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Everyone expected to meet their soulmates at some point. Why else would they have their first words on their body?
Sometimes, it happened way late in life.
Sometimes, it happened very early in life.
When Quinlan and Obi-Wan met, Obi-Wan was two and did not know what his words said, not yet. Quinlan did know, though he could not read the Basic yet.
Quinlan was being introduced to his new crecheclan after being brought to the Temple. He was the oldest, and there were only two other kids in the Clan so far. Later, more would be added as they came to the Temple.
He initially waved a little shyly. His parents had died months ago, and now he was here with people he didn't even know, even Master Tholme was only going to visit.
It didn't take him long to warm up enough to start playing.
His first words to Obi-Wan were "Hey, mind if I join you? I love blocks!"
Obi-Wan just gave him a look and quietly scooted over. He had been in the creche since he was a little baby, younger than most were when they were brought to the Temple, as the usual age was two to four, with the Temple accepting up to six years old.
And for some reason, he refused to talk. He communicated well enough through looks and the Force, along with sign language.
Quinlan liked Obi-Wan the most, even when others were added to their clan. They got along well.
Then, almost a full year after Quinlan arrived, Obi-Wan shyly spoke to him. It was Quinlan's fifth birthday, Obi-Wan had turned three just the month before.
"I made this for you." Obi-Wan held out the card. "Lots of glitter."
Quinlan grinned and accepted the card, giggling at all the glitter and how it went everywhere when he opened the card. He loved glitter. His soulmark had nothing to do with it.
As he stared at the heart and scribbles it hit him and he looked up with wide eyes. "Obi! Show me your soulmark!"
Obi-Wan gave him a weird look and held out his arm.
Quinlan stared at the aurebesh and read it slowly, making sure he got it right. "Hey, mind if I join you? I love blocks!" Quinlan remembered that he did say something like that to Obi-Wan when they first met.
Obi-Wan's eyes widened and he looked to Quinlan.
Quinlan grinned and held out his arm. "I made this for you. Lots of glitter." he said proudly.
Obi-Wan shrieked and hugged Quinlan. He didn't quite understand at that age what a soulmate was but he knew it was important and that it meant that Quinlan was special. But he already knew that.
After all, there was a reason Quinlan got the first sentence Obi-Wan had ever spoken.
.
Over the years, not much changed. They just grew closer.
The first test of their friendship was when Obi-Wan wasn't selected as a padawan. Quinlan cried. Obi-Wan cried.
Part of the problem was that while the Jedi accepted soulmates, some knights and masters were not comfortable raising a padawan if they already knew their soulmate. They were worried about that causing issues with attachment for them to have met so long before properly starting their training.
Master Tholme was always going to train Quinlan and a soulmate was not going to change his mind.
But Obi-Wan? Obi-Wan already struggled more than most their age with his emotions. Sometimes, his outburst were true anger. Sometimes, they were just meltdowns of too much emotion when he felt cornered and he lashed out.
By the time he returned, now a padawan, he had learned that flight was the better option between flight or fight. He couldn't freeze, he was too emotional for freezing for longer than it took to process a shock. But there was one other option. Fawn.
And that was Obi-Wan's default for most authority figures, especially his master. For most others he did freeze, and if that failed, he went for flight.
Quinlan worried about the change. Others thought that Obi-Wan had just learned to handle his emotions appropriately instead of lashing out all the time, but to Quinlan, it was clear that Obi-Wan still struggled, he'd just learned to keep it all in and keep himself safe. Something had happened.
But Obi-Wan still was Obi-Wan, they were still close, and Quinlan just was as supportive a friend as he could be, even as they got older and started experimenting if maybe they were romantic soulmates. Turned out they were, and as long as they kept their friendship strong, the bonuses that came with dating didn't affect anything.
Things continued in a nice sort of balance for a while. Obi-Wan had his issues with Qui-Gon but he kept them to himself. And he was doing well in classes, doing well on missions. He was still the same person with Quinlan for the most part, though more prone to silences like he was before he started talking.
But Quinlan always felt like something was off, though he could never put his finger on it. So he waited and observed.
It finally came to a head when he returned from a mission. It had been a good mission, one that had been surprisingly easy to pull off. So he was very cheerful.
He knocked on the door to the Jinn-Kenobi rooms.
Qui-Gon opened the door. "Quinlan." He nodded. "Obi-Wan is busy. He has finals this week. I don't want him distracted. If he fails any of these he has to make them up in order to be promoted to senior padawan."
Quinlan stopped bouncing. "I'm not distracting."
"Yes, you are, especially since you're his soulmate." Qui-Gon closed the door in his face.
Quinlan frowned and sighed. It wasn't the first time Qui-Gon had prevented Quinlan from seeing Obi-Wan. There wasn't anything he could do about it. It was Qui-Gon's choice when it came to Obi-Wan's training, even keeping him from his soulmate.
