Chapter Text
Obi-Wan doesn’t know what to do with himself in the days following the war. None of the surrender negotiations require his intervention, not even the official Separatist Senate’s formal surrender.
He helps the Padawans, mostly. Continues to meditate with Wooley, in between.
Finds time to make sure that Anakin’s something approaching alright, somehow.
It’s no secret that Padme’s with child, and Anakin’s given up all pretenses of pretending that they’re not together. But Obi-Wan won’t complain to see him away from their apartment, still technically both of theirs because the war had been well in motion before Anakin was Knighted. But if Anakin decides that he wishes to live with his technically-still-a-secret wife, then all the better for Obi-Wan and Cody. Cody, who doesn’t technically have any other place to stay, and Obi-Wan sees no reason not to let him stay with him in the Temple.
“Any day now, apparently,” Anakin tells him, on one of his increasingly rare visits to the Temple. He’s on his way to leaving the Order, Obi-Wan thinks. Would have already, he thinks, if Ahsoka weren’t still too young and too far removed from her Trials. “And Riis and Rex aren’t staying on Coruscant much longer.”
Obi-Wan knew that, too, had already heard it two days ago when Rex told Cody. “I’m sure that Riis will make sure that Padme has a fantastic physician to see out the rest of the pregnancy and the earliest days of the baby’s life.”
Anakin shakes his head. “They said they won’t leave until Riis knows that the babies will be fine.”
“Babies?” Obi-Wan repeats. “More than one?”
Anakin nods. “She’s going to have twins, apparently.” He fidgets with the glove that covers his cybernetic hand. “I think that the Chancellor was feeding me visions,” he admits quietly. “Of Padme’s death.”
That would explain, Obi-Wan thinks, why Anakin had started acting so strangely recently. He’d written most of it off as concern for his child (children) and Padme’s health, as they got closer to the day that Padme was meant to be going into labor. “I take it they’ve all stopped, then?”
“Haven’t had one since he died,” Anakin agrees. “I trusted him. I thought he was my friend.”
They all trusted him. Even Obi-Wan had trusted him, so much as he ever trusts a politician. Trusted him enough to let him spend so much time with his Padawan, from very shortly after Anakin was brought into the Order.
“He was just using me,” Anakin continues. “This entire time, I wasn’t anything more to him than a tool for him to take over the galaxy.”
“You were so young when he first started planting the seeds of manipulation,” Obi-Wan reminds him gently. “And that’s my fault, I’m afraid. I shouldn’t have let him spend so much time with you.” He sets a hand on his former Padawan’s shoulder. “But I was still quite young myself. Younger than you are, now, even. I fear I made many mistakes in the early days of your training. Most, you’ve been able to overcome entirely on your own. But there are some that are too deeply entrenched to be quite that easy.”
“You can’t mean that,” Anakin snaps, shaking Obi-Wan’s hand off. “It’s not your fault that Palpatine meant to use me to destroy the Jedi! You were the best Master I could have had!”
“That doesn’t mean I didn’t make mistakes,” Obi-Wan reminds him softly. “Padawan mine.”
“Then what do you mean?”
“I mean that nobody is perfect,” he explains. “I mean that I was not ready for a Padawan at all, much less one so important and special as the one my old Master believed to be the Chosen One. I mean that I feared, every day, that I was failing you somehow. I always felt like I’d found some new way with each new day that passed.” Anakin isn’t looking at him. Obi-Wan can’t tell if it’d be easier or harder if he was. “I let Palpatine counsel you in the early days because I was blind to all the reasons not to. And I let him continue to counsel you because you always seemed so much more settled afterward. All I ever wanted was for you to be happy, Anakin. All that I have always wanted has been for you to be happy.”
And if that means that Anakin leaves the Order, then Obi-Wan will see him go with as much support for his decision as he can fit into his whole being.
Mace introduces the Council to his new Padawan the day after Obi-Wan’s conversation with Anakin. He recognizes him as one of Anakin’s men.
“Old, for a Padawan, he is,” Yoda points out.
“You misunderstand me,” Mace says simply, laying a hand on his new Padawan’s shoulder to steady him. “I’m not requesting permission to train Padawan Tup. I’m telling you that the decision has already been made.”
“And none of the clones were Force sensitive more than a year ago,” Depa reminds the room at large. “In terms of their relationship with the Force, they’re all much younger than any of us were.” Depa had arrived back to the Temple from the Outer Rim yesterday morning and proudly declared that Caleb was her son, now, and that there was nothing that anybody could do about it. Obi-Wan supposes it shouldn’t be a surprise that she’s already decided that Tup will be her new brother.
“Anakin tells me that you and Dogma both have made excellent progress with your shields and your meditation,” Obi-Wan says, directly to Tup. “You couldn’t have asked for a better teacher going forward than Master Windu.”
Tup looks startled to be addressed. “Oh, uh, thank you. Sir.”
“Well, seeing as Master Windu has already decided,” Master Plo says, hologram flickering slightly, “Welcome to the Order, Padawan Tup. Out of curiosity, your batchmate was also Force sensitive, was he not?”
“Oh, well.” Tup shifts uncomfortably. “Dogma doesn’t want to train, sir.”
“I intend to keep an eye on him, regardless,” Mace adds. “To at least ensure that he doesn’t find himself stricken with Force exhaustion. We’ve all noticed that Coruscant has seemed more overwhelming in the time since Palpatine’s death. I would hate to see any of the men falling too deep into the swirling sea of emotions.”
“If you find yourself requiring an extra hand, I’d be happy to help,” Plo says, and Obi-Wan can tell that he’s smiling behind his antitox mask.
“Are you not training all seven of your men who woke up from their procedures Force sensitive?” Master Ti reminds him. “I feel as though your hands are already quite full.”
“Regardless of how many men’s training that Master Plo is overseeing,” Mace says, bringing the focus back to the topic at hand, “I should think I’m more than capable of training one Padawan and keeping an eye on his brother without any assistance.”
“Only one Padawan, all of you should have,” Yoda reminds them all. “More than one, we are not permitted.”
