use the Force to change some of her relatives’ thoughts on how they treated her and her cousin.
Spoiling him that much could not be a good thing.
The cousin was a thug and a bully and held no redeeming qualities as far as Obi-Wan could tell. But she rarely gave up on trying to help people, and he was a product of his environment. If he could get some discipline, some order, and rules, he may turn into a reasonable being.
She hoped so anyway.
Grandmaster Dooku had always said her desire to see the good in others was impressively large but would get her into trouble.
He wasn’t wrong.
She missed her Grandmaster and had done for two decades. He had died when Anakin had laid siege to the Temple. He protected the younglings to the very end. He always knew what to say when she needed the complete unvarnished truth about something. And, unlike her Bonded Mace, Dooku had never cared if she wanted to hear it or not. She always returned the favour as well.
She was the only being in the Order who could tell him to pull his head out of his shebs without him getting prissy about it. Likewise, he was the only one in the Order who could tell her to give up on someone that could not be saved without her falling into something akin to a depressive state.
She had the feeling that Marvolo was similar to Dooku in that regard. Obi-Wan was broken out of her reverie and the moving meditation she had lapsed into when she heard a pop behind her.
She also felt such a burning hatred and insanity that she was reminded of the last time she had been near Anakin.
Or rather, Darth Vader.
She spun, still on her knees, and saw a tall being behind her. He was dressed in black robes and was snarling at her, practically frothing at the mouth. He was a squat, lumpy looking man, with a lopsided leer on his sneering face. He drew a piece of wood and pointed it at her.
Obi-Wan knew that was a bad thing and threw herself to the side even as Marvolo snarled what she thought was a name.
$$Carrow. Obi-Wan, whatever you do, do not let the green light hit you, it will kill you.$$
Obi-Wan simply used her still remembered skills, in a sadly untrained body, to keep moving, wishing desperately she had her lightsabre.
She was only mildly shocked when it appeared in her hand and was able to block a strange yellow light. She was not physically capable of using her favoured form of Soresu, but her body could use beginners Shien, so that is what she would do.
She blocked another few differently coloured lights, and then suddenly used a burst of speed to cross the six feet separating her from her attacker and she used a reverse grip on her ‘sabre to cut his hand off and then slammed her ‘sabre into his throat, decapitating him, killing him instantly. She yanked her ‘sabre out of the now dead attacker and looked around, her panting breath harsh in the otherwise quiet morning.
“Marvolo, I have not wanted to press, but now, now you have some explaining to do.”
$$$$$$$$$$$