He walked away and went to the Room of A Thousand fountains. He passed several different sections of flora from different systems and stopped at Kiffu. He was the only Kiffar in the Order, so he was the main person interested in maintaining it. Tholme helped him get plants from Kiffu to grow in the section, as it had been a bit barren before.
Obi-Wan liked helping him in the garden, and it did help with his emotions. Mostly because it was easy to fall into a moving meditation while working with the plants.
Quinlan climbed a tree and rested on the branch, thinking. Not letting Quinlan see Obi-Wan was going to make things worse.
Obi-Wan's focus got worse the longer he worked on things. He needed a ten minute break every hour if he wanted to maintain his productivity. Sometimes, yes, they would get carried away, but when Obi-Wan got back into the swing of working, he would actually do even better than usual for a while until he had been focusing for a while.
Quinlan wished he could help Obi-Wan. He would just cuddle Obi-Wan and help out with the studying and otherwise do some reading or something. Obi-Wan had told him it helped. So he would of course keep doing that.
But only so long as Qui-Gon allowed him to see him. And technically, though being senior padawan came with more privileges, Obi-Wan would still have to listen if Qui-Gon said no.
So Quinlan was stuck without being able to see his soulmate. And worried about how Obi-Wan was doing being forced to focus on something for so long without a break. Obi-Wan could find something to distract him even if it was just him and his school work in an empty room.
.
Just a day later, Qui-Gon was called away on an urgent mission. He did not leave any instructions for a master to keep an eye on Obi-Wan or keep Quinlan away.
So Quinlan gleefully took the opportunity to enter the rooms. Knowing that Qui-Gon was gone, he just entered using the code. He knew the code, had known for years. Just like Obi-Wan knew how to get into his rooms.
He dropped off the casserole he'd made with some dessert in the kitchen and then went to Obi-Wan's room.
Obi-Wan looked awful.
He looked exhausted and was muttering to himself as he stared at one of the text books.
"Obes!" Quinlan hugged him. "Come eat dinner with me!"
"Can't... gotta finish studying and got an essay to write and..."
Quinlan picked up Obi-Wan. "That can wait. You need food."
Obi-Wan protested tiredly. "I really can't stop. I gotta get good scores."
"And if you exhaust and starve yourself you're not going to get them."
Obi-Wan grumbled, though he perked up when he saw the casserole. "My favorite!"
"Of course. That's why I made it!" Quinlan set him down in the chair and got plates out so they could eat together. He sat down in the chair next to Obi-Wan and leaned on him lightly. "So tell me about what you've studied and what you still need to study."
Obi-Wan started talking slowly at first, while he was eating, but by the time they'd each had a second portion, he was speaking quickly.
Quinlan kept up, asking questions occasionally.
Finally Obi-Wan slowed down. "And that's about everything."
"I think you're prepared, Obes. That was a lot of details. No way you're going to fail. Just relax for the next few days until the tests start and do a brief read through every day and you'll be fine."
"You really think so?"
"Yes, I do. You remember a lot more than I did for those classes, and I passed without much trouble. Now... what about the essay?"
Quinlan listened while he got the slices of apple crisp and added ice cream and whipped cream for each of them As he put the dessert in front of Obi-Wan, he started offering suggestions on what Obi-Wan could cover and where he should look to find any extra information.
The rest of dessert was spent discussing the essay.
Obi-Wan yawned at the end. "Thanks... I should get back to work."
"I'm thinking maybe you need to go to sleep."
"No, can't sleep. Too much to do."
Quinlan sighed and carried him to his bed. He got the essay and references off of Obi-Wan's desk and handed them to Obi-Wan.
"Why do you have so much to do?"
"I was so behind from missions, that I had to overload my classes, I got ten and there's still work due and... I can't sleep."
Quinlan hummed and cuddled Obi-Wan. "Okay. Do some work."
Obi-Wan eyed him suspiciously but started working, yawning.
Quinlan just watched quietly, humming a song.
Obi-Wan was desperately fighting sleep, even as he made more progress on his essay after talking it through with his soulmate.
As Obi-Wan slowed down, Quinlan switched to a lullaby. He cuddled Obi-Wan as he always did.
Obi-Wan dropped everything and fell asleep against Quinlan.
Quinlan smiled and dropped a kiss on his forehead. He adjusted so that they were laying down, using the Force to drop all the work on the desk.
He waited until he was certain that Obi-Wan was asleep before he got up and started cleaning up the mess that was Obi-Wan's room. There was trash everywhere, clothes everywhere.
Once he was done cleaning everything up, he organized the desk by class, with those classes that still had work due more easily accessible. He made sure it was closer to what Obi-Wan preferred in organization than what he preferred.