“I have no Padawans,” Master Plo points out mildly. Obi-Wan has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing aloud. “I am simply helping seven young Force sensitives in my care learn to control their newfound abilities until such time that they decide whether they’d like to formally continue their training or not.”
Yoda, for the first time that Obi-Wan can remember, visibly seethes.
“When do you plan on introducing Wooley as your Padawan?” Mace asks Obi-Wan, twenty minutes after the Council meeting ends. Rather abruptly ended, as well, if Obi-Wan’s being honest. Yoda appeared as though he were starting to feel ganged up on, and called an end to the meeting shortly thereafter.
There hasn’t been much to talk about, anyway, with the Force back to rights and the war at an end.
“Wooley isn’t my Padawan,” Obi-Wan corrects. “I don’t want any more Padawans.”
“As the Wolfpack aren’t Master Plo’s Padawans?” Mace asks him drily. “Another young man you’re teaching to meditate and nothing more?”
“Wooley has expressed no interest in joining the Order,” Obi-Wan says. “As, I’m sure, the Wolfpack hasn’t. You would not have been the first to take one of the clones as a formal Padawan if any of those men had.”
“And if Wooley were to express interest,” Mace muses, “would you suddenly change your mind on not wanting another Padawan?”
“Most likely not.” Obi-Wan doesn’t want another Padawan now any more than he had when the Council had asked him if he would rather train Ahsoka than to trick Anakin into doing it himself. “But it doesn’t matter much. All of Ghost seems to have rather…negative feelings towards the Jedi.” According to Cody, at any rate, although Obi-Wan’s certainly noticed some of it for himself over the years. “Wooley wouldn’t want to be one of us.”
Obi-Wan doesn’t see Ahsoka much more than he sees Anakin, even if she is still living in the Temple. He’s not entirely certain which apartment she’s living in, either, as Anakin doesn’t have one of his own and she’s certainly not living in his apartment.
“Oh, hi, Master!” Ahsoka grins at him when she passes him in the hall. “Is it true that Master Windu is training Tup, now?”
“It is, indeed,” he confirms, and she starts following him wordlessly in the direction of his apartment. “He presented him to the Council this morning.”
“I’m glad he decided to try, then,” Ahsoka says, as he steps into the apartment. She steps in behind him and lets the door slide closed behind her. “Oh! Hi, Cody!”
Cody glances up from his spot on the sofa. “Commander.”
“Ah, ah,” Ahsoka reminds him, holding up a finger. “Not a Commander anymore, remember? Just Ahsoka!”
“Of course,” Cody concedes with a nod. “My apologies.”
“I take it you encouraged Tup to seek formal training, then?” Obi-Wan asks, moving into the kitchen to make some tea. Ahsoka’s not nearly as fond of any blend as he is, but she’s much more amenable to having tea with him than Anakin is.
“Yup!” Ahsoka grins, sitting down next to Cody on the sofa. “He said he wanted to train more than just mediation and shielding, and I told him that he should go to the Temple and ask. I tried to encourage Dogma to find someone too, but he was pretty adamant that he didn’t want to.”
“Yes, Tup mentioned.” Obi-Wan reaches for the jar with Ahsoka’s favorite tea blend and pulls it down, setting it on the counter. “Mace said that he intends to keep an eye on him to keep him from falling to Force exhaustion, but he’ll let him do as he pleases otherwise.” He finishes the tea and moves back into the front room, handing Ahsoka her mug. “But you know, I don’t believe it would have been so easy to convince the Council to agree to Tup’s training were it not for you and the work you put into helping him and Dogma with their meditation.”
“Oh, well.” Ahsoka takes a sip of her tea to stall. “I don’t know about that, Master.”
“Regardless, it is true,” Obi-Wan assures her, settling down in his armchair. “After all, all younglings have a basis in meditation and primary education before their Padawanships. As Tup was not Temple-raised, it would be hard for him to catch up, otherwise.”
“But…Anakin wasn’t Temple-raised, either,” Ahsoka points out. “And he did just fine.”
Just fine feels like it both over and undersells things. “Anakin was not Temple-raised,” Obi-Wan agrees, “and it is true that he’s made a fine name for himself as a Jedi Knight. But he had difficulties, in the beginning. There were days when it was difficult to convince him that he had what it took to be a Jedi at all.”
“It’s hard to imagine him questioning himself,” Ahsoka admits. “He’s always so confident and sure of himself.”
“He is,” Obi-Wan says. “Too much so, some days.” Anakin never was particularly good with middle grounds. “But he was in the Council room the day that Yoda told Qui-Gon that he was too old to be trained, and his inabilities to sit still and quiet for meditation made it difficult for him to believe that Yoda was incorrect.” Anakin has, after all, become one of the best Jedi in the Order, even if most of the Council doesn’t get to see it all too often. “I do believe that Mace will be better suited than I was to training a Padawan who was raised outside the Temple.”
“But…you did a great job with Anakin!” Ahsoka argues.
“Not without difficulties,” Obi-Wan reminds her. “Need I remind you that Anakin got married in what he thought was secret before he was even Knighted?”
“Well, yeah, but…” Ahsoka trails off. “You didn’t fail him, though. You know that, right?”
“I never said that I did.” Cody snorts from his spot on the sofa, pretending that he’s not paying attention to the conversation. “Only that I was young and inexperienced, and I was given an unconventional Padawan besides. I managed. We both did.”
Ahsoka stares down into her cup. “I think he’s planning on leaving,” she admits quietly. “Or, I think he wants to.”
“If Anakin wanted to do something, he would do it,” Obi-Wan reminds her, even though he feels like she’s right. “You know him well enough to know that he’s far more stubborn than that.”
“But what if…What if there’s something that he wants to do, but then there’s something that he doesn’t want to do, and he can’t do one without doing the other because they’re directly at odds with each other?”
Obi-Wan sighs. “Are you asking me for counsel or are you simply trying to work through this for yourself?”
