Chapter Text
Beru went in the morning, before the suns had fully burned the chill out of the air.
If she waited until later, Owen would find a way to stop her. Not because he didn’t care. Force knew the dark circles that had bored under his eyes after his visit yesterday spoke otherwise. But because caring scared him, and fear always came out sideways with Owen, sharp-edged and practical to the point of cruelty.
She moved quietly through the kitchen, packing a woven bag with what she could spare: a small loaf of flatbread, still warm from the griddle; a sealed jug of water; a wrapped bundle of dried fruit; a jar of salve for cracked skin. On impulse, she added one of Owen’s old shirts and a pair of trousers Luke had nearly already grown out of. They’d be too short for Ben, but they’d be cleaner than what he had, and maybe that was what mattered.
Luke padded in halfway through her preparation, hair sticking up in every direction, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
“Aunt Beru?” he mumbled. “Where’re you going?”
Beru smiled and reached out to smooth his hair. “Out to check one of the outer vaporators, love. It’s been acting up.”
“Oh, I can come,” he said, brightening. “I’m good with the spanners! I’ve been learning how to-”
“Not this time,” she cut in gently. “I need you here to help Uncle Owen. He’ll be grumpy all day if he’s left alone with the farm.”
Luke pulled a face that said He’s always grumpy anyway, but nodded. Then his gaze dropped to the bag at her hip, curiosity wrinkling his nose.
“That’s a lot of stuff for one vaporator,” he said.
Beru hesitated.
She and Owen hadn’t exactly told Luke about the details of yesterday. They’d said Owen had gone to check on an old acquaintance from the war, out in the Dune Sea. They hadn’t added and found him half-starved and babbling in a sand-coated hut, looking like a man who’d been left behind when his mind fled the scene.
Still, Luke had heard the stories in town. Everyone had.
“It’s for a friend,” Beru said at last. “Someone who hasn’t been taking very good care of himself.”
Luke’s expression shifted. “Crazy old Ben?”
The name made her flinch, though she tried not to show it.
“His name is Ben Kenobi,” she said quietly. “And he’s… not well. Sick. Your uncle saw him yesterday. I’m going to see if I can help.”
Luke chewed his lip, eyes big.
“Is he… dangerous?” he asked. “Some’a the kids in Anchorhead say he is. That he has…” He lowered his voice dramatically. “Magic powers.”
Beru thought of the broken man Owen had described, alone with his ghosts and nightmares and hands that wouldn’t stop shaking.
“No,” she said. “I don’t think he’s dangerous. I think he’s scared. And when people are scared and alone, sometimes they can get sick. Not in his body,” Beru put a gentle hand over Luke’s heart. “…but here.”
Luke cupped his hands over his mother’s. For a moment they stood in silence, locked in an all-too-rare embrace as mother and son.
Aunt, she thought. Not mother. No matter how much she wished that she was.
“Can I meet him?” Luke blurted. “If he’s lonely, I could…”
“No,” Beru said sharply, snapping from her memory, and Luke recoiled as if slapped.
She softened immediately, kneeling so their eyes were level.
“Not yet,” she amended. “He’s not ready for that. He wouldn’t want you to see him like he is now. All right?”
Luke frowned. “How do you know what he’d want?”
Because he’s already lost one boy, Beru thought. Because if he cares even half as much about you as I think he does, the idea of scaring you would cut deeper than any wound.
“Because sometimes,” she said instead, brushing a thumb over his cheek, “grown-ups can ashamed of things. Even when they shouldn’t be. I promise I’ll tell you about him when I get back. Deal?”
Luke considered this, then nodded solemnly. “Deal.”
He leaned forward and hugged her again, quick and fierce. She closed her eyes and held on a heartbeat too long.
He’s why you’re doing this, she reminded herself, as she stepped out into the cool morning air. Not because you owe anything to a half-mad Jedi. Because this man bled to put that baby in your arms. Because someone should look after the one who looked after him.
⸻
The walk felt different than it had for Owen. Where he’d trudged, berating the sand and the heat with every step, Beru paced herself, letting the rhythm of her breaths match the crunch of her boots. She’d grown up out here. The desert didn’t scare her. It demanded respect, not fear.