Then he checked the time and decided he might as well go to bed early too.
.
Obi-Wan woke up confused, facts about astronavigation and how to calculate travel time dancing in his head. He'd fallen asleep. How did he end up in bed?
His head didn't want to think too hard about it. Everything was really fuzzy with sleep, way more than usual. He grumbled and curled into the warmth next to him. He wanted to sleep more but he had too much to do... he shouldn't have fallen asleep in the first place.
Quinlan chuckled. "Awake, sleepy?" he teased.
Obi-Wan opened his eyes and smiled at his soulmate. "I guess... how long did I sleep?"
"Twelve hours. You don't have any class today. You have plenty of time to finish the work you need to finish still."
Obi-Wan subsided with a grumble, memories of what they talked about over food and dessert returning. "I shouldn't have slept at all."
"Why not?" Quinlan asked gently. "You shouldn't sacrifice your health."
"You don't understand."
"Why don't you explain it to me, then?"
Obi-Wan shook his head and pulled away. He stumbled to the bathroom and back, before sitting at the desk to get to work.
Quinlan surprised him a few minutes later with breakfast. Quinlan then sat down on the bed and did some reading for an hour. At that point he insisted Obi-Wan take a ten minute break to stretch and drink some water.
Obi-Wan reluctantly agreed. He was unhappy to find that Quinlan was right. Things did look better after the break.
Coupled with the sleep, food, and company, he made far more progress than he had in days in just two hours.
Quinlan kept nagging him about breaks, but otherwise didn't disturb him.
After a while Obi-Wan started asking questions, and getting the help he needed. Help he never would have gotten from Qui-Gon.
With that, he started relaxing for the first time since he started the classes.
He didn't say anything until dinner, though, which was soup and homemade bread. He ate quietly then looked up at Quinlan.
"I need at least 80% in five of my classes. 60% in two. 70 to 75% in the other three. I fell behind early on, couldn't juggle all of my classes, and Qui-Gon wasn't giving me a chance to get a break and it just... I found it harder and harder to get things done and now here we are."
Quinlan hugged him. "I'm sorry. I wish I was here to help, although that's assuming that Qui-Gon would have let me in at all."
"He just was doing what he thought was best."
"Obes. You were refusing sleep."
"It's not his fault!"
"Then what's going on?" Quinlan asked, even more worried.
"I just disappointed him when I started falling behind, that's all, and I'm trying to make up for it, and there just was no way to get sleep with all the class work I had and I just got in the habit and then he started being strict about making sure I was doing the work when I fell more behind and it just got worse."
"So... it started off small and just kept snowballing?"
"Yeah..." Obi-Wan sighed. He leaned on his soulmate. "I missed you, that didn't help. I mentioned you once. Qui-Gon blew up about how I needed to let go of you and all that."
Quinlan hugged Obi-Wan tighter, too worried to be angry. "That was something we mastered as soon as I became a padawan 'cause you were stuck here and I was doing missions."
"Yeah. What I really meant was that I missed you because you always knew what I needed. Whether it was a break, a new approach, food, or just company. I didn't even know what I needed. All of the above apparently. Qui-Gon's the sort that just buckles down and does it in one go and that just doesn't work."
"It never has worked for you," Quinlan agreed quietly. "But you get a lot more done in ten minutes than most people do. You just need to spend some time not doing it to keep that level up."
Obi-Wan nodded. "Thanks for getting me back on track. I got so stuck in the patterns I was forced into to try to keep up and please Qui-Gon I didn't consider any other options."
"I know. Why was it so important you did ten classes this class cycle instead of doing five now and five next?"
"Because Qui-Gon doesn't want to be stuck in the Temple for half a year straight and since I'm so close to senior padawan and have all the mission hours needed, they would want me to do them back to back."
Quinlan snorted. "So it's about what he wants not what's best for you and your growth?"
Obi-Wan sighed. "Yeah. It's okay. I'm used to it."
Quinlan shook his head and kissed Obi-Wan's cheek. "I think it's time for dessert. I need to process a little."
"Okay. More apple crisp?"
Quinlan grinned. "Of course. I made a whole pan yesterday."
"Good."
.
It was the next day that Quinlan had enough of the situation and decided it was time to involve some others.
Obi-Wan looked better after another full nights' sleep. He was zooming through his work, with just one class left. He did some quiz games with Quinlan to make sure he wasn't forgetting any information for any of his classes.
So Quinlan thought he wouldn't need to worry, so long as Qui-Gon came back after the finals were taken, which was likely.
Then Obi-Wan stood up and his legs gave out and he felt to the ground with a groan. "Ow..."
"Obes!" Quinlan rushed to his soulmate's side. "What's wrong?"
"I'm fine..." Obi-Wan started trying to push himself up. But his body had enough and he just collapsed back down again.