Ahsoka shrugs. “I don’t know. Both, I guess.” She sets her mug down on the caf table in front of her. “I just. I know I’m not supposed to tell people that I know about him and Padme, but he’s been so excited since he found out she was pregnant, and I just don’t want to be the thing that ruins this for him.” She sinks back into the sofa.
Obi-Wan glances over at Cody, still sitting beside her and still pretending not to be listening to the conversation at hand. It seems much harder for him to stay out of it, now.
“Ahsoka, dear. Look at me.” He sets his own mug down beside hers. “Anakin’s decision to stay in the Order to see your training through to the end would not ruin his having a family with Padme and the twins. Alright?” He moves, so that he’s kneeling in front of Ahsoka, taking her hands in his own. “It’s no secret, anymore, he’s given up on all those pretenses. And the Order’s changing, besides, in the aftermath of everything. Nobody’s going to force him to choose between training you and staying with his family. He doesn’t have to choose.”
“Yeah,” Ahsoka mumbles. She nods. “Yeah, you’re right. He doesn’t have to choose.”
Obi-Wan doesn’t know how he feels about the way that she says it, but it doesn’t fully sound like he’s convinced her.
Anakin is, in a word, blindsided by how difficult it turns out to be to assemble furniture. But Padme’s still doing very important Senator work, even with as far along in the pregnancy as she is, and she’d asked him to at least build the cribs today while she was at the Senate building. She’d also asked him not to make any modifications to the little spinning things that are supposed to be suspended over their cribs, although Anakin could totally make them so much better than they are now.
The front door chimes. Anakin drops the two pieces of the crib that he’s trying to put together and goes to let whoever it is in.
“Snips!” Anakin steps aside and lets Ahsoka step inside. “I didn’t think I lost that much time.” He was supposed to meet up with her tomorrow, he’d thought, but between preparing for the babies and the difference between sleeping on the Resolute and sleeping in Padme’s apartment, his usually bad sleep schedule is much worse, and it’s entirely possible that he'd gotten the days mixed up.
“No, that’s…that’s still tomorrow,” Ahsoka assures him. “But I just…I wanted to talk to you now, about something, if you’ve got the time?”
“I’ve always got time for my favorite Padawan, Snips,” Anakin says, leading Ahsoka into the room that’s going to be the nursery, if he can get the cribs assembled. “Do you know anything about assembling furniture?”
“The non-mechanical kind, I’m assuming?” Ahsoka looks at the scattered pieces of the two cribs littering the floor. “Did you open and unload both boxes at once?”
“Yeah, I was planning on doing them both at the same time.”
Ahsoka giggles. “But now there’s too many pieces, Skyguy. When you do maintenance on droids, you don’t get all the parts for all of them out at once, do you?”
Anakin reaches up and scratches the back of his head. “I guess not,” he admits. “I thought it’d be easier this way. And since the pieces are all bigger than droid parts, I didn’t think it’d be a problem.”
Ahsoka kneels down and starts sorting through the pieces, stacking them together so that the identical pieces are grouped together. It already looks much less daunting than it had.
“So, what’d you wanna talk about?” Anakin asks, sitting down next to his Padawan as she reaches for the instructions that he’d largely ignored.
Ahsoka freezes for a moment, before sitting up straight and settling on her heels. “Oh. Right.” She’s nervous; Anakin doesn’t think he’s ever seen her quite like this. She’s always been so comfortable with him. “Well, I’ve been thinking, and…You know I’m happy, to have you as my Master, right? I’ve learned a lot, and I’ve had a lot of fun, and I couldn’t have asked for a better Padawanship from anyone.” She looks up at him, bright blue eyes wide with something Anakin doesn’t quite know how to name.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better Padawan,” Anakin tells her, because he couldn’t, and he feels like it’s the thing to say. He doesn’t know where this is going. “I know I acted like I didn’t want to train you at first, but I’m really happy that you were assigned to me, too.”
“Yeah,” Ahsoka mumbles. “Right. But, see, the thing is…Well, I know that all the Jedi are having all their own problems adjusting, right, and especially the Padawans and the ones that were Knighted during the war, but the thing is that…I feel, I feel like you don’t…want…to be a Jedi, anymore?”
Anakin hasn’t really thought about it, not in the way that Obi-Wan seems to think he has. Or the way Ahsoka apparently thinks. He’s been avoiding the Temple because he hasn’t wanted anybody to corner him and remind him about the Order’s opinions on attachments. “Is this about the babies? Because I’m not leaving the Order until they kick me out, but I don’t think that they’re going to now because I’m pretty sure they already would have.”
Ahsoka shakes her head. “Okay, but what if…What if you didn’t have to stay?”
Anakin doesn’t understand what’s happening. “Snips, what are you talking about?”
Ahsoka sighs. “I…I spoke with Master Secura. If…if, okay, it’s important that you understand that this is only if, but if you decide that you do want to leave, to spend more time with Padme and the twins, that you don’t want to be a Jedi anymore…She’d be willing to finish my training. So you don’t feel like you have to stay, or anything.”
Oh.
Anakin doesn’t think the cribs are going to be assembled today.
“What if I don’t want to leave?”
Ahsoka shrugs. “Then you finish my training yourself.” She tugs on the bottom of her tunic, the way that Anakin used to tug on his Padawan braid. “It’s not…I’m not trying to replace you, Master. But I also don’t think you’d try to find yourself a replacement, so you wouldn’t leave until I’d passed my Trials. Even if you did want to.”
Ahsoka’s right. The only reason, really, that Anakin hasn’t thought about leaving—and quite possibly the only reason that Padme hasn’t brought it up—is because he can’t leave Ahsoka alone.
Except that he wouldn’t be leaving her alone. She’s already found somebody to take over for him.
“I just didn’t want you to feel like you didn’t have a choice,” Ahsoka explains, hands all twisted in the excess fabric of her shirt. “Now you do have one.”
“Obi-Wan says we always have a choice.” He doesn’t know what else he’s supposed to say.
“But it doesn’t always feel that way, does it?”
No, it doesn’t.
“You’re too smart for me, Snips,” Anakin admits. “Have I ever told you that?”