The suns climbed slowly, brushing the horizon with crimson-gold as the homestead shrank behind her. Ahead, the land became a series of ripples, dunes folding into one another, the world reduced to sky and sand and the distant silhouette of rock outcroppings.
She saw the hut from far off, a lump against the endless line of the dunes, half-buried, stubbornly present. Up close, it looked even worse than Owen had described.
The door sat crooked in its frame, grit piled against the threshold. One corner of the roof had sagged further overnight, slumping like a tired shoulder. The blanket Owen had ripped down yesterday lay in a heap nearby, already half-covered in sand.
Beru stopped a few meters away and just listened.
Nothing.
No muttering, no movement. For a moment her heart leapt into her throat. What if he’d wandered off? What if he’d done something stupid in the night? But then she heard it: a faint, irregular sound, like someone dragging breath through a throat raw from screaming.
She swallowed, squared her shoulders, and stepped up to the door.
“Ben?” she called softly. “It’s Beru Lars.”
No answer. Just that ragged breathing, a hitch, then a muffled murmur.
She knocked.
The sound seemed too loud in the quiet. Inside, something thumped. A scrape. The breathing quickened.
“Obi-Wan,” she tried again. “Owen came yesterday. He told you I might visit. I’ve brought food. And water. I’m going to open the door now, all right?”
She pushed.
The door resisted, sand grinding under its edge, then gave way with a reluctant groan.
The smell hit her like a wall: stale air and unwashed cloth, and the faint acrid tang of old fear. It caught at the back of her throat. She didn’t let herself react.
The hut was dim. Ben had pinned a ragged scrap of cloth up over the window in place of the blanket, though light still leaked around the edges. Dust motes swam lazily in the beams, turning the air into thick, visible layers.
He was on the floor.
Beru’s first impression was of movement, small, restless, frantic. A hunched shape near the back wall, shoulders heaving, hands dug into their own hair.
“Obi-Wan?” she said, taking a careful step inside.
His head snapped up.
For a heartbeat, his eyes were nothing human at all.
They were too wide, pupils blown huge in the dimness, whites spiderwebbed with red. His lips were pulled back from his teeth in a silent snarl. Every line of his body was coiled, muscles bunched, ready to spring.
Beru froze.
She’d seen animals cornered before. Womp rats trapped in storage pits, half-wild eopies spooked by lightning. There was the same feral terror in his gaze now, like a creature that knew it was hurt and knew, too, that anything which came close might hurt it more.
“Don’t,” he hissed, voice raw and shredded. “Don’t come any closer.”
He scrambled back on hands and heels, spine colliding with the wall. His fingers flailed for purchase and found a metal cylinder half-buried in the sand, a lightsaber hilt. Beru’s heart lurched.
The air shifted.
It wasn’t a sound so much as a feeling, a pressure building under her skin, the tiny hairs on her arms standing up. The stories about “magic” were not stories, she thought with a distant, inappropriate calm. This was it. This was the thing that had once made him so feared.
The hilt scraped against his palm as he fumbled for the activator. His hands were shaking too badly to find it.
“Obi-Wan,” she said, and made her voice very soft, stripping all the urgency out so only warmth remained. “It’s Beru. Luke’s aunt. Do you remember me?”
He blinked hard, eyes darting between her and something over her shoulder only he could see.
“S’gotta be a trap,” he gasped. “No, no, no. You’re dead, you’re… he killed you, he killed all of you…”
He flinched sideways, as if struck by an invisible blow.
Beru took a slow breath.
“I’m not dead,” she said. “I promise. I’m very alive, and I’m standing in your doorway ruining my boots on your terrible floor.”
That earned the barest flicker of confusion.
“Beru?” he whispered, as if tasting the name. It sounded like it hurt.
She nodded. “Yes. Beru. Owen’s wife. Luke’s… well. Luke’s caretaker.”
The pressure in the air fluctuated, then ebbed, like a held breath slowly let out. The hum faded.