"Easy, doesn't look like your fi- What's this?" Quinlan pushed aside the outer robe to stare at the blood underneath.
Obi-Wan wouldn't look at him.
Quinlan pulled his clothes off to see that he had a deep wound there that wasn't healing well, and there were other cuts.
"Obi..." Quinlan whispered, horrified, "what happened?"
"It's nothing. I didn't have time to go see a healer."
"Because you had too much to do." Quinlan took in a deep breath. "I'm taking you to the healers."
"No! I still have class work to finish."
"And your teacher will have to understand that you can't. You can't even push yourself up right now, Obi. Why did your legs collapse? Are they injured too?"
Obi-Wan hesitated, then nodded.
Quinlan closed his eyes briefly. "Alright. Let's go." He wrapped a cloak around Obi-Wan and picked him up. "Tell me about what happened along the way?"
"It was nothing big. Sometimes we get minor assignments to the Senate while on Coruscant and it wasn't bad, but I tripped down some stairs and I think maybe fractured my shin? My ankles were definitely sprained."
"Okay, so that explains your legs. Your chest and stomach, Obi?" Quinlan kept cradling him close and occasionally kissed him to reassure himself that Obi-Wan was alive and there.
"...I had a mishap with some other padawans."
"Bullies?"
Obi-Wan sighed. "Yeah. I don't know that they actually meant to stab me, but the cuts were deliberate. They were trying to make a broken heart but I was moving too much."
Quinlan took in a deep breath. "Why?"
"Because they're jealous of you and me. That we already have each other and we're clearly in love. Tried to say there was no way you were any good for me, no way you wanted me, and I wasn't having it and things escalated. From the looks on some faces, I don't think all of them were good with the plan to actually hurt me."
"Did you tell anyone?"
"Never got me anywhere in the past, even when I let Bruck hurt me and didn't fight back. I tried to mention it to Qui-Gon and he advised me to let go of hard feelings into the Force and walk off the bruises."
"So he doesn't know and shut down your attempt to tell him."
"Yeah. Just told me to get to work, and wouldn't hear any excuses on why I was struggling."
"Kriff, I wish you'd have told me."
Obi-Wan shook his head and half hid against Quinlan. "Didn't want to make things worse. And I wanted to get stuff done, figured if it was still a problem after the exams I'd go in, but not before. Guess my body had other plans."
Quinlan sighed. "Please don't keep secrets from me Obes... I have enough secrets to deal with as a shadow, I never keep anything from you and I don't ever want you to feel like you have to hide injuries from me."
"I don't... I didn't mean to. I just wasn't ready to talk about it."
"More like you were in denial... Obi, if you're aware there's a problem, please say you aren't ready to talk about it rather than implying there's nothing going on at all. I can wait. But you saying it's nothing or you're fine when I can tell that you're not makes me want to push you to talk."
"...I'll try to remember that. You'll do the same?"
"Yeah, of course. Might be a little difficult after some missions. I've noticed it can be hard to open up after undercover missions 'cause I got used to not talking."
"Oh. That makes sense. But you'll try."
"Yep. Just might need a reminder at first." Quinlan kissed him. "Now, we're almost to the healers. Ready for the interrogation and lectures on taking care of yourself?"
Obi-Wan groaned. "I'd rather not but whatever. I'm gonna have to deal with it."
Quinlan nodded. "You know Qui-Gon's gonna get in trouble, right?"
"Why?"
"Because the moment you mention that you didn't want to come in because you have to pass your classes, they're going to prod at that, question why you had to take all ten this class cycle instead of splitting it into five and five, and it's not a good idea to lie."
"And the more they dig, the more they'll see I wasn't taking care of myself and Qui-Gon didn't seem to notice, at best." Obi-Wan sighed. "Okay. Whatever."
"Whatever they decide with Qui-Gon, I'm still gonna be here. We're soulmates, and nothing anyone says can change that, okay?"
"Okay."
.
This incident was a huge cornerstone for their relationship. With new habits and communication that carried them through the roughest times.
When no one else could get Obi-Wan to say there was a problem, Quinlan could. When no one else could get Obi-Wan to slow down and take breaks, Quinlan could, though by the time the war started, Obi-Wan was good at his hour of work, then ten minute break habit, even if he did let it cut into his sleep sometimes.
When no one else believed in Quinlan, Obi-Wan was there. When no one could get Quinlan to open up about a mission gone wrong, Obi-Wan did. Even when Quinlan Fell, Obi-Wan was there to support him, reminding him they were soulmates and they were together for better or worse.
People who knew them individually were always confused when they learned the two were soulmates, when they learned they were together, married in the Jedi way.
But those who saw them together, they understood why they were soulmates even if it never made sense. They just fit together.