Ahsoka scoffs, all tension bleeding out almost immediately. “You didn’t have to,” she tells him, reaching out and knocking a knuckle against his shoulder. “I always knew.”
Obi-Wan gets a frantic comm from Anakin at something close to 0200. Cody tries to convince him to ignore it the first two times his comm pings, because there’s no war and no urgent subcode to abuse, but on the third ping, he has to concede that he’s only going to keep trying until Obi-Wan answers.
“Obi-Wan, I think the babies are coming, and I don’t know what to do but Padme said I should call you because she thinks you should know and I kind of agree with her actually.”
Obi-Wan shoots a sidelong look over at Cody. Ignore it, he mouths. It’s probably not important.
Cody shrugs, entirely unrepentant. Usually isn't, he mouths soundlessly back.
Obi-Wan rolls his eyes. “Have you informed Riis, yet?”
“That’s what Padme’s doing,” Anakin tells him. “And then we’re supposed to go to the hospital, I think, but Riis doesn’t work at the hospital anymore so I actually don’t know.” There’s a moment of quiet before Anakin admits, much quieter but much more panicked, “Obi-Wan, I don’t know anything about babies.”
Obi-Wan doesn’t know the first thing about babies, either. That is, probably, not the correct thing to point out to him. “Fives didn’t know anything about them, either, as I recall,” he says instead, climbing out of bed and getting to work on gathering clothes to wear to the hospital, as soon as Anakin knows for sure which hospital to go to. “But he seems to have worked it out well enough for himself.”
“But he only had one baby and I’m going to have two,” Anakin points out, like it makes that much of a difference.
“One baby or two, I’d imagine the process is still much the same.”
“But what if I mess everything up? What if I get it all wrong and—”
Cody would be laughing at him if he didn’t think that audible laughter would make Anakin’s panic worse, Obi-Wan can tell.
“Anakin,” Obi-Wan interrupts. “Do you remember the conversation we had a few days ago about how I felt some days that I was failing you somehow?”
Anakin’s quiet for a moment. “That doesn’t make me feel better,” he says finally.
“No, I don’t imagine it does,” Obi-Wan agrees. “But take a look at how far you’ve come, since you were a small, scared boy having his slave chip removed. You’ve trained Ahsoka into a fine Senior Padawan, you’ve earned the respect of hundreds of men that would follow you into any battle you led them into, and you’re one of the strongest Jedi the Order’s ever seen. Even for all my doubts and fears, in myself, and in the job that I was doing in raising you, you’ve grown into such a fine young man, Anakin. And while I do not doubt that you’ll have your own doubts in the years to come, I do believe that they’ll be just as unfounded as my own.”
“You really think I’m one of the strongest Jedi?”
Cody snorts softly, the same way that Obi-Wan imagines he used to when he had the bucket to hide behind. It’s quiet enough that the communicator won’t pick up on it.
“Of course,” Obi-Wan says simply. It’s incredibly telling that it’s the only thing that Anakin picked up on, but Obi-Wan’s going to let that be because it’s maybe the only point that won’t lead to further panic. “Your raw strength is unmatched by anyone around the same age as yourself, and those who do come close or surpass you have decades of training behind them.” Anakin’s struggles as a Jedi come in control and refinement, but his strength and power are something Obi-Wan’s never seen in any of the younger Knights.
“You used to lecture me for saying stuff like that,” Anakin reminds him after a moment. “I always just assumed it was because you didn’t agree.”
Obi-Wan loves his former Padawan. Truly, he does. He just needs to remind himself of that, some days. Like days where he has to assure his former Padawan at just past 0200 that he’ll do just fine as a father.
“I lecture you for saying stuff like that because humility is a very important quality for a Jedi to have. However, it would be unfair of me not to give you credit where credit is due.”
“Oh.”
Really, he loves Anakin.
“Well, um, thank you. Um, Padme’s done talking to Riis, so I have to go now, but thank you, for answering. And for talking to me. I know that it’s really late.”
“Are you going to the hospital Riis used to work at, or are you going to be using the Senatorial medcenter?”
“What? Oh, I don’t know, hang on.” Obi-Wan listens to him ask Padme, and listens to Padme’s frayed and pained voice reply, even though he can’t quite make the words themselves out. “The Senate one, apparently.”
“Alright. I’ll be there shortly.”
“Wait, you’re coming too?”
Cody buries his face in one of the pillows to muffle the sound of his laughter.
“Yes, Anakin,” Obi-Wan says, biting back a sigh that will hurt more than help. “If you’ll have me, I’d be happy to be there.”
“Of course I want you to be there,” Anakin agrees. “I just assumed that you’d be going back to sleep. You know, since it’s so late.”
“I can catch up on sleep,” Obi-Wan reminds him. “But if I miss the birth of your children, then there’s no second chance.”
“Oh. Right. Yeah, that makes sense. See you in a bit, then.”
The transmission ends.
Cody lets all of his amusement and laughter out at once, until he laughs so hard he falls off the bed entirely. “How he managed to be such a steady General when panic makes him stupider than a bantha is beyond me,” he gasps out. “You’re coming too, like you’d even dream of missing this.”
“Yes, well,” Obi-Wan huffs, throwing his robe around his shoulders. “He does have a point. It is quite late.”
“Yes, well,” Cody says mockingly. “You weren’t exactly sleeping, anyway.”
Obi-Wan throws one of Cody’s soft polycotton shirts at his face in retaliation. “If you intend to come too, then get dressed. We’re in a bit of a hurry, I’d imagine.”
Rex is waiting for them at the front entrance into the medcenter, still dressed in what appears to be his sleepclothes. “I was told to wait here and take you all to the operating room,” he informs them. He looks as though he’s barely been out of bed longer than the time it took for him to get here.
“Operating room?” Cody repeats. “What operation?”
Rex waves a hand vaguely through the air. “She didn’t want to do it the normal way, apparently. Riis told me I didn’t want to know more than that, and if I did, then I needed to ask Fives.”
