Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Darth Vader cuts Ben down--the first time Darth Vader cuts him down--Ben thinks only one thing:

That’s it?

He hardly registers his knees hitting the ground or the smell of lightsaber-seared flesh or the sounds in Luke’s scream as the Force takes him, pulls him into its endless embrace.

I want to live.

Ten lives and ten deaths later, he will remember these words and regret them deeply.

The first time Ben wakes, he doesn’t wake at all.

He rises from his bed in the Initiate dorms as if in a dream and takes in the unsoiled, unbroken, and beautiful home of his memories, back before everything went so horribly, horribly wrong.

It’s all just as he remembers, from the ancient corridors shining in the faint dawn light as he makes his way past other Jedi--other Jedi!--to the smell of clean linen and the faint tang of Coruscanti air to the peaceful sense of belonging that vibrates in the Force and wraps him in its safety. He shouldn’t be surprised. The Force has put him through trials--too many trials, perhaps--but he’s never lost faith that it would be merciful in the end. He’s never really thought about it, but there’s few places he’d rather be than returned to this peaceful tableau, his…home.

He nearly trips over himself, unused to his Initiate-sized body (and he can hardly even believe that he used to be so small), and he pushes his way through the Temple with no destination at all, no desire except to drink it all in.

His senses spool out into the Force, looking for people, looking for friends, and…everyone’s here, of course. Everyone died before he did, and he’s the last to join them.

If this is what it means to become one with the Force, then there’s no wonder people say not to fear it.

It takes no time at all to find and embrace his friends of so long ago (they’re so young, how could they ever have been so young?) and tell them how much he missed them and how much he loves them and he cries into their shoulders about how he’s sorry, how he did everything he could--

Nobody’s really sure what to do about this emotional outburst, but they let him have it. Ben lets himself have it. He did just die, after all.

He feels so bright, so full of emotions that there’s nowhere for them to go--so much so that he’s nearly in a daze when Bant pulls him to their classes that he listens to with only half an ear.

(Silly, really, to treat them like Initiates just because they look like them, but there’s something to be said for routine.)

Days pass in a blur. He’s so giddy that nothing can touch him--not the old bullying from Bruck and his friends, not the confused looks and lack of recognition when he embraces the Masters who were once his friends and brothers-in-arms, not the strange feeling of being ten-yet-fifty-seven and readjusting to such a small body. He feels alive, and he is home, and that what matters.

It lasts until about three weeks after Ben’s death, when the Initiates take a trip to the Senate building. Nobody’s really paying that much attention to Ben as he strays from the group--they’re taking his quirks in stride, it seems--and so, nobody notices how he freezes when one Senator Palpatine walks into the hall.

In the next three seconds, several things happen at once:

Palpatine greets him kindly, and Ben’s smile freezes. He calls out into the Force, and a lightsaber--the chaperoning Knight’s fully functioning and fully lethal lightsaber--flies into the palm of his hand, and in one smooth motion, Ben ignites it and cuts a perfect slash through Palpatine the same way Vader had put a single slash through Ben, three weeks ago. Even the great Sith Emperor can’t react fast enough to a ten year old’s killing blow when he’s unarmed and off his guard, and he collapses, fatally wounded.

That’s as much as Ben sees before he is shot by the Senator’s guards. Pain fills his consciousness as blaster bolts pierce him with burning plasma, and as he dies on the Senate floor, not a meter away from the Sith he has just assassinated, he realizes that perhaps this is not a dream after all.

The second time Ben wakes, he is no longer dreaming.

The feeling of blaster bolts through his chest is still fresh in his mind as he pries his eyes open and stares at the ceiling that he knows so well.

He is ten years old. He is an Initiate in the Jedi Temple at Coruscant, and if he were to look at his chrono, he would find that he is three weeks earlier than he was just a moment ago.

Somehow, he has died twice, and he is still alive. Alive, and ten years old, before everything--everything went wrong.

Qui-Gon’s death. The rise of the Sith. The Clone Wars. Satine’s murder. The Empire. Cody’s betrayal. Anakin…

Anakin.

It always comes down to that, at the end. Anakin, the start and end of it all, the Chosen One, the child of prophecy, and…only one person. Only ever one person, no matter what power he had, and Ben had failed him just as he failed so many others.

Ben breathes in. Out.

He thought everything would be over once he passed into the Force, but it seems it still has use for him. He isn’t sure how he feels about that.

Ben’s second--third?--life goes pretty poorly. Despite his efforts, a lot of things go the same way they did the first time. Qui-Gon still runs ahead at Naboo and gets his fool ass killed by Maul, Ben still trains Anakin, and the Clone Wars still happen, because it turns out that stopping a war is really hard. Ben does his best to keep Anakin away from Palpatine and be a better Master--and he thinks he does better now that he has the benefit of experience and knowing more than literally nothing about teaching children--but he doesn’t know if it actually pays off, since he ends up dying in a skirmish about four months into the war. A piece of shrapnel, of all things. Embarrassing, really.

The third try goes better in some ways--Ben kills Maul on Tatooine, leaving Qui-Gon alive to take on Anakin as his Padawan. It still hurts like hell that Qui-Gon’s so eager to get a new, better student, especially when it took Ben literally offering to die for Qui-Gon to even consider training him, much less show this much enthusiasm. Even in this life where Ben is literally the most talented and powerful and (he would hope) emotionally mature Padawan a Master could ever have, Qui-Gon seems to find him wanting.

There’s really nothing to be done about that. Despite being through the whole thing three times in a row, despite how much Ben cares about his old Master, he can’t ever be anything but a massive disappointment to Qui-Gon. It must be something about him at the fundamental level, but whatever. It’s not important; Ben doesn’t have the time or energy to keep fighting a losing battle. He’s made his peace with the fact that he will never please Qui-Gon, so he might as well stop trying and do whatever he wants instead. At least, since this time Ben gets knighted before Qui-Gon so eloquently declares he’ll train Anakin, he doesn’t have to sit through Qui-Gon actively abandoning him once again.

(It’s not…appropriate for a Jedi to be bitter about past slights, and Ben generally isn’t, but this is an old wound, and he can admit it still hurts. It’s never going to hurt as much as it did that first time, when Qui-Gon had been ready to fling him straight into the Trials without so much as a by-your-leave. Those ten minutes in the Council Chamber were the most scared Ben had--has--ever been in his life, and he’s still not sure if anyone noticed. If they did, they certainly didn’t let him know.)

Ben’s emotional baggage aside, the situation isn’t bad at all. Becoming an unattached Knight is a…really novel experience. Ben’s still got his duties to the Council, obviously, but he’s got no Padawan to be responsible for, no Master to answer to, no army to lead, no youngling to protect. A hundred and thirty years and he’s never had this kind of freedom. He wastes no time abusing it to do something drastic.

He assassinates Palpatine.

It’s a bit tricky, but not technically difficult when it comes down to it. As proven from that one time he murdered Palpatine when he was only ten years old, killing the Sith Lord doesn’t take exceptional skill so much as an extreme element of surprise. In the end, it’s not a lightsaber battle or the Force that brings Palpatine down, but some sleight of hand and a vibroknife between the ribs. Ben gets about fifteen minutes to drop Palpatine’s cooling corpse and ransack the man’s files for evidence of turbo evilness and ship it off to the Jedi Temple before security bursts in and nearly shoots his face off. Ben escapes just fine, but not before the security droids get a nice good look at him and he promptly becomes the one of the most wanted men in the galaxy.

He spends the next several years on the run, which really isn’t so much different from the tail end of his original life, except that he sticks to climates much more palatable than Tatooine. It would be worth it, except that the Clone Wars still happen anyways, presumably at the behest of Count Dooku and friends.

Ben’s kind of put out about it. He took care of the biggest Sith problem and sent the Jedi Council a ton of evidence in a gift-wrapped box--surely they were able to do something with it.

Apparently not.

The end of that life is spent behind enemy lines, sabotaging droid factories and Separatist supply chains. He makes himself enough of a pain in the ass that when he gets captured, he gets an audience with Dooku himself.

“Knight Kenobi,” Dooku says in that smooth, aristocratic way that makes him sound like he’s always slightly disgusted.

“Grandmaster. Nice to see you,” Ben says in a much friendlier tone, or as well as he can manage while hanging upside-down in a containment field.

“Is it, really?” Dooku asks. “With how much trouble you’ve given me, I find that hard to believe.”

“Quid pro quo, I’d say,” Ben replies. “I saved your life, so now I’m entitled to make it interesting.”

Dooku arches a brow. “Saved my life? In what way?”

“I killed Sidious. Surely you know about that--it was only on the holonews every night for about an entire month. I have to admit, I’m kind of annoyed you started his war anyways. Tell me, is the Dark Side everything you thought it would be?”

Dooku’s eyes narrow. “Your impertinence will be your undoing, Kenobi.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. That seems to be the story of my life. Lives.” Ben shrugs, as best as he can shrug while being in the uncomfortable position he is. “Since I’m pretty sure you’re going to kill me quite soon, can you do me a favor, dear Grandmaster?”

“I’m not feeling particularly charitable right now.”