His grip on the lightsaber didn’t loosen, but his shoulders dropped a fraction of an inch. His gaze skittered away from her face, landing instead on the bag at her side.
“Did they… send you?” he asked hoarsely. “The Inquisitors? Did they… change their tactics?” His lips twisted. “Friendly faces are more deadly than blades.”
“No one sent me,” Beru said. “Owen came because he was worried. I came because I was.. even more worried.”
“Worried,” he repeated blankly.
She stepped carefully sideways, giving him a wide berth, and set the bag down on a crate. His eyes tracked her the whole way, animal-suspicious, pupils still blown wide.
“You’re shaking,” she observed gently.
“I’m…” He looked down at his own hands as if surprised to find them attached. The tremor running through them was visible even from across the room. “I…”
Words failed. His chest hitched.
“May I sit?” Beru asked. “Over here. Not too close.”
He took a moment to process the question, then gave a jerky nod.
She eased herself down onto an overturned crate glancing distance from the door. If he bolted, she wouldn’t be between him and escape. If he lunged, well. She’d grown up with brothers. She knew how to dodge.
“Obi-Wan,” she said again, softer. “You look like you haven’t slept in a month.”
He let his head tip back against the wall. Up close, she could see how deep the bruised shadows lay under his eyes, dark crescents etched into a too-pale face. His beard had gone almost completely to gray, wild and uneven.
“I sleep,” he muttered. “Sometimes. It’s… not restful.”
Nightmares, then. She didn’t need him to elaborate. She’d heard stories from the war, the things the clones and officers wouldn’t dare mention.
“Do you know what day it is?” Beru asked quietly.
His brow furrowed. “Day?”
“How long since Owen was here?”
He blinked at her.
“Owen was here?”
Her heart sank.
“Yes,” she said. “Yesterday. He… said that he pulled down the blanket from your window. Let the light in a little.”
He glanced at the window, at the ragged replacement scrap tacked there, and a shadow of shame crossed his face.
“It was too loud,” he murmured. “The light. Too bright. Too many edges. I thought…” He broke off, shaking his head sharply, like he could dislodge the thought entirely. “Owen… He was here?”
Beru nodded. “He was. He found you in a bad way. He asked me to come. He thought… maybe I’d be less of an ass about it than he was.”
That startled something like a laugh out of him, a breathy, bewildered sound that silenced near-immediately.
“He was… honest,” Obi-Wan said, once he’d caught his breath. “Owen always was.”
She let the silence stretch, giving him room to settle. His breathing was still uneven, but the wildness in his eyes had dulled from a frantic blaze to a jittery flicker.
“All right,” Beru said at last, in the same tone she used with skittish eopies and scared children. “I brought food. And water. Would it be all right if I gave you some?”
He opened his mouth. She could see the refusal forming, the automatic I don’t deserve, you shouldn’t waste that on me, so she cut in quickly.
“It’s not charity,” she said. “It’s investment. Owen’s words. He says if you drop dead out here, it’ll be terrible for the property values.”
This time the laugh came easier, a short, incredulous puff.
“Owen said that,” Obi-Wan repeated faintly.
“He did.” She rummaged in the bag and pulled out the bread. The smell of it, warm, yeasty, dusted with a hint of spice, slid through the sour air like a ray of sun.
Something in Obi-Wan’s expression shifted.
Hunger was a physical thing, flickering across his face, tightening the line of his throat.
“Here,” Beru said. She tore the loaf in half, then half again, making a small piece and placing it gently on the floor within his reach. “Start with that. Slow, please, or you’ll make yourself sick.”
He stared at the bread like it was a trick. Like it might vanish if he blinked.
“You’ll… take it back,” he said. “When I… when I prove… whatever it is you’re looking to figure out.”
“I’m not looking for anything,” Beru said. “I already know.”
He looked up, wary. “Know what?”
“That you’re not well.”
He flinched, as if she’d struck him.
“I’m…” His gaze darted away. “I’m fine. I just… there’s work to be done, and…” His eyes fixed on a corner where there was nothing at all. “You’re already dead,” he whispered, voice cracking. “All of you. Why won’t you… why won’t you stay dead?”