Cody glances over to Obi-Wan, one eyebrow raised. Obi-Wan shrugs in response; he’s hardly an expert on various methods of childbirth. “Fives is the only person any of us know very well who’s had a child,” he points out. “I suppose it would make sense that he knows more about it than the rest of us.”
“Why wouldn’t Riis just tell you?” Cody asks, as they walk into the medcenter and through the corridors.
Rex shrugs. “Considering the fact that the Senator would rather be cut open than whatever the normal method is, I imagine it’s because she doesn’t want to be the one to explain why that might be.”
Anakin’s still out in the waiting room, when they arrive. He’s pacing the length of it faster than Obi-Wan thinks he’s seen him move since he was a boy. “Piss Riis off that much already, sir?” Rex asks, in the sort of voice that Obi-Wan recognizes as the sort of teasing the men use as a comfort.
“She said she’d get me before anything actually happens,” Anakin says, turning on his heel and crossing the room again. “I was in the way.”
Obi-Wan knows very well what Anakin is like when he’s nervous and panicked as he is right now. He can only imagine how in the way he was. He watches him cross the room two more times before saying, “I’m no expert, but I suspect most expecting fathers are kicked out of the room while the preparations are made.” From what Ahsoka had told him about the days leading up to Nova’s birth, Fives hadn’t been much calmer than Anakin is now.
“They most definitely are.”
Anakin whips around, finding a doctor who isn’t Riis standing in an open doorway.
“Most first-time fathers are nervous wrecks,” she continues, leaning against the wall. “You’re in good company, I assure you.” She nods her head down the corridor behind you. “We’re ready for you now, if you’re willing to sit as still as possible by your wife’s head while we work.”
“I…Yes. I can do that.” Given the way his hands fidget even as he says it, Obi-Wan has his doubts. Kindly, nobody gathered voices them.
The doctor directs Anakin down the corridor and reminds him which room Padme’s in, then turns back to the rest of them. “Small room,” she says with a shrug and an apologetic look on her face. “I’ll come back and get you all one at a time once we get everything all cleaned up.”
Rex falls asleep in one of the waiting room chairs. Cody scoffs when he notices. “The great and mighty Captain Rex,” he mutters, knocking one of Obi-Wan’s knees with his own. “Taking a nap in a hospital waiting room.”
“We don’t need the great and mighty Captain Rex,” Obi-Wan reminds him. “Just the legendary Nurse Beranna.”
“She’s going to be upset when she finds out that he didn’t even have the courtesy to be awake while she had to be awake,” Cody says. “She obviously made him come for a reason.”
“I imagine he’s here because he brought her here,” Obi-Wan argues. “I believe Padme mentioned once that Riis doesn’t typically use speeders. And if that is the case, then it’s probably best that he does get some more sleep, so that he can take her back.”
The chronometer that Cody had grabbed on his way out of the apartment says that it’s almost 0400. There’s no word on how the procedure’s going.
“Should it be taking this long?” Cody asks, leaning his head on Obi-Wan’s shoulder.
“How should I know?” Everybody seems to be forgetting that Obi-Wan doesn’t know any more about children than the rest of them. “I imagine if there were any complications, they’d kick Anakin out again,” he offers after a moment. “I don’t believe he’d be much help in this sort of a crisis.”
“No, probably not.”
It’s just past 0500 when the doctor who’d retrieved Anakin steps back out into the waiting room. Rex is still asleep in the corner. “Mother and babies doing well,” she informs Obi-Wan and Cody, quiet enough as to not wake Rex. “Who’d like to meet them, first?”
Cody nudges Obi-Wan, a reminder that there’s no question as to which of them will be going into the room first. Obi-Wan gets to his feet, surprised to find himself nervous even though the worst part is already past.
“Me, I suppose,” he says.
“Come with me, then.” The doctor smiles at him.
The first thing that Obi-Wan notices is that Anakin’s been crying. May still be crying; Obi-Wan can’t quite tell that much with his head angled down as it is, staring at the small thing cradled in his arms.
I didn’t hold Nova, Anakin had admitted, when he’d first confessed that Padme was having a child at all. And so I don’t know how to hold a baby. Should I have held Nova? Would that have been better?
He’s doing just fine, now. Must be, at least, because Riis is letting him do exactly as he’s doing.
“How’d I know you’d be the first one in here?” Riis asks him drily, hardly looking up from where she’s setting some things on the countertops.
“Obi-Wan is very reliable,” Padme says from the bed. She’s holding the other child, cradled softly in her arms and staring down just as fondly. She looks exhausted. She barely glances up at him to add, “We are glad that you’re here.”
“I wouldn’t have dreamed of missing it, my dear,” Obi-Wan assures her. He crosses the room to stand beside her, on the opposite side of where Anakin’s standing. “You’re looking remarkably well for a brand new mother,” he adds.
“And you’re looking well for someone who spent the last three hours in a hospital waiting room,” Padme replies, although Obi-Wan doesn’t imagine she’s looked at him long enough to come to any sort of assessment on his appearance. Even so, she’s more than likely correct. “How’s Cody?”
“He’s doing well,” Obi-Wan answers, as though it matters how Cody is when Padme’s just had two beautiful and healthy children. “He’ll probably choose to wait to say hello until later, though.” After Padme’s been moved to a room for recovery, possibly even until later in the day when he’s gotten a bit more sleep.
“Oh, that’s alright,” Padme says. “I’d like to wait until later for any other visitors, myself.” She glances up at Anakin. “Right, Ani?”
“Right,” Anakin agrees, voice thick. Definitely crying then, and almost certainly not aware of what he’s just agreed with.
Padme’s usually right, though.
“Would you like to hold one of them?” Padme offers, looking back over at him.
Obi-Wan looks down at the tiny little human in Padme’s arms, red-faced and squishy. He looks over at Anakin, looking down at the human in his own arms like it holds all the secrets of the universe. “Padme, my dear, I would be honored.”
They do go home, after Obi-Wan bids Padme and Anakin goodbye so that they can be moved to a recovery room to rest. Rex is still sleeping, when Obi-Wan returns to the waiting room, and he and Cody make the decision to leave him where he is. Riis can wake him up when she’s ready to go home.