Ben grins. He’s been told his smile is very charming, so it’s worth a shot. “Don’t worry, it’s nothing strenuous. Just tell me--what made you want to do all this? Leave the Jedi, start a war, join the Sith?”

“Why would I tell you something like that?”

“I’m curious, that’s all,” Ben says. “Do it as a last favor to your Grandpadawan before you kill him?”

It takes some cajoling, but not too much--Dooku seems to honestly want to get all this off his chest, or at least gloat about how useless and hypocritical the Jedi Order is. That’s how Ben learns about Galidraan and how Sifo-Diyas died and Dooku’s absolutely awful relationship with Qui-Gon and Yoda both.

“You know, this information won’t help you. You aren’t going to escape,” Dooku says after Ben thanks him.

“I wasn’t planning on it,” Ben says. He’d already failed once the Clone Wars started. “Are you going to kill me now or after you torture me? Because I haven’t been in the Temple for over a decade, so I have no information to give you.”

In a smooth movement, Dooku lights his saber and sets its point at the base of Ben’s throat. It’s not a comfortable place for a saber to be. “I wouldn’t say that. You knew about Sidious, and the origins of the War. Clearly, you possess some knowledge.”

Just then, the door explodes, and Ben glances over to none other than Master Qui-Gon and his Padawan Anakin.

“Well, this is awkward,” Ben says.

Dooku stabs him in the throat. Ben dies to the sound of Qui-Gon screaming his name.

The fourth and fifth tries aren’t great. Ben tries to stop Dooku from going to the Dark Side, but he’s too late to stop the man from losing faith, and there doesn’t seem to be any combination of evidence and strategic property damage that can stop the Jedi Order from getting involved in the Clone Wars. The war itself seems to be as impossible to stop as the sun coming up in the morning. After all his efforts, Ben has to admit he’s losing some faith himself.

The sixth life, Ben decides to stop bothering with Qui-Gon and the Temple entirely. After so many iterations of the same Padawanship, Qui-Gon is starting to feel more like a droid than an actual person--all pre-programmed responses that Ben has learned by rote--and he would prefer not to taint his memory of a man he loved--loves. Besides, his attempts to fix things as a Jedi so far clearly haven’t been drastic enough.

When he’s eleven, he uses his High Council codes and breaks into the Armory to…borrow a lightsaber--an old yellow lightsaber that seems to be pretty close to his real age and whose crystal seems to understand Ben’s goals and agrees to help--then disappears in the middle of the night.

He kills Sidious. He takes Maul back to Darthomir. He ruins Xanatos’ business with some strategic slicing and industrial sabotage. He sets a bunch of facilities on Kamino on fire. He frees slaves on Tatooine, and Ryloth too since he’s in the area. He tries to convince Dooku not to start a war, and failing that, kills him, too. All the threats Ben can think of, and still he’s not sure it’s enough.

That’s the life he finds out about Plagueis.

Ben dies at the tender age of nineteen, after suffering the worst torture a Sith can come up with for a full month and a half, which is how long it takes Ben to find out that becoming one with the Force is a skill that can be invoked directly, something he wish he’d known back when the blasted Sith had first grabbed him.

Ben, age ten, wakes up in the Initiate dorms at the crack of dawn for the seventh time, and cries like he’s had his heart ripped out. Nobody knows what to do with him.

That seventh life starts out rough.

Ben can’t even do the Jedi Knight thing. It takes him almost a year to recover from Plagueis’ tender mercies--the physical marks might be gone, but Ben certainly remembers the experience better than he’d ever hoped to.

“I was tortured by a Sith Lord, if you must know,” he tells the Mind Healer in their fourth session, because he has no reason not to. It’s not as if they’ll remember this once he dies again. “His name is Darth Plagueis, also known as Hego Demask of the Banking Clan, not that I expect you to believe me. He has an apprentice, Sheev Palpatine of Naboo, or Darth Sidious, though I don’t know if he goes by that yet. Also, apparently we can’t detect the Dark Side as well as we thought we could, so maybe someone should figure that out.”

They don’t believe him. They say something about an overactive imagination or trauma-induced delusions or misinterpreted Force visions, but Ben tunes it out. There’s nothing he can do to prove that the Sith are there and real without telling them he’s been reliving his life for the past three hundred or so years--and they certainly wouldn’t believe that, either. He doesn’t have the energy to try and convince them while also getting his own shit together.

And he does get his shit together. Eventually, and largely without the help of the Mind Healers. It isn’t like he hasn’t been tortured before--it just takes a while to regain his equilibrium, and fortunately he has nothing but time.

He goes to AgriCorp that life--actually goes to AgriCorp, without Qui-Gon or any of that other mess. He takes care of Xanatos’ mines and some pirates and frees a bunch of slaves--even a training saber can do a lot of damage if you know the right place to strike--then settles in to learn how to do some kriffing farming.

It’s a refreshing experience. Nobody shoots at him, nobody makes him officiate diplomatic treaties, nobody is vaguely disappointed at him for being too willful or not having the right temperament or whatever. It’s just him, a shitty planet, and fifty million plants.

The surprising thing is how much Ben enjoys it. Not because he loves plants or farming or anything, but because he loves to learn, and he loves to learn from other people, and not just from his own reading and experimentation the way he’s been doing for the past few lives--Qui-Gon certainly hasn’t had anything to teach him for the past couple hundred years. He learns more than he ever needed to know about ecology and the degradation and reconstruction of ecosystems for agricultural needs, and about staple crops and plant biology and, to a lesser extent, terraforming. He learns about using the Living Force, which despite his multiple apprenticeships with Qui-Gon, he never really could get a grip on but aims to correct now. He meets new people and really gets to know the Service Corp and it’s so much different from being a Knight that he’s practically vibrating with excitement--he had no idea he’d stagnated so hard from doing the same thing for hundreds of years.

It’s hard work and a few years of constant learning despite his unfair advantages, and he gets good at farming and research and planning out relief efforts and teaching people about how to not farm their planets to death--he might even go so far as to say he thrives in AgriCorp. Not the way he thrived as a Knight, where he managed to pull out impossible treaty after impossible treaty and directed war efforts and managed to repeatedly not get killed, but he does good work that saves millions of lives, and that’s really nothing to sneeze at. It’s much calmer work overall, though he still occasionally has to do some aggressive negotiations with slavers and companies that are trying to exploit planets for all the pretty credits they’re worth.

When he’s twenty-four and working on another research project on Bandomeer, he gets recalled to the Temple by an urgent holocall from none other than Yoda himself. Ben’s kind of annoyed that they couldn’t at least send a representative in person or maybe give him a week’s notice before telling him to put all his work on hold.

He goes to the Temple. It’s still his home, even after all these years, and he still respects the High Council, for all that he’s become increasingly cognizant of their flaws. He can’t see why they want to see him when they probably barely realize he exists, if at all--traumatized, deluded child who prefered farming to Knight work that he was--but Ben cares about them, and that’s enough.

He enters the Council Chamber for what’s practically the first time in this life. It all looks the same--it always looks the same--but Ben is different now. Different clothes, different attitude, different age, no lightsaber. He bows with all the appropriate decorum. “Masters,” he says. “It’s an honor to be here.”

“Obi-Wan Kenobi,” Yoda says. “Seen you in a long time, we have not. Look well, you do. AgriCorp suits you, it does?”

“It’s been good for me,” Ben agrees. “I returned to Coruscant as soon as I could. What do you require, Masters?”

Mace shifts slightly in his seat. “One of our Masters recently had a mission that uncovered some…disquieting information. We wished to hear your opinion on it.”

Ben blinks. That’s not what he expected at all. “I’m happy to help, but I can’t see what insight you think I can deliver, considering I’ve been on the Outer Rim since I joined the Service Corps.” He also can’t see why this couldn’t have been done over holocall, but he’s got enough tact to not say so out loud.

Mace nods. “We appreciate your cooperation.”

“This may be…upsetting,” Plo Koon adds. “If you feel this discussion becomes harmful for your mental health, please let us know immediately.”

Ben’s brows draw together. He’s never seen the Council walk on eggshells like this, least of all with him. “…Okay? So what do you need?”

“Fourteen years ago, a vision you had,” Yoda says.

Oh.

“From a certain point of view, yes,” Ben replies evenly. He wouldn’t really say he’s over getting tortured by Plagueis. It’s not like he’s having nightmares and panic attacks all the time like he used to, but it’s still not something he wants to think about.

“And what point of view would that be?” Mace asks, ever-vigilant of Qui-Gon-like slippery language. “Did you not have a vision of being captured by a Sith?”

Ben clasps his hands together behind his back and says, “I have the memory of being captured by a Sith. I have the memory of being tortured and subjected to severe and inhumane experimentation, by a Sith, for a month and a half before committing suicide. I would not classify it as a vision, but your purposes, it may as well be one.”

“A memory, you say?” Yoda asks. “Not captured by Sith, you have been. Noticed, we would have. On your body, evidence there would be. Become one with the Force, you are not.”

Ben sighs. “Because it didn’t happen in this life. It’s the memory of a life that didn’t happen, and won’t happen.”

“How old, you were, in this memory, when became one with the Force, you did?” Yoda asks.

“Nineteen.”