Her chest clenched.
“Obi-Wan,” she said gently. “There’s no one else here. Just you and me.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. His hand came up, pressing the heel of his palm hard against his brow.
“They don’t like it when I ignore them,” he muttered. “They get louder. They show me… things.” His voice frayed on the last word.
Beru breathed in, slow and steady.
“Look at me,” she said softly. “Just me. Not them. Can you do that?”
For a moment she thought he wouldn’t be able to. The muscles in his jaw jumped, his fingers digging into his skin as if he could peel the visions away. Then, with obvious effort, he lowered his hand and dragged his gaze back to her.
“That’s it,” she murmured. “Good. Take a breath. In… and out.”
He obeyed. The first inhale shuddered, but the second was smoother. The third nearly normal.
“There you go.” She nodded toward the bread. “Now. Eat. One bite. For me.”
He hesitated. His hand hovered uncertainly over the bread, like he was waiting for permission.
She smiled, small but genuine. “It’s yours, Obi-Wan. I promise.”
He picked it up.
The way he bit down, cautious, almost reverent, told her everything she needed to know about how long it had been since his last real meal. He chewed slowly, eyes fluttering shut, as if focusing entirely on the simple act of tasting, swallowing, existing in his body instead of whatever horrors lived behind his eyes.
Beru let him eat in peace for a few minutes, refilling his cup from the jug when he drained it halfway, sliding over a bit of dried fruit when the first piece of bread was gone.
He didn’t talk. But the line of his shoulders eased with each bite, the tremor in his hands softening from a violent quake to a small, persistent shiver.
When the worst edge of his hunger seemed blunted, Beru folded her hands in her lap and studied him quietly.
“How did… how did this happen, Ben? How did you get like this?” she asked.
The question hung in the air between them, simple and enormous.
Obi-Wan’s jaw clenched. His fingers curled around the empty cup until his knuckles went white.
“You’ve heard the stories,” he said finally. His voice had gone flat, as if it had passed through too many filters on its way out. “Crazy old Ben. Mad Jedi. War did it. Desert did it. Take your pick.”
“That’s what they say,” Beru agreed. “But I didn’t ask them. I asked you.”
He laughed, short and bitter. “You assume I know the answer.”
“Maybe you don’t.” She tilted her head. “But you remember pieces. I can see it. You’re drowning in them.”
His eyes snapped to hers, sharp for a heartbeat. Then they went distant again.
“It started,” he said, very slowly, “with his voice. Orders. Three words. Execute Order Sixty-Six.”
She’d heard the phrase before, of course. Everyone had. It carried a certain chill, even years later.
He spoke it like a curse.
“I was on the front,” he went on. “Another battle. Another planet whose name blurs into all the others, dust and blasterfire and men I called brothers dying in white armor. I thought…” He huffed out something too ragged to be called a laugh. “I thought we were winning.”
His hand went unconsciously to his chest, fingers digging into the worn fabric of his robe.
“And then,” he whispered, “it was as if the entire galaxy pivoted on a knife’s edge, and everything… broke.”
Beru stayed very still. The desert hummed faintly outside, wind sliding over sand.
“They turned on you,” she said quietly.
“They turned on us,” he corrected. “On the Order. On anyone with a saber in their hand and a lifetime of… of…” He groped for the word, face twisting. “Programming,” he spat, surprising her. “Conditioning. Call it whatever you like. We only wanted to be peacekeepers. We were soldiers from childhood.” His lip curled. “We didn’t even see the trap until it closed.”
His gaze flickered, unfocused, as if watching something replay on the inside of his skull.
“It was my men,” he said, voice fraying. “My… my commander. I loved him. I wasn’t supposed to, but I did. He smiled when he took off his helmet. He laughed. He… trusted me.” His fingers dug harder into his chest, as if trying to hold something in place. “And then his eyes went flat. And his hands shook. Just a little. He aimed at me and I thought…” His breath hitched. “I thought he’d missed. Thought he’d chosen me. Even then, I wanted to believe that.”
Beru’s throat tightened.