“They’ve named the twins Luke and Leia,” Obi-Wan tells Cody, in the speeder on the way back to the Temple. “Anakin spent the entire time crying.”
“Good tears, I hope,” Cody mumbles. He’s practically asleep himself.
“Given the way he hardly looked up from Leia’s face, I’d say so,” Obi-Wan agrees. He’d held Luke, because Padme hadn’t thought that Anakin would be handing their daughter to anybody else anytime soon.
It’s well past 0600 by the time they get back to Obi-Wan’s apartment in the Temple. They both fall asleep almost immediately.
Obi-Wan isn’t able to spend as much time with Anakin and his new family as he’d like; there are still important Council matters to attend to, apparently, that require his more immediate attention.
It’s the last day before they can go home that he gets a message from Anakin requesting that he come to the hospital as soon as he can. There’s a sense of urgency, but not the sort that suggests any sort of emergency.
“My presence is being requested at the hospital,” Obi-Wan says, standing up from his Council chair and fully interrupting whatever Mace had been saying. “It seems rather important, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, are the babies alright?” Depa asks worriedly.
“I should hope so,” Obi-Wan assures her, already halfway to the door. “Otherwise Anakin would have insisted on a holo-transmission.”
Cody seems surprised to see him out of the Council chambers so quickly, and without the rest of the Council trailing behind. “Is something the matter?”
“Oh, I’ve no idea,” he admits. “We’re needed at the hospital, though.”
Obi-Wan runs into Bail Organa just outside the room. “Did you get a cryptic summons, too, then, my friend?” Bail asks him, amusement clear across his features.
“I thought it was quite clear,” Obi-Wan counters. “For coming from Anakin.”
The babies are fine, Obi-Wan assesses, sleeping soundly, one in each of their parents’ arms. Anakin’s sitting in one of the plush chairs beside Padme’s bed, Luke cradled delicately in his arms. Obi-Wan doesn’t think he’ll ever stop being surprised by how different his former Padawan looks when he’s holding one of his children. Fatherhood will suit him well, he can already tell.
“Oh, excellent,” Padme says, as the door slides closed behind them. “We only have to do this once.”
Bail glances over at Obi-Wan, one questioning eyebrow raised. Obi-Wan shrugs, no more idea what they’re doing here than the Senator.
“We wanted to talk to both of you about being godfathers,” Padme explains, smiling up at the both of them. “And since it is, for some reason, common to assign a separate set of godparents to each twin, it worked out perfectly.”
Obi-Wan is vaguely aware of the concept of godfathers, because Cody had told him about Rex’s experience with Fives asking him to fill the role for Nova. Something about if something happens. It’s a spot typically reserved for the people closest to the family, as he recalls.
“And, Bail, since I know you and your wife have always wanted a baby girl, I figured you could be Leia’s godparents,” Padme continues, leaving Obi-Wan to himself for the time being.
“Oh, I’d be delighted and honored, Padme,” Bail agrees readily, like he’d been expecting this.
“Obi-Wan?” Anakin asks, finally looking up from Luke.
“I—Me?” Obi-Wan asks. He’s not quite certain why he’s even in consideration; he knows absolutely nothing about infants, and he’d have thought that Anakin would assume he’s too busy with the Order to be able to care for a child in the event it was required.
“Of course,” Padme says, like she can’t see the source of Obi-Wan’s confusion. “Who else?”
“I, well…”
“You’re family, Obi-Wan,” Anakin reminds him. “You and Ahsoka are the only other family that I have. And no offense to Snips, but I think she’s a little too young for this.”
You’re like a father to me.
“Oh, well, in that case.” There aren’t enough seats in this room; Obi-Wan needs a place to sit. “I’d be honored.”
Obi-Wan and Cody are at Padme’s apartment, entertaining the twins while Padme takes a nap—and, in theory, Anakin, though he’s more likely staring up at the ceiling. It’s easier than Obi-Wan had expected, they’re both quiet, sleeping heavily in both their arms. They’re only about a tenday old.
Anakin emerges from the bedroom quietly, trying hard not to wake Padme as he does. They both look like they haven’t slept since they got home.
“You know,” he says quietly, sitting down beside Obi-Wan on the sofa, “after Nova was born, Fives said something about how much babies scream in the middle of the night. I didn’t think he was serious.”
“It doesn’t last too long, I don’t think,” Cody offers. “I think Rex mentioned that Fives had told him that Nova was mostly sleeping through the night before he had to get back to you on the Resolute.”
“Counts for something, I guess,” Anakin mumbles. “Did you know that Ahsoka asked Aayla to finish her training, if I decided that I didn’t want to be a Jedi, anymore?”
“No, I didn’t,” Obi-Wan admits. He’s seen Ahsoka a few times, since the conversation they’d had about her feeling that she’s the only reason Anakin hadn’t left yet, but she’s never brought that conversation up again. “I knew that she was concerned that she was making you feel as though you were obligated to stay with the Order, but I hadn’t realized that she’d taken matters into her own hands.”
“She said I was the best Master she could have asked for,” Anakin adds. “And she made a point to make sure I knew that Aayla would only take over her training if I left the Order.”
“Ahsoka just wants to ensure that whatever you do, it’s because it’s what you want to do,” Obi-Wan tells him softly. “Same as I want.” Things in the Order are changing; Obi-Wan can feel it. He can see it, in the way that Mace didn’t ask anyone before taking Tup on as a Padawan, in the way that Plo never came back to Coruscant after killing Grievous and had instead opted to fly out to join Shaak on Kamino, helping her to raise the clone cadets still there, in the way that Depa’s started calling Caleb her son and not budging on the point. In the way that nobody’s mentioned anything about the fact that Cody’s obviously living with Obi-Wan in his little apartment in the Temple. There’s no reason why Anakin should have to leave the Order just so that he can keep his family here, but Obi-Wan doesn’t think that Anakin ever really wanted to be a Jedi. Not in the way he thought he did, as a boy. What he’d wanted, Obi-Wan suspects, was reassurance that he wouldn’t ever have to go back to Tatooine.