There’s an awkward pause in the Chamber, a pregnant silence that’s filled to bursting with emotions Ben can’t decipher. Sorrow. Disbelief, maybe. The High Council doesn’t seem to like how candid Ben is about this experience, but the joke is on them because if Ben doesn’t speak frankly like this, he’ll probably start crying instead, and that would be embarrassing for everyone present.

“If it’s a memory of something that didn’t happen and won’t happen, then is that not a vision?” Mace asks, not unkindly.

Ben purses his lips. “Mace, I don’t care what you call it. Is this pedantry important? I don’t actually like talking about this.”

“Mind your manners, young Kenobi,” Ki-Adi-Mundi says.

Yeah. That’s pretty rich. Ben’s the oldest kriffing person in the room, excepting Yoda, and he had to clear out his entire schedule for two and a half weeks to make this meeting work, all so he could talk about what was literally the worst fifty-three days of any of his lives. He’s not in the mood to get lectured on manners.

He looks directly at Yoda. “Why is my traumatic experience relevant now?”

“Hmm. A Sith, you claim to have seen in your memory. A Sith, one of our masters claims to have encountered.”

Ben’s heart drops. “Maul?”

Yoda peers at him. “Its name, you know?”

Okay. Maybe Ben shouldn’t have said that. “I suppose so,” he says, because it’s too late to roll that back. “A red Zabrak with a red saberstaff.”

There’s another long pause while the Councillors exchange meaningful glances with each other. There’s tension in the Force, and disquiet between them.

Mace clears his throat. “You…have seen this Sith.”

Ben nods. “Not in this life, but yes.”

“Inform us of this, you did not,” Yoda says.

Ben valiantly suppresses the urge to roll his eyes. “You didn’t believe me the first time I told you about the Sith.”

There’s another disturbance in the Force as the Councillors commune with one another wordlessly. Ben can practically tell what they’re trying to say from their expressions alone--he was part of the Council for long enough to learn that much. Mainly, they seem to think he’s being unnecessarily difficult. Not a new sentiment, certainly.

“Tell us about the Sith, we request you will,” Yoda says after a long silence. “Our enemy long lost, has returned. To fight them, we must learn.”

“You would trust my…visions?” Ben asks.

“Clear, your memories have been. Clear, we hope they remain. Illuminate this darkness, your knowledge may,” Yoda says.

“If that’s what you wish,” Ben says.

Yoda nods. “We do.”

It takes almost an hour and a half to say everything he has to say about the Sith. There’s no way for him to explain why he knows what he knows, even with the handwavey excuse of his ‘vision’, but he holds nothing back because it’s information that may yet save them.

It’s clear by the end of it that they’re horrified by the extent of Palpatine’s plans, and skeptical simply because the alternative is so much worse. They don’t tell him he’s full of shit, so maybe they’re actually considering it. Ben can only hope--he has no proof besides his words, so it’s possible they’ll still slam dunk all he says into the trash the moment he leaves, and are refraining from doing so now simply out of respect.

The main thing the Council seems to get out of all this is that whatever their Master encountered, it actually was a Sith, and maybe they need to take this whole Sith business seriously. It’s better than nothing.

At the end of it, they thank him and call in the Master in question. It’s Qui-Gon, of course, with young Anakin trailing a step behind him.

Qui-Gon looks at Ben and there’s no recognition at all, only polite interest and mild surprise, probably because Service Corp personnel don’t generally get called to the Council Chamber. Ben doesn’t stare long--after fifty or so cumulative years as the man’s Padawan, the lack of familiarity makes him extremely uncomfortable.

Anakin, on the other hand, well…he looks just the same. Scrawny and unrefined and just a little bit feral, the way Ben remembers him in those early days out of Tatooine. Ben wonders if Qui-Gon remembered to get Anakin his inoculations.

“Kenobi,” Mace says. “This is the Master we discussed, Master Qui-Gon Jinn.”

Of course. It seems like Qui-Gon encountering Maul always remains constant.

That’s actually kind of weird, now that Ben thinks of it. If it keeps happening that way regardless of Ben’s interference or noninterference, does that mean someone’s making it happen that way on purpose?

Ben bows politely. “Pleased to meet you, Master Jinn.”

Qui-Gon smiles diplomatically. “Likewise.”

“Master Jinn and his ward are leaving on a mission to Naboo shortly, to protect Queen Amidala. We would like you to accompany them,” Mace says.

Ben’s eye twitches. “What? Why?”

Apparently the Council isn’t used to being questioned so directly, because there’s an awkward pause before Mace says, “We don’t believe the appearance of the Sith on Tatooine was a coincidence. And according to what we have learned today, it seems probable that the Sith will return to make an attempt on Queen Amidala’s life once again. You are the one who knows the most about the Sith, Kenobi.”

Ben squints at Mace, as if that’ll make the logic detangle itself. “My ‘experience’ with Sith is getting captured and tortured,” Ben says. Of course, he has also killed quite a lot of Sith as well, but the Council doesn’t know that. “And I already have my own work in the AgriCorp. Time-sensitive work, at that. I can’t just leave it to go on bodyguarding missions. I don’t even have a lightsaber.”

“A weapon you have, do you not?” Yoda asks. “Your record, we have seen. Pirates and slavers, you have defeated, if for the situation, it calls. Your skill in combat, considerable it is.”

Ben’s hand strays to the saber hanging on his belt. He’s customized the grip and balance to better suit him, and he’s won a lot of fights with it--sometimes lethally, because a training saber is still a dangerous weapon in the right hands--but it’s still a training saber. “Surely you aren’t telling me to fight a Sith with a training saber?” Even for Ben, that would be reaching new depths of stupidity.

“Fight the Sith, we do not expect you to,” Yoda says. “Simply defend the Queen, we wish. If detect the Sith, you do, then confront it, Master Qui-Gon shall.”

“If Master Jinn fights that Sith on his own, he’s going to die,” Ben says flatly.

There’s a flicker of…annoyance in the Force from Qui-Gon, an emotion that Ben is intimately familiar with coming from the man, even without a direct bond between them. Still, Qui-Gon’s face remains pleasant, and he smiles as he slips his hands into the sleeves of his robe. “I assure you, I am quite proficient with a saber. And I have fought this Sith once before.”

“Yes, and the next time you fight him alone, he’ll kill you,” Ben replies. “I don’t mean it as a sign of disrespect. I mean that the Sith is more powerful than even you realize, and that you should have someone to assist you--another Master, ideally. I, unfortunately, am not a Master.”

Maybe it’s selfish of Ben to not want to fight Maul. It isn’t like he can’t, even wielding only a training saber--he knows Maul well enough that he could even win despite that disadvantage. But he’s fought Maul five lives in a row. He’s tired of having to do the same thing life after life, especially now that he’s found something new, and fighting Maul is just the precursor to all the other things he’s had to do over and over again. He’s seen the war go on without him--someone has to manage the Republic’s armies and the war effort, but it demonstrably doesn’t have to be him. There’s no reason fighting Maul has to be him, either. As long as Qui-Gon isn’t an idiot who runs ahead and splits up, he and some other Master can defeat Maul just fine. Maybe even kill him properly, this time.

Ben wants a karking break for one life. Is that so much to ask? If he were to ask the Council or, Force forbid, venerable Qui-Gon Jinn, they would probably say yes. Yes, that is too much to ask. Yes, that’s shirking his duty. And why wouldn’t they say so? Ben’s seen this all before, but they’re going into the unknown and Ben is objectively their best bet at getting through all of this unscathed.

But still. Ben doesn’t want to fight Maul. Selfish, yes, but he’s already told the Council everything they need to know. Ben may outstrip most of the Order in experience and skill at this point, but he’s only one man, and he’s no linchpin, no Chosen One of prophecy--they could use his help, but they don’t need him. Let someone else be the Sithkiller. Ben has other obligations in this life.

Nobody’s called him the Negotiator in hundreds of years, but his silver tongue has only gotten sharper with practice, and he talks the Council around to his point of view. He is not a Jedi, he is a respected member of the AgriCorp, with duties that cannot be deferred more than they already have been. His combat skills may be good enough for pirates and slavers, but will not be strong enough to make any difference against the Sith, and he has no proper Knight’s weapon besides and no time to construct one. He has no experience in missions similar to what Qui-Gon will soon embark on, and would end up being a liability, if anything. A second Master, or even a Knight would be a better addition.

In the end, Ben secures his permission to return to Bandomeer tomorrow morning, with only a duty to remain available for consultation over commlink. A perfect outcome for Ben, only marred by the fact that he is to stay overnight in Qui-Gon’s quarters and brief the man on everything he needs to know about the Sith.

When he’s finally dismissed from the Council Chamber, along with Qui-Gon and Anakin, he is quite exhausted.

Qui-Gon is largely silent as he leads them to their rooms, until about halfway through when he says, “That was an impressive display, back there.”

Ben blinks. “What?”

“You convinced the Council to not put you on our mission,” Qui-Gon says. “They generally do not change their minds about things like that. Your persuasion skills are quite commendable.”

Ben’s a bit put-off by the compliment. It just doesn’t sound right, coming from Qui-Gon. “I only told them the facts, and they realized that there was a better solution.”