“But it wasn’t him,” Obi-Wan whispered. “It was a chip, they say. A sliver of control in their skulls. Pull the switch, flip the command, and suddenly the men you bled with are your executioners.” He laughed again, a broken, high-pitched sound. “It’s elegant, really. No need to import new troops. Just… reassign the old.”
His fingers traced lines in the dust on the floor, patterns that meant nothing and everything at once.
“After that… it all blurs,” he said. “More battles. More deaths. A temple burning. Tiny bodies and smoke and…” He cut himself off, swallowing hard, jaw working. “Then a volcano. Fire. Screaming. The smell of cooking flesh.” His face went gray. “My Padawan. My… son. I cut him down. Left him to burn. And then she tells me… they tell me he lived.” He pressed the heels of his hands hard into his eyes. “Of course he did. That would be another joke, wouldn’t it? Of course he did. He is dead, but something else remains.”
Beru closed her eyes for a heartbeat.
“I’m sorry,” she said. It felt inadequate, but it was true.
He made a rough, dismissive noise.
“And after that,” he continued, voice muffled by his hands, “I had to. To watch. To live with the weight of all of it.” He dropped his hands and looked at her, eyes too bright. “How did I get like this?” he echoed. “I broke. That’s all. There’s no great secret to it. It was all just too much.”
Beru studied him.
“People don’t break like that all at once,” she said. “Glass doesn’t shatter from one thing. It cracks first. Tiny fractures and hairline cracks.”
He stared at her, thrown by the metaphor.
“And what?” he asked hoarsely. “You’re here to glue me back together?”
“No,” Beru said. “I’m here to sweep up what I can and make sure the pieces don’t cut anyone else. Including you.”
He huffed, but the edge of his mouth twitched.
“You keep saying you’re broken,” she went on. “You say it like it’s a moral failing. Like you did it on purpose.”
He looked away.
“I survived,” he said bitterly. “Others didn’t. That feels like a moral failing.”
Beru’s eyes stung.
“Do you think Luke would agree?” she asked.
He flinched as if the name were a blow and a balm all at once.
“He shouldn’t have to carry any of this,” Obi-Wan said. “That’s the bargain. He lives. He is free. I stay here and hold it. All of it. Until it eats me. It’s only fair.”
Beru’s throat tightened.
“Do you think that’s what his mother would have wanted?” she pressed, gently relentless. “Do you think that’s what Anakin would have wanted? For their boy’s protector to rot in a hut until there’s nothing left of him but madness and ghosts?”
His breath caught.
“Don’t,” he whispered. “Don’t say his name. It hurts.”
“I know,” she said. “Hurting isn’t the same as wrong.”
He gulped air like a man pulled out of deep water.
The silence that followed was thick, but different now. Less like suffocation, more like exhaustion.
Beru shifted on the crate, feeling pins and needles in one leg. She reached into the bag again, pulling out the shirt and trousers.
“I brought you these,” she said. “They’re not much, but they’re clean. And they smell like our soap, which is an improvement on…” She gestured vaguely around the room. “This.”
He blinked at the bundle as if not sure what he was looking at.
“I…” His hands twisted in his lap. “I don’t remember the last time I’ve had clean clothes.”
“I believe you,” she said dryly.
She laid the clothes beside him, within reach but not forced into his hands.
“If I go and stand outside,” she said, “would you be willing to wash your face? Your hands? Change your clothes? Just that. Nothing else. We can tackle the rest of this mess another day.”
He stared at her, suspicion and hope warring in his eyes.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, and his voice cracked on the last word.
“I know,” Beru said. “And I’m going to be careful anyway.”
She leaned forward, just a little, not touching him, but close enough for him to feel the warmth of another person in the room.
“You don’t have to be alone in this,” she said.
Obi-Wan stared at her like the idea was too big to fit inside his chest.
Outside, the desert kept hissing and shifting, endless as always. But inside the half-buried hut, with clean water in his belly and soap on his skin and a slice of daylight where there hadn’t been one before, Obi-Wan Kenobi sat very still and tried, with trembling effort, to believe her.