“Even if it means that I throw away everything you did for me?”
Cody shifts, before he stands up and goes into the room that they’ve set up as a nursery. Probably under the guise of putting Leia to sleep in her crib, but more likely just to give Obi-Wan and Anakin some privacy.
“Throw it away?” Obi-Wan repeats, baffled by Anakin’s ability to think that Obi-Wan would feel like he’d wasted his time training him just because he’d decided to leave. “Anakin, deciding to leave the Order doesn’t invalidate anything that came before. Choosing to stay and focus on your children doesn’t change what a fantastic Jedi you’ve been while you were here.”
“You spent so long trying to figure out how to help me,” Anakin points out. “And I acted like I didn’t notice that you were struggling because I always acted like I didn’t notice with my mom but I did, okay, I did notice that you were struggling. And all that for what, for me to decide to just leave?”
“If you leave,” Obi-Wan says, trying hard to choose his words carefully, “you will be leaving for your children. Children who will never have to experience the things that you had to go through as a young child. You wouldn’t have gotten to where you are now if I’d just given up on you, or if Qui-Gon hadn’t gotten you off of Tatooine in the first place.” Something about giving himself any part of the credit for how far Anakin’s come leaves a bitter taste in Obi-Wan’s mouth, but he doesn’t know how else to assure Anakin that his efforts have not been wasted. “I told you, Anakin, I am already so proud of you, and I will continue to be proud of you no matter what you choose to do next.”
Anakin is with Padme because he’d been capable of protecting her at nineteen. He’s here because he’d done such a fantastic job at nineteen that the Order had allowed him to continue to protect her even though he was clearly what they’d generously called attached. He’s here because he’d fought in the front lines of a seemingly endless war and survived.
Obi-Wan’s efforts have been everything but wasted.
“You really wouldn’t be upset?” Anakin asks smally.
The only thing that Obi-Wan would be upset about it if Anakin stayed for no reason other than a fear of disappointing him. And he’d be upset with himself, not with his former Padawan. “No, Anakin, I won’t be upset.”
It’s not even a tenday later that Anakin formally leaves the Order. Nobody even bothers to act like they’re surprised. That same day, Aayla formally announces that she’s taking over Ahsoka’s training. The Council doesn’t bother to try and argue it; after Mace’s decision to train Tup regardless of their opinion, they’ve just accepted that their Masters will train whoever they will train.
Ahsoka joins Obi-Wan in his apartment after the meeting for tea. She’s a lot more relaxed than she’d been when they last spoke about Anakin leaving the Order.
“I must admit, I am curious,” Obi-Wan says, handing Ahsoka her mug and sitting down beside her. “How did you come to choose Aayla to finish your training?”
Ahsoka shrugs. “She didn’t have a Padawan already, and I’m not sure that anybody would ask her to take a new Padawan when she’s in an obvious relationship with Bly.” Aayla’s been even less concerned with keeping her relationship a secret than Anakin had been. Anakin had least tried, and been very bad at it. Aayla just doesn’t seem to care. “So I figured that training with her wouldn’t take the option away from anybody else.” She looks down at her hands. “And I learned a lot from her, when we worked with her on missions. I don’t know, I just thought she’d be a good choice.”
“She’s an excellent choice,” Obi-Wan assures her. “Aayla’s a brilliant Jedi. In fact, if I had to guess, I’d say the reason you’re Aayla’s first Padawan is because she doesn’t much care to be responsible for a younger child. But you’re just past seventeen, now. One of the most senior Padawans in the Order."
“Is it ture that they asked you to train me before they gave me to Anakin?” Ahsoka asks him. Obi-Wan doesn’t know where she might have heard that. “And you said you didn’t want any more Padawans?”
“Not quite.” Obi-Wan settles back into the sofa. “They always wanted you to train with Anakin. They’d hoped that having a Padawan would teach him responsibility and make him less impulsive.” Ahsoka snorts; it hadn’t worked, and she’s clearly noticed. “I wasn’t certain that Anakin was ready for that sort of responsibility. He’d only been a Knight half a year, and had so much trouble adapting to being a General for the 501st. I had…expressed concerns. The Council asked if I’d rather train you, instead.”
“And you said no.”
“My first experience with a Padawan was…difficult,” Obi-Wan reminds her. “And I wasn’t sure about inducting a fourteen-year-old into the Army.” He nudges her gently. “And I’d rather not be the one on the receiving end of Riis’ ire that you were constantly being placed in life-or-death situations.”
Ahsoka giggles. “That’s fair,” she admits. “Although it’d make her relationship with Cody a lot more interesting, wouldn’t it?”
Obi-Wan can’t help it, he laughs outright. “Yes, I suppose it would have.”
Mace corners Obi-Wan on their way out of the Council chambers three days later.
“Obi-Wan,” he says, stepping up beside him. “Can we talk?”
Obi-Wan doesn’t exactly see a choice, no matter how Mace phrased the request. “Very well,” he agrees, already letting Mace drag him into an unused classroom. Unused for now, that is. Now that the war’s ended, many of the empty and disused rooms are being cleaned and placed back into circulation for Temple classes. “What is it, this time?”
“This time?” Mace repeats, sitting himself in one of the chairs scattered about the room. “You act as if this is a regular occurrence.”
Not regular, but not unprecedented, either. Why do you think we made you a Knight? “I have a feeling it would happen more regularly were we not spending the last few years scattered about the Outer Rim,” he admits instead.
“What kind of—” Mace cuts himself off. “I don’t think I want to know the answer to that, actually,” he says, waving himself off. “Skywalker seems to be doing well for himself,” he says instead. “I’m assuming you’ve met the twins already.”
Obi-Wan hasn’t told anybody that he’s Luke’s godfather. The only ones who know outside Padme and Anakin are Bail, who was there when he was asked, and Cody. “I have,” he says. “They’re already much more well-behaved than their father.”