“Hm,” Qui-Gon says. “True from a certain point of view, I suppose. I don’t think you are nearly as defenseless as you made yourself out to be.”

“I didn’t say I was defenseless. I said that another Master’s assistance would be much more useful than my own, which is true.”

“I don’t quite believe that, either,” Qui-Gon replies, serene as ever. “You are deeply powerful in the Force, young Kenobi. If I hadn’t known your age and profession, I would have assumed you a Master.”

“I am a farmer and a researcher, Master Jinn,” Ben says. “I’m not meant to fight Sith.”

“You are fearful,” Qui-Gon says.

Ben’s mouth twists. That’s more of the tone of voice he’s used to. The casual judgement, so assured in his truth being the absolute truth. No, Ben isn’t afraid of the Sith. He’s tired of them, but Qui-Gon would never see that.

He wonders when his thoughts about Qui-Gon had become so bitter.

“If I am, that’s no concern of yours,” Ben says. “Not all of us have the durasteel control and fearlessness of the Jedi Master, Master Jinn.”

Qui-Gon appraises him with a single glance. “Evidently not.”

That’s the end of that conversation.

Ben leaves the next morning, just as scheduled, not even sticking around for breakfast. Yoda sees him off, along with Qui-Gon, who seems to be there only out of politeness. Anakin contrives to be missing, though that might be less of Anakin’s will and more of it being the ass-crack of dawn. It’s just as well--Anakin’s just a child, not the man and the student Ben loved, so many lives ago. It wouldn’t be fair to put that burden on Anakin here, now.

Besides fielding a few questions over comm from Qui-Gon and the Mon Calamari Knight who’s accompanying him, Ben spends the trip back to Bandomeer in silent meditation.

He meditates on duty, and what it means to someone who lives like he does. Ben will always be a Jedi, despite everything. He won’t always have a lightsaber and he won’t always be in the Order, but he’s devoted his life to the way of the Jedi and that--as far as he can fathom--will never change. He’s always felt in the core of his heart that he will always pledge his service to the Force and to the people of the Galaxy who need it, and he’s never felt the weight of that burden so keenly as he does now, holding the knowledge that he does.

He wants to stop a war. He wants peace. He wants his home and his family to survive.

He just doesn’t know how.

How can he stop a war? How can he, the single man that he is, save the Galaxy from the evil that rots it from within? How can he protect the entire Jedi Order and all the people in it whom he loves from a threat they can’t even see?

The only thing Ben has to offer is himself--his knowledge, his skill, his service, his health. Ben won’t flatter himself and say he’s selfless or noble, because it’s his duty to give everything he can to better others, as a Jedi must, but he has to wonder what he’ll be at the end, after he’s distributed everything within him to all those who need it and has nothing left to offer. What will happen when he carves himself out to nothing but the infinite sadness and grief he carries in his soul, blessed--and cursed--with a heart that cares so much, about so many.

He doesn’t mind becoming nothing if it means that others will be safe. He doesn’t mind suffering alone if others can benefit. The Galaxy is so vast, and he is only one man, and it’s not his place to reap the benefits of his own service, as much as he desires them.

But. He’s tried seven times, and he’s failed each and every time. He’s sure he’ll fail that many times more, many times over. There’s no angle of attack he can see to fix everything. There’s no critical point, no linchpin to unravel the entire thread. All he can do is watch people with familiar faces die and fall again and again, because they all live such dangerous lives, and if one thing doesn’t take them, it’ll be another, or another, or another.

The timeline moves without him. Wherever Ben isn’t, there’s always another Jedi, another diplomat, another General. Expecting to be able to save the world by virtue of his knowledge and skill alone is akin to expecting a single pebble to divert a river. It’s his duty to try, but it’s so hard to commit to duty when it never seems to matter.

Ben sticks to it because it’s all he has. He’ll give up everything that makes him whole, and he’ll do it over and over, because it’s his duty as a Jedi to the Galaxy, but he knows in his heart it’ll never be enough.

There is no win condition.

That life, Ben survives to the end of the War without participating in it. Not directly, anyways. His entire tenure with the AgriCorps during the war consists of relief efforts, trying to get supplies and food and shelter to all the people whose homes are destroyed by the conflict between the Republic and the Separatists.

Between helping villages rebuild and writing up supply requests to bring aid to overworked medical centers, he can’t help but feel resentful. Towards whom, he’s not sure, but certainly about the war and how much it costs everyone, not just the Jedi and the clones.

He doesn’t save everyone. Not even close. Here, trailing in the wake of the War he encounters so much more death than he ever did fighting on the front lines, to the violence of famine and disease and crumbling infrastructure. It wasn’t like he never knew about this--he knew the cost of the war and the collateral damages of their conflicts in bold black type on flimsi, but here, in the middle of it all is a whole different thing.

The High Council--sometimes Yoda, sometimes Mace, much less often anyone else--comms him every so often throughout the War to ask if he knows anything new, if his visions have granted any more clarity into what is happening, or how to end the conflict.

“The war ends when all the Jedi are dead,” Ben tells them. “The clones turn on them. I don’t know why. Maybe you can figure it out.”

He doesn’t know if they believe him, or if they ever learn anything from his advice. The clones shoot their Jedi in the backs, the Order falls, and the Empire rises in its place. Ben spends the early days of the Empire moving refugees and supplies and ducking Imperial patrols, which lasts about six months before he’s personally captured by Anakin.

No, not Anakin. Vader.

The fight isn’t worth mentioning--Vader has the Dark Side and all of his limbs while Ben is overworked and underfed and still has only a training saber. All the goodness in the Galaxy can’t pull a victory out of that.

The trip to Coruscant is singularly unpleasant.

“How does it feel to change one Master for another, Darth?” Ben asks. “Growing up the way you did, I’d think you would want to never say ‘Yes, Master’ again.”

Vader doesn’t say anything, but he beats Ben bloody with bare fists for his words.

“You know Padmé wasn’t in danger until you made a deal with a Sith Lord, right?” Ben says through his split lip. “She’ll never agree with you, or the Empire. I assure you, your love will die at your Master’s hand, if she doesn’t die at yours, first. Assuming she isn’t dead already.”

Vader’s not happy to hear that, either, and makes him suffer for it. Ben continues to goad him, and that goes about as well as expected, but it’s clear that Vader needs him alive, and has enough self control to keep from killing him. Barely.

When they finally reach the newly-established Imperial Palace, Vader throws Ben’s broken body at his Sith Master’s feet like a tooka presenting a dead bird, and Ben just wants to cry.

“So this is the one who knew so much about our plans?” Sidious hisses at him. “I’ll be pleased to see what other information his visions hold.”

Well, that answers what Sidious cares about a farmer from the ass-end of nowhere.

Ben, with considerable difficulty, looks up at Sidious. He’s a terrible man, with malice radiating off of him in waves so thick it’s nearly suffocating. The Dark Side has not treated his body well--Ben can practically smell the decay, but he’d bet that Sidious has hardly noticed.

“I’m not telling you anything, Sidious,” Ben says, his voice as even as it ever is.

Sidious sneers. “You will, pathetic Jedi. The Dark Side will bring you to heel. None of your tricks can protect you now.”

“Are you sure about that?” Ben says, and releases himself into the Force.

Ignoring the shitty start and also that part at the end, that seventh life wasn’t bad at all, so Ben decides to stick to Service Corps for a while. It’s not glamorous and it’s not exciting the way all his Jedi Knight work was, but it’s good and important work and frankly if his path to become a Knight means having to work with Qui-Gon again, he’d really rather not. Ben can’t help but love Qui-Gon, but he doesn’t have patience for actually dealing with him. Best to go somewhere else.

He does ExplorCorp in his eighth life, and sees a lot more explosions than he thought he would, as well as runs into a lot more rogue Darksiders hiding out in Unknown Space than he was expecting. That life, he visits more planets than in his previous seven lives combined, and learns about so many different cultures that his journals fill datapad after datapad. He barely ever hears about the War at all, so far from the conflict and from having little to no HoloNet connection as he does, and dies in one of those aforementioned explosions during an extremely rough landing sometime around the age of thirty-two, which is also precisely the reason why he still hates flying.

His ninth life, he picks up MedCorp. He’s never learned how to heal properly--it’s kind of the thing that people have a talent for or not, but Ben’s got so much experience in using the Force that he can basically hack anything together at this point. It’s an unfair advantage that gets him a long way, though he still has to learn about anatomy and drugs and medical interventions the hard way, and he finds learning in-depth physiology of so many species a refreshing challenge. Meanwhile, his skill with Force Healing will never reach the elegance or efficacy of Vokara Che’s, but he’s good at triage and a fair hand with cybernetics and he helps the Healers run a tight ship when he isn’t coordinating relief efforts on other planets--yet another thing in which he has an unfair advantage, not that anyone is anything but grateful for it.

He gains a lot of respect for the Healers, and now that he’s standing on the other side of it, he feels slightly guilty about how bad of a patient he’s been every single time he was in the Halls of Healing for the last four hundred or so years. He loses some people, but he helps save a lot more--he gets good enough to be called Healer, and he has to admit that sounds a lot better than General.

That life, he dies when Vader and the 501st sack the Temple, and Ben holds them off so as many people can escape as possible--he’s set up evacuation plans for exactly this, years ago. In the end, Ben kills Vader in the Halls of Healing with a well-aimed hypo and a textbook perfect Ataru strike slipped through the weak low guard that Anakin had always had trouble with. The moment Ben hits home--only that single moment--surprise and fear overtakes Vader’s expression, and in that one moment, all Ben can see is Anakin. Without thinking, Ben reaches out to catch him, only to be shot in the back by a blaster bolt. He doesn’t see which clone fired it.

It’s just as well. Ben didn’t think he would survive killing Anakin anyways.

He does EduCorps in his tenth life--he’s certainly got plenty to teach. He spends a lot of his early life in the Archives doing research on the Sith and, when he can grow a beard and therefore doesn’t look like a complete youngling anymore, teaches a few Initiate and junior Padawan classes about Mando’a and diplomacy--or at least the parts that he can plausibly know without having to actually go out and get diplomatic experience--and helps out with saber training from time to time. Once he feels a little more secure in his position, he teaches some history courses, too, focusing on the conflicts between the Jedi and the Sith. The hope is, by teaching about it, people will perhaps start to take them more seriously, and not just as some thousand-year-old bogeyman.

For some reason, this upsets the High Council.

“Think the Sith will return, do you?” Yoda asks.

“I never said that,” Ben replies. “But Sith culture runs very deep. They have their own ruins and their own sectors of the Galaxy--it would be ridiculous to think they’ve died out completely, or that no one would want to revive them. Would it be now or in a hundred years? I don’t know. But it seems foolhardy to claim to fight the Dark Side if we don’t even examine what the Dark Side is.”

“Path to the Dark Side, study is,” Yoda says.

“Studying an infectious disease makes me more likely to contract it, but that doesn’t mean I should stop trying to understand how it works,” Ben says. “There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. Or do you expect all young Jedi to miraculously identify and avoid all the lures of the Dark Side simply through intuition?”

“You speak as if you know something of the Dark Side,” Plo Koon says, leaning forward in his chair.

Ben grimaces. He knows a whole lot about it, yeah, but he can’t say that. He’s nineteen years old and barely spends any time outside the Temple. “I know of it,” Ben says. “And it’s not as if the Jedi are unfamiliar with it--Jedi Falling is a well-documented phenomenon, even in recent times. I don’t personally know what it’s like to Fall, or how a Darksider would contrive to coerce me into something like that, but I can talk to people who do and learn from their experience. That’s the point of having a community in our Temple, yes? To support each other and share knowledge?”

“Hm,” Plo Koon says. “Well said, young Kenobi.”

“None of this explains why you want to teach about Sith, specifically,” Mace says.

“Because it’s a part of our history?” Ben says. “If we don’t teach it here in the Temple, then who will?”

“Great power, the Dark Side offers. Shown by history, it is,” Yoda says. “To younglings, very tempting, it may be.”

“Yeah, the Dark Side has tons of power which was unanimously used at great cost to commit massive atrocities,” Ben replies. “If any younglings are tempted by that kind of power, don’t you think that’s something we should probably work out in a safe environment instead of having them stumble into it in the field? The Dark Side has power to destroy entire planets, if it’s strong enough. If that’s a prospect that genuinely attracts some of our students instead of horrifying them, that’s something we need to catch and work with early on instead of just hoping it never comes up.”

Such arguments continue for about a month, but eventually the High Council lets Ben teach his history classes the way he wants to, just so long as they see the lesson plans first. Sometimes, they sit in on his classes for “observational purposes”, but Ben’s pretty sure they never learned this stuff, either. He certainly didn’t.

Mace is a frequent visitor, probably due to his experience with the Dark Side, but Plo Koon is surprisingly the member who is there most often out of all of them. Ben’s not sure why. Maybe Plo just likes being around younglings.

There are some benefits to living the way Ben does--one of them is that he has absolutely no social life to speak of and therefore has tons of time to devote to literally anything else.

In previous lives, he’s spent it on relief efforts and trying to dismantle the rising Sith Empire. This life, he devotes it to the younglings.

They love Ben. He doesn’t tolerate bullying, he doesn’t condescend to them, and he always makes time to listen when they need it (and he has so much time). It probably helps that he isn’t one of the old Masters, at least physically. He might be old as hell, but he’s lived his childhood recently enough to remember what kind of support they need, and he still remembers what it was like as an aged-out Initiate whose concerns and problems were summarily ignored. The Temple’s support network for younglings just…leaves something to be desired, so Ben tries to be the adult he wishes had helped him when he’d been younger, the adult he should have been for Anakin, and fills in the cracks where he can.

He talks to Initiates who are scared of aging out and being sent to Service Corps--he’s really the most qualified person to talk about that, at this point--and he talks to Padawans who don’t feel like they live up to their Master’s standards and never can, and he talks to younglings who have too much anger and don’t know what to do with it. Ben can’t fix everything on his own, but he’s always got a willing ear and a list of people he can introduce younglings to for more qualified advice, and it’s a system that seems to work. More younglings get to learn more about the other people in the Temple and more of those that really could benefit from talking to Mind Healers, do.

The surprise is that a lot of his students come back to visit him even after they’ve passed his classes. A lot of the time, it’s to tell him about their missions, or talk about their Masters--and younglings? listen to everything. It’s kind of alarming, actually, and Ben wonders what he’s said or done when he thought Anakin wasn’t listening. It’s not long before he’s practically become the most up to date repository of the juciest gossip around the entire Temple.

And really, that’s the other thing. A lot of people talk to him. Masters, Knights, Padawans, Initiates, even people visiting from Service Corps. They join him in his office for tea and conversation and recommend him holonovels and restaurants and play Sabacc and all of the other things that people do when they’re…friends.

Ben’s never had this many friends. He’s never had this many people…trust him like this. Respect, sure. Revere, certainly, after that whole Sithkiller thing. But this kind of open trust, without the confounding factors of power dynamics between them? Never. He’s not even sure why they do it--it’s not like he’s fought alongside them or done anything for them, besides teaching the younger ones. The Masters and Knights, he’s only talked to, if that, and yet they seem to hold him in such high regard.

Trust is such a dangerous thing to hold. Ben’s not sure what to do with it.

It’s a late evening, and Ben’s grading papers in his office over his third cup of very strong tea. He loves his students, but by the Force, they need to learn how to spell.

“Master Kenobi?”

Ben glances up and smiles. There’s three teenagers at his door--a Human, a Zabrak, and a Twi’lek. Lorn, Meera, and Sel-Keno are their names. They’re close friends who had been in his history classes about three years ago, and had visited him every few months since; he’d given them all a small gift when they became senior Padawans.

“Come in,” Ben says. “I haven’t seen you troublemakers in a while. How are you?”

Meera exchanges glances with the other two nervously, and that’s not a good sign. Something’s wrong.

“Meera?” Ben prompts. “Did something happen?”

“Um,” Meera says. “Not exactly, but…”

“We didn’t know who to talk to,” Sel-Keno interrupts. “We, uh. But we thought you would believe us.”

Ben sips his tea slowly. This whole conversation is putting him on edge, and it hasn’t even started. “Believe you about what? And please, sit down. I’ve got such a nice couch it’d be a shame not to use it.”

The three of them sit down and get comfortable. Ben offers them some tea--slightly less strong than what he’s currently taking, and with two pieces of rock sugar in the bottom of each cup.

It’s Sel-Keno who speaks up first after they get settled in. “You, um. Know how you taught us? About the Dark Side?”

Ben’s feeling of dread only deepens, but he carefully keeps it off his expression. He doesn’t want to scare them off. “Yes, I do.”

Sel-Keno nods. “Well, the three of us, we’ve been on a lot of away missions lately, and, um. When we got back to Coruscant, uh.”

“Coruscant feels dark,” Lorn says softly. “It feels…really dark, compared to all the other planets we’ve been to. I thought I was just making things up, but Meera and Sel both felt the same thing, and…”

“We’re not lying!” Sel-Keno says. “Our Masters didn’t believe us, but we’re not making it up, we swear.”

Ben takes a deep breath and nods. This is…not a bad development. “I believe you.”

The Padawans sigh in relief. Meera says, “Thank you, Master Kenobi, I just…” She clasps her hands together and presses them tightly. “We don’t know what to do.”

Ben takes another sip of his tea. “Well, if Coruscant is dark, what does that mean?”

“It means there’s something dark in Coruscant, right?” Lorn says. “That’s…really bad.”

“It’s certainly not good,” Ben agrees. “If there’s something dark in Coruscant, then what can we do?”

Meera’s brow furrows. “We…we have to find it, right? And stop it?”

Ben nods. “Precisely.”

Obviously, Ben does not go assassinate Palpatine with three Padawans in tow. It’s not that he’s incapable of doing so--he just doesn’t have the authority to get away with it, and assassination has not worked super well in the past to prevent the actual important stuff like the Clone Wars, and also all his new friends would probably start a riot in the Temple if he got arrested.