“As I recall, it wasn’t until he was older that Anakin really became a menace,” Mace reminds him. It’s true, Obi-Wan supposes. Anakin had spent much of his early days at the Temple on his very best behavior, for fear that they’d send him back if he made a big enough mistake. “Just out of curiosity, is there any particular reason you aren’t the one taking over Padawan Tano’s training?”
“I wasn’t asked,” he explains simply. Likely because Ahsoka had been under the impression that Obi-Wan didn’t want to train her at all. “Ahsoka’s old enough that she can make her own choices. If she wants Aayla to finish her training, then there’s no reason why I should argue with her.”
“And why, I wonder,” Mace says, crossing his arms, “didn’t she ask you, when you’ve already played a larger part than the average grandmaster in her training?”
Obi-Wan hadn’t asked her that; he has no intention of doing so, now. “I don’t know,” he admits plainly.
Mace sighs, like this conversation isn’t going the way he’d wanted it to. “What are you still doing here?” he asks finally.
Mace is the one who dragged Obi-Wan here in the first place. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean.”
Mace looks, in that moment, so incredibly tired. “Your Padawan has left the Order,” he begins. “Your grand-Padawan has found a new Master, outside your lineage. You’re training Wooley but refusing to take him on as a formal Padawan. Your former Commander is living with you in your apartment in the Temple despite the fact that I know for a fact that all the Commanders received much nicer apartments than ours. You’ve been opposed to many of the Council’s decisions and mandates for far longer than the war’s been going on.” He leans forward, closer to Obi-Wan, elbows resting on his knees. “So I don’t understand. Why are you still here?”
Cody spends most of the time Obi spends in Council meetings standing outside the Council chambers waiting for the meeting to finish. But Obi had told him before going in this morning that this particular meeting was shaping up to last them all day, and he’d said it in the way that suggests that he’d rather Cody actually bothered to do something other than spend the entire day standing in the corridor.
He spends it in the apartment, instead, exchanging text-based messages with Rex and Riis, both completely separately. They’re moving to Naboo, apparently, probably soon. The biggest reason they’d been waiting was because of Senator Amidala, and now that the babies have been born, there’s nothing really keeping them on Coruscant. Unless Riis wants to stay until the twins reach a certain age.
The door to the apartment opens, not even at midday, and Cody glances up from his comm. “All day, huh?” he asks, as Obi briskly crosses the room and makes a beeline directly for the bedroom in the back of the apartment. “Obi?”
He stands up, following Obi into the bedroom, where the bag he’d used to carry his things off the Negotiator when the war had ended sits right in the center of the bed. He’s rifling through his drawers and tossing things into the bag. About half of them land on the bed, instead. Cody doesn’t bother to ask why he’s not using the Force to help him.
“Have they assigned you to one of the other Temples?” Cody’s heard of other Temples scattered around the galaxy. Most haven't been used for the duration of the war, because the Jedi had become so tightly tied to the Senate due to the Chancellor’s meddling, but Obi had told him that the Order was working on getting them back into circulation.
“Hm?” Obi barely glances up. “Oh, no. No, I haven’t been reassigned.” He doesn’t stop tossing things onto the bed.
“Then…where are you planning on going?”
“Oh, I’ve no idea,” Obi admits. He finishes with the drawers, apparently, and moves on to the small closet that mostly holds his robes. Obi completely ignores them, opting instead for a small box tucked away on the top shelf. “Anywhere we want, I suppose.”
Cody feels like he’s missing something.
“We’re just…going?” he asks, moving over to the bed and getting everything haphazardly tossed onto it into the actual bag. “And the Council’s okay with it?” Everything that Obi does, much to Cody’s chagrin, is for this Order.
Obi pauses, small box in his hands. “I’m leaving,” he says quietly. “Mace, the other day, he asked me why I was still here, since Anakin’s left, and Ahsoka’s training with Aayla, and…I don’t remember the time before I came to the Temple. I spent my entire time as a crecheling wanting nothing more than to be one of the Knights. But I had almost aged out of the chance to be taken as a Padawan at all before Qui-Gon finally agreed, and I tried so hard to find a Master.” He shrugs. “Even without Anakin and Ahsoka, it never occurred to me that I wanted to just…leave.” He turns, box in his arms hugged tight to his chest. “But I’m so tired of all of it. Even without the Senate dictating our every move, there’s so much politics involved that I never knew about as a youngling.” He steps around Cody and sets his little box carefully on top of everything else in the bag. “The only thing keeping me here was myself, I suppose.”
“Well,” Cody says, after a moment of letting that set in. “You know, I’ve just realized, you never gave me a full tour of the Temple.”
Obi-Wan and Cody spend almost two hours in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Obi-Wan always loses track of time in this room; he doesn’t even have to actively settle in to meditate in here. That was the purpose of this room, he supposes. A place where it was much easier to connect to the Force.
“This room is my favorite in the whole Temple,” Obi-Wan says, glancing over at Cody. He’s looking around the whole room with wide eyes and his mouth hanging open. “Always has been.”
“It’s like a whole other world in here,” Cody breathes. “Hard to believe this has just been on Coruscant this whole time.”
“The only thing that I ever thought was worth staying here for,” Obi-Wan admits. “I used to spend so much time here. Before Qui-Gon died. After Anakin got to be old enough that I could leave him alone for a couple hours at a time.”
“The room suits you,” Cody tells him. “Is there anywhere you want to go?” he asks. Obi-Wan should have known that their earlier conversation wasn’t over. “Because I know you don’t want to stay on Coruscant now that you don’t have to.”
“I don’t know,” he admits. “I’ve never thought about where I wanted to live. I always assumed I’d be stuck here, anyway. Honestly, I was much happier travelling around the Outer Rim than I ever was living here, even with the war going on.”
Cody looks over at him. “Well, you know,” he says, nudging Obi-Wan gently. “There are a lot of planets I’ve never seen outside of an active battlefield. I wouldn’t mind a bit of no-stakes travelling.”
Obi-Wan grins. “That sounds lovely, dear.”
He’s not a Jedi anymore; there are no rules about attachment or romantic involvement or anything of the like.
Obi-Wan can kiss his partner all he wants, even inside Temple walls.