The best path here is to make everyone aware of the rising danger, and to track it down to Palpatine and/or Plagueis, then take care of them. Due process, or something like that. Not that there’s really a procedure for dealing with Sith--the Jedi Order haven’t dealt with Sith in such a long time that any processes they had back then are horribly outdated now. But at least they can use some kind of official process.

Ben starts by speaking to other Padawans he’d taught in his history classes, especially the ones who have been on away missions, and finds that, yes, the feeling of darkness around Coruscant is fairly ubiquitous. Of course it would be--Ben knows better than anyone that it is. But it’s much more convincing when he has more than just his own word to go on.

He collects fifty-some accounts of this, then goes to the High Council with it.

“Obi-Wan Kenobi. Called the Council to assemble, you have,” Yoda says.

Ben nods, and tells them what he’s found.

To say they’re unhappy about it is a bit of an understatement.

Ben has wondered at length about how they had let the darkness rise in Coruscant for so long without noticing. How Sidious had managed to be so, well, insidious. Now Ben knows for sure that the darkness was perfectly visible all along--they simply didn’t know how to see it.

If the Force as they know it operates on one specific wavelength, the Dark Side is operating on another frequency altogether--a shorter, more volatile wavelength the Masters have inadvertently become blind to in their attunement to the Light. It’s only the youngest of them--the ones who haven’t yet learned how to shut out the noise and properly focus on the Light--who can feel the Dark so strongly, once they know how to look.

Ben can sense the Dark pretty well from his repeated exposure, but even he, as old and experienced as he is, can’t feel it the way the young ones do, feeling it for the first time. They teach it to him, the way he’d once taught it to them, and it feels…

It feels terrible. The Darkness is spread thick through Coruscant like a miasma, suffocating and cold and it’s everywhere. It’s all Ben can do to not retch and recoil from the horrific feeling.

The young ones surely can’t feel it to the depth that he can, or he sincerely hopes they can’t. They’d go mad, otherwise.

It’s no wonder, anymore, that he and every other Master in the temple only detected the Dark once it became so powerful it began to interfere with the Light. Sidious probably thought that was funny, to grow the Darkness right under their noses, not a stone’s throw from their sacred Temple.

No matter. They’re no longer blind. One by one, Ben helps open the Masters’ eyes to the Dark, guides their focus to that volatile frequency, and they see the Darkness that has grown around them in their complacency.

Plo Koon looks at him for a long time after their session, looking more tired than he ever has, outside the Clone Wars. They’re in Ben’s quarters, a space they have shared many times in the last few years, though never for quite such a dire reason.

“You knew this would happen,” Plo says after a long silence.

“What?” Ben says.

“The Darkness. You endeavored to teach all those younglings--and some of us Masters as well--about the Dark. Because you knew this would happen. The Dark Side. Here in Coruscant,” Plo says.

Ben doesn’t respond to that right away. He picks up his tea, now completely cold, and pours it out in the sink. He rinses the cup, and places it upside-down on the counter.

“I didn’t,” Ben says. “I mean. I didn’t know this, specifically, would happen. I knew there was Darkness rising in Coruscant, and I know there are some horrible things that will happen in the future if we can’t stop them. I just wanted the young ones to be prepared.”

Plo snorts. “You’re not yet twenty-three, Obi-Wan. It’s a bit soon to call anyone ‘young one’.”

Ben takes his seat again across from Plo. “Really? Sometimes I feel about four hundred years old.”

“Truly?” Plo says.

Ben doesn’t answer. He looks down at his hands on the table, tracing over scars of past lives that should be there, but aren’t.

Slowly, Plo reaches out and sets a gentle hand on his. “Obi-Wan,” he says. “I won’t force you to say anything you don’t want to. None of us in the Council would.”

“Of course not,” Ben says.

“But we’re here for guidance if you need it. I’m here for guidance if you need it. Or, if you don’t need guidance, simply companionship. You are such a good hand at cards, after all.”

That gets a small smile out of Ben. Excepting Yoda, Plo Koon is the biggest karking Sabacc cheater in the entire Temple. Playing against the two of them requires inventing new and exciting ways of cheating just to keep up.

“But Obi-Wan, we…I’ve known for a long time that there’s something different with you,” Plo continues. “You’re much too knowledgeable for your age and your experiences. I’ve observed many of your classes. You teach very high-level diplomacy, even if you shroud it within the fundamental principles, and you speak Mando’a with a fluency you could only get from extended exposure on the planet, which you have not visited once. Your proficiency in teaching lightsaber forms is that of someone who has taught it before, perhaps even multiple times, even though you have never trained under a Master, and I have never seen you spar. It is miraculous, the wisdom that you hold, but for someone so young, I must wonder where it comes from.”

It is just like Plo Koon, Ben thinks, to ask without asking. A simple courtesy to not force Ben’s hand, but still one that means so much. It’s one of the things Ben has always admired about him--that compassion, offered so freely, without thought to it.

If Ben never explains what he knows or how, Plo Koon would accept that. Maybe that is why Ben speaks anyways.

“I have a…long memory,” Ben says. “Of different lives I could have had. Ways things could be, if I made different choices.”

“Four hundred years’ worth?” Plo asks.

Ben nods. “Something like that. I don’t keep track. It’s…not a vision. I can’t see the future, just…the present. A lot of different presents.”

“That’s a heavy burden to carry, Obi-Wan.”

There’s something about hearing his given name, spoken so gently and sincerely, that resonates deep in Ben’s soul. It stirs something he hasn’t felt for a long time, something that clenches tight in his chest.

“You needn’t worry about me,” Ben says. “I’ve carried my burdens this far.”

“But if you have others to carry it with you, is that not better?” Plo Koon asks. “Even if you can stand the duties that are given to you, it’s better to have companions by your side. Obi-Wan, it would be my honor to help you in any way I can, if only you would allow it.”

Oh. That’s…unexpected. Ben opens his mouth to say something, but all that comes out is an undignified, “Ah.”

“Why do you suppose you’ve been given such knowledge?” Plo asks. “What does the Force wish you to accomplish with it?”

Ben purses his lips slowly. It’s now or never. “If we don’t stop the Dark Side, the entire Jedi Order will be destroyed in less than fifteen years.”

Plo’s breath leaves in a rush, rasping past his filter in a single whoosh.

“The Dark Side in Coruscant isn’t a random occurrence,” Ben says. “It’s the culmination of a decades-long plan by the Sith. They want to destroy the Jedi and remake the Republic in their image. A Sith Empire, like the days of old.”

“…Fifteen years?” Plo asks, his voice as even as it always is. Ben can feel in the Force Plo Koon’s dread, but there’s no indication of it on the man’s face; the Kel Dor is much too composed and in control of himself to ever let that kind of distress show in public. Ben wishes he could have such composure.

“Within a few years, the Sith will first reveal themselves,” Ben says. “And that will start the chain of events to the Sith gaining increasing power in the Senate, leading us to an intergalactic war. But the war…the war isn’t real. The war is manufactured on both sides, only serving to draw the Jedi into its maw and crush us all in a single blow.”

Ben shudders then, under the memory of that thing, that wave through the entire galaxy in the moment that the clones turn on them and execute them all. The worst betrayal among a sea of betrayals, an entire people destroyed in an instant.

All this time, and Ben doesn’t know why.

“Everyone dies.”

Saying the words aloud breaks something in him, and memories come crashing in, one after another. Of battles against Grievous. Of people dying in the streets from starvation. Of Anakin burning on Mustafar. Of Plagueis’s hands beneath his skin. Of explosions and chaos and shrapnel and those fateful static-filled words through the comm, “Blast him.”--

A gentle touch on his shoulder and a warm feeling in the Force drags him back above the surface, back to the present, and Ben blinks as the sight of Plo Koon’s face swims into view. Plo is beside him, a hand grasped firmly around his shoulder so he doesn’t fall. Plo’s sorrow is palpable in the Force.

“Oh, my child,” Plo says. “You’ve seen horrible things, haven’t you?”

“I--” Ben says as he struggles to breathe. “I keep trying to stop it, but I can’t--” He tries to blink back burning tears. “It never works. It never stops.”

And suddenly, Ben finds himself pressed against Plo’s chest, held in a tight embrace.

“I’m sorry, Obi-Wan,” Plo says softly. “I’m sorry you have had to experience the things you have.”

Ben leans into the hug, clutching Plo’s robes with a desperation that burns. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I can’t ever make things right, I keep ruining everything and everyone keeps dying and--”

“It’s okay,” Plo says. “You are not alone, Obi-Wan. You said it once before--we are a community. A family. We’ll figure this out. We’ll root out the Dark Side before it can destroy us all. We will save our Order.”

A wordless cry tears itself from Ben’s throat, and he collapses against Plo, sobbing. Plo only presses him closer.

Ben cries, and cries, and cries.

Plo Koon wastes no time in making good on his promises.

In another world, the Council doesn’t move to act even when the Sith show themselves for the first time, but in this world, where every Councillor has learned firsthand of the Dark that invades their very homes, there is nothing but action.

There are long nights in the Council Chamber, plotting out ways to force the source of the Dark in Coruscant into some kind of confrontation, ways to protect the Jedi Order from destruction. Scouting missions are sent out to locate the nexus of the Dark Side while archivists dive into the records to discover what they might be able to do to defend themselves. Temple defenses are reviewed and updated and practiced rigorously. They are gearing up for a war against the Dark Side, and the rising tension is palpable in all of the Temple.

Ben…is not involved in any of this. For all that his students call him ‘Master’, he’s not actually that kind of Jedi, Service Corps archivist and teacher that he is. He’s certainly not part of the High Council, and he has no power besides making appeals to them. He’s not even authorized to run missions. Turns out there are some pretty significant downsides to being twenty-two, and also not a Knight.

It is a little frustrating to let other people handle the problem, especially when their track record is zero for nine.

Of course, Ben has done exactly as badly, or maybe even worse, considering his unfair advantages. After all, losing a game is just how things go sometimes, but cheating and still losing is…exceptionally pathetic. He vaguely wonders if it’s some form of self-flagellation, to want to take responsibility for something he knows he will fail.

(Well. He doesn’t know he’ll fail, and he shouldn’t take it as a foregone conclusion. His focus determines his reality, after all, and if he has no hope for success, there’s no hope of success.

At the same time…it’s hard to hold out hope when all he’s known is failure. Only another reason why he shouldn’t be in charge of the fate of the galaxy.)

But the way of the Jedi is letting go and having trust in the Force. If it doesn’t mean for Ben to take an active role against the Dark, then Ben has to stand down. At least, that’s what he tries to tell himself as he releases his frustrations into the Force night after night.

It occurs to him that accepting these circumstances would not have been so difficult in his original life. When did he start thinking he had the power, much less the right to change the entire galaxy? When did he stop trusting the judgment of his peers, just because his own knowledge outstripped theirs?

All of this paints a vivid picture and none of it is flattering. At some point, Ben has gone from flirting with arrogance and hubris to immersing himself in it. He is supposed to be a Jedi--a vessel for the will of the Force. A tool to assist the galaxy and the lives of its people, even at the cost of his own.

Four hundred years of experience, and all Ben has done is become complacent. Perhaps it is no wonder the Force now holds him in a position where he cannot act against the Dark.

Ben allows himself to be chastised and releases his shames into the Force. He has to think of what is good for the galaxy, not his own pride. If the Dark Side is defeated, if the Clone Wars are averted, then that is all that matters.

He will trust his people.

Plo informs Ben over tea that they have tracked down the source of the Dark to the Senate, and that the High Council is figuring out what to do about that.

“It’s a bit difficult to act when we don’t know who we’re acting against. Making an accusation against the Senate is very serious, and we cannot afford mistakes,” Plo says.

Ben nods slowly. “Even if you’re correct, you can’t exactly move against a Senator without evidence. Being a Sith isn’t exactly illegal, despite everything.”

“But trying to usurp the Republic is,” Plo says. “You said that was the eventual goal, did you not?”

Ben sips his tea. It’s steeped too long, and bitter for it. “I did. But it’s over a decade before any of that comes to a head. I don’t know what you can find right now.”

“It would be easier to find if we had a name,” Plo says.

“Oh,” Ben says. “Yes, I suppose it would be.”

Plo steeples his fingers. “I understand if you are reluctant to say anything, since it may be dangerous to influence our investigation, especially without solid proof.”

“No, I don’t actually care about any of that,” Ben says. Back in one of his previous lives, he might have been much more cautious, but now, he can’t be bothered. What’s the worst that could happen? This timeline gets messed up? Can’t be worse than what he’s already done. Might as well tell them the names now. “I’ll tell you, if you think it’ll help. I just didn’t have the chance to earlier.”

He tells Plo about Plagueis and Sidious and Maul. He says what he knows, which unfortunately, despite his fairly extensive knowledge of them and the depth of their cruelties, doesn’t help much to track down evidence against them at this point in time.

He doesn’t tell Plo about Tyranus. It seems uncharitable to condemn a man for crimes he hasn’t yet committed, and Ben’s spent enough time with Dooku to know that the man…doesn’t have to Fall. He certainly doesn’t have to become Sith. But there’s no way to keep him in the Order. He’s lost too much faith for that, and it would be cruel to force him to stay.

“…Thank you,” Plo says at the end of it. “It can’t have been easy to learn all that you have.”

Ben shrugs. “I wish I could tell you how to stop it all, but unfortunately, I don’t know. If it helps you, then it helps you.”

“I think it will,” Plo says.

“Then may the Force be with you,” Ben says. “You’ll need it.”

Less than one year later, Palpatine gets put on trial for corruption charges. He’s cleared of a lot of the charges, but not all of them, and certainly not enough of them to get voted into the Supreme Chancellor seat when that whole Naboo fiasco goes down.

(Qui-Gon survives Maul, if only barely, and Maul gets away, causing huge amounts of damage to the palace and the people in it. Ben feels sick knowing, definitively, that it was his fault that Qui-Gon died.)

Still, Palpatine has a position in the Senate and Ben’s more aware than most that Palpatine knows how to manipulate people. He doesn’t have to be Supreme Chancellor to put his plans through; it’s just easier that way.

The Dark Side in Coruscant still grows, and it wears on the Masters of the Temple. It’s no small burden, to be able to feel the Dark in times like this, and it’s difficult to know what to do when trying to hold back the Dark Side feels like trying to hold back the tides.

Ben speaks to Plo about it sometimes, and a few of the other Councillors as well, but he’s never more involved than that. He meditates on patience, and on duty, and continues working with the younglings.

Life goes on in the Temple. Ben teaches classes. He plays cards with acquaintances. He learns how to cook foods from different planets and reads about history. Anakin arrives and is kept in the Temple through Qui-Gon’s sheer bullheadedness, and Ben only knows about it because he can feel Anakin’s sun-bright impression in the Force. He doesn’t physically see the boy even once.

Then, two years later, Palpatine is convicted of treason, and defeated in a fight against six Jedi Masters when he refuses to be arrested and reveals himself as a Sith Lord. Three of the Masters die, with the other three sustaining life-threatening injuries. The entire confrontation is caught on camera, which is nice because it’s a lot easier to convince the Senate that killing a Senator was a good idea when said Senator throws a bunch of lightning around while saying a lot of evil stuff about how the Republic should end.

Palpatine’s death rips away the Dark miasma in Coruscant in a moment, and it’s such a sudden relief that Ben nearly collapses from it in the middle of teaching a lightsaber course.

It’s over. They did it.

Obviously, Palpatine’s death doesn’t solve everything. Maul is still out there, and many of the plans Palpatine put into action are still moving without him. There’s too much momentum to simply trust all the loose ends will sort themselves out.

To that end, Ben convinces Plo to let him go to Kamino.

Ben has to be accompanied by a Jedi Master, since he himself is not one and has only been off planet like three times in this lifetime, so Ben requests Shaak Ti.

They find two things in Kamino: The first couple batches of clones, and Jango Fett.

Jango tries to murder the two of them on sight, which is a fun blast from the past, but Ben and Shaak Ti manage to stop and restrain him, amidst a lot of Mando’a cursing.

“Stop struggling, you idiot. We’re not trying to hurt you,” Ben tells him in Mando’a.

Jango insults Ben’s heritage, appearance, and virtue. He’d probably go on to insult Ben’s profession and pets and hair if he were allowed to continue, which is why Ben knocks him out with a touch of the Force. It’s a deceptively simple Healer’s skill to physiologically induce sleep or coma, which is useful since it completely bypasses mental defenses. Jango goes down like a stone.

“So that was interesting,” Shaak Ti says. “Where did you learn to fight like that? I thought you were a teacher.”

“I am,” Ben says. “We should probably do something about Jango.”

They disarm and gently restrain Jango in an office, and Ben wakes him up using the Force.

Jango swears at them a lot, but Ben’s four hundred years old. He can wait it out. Eventually, they have a halfway civil conversation where Ben tells Jango that his employer’s dead and they’re halting clone production since they don’t actually want an army for a war they’re not having.

Jango doesn’t take this news super well, which leads to another slightly violent confrontation, but eventually (very eventually) Ben and Shaak Ti get him to stand down. Jango demands to have the rights for his four thousand clones to be transferred to Mandalore, which Ben agrees to easily enough. He trusts Jango will treat them well, at the very least, and the Temple has no way to deal with so many younglings, much less soldiers.

It takes about six hours of discussions and paperwork, but at the end, it’s all sorted out. The clone production is stopped, the Kaminoans have their money, Jango has his four thousand dependents.

All that, and Ben only got shot at once. That’s basically a perfect mission.

Five years later, Maul is spotted on the Outer Rim, massacring a lot of people and burning down villages and being basically a massive problem.

Qui-Gon and his new padawan Anakin are sent off after him at Qui-Gon’s request, despite literally everyone else thinking that’s a horrible idea considering the last time they met, Qui-Gon got stabbed in the chest and almost died. They’re sent along with a couple of other Jedi--they still haven’t forgotten how hard it was to kill Sidious--and track the Zabrak down over the course of about three months.

They fight and kill Maul. Anakin loses a leg, one of the supporting Jedi dies, and Qui-Gon’s injured so badly that he’s unlikely to be sent out into the field again for another few years, but Maul is finally and absolutely defeated--they took Ben’s advice and cut off his head just to make sure. The Sith are finally defeated, excepting any of Maul’s apprentices, if there are any. Ben finds it hard to conceive of Maul ever teaching anyone.

There’s celebrations when the hunting party returns. Anakin’s killing blow on Maul is treated as a confirmation that he really is The Chosen One, and Ben supposes he can see why--Anakin’s only sixteen, and he’s accomplished more than most Masters have in their entire lifetime--but he doesn’t like it. Sixteen is way too young to be fighting Sith and losing limbs. Anakin should never have been on that mission.

Ben stays away from the festivities entirely because it all gives him a bitter taste in his mouth. He still remembers being called the Sithkiller and everyone looking up to him like he was some historical hero, someone who was bigger than life itself. As if he hadn’t acted rashly and just gotten his Master killed. As if he didn’t have to figure out what the kriff to do with a padawan he never expected to have. He hated it then, and he wouldn’t wish it upon anyone now.

He’s in his office, drinking tea and grading more papers when there’s a knock on his door, and Anakin walks in, still a bit off-balance from the cybernetic leg.

Ben doesn’t have to turn to know it’s him. He’d know that blinding feeling in the Force anywhere.

“Hello there,” Ben says. “What brings you here, young one?”

“'m not young,” Anakin mumbles as he makes himself at home on Ben’s sofa.

“You’re young to me,” Ben says. “Did you need something?”

“No,” Anakin says, and starts messing around with the assorted objects on Ben’s side table.

“Would you like some tea?” Ben asks.

“No.”

Okay, then. It’s been a long time since Ben’s had to deal with teenaged Anakin, but that’s fine. He still remembers how to do it. He goes back to grading papers and lets Anakin figure himself out--it’s not like the boy’s going to talk any sooner than he wants to anyways.

Anakin sulks quietly to himself for about twenty minutes, which is a pretty impressive stretch of time for Anakin to keep his mouth shut, then starts sulking loudly because he’s decided he doesn’t actually want to be ignored. Anakin’s indecipherable grumbling calls to mind a tooka whining for attention, if the tooka were passive aggressive and also significantly less cute.

It’s kind of nostalgic, honestly.

Still, Ben puts down his datapad. He knows from experience that Anakin’s only going to escalate in annoyingness from here. “Anakin, do you need something?”

Anakin pouts. “No.”

Apparently, that is Anakin’s word of the day. It’s not like Anakin doesn’t have a vocabulary--Ben’s heard the whole thing, at length, repeatedly. Anakin’s just being contrary because he can, or maybe Qui-Gon hasn’t tried nearly as hard as Ben did to instill some sense of manners.

“Anakin. Why are you in my office?” Ben asks. “Isn’t there a celebration going on?”

“Yeah? I don’t see you celebrating,” Anakin says.

“These papers aren’t going to grade themselves,” Ben replies. “You, on the other hand, probably have more exciting things to do than sit in my office doing nothing.”

Anakin scowls and crosses his arms. It seems that he is as belligerent as ever. "I’m not doing nothing."

“Is that so? Then what are you doing?” Ben asks.

Anakin grumbles something to himself.

Ben raises a brow. “I beg your pardon?”

For a moment, Anakin looks like he regrets saying anything, then bursts out, “You’re weird, okay?!”

Anakin says weird, but his tone of voice makes it sound like diseased. Like Ben’s some sort of walking abomination. Anakin’s manners certainly leave something to be desired, but the exceptionally caustic tone of voice makes Ben think Anakin…isn’t saying that just to be rude. He seems to actually mean something by it, though it would take someone a lot smarter than Ben to figure out what.

“In what way?” Ben asks.

Anakin visibly swallows his first response, then crosses his arms with a huff and says, “There’s a huge party going on and you’re up here grading papers. Seems pretty weird to me.”

Well, it would be too easy for Anakin to give him a truthful answer. It’s not like Anakin owes him or personally respects him or even knows who he is.

He could push, but decides against it. He’s not entitled to Anakin’s thoughts, now or ever, and Anakin will say what he wants to, when he wants to. Ben can live with Anakin thinking he’s ‘weird’.

“That still doesn’t explain why you came looking for me,” Ben says. “Unless you mean to say you were so eager to avoid celebrations that you walked into the first open office door you could find.”

“No,” Anakin snaps, suspiciously quickly. He grimaces. “Well, sort of. I don’t want to be down there, and the other Padawans talk about you a lot. Thought I’d see what the deal was.”

This isn’t the first Ben’s heard of the younglings gossiping about him, but it’s still a bit concerning to hear that they talk about him ‘a lot’. “Really? And do I measure up to the talk? Even if I’m…‘weird’?”

Anakin makes a face like he wants the ground to swallow him whole. “That’s…I didn’t mean to say that. I shouldn’t have said that. Master Jinn says that’s why I’m probably not going to be Knighted forever, because ‘my tongue gets ahead of my mind’”--and wow, Anakin must practice that impression of Qui-Gon--“and I keep saying stupid shit, I mean. Stuff. Stupid stuff. Sorry for being rude. And swearing.”

“No harm done.”

“But yeah, you’re fine, I guess. You’re a teacher. Not sure what I expected,” Anakin says, waving a hand in the air. “I think I would have taken one of your classes if Master Jinn hadn’t pulled me out of them. Already get enough diplomacy experience on missions.”

“You can always sit in on a session if you’re interested,” Ben says.

Anakin snorts. “Yeah, uh. Sorry, no offense, but no. If I take extra classes, it’s not going to be diplomacy or history. I get enough of that from my Master.”

Ben shrugs easily. “That’s true. Master Jinn is sent out on the most diplomatic missions out of anyone in the Temple--most numerically, that is. Not most diplomatic, if what I hear about his missions is true.”

“The explosions?” Anakin asks. “Yeah, that’s true. That’s super true.”

Ben suppresses a laugh. He’s completely sure that a solid 60% of those explosions are directly Anakin’s fault, and he’s only willing to go that low because at least 25% has to be Qui-Gon’s fault.

Ben drinks the last of his tea while he contemplates what to say next. He’s not sure what he’s trying to accomplish. All his long term goals have been checked off--the Sith have been eliminated and the war has basically been averted. Anakin won’t Fall, the Jedi don’t get wiped out, the galaxy’s saved. It’s over.

He can have his life back, now.

The thought alone makes his head spin. He’s been subjected to the endless torment of living life over and over for so long, doomed to repeat his mistakes or to make all new ones, trying to avert a war that’s too big to stop. The idea of living once and not again is…intoxicating. His actions will actually mean something. His friends can be more than memories. He can find peace…starting now.

He can’t have the relationship with Anakin that he had in his original life--he’ll never have that kind of trust or kinship again, though considering how that life ended, he’s not entirely sure he ever really did. But that’s in the past, and this is now. He can’t have a Padawan or a Master, but he can have a friend, with no Sidious to tear them apart.

He…would enjoy being friends with Anakin again.

“I see. You know, I don’t think I actually introduced myself. I’m Obi-Wan Kenobi, from the EduCorps. I do archival work and teach.” Ben holds out his hand.

Anakin stares at the offered hand like it’s going to bite him. There’s an awkward four seconds while Anakin works out some issues internally, then acquiesces to the handshake. “Anakin Skywalker. Padawan to Master Qui-Gon Jinn. Good with droids and flying. And other stuff.”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” Ben smiles. “You know, Master Plo and I play Sabacc in the evenings. I’ll be meeting him after I finish with these papers. If you don’t want to sit in on any of my classes, maybe you can join us. It’ll be more interesting than wandering into open offices, if nothing else.”

Tenatively, Anakin smiles back. “Yeah. You know what, that doesn’t sound so bad.”

Maybe this will work.

Life goes on. Ben teaches his classes, spends time with old and new friends, and keeps an eye on galactic affairs.

As the years pass, there are secessions from the Republic, mostly at the Outer Rim, but the conflicts that arise are local, which sometimes calls for Jedi intervention, and the Separatists’ droid army never makes an appearance.

There are shifts in the Republic, of course, and it is still as bloated and horrifically bureaucratic as it always was, but without Palpatine at the head, there’s not so much momentum hurtling towards the awful authoritarian state of the Empire that good senators can help turn things for the better. It’s not enough and it’s not ideal--it never is--but it’s a start, and Ben is willing to be optimistic.

He passes his thirty-fifth nameday and there is no sign of war. Nor is there any for the thirty-sixth, or thirty-seventh, or thirty-eighth, or any time afterwards.

The war has been stopped. The Force is filled with Light. And Ben…is at home.

He is good friends with Plo and Mace and Jocasta and so many other people. He does research and teaches younglings and cheats at Sabacc. Anakin takes a while to warm up to him, but eventually becomes a regular presence at evening card games, and teaches Ben how to whistle in Binary while gossiping about Qui-Gon’s latest banthashit. Ben finally acquiesces to requests to spar, and wipes the floor with a lot of Knights that he had once taught as Padawans.

“We did it,” Ben says over a glass of Corellian brandy on his fortieth nameday. “We saved us.”

Plo’s amusement shines in the Force. “We did, young Obi-Wan.”

Ben holds up his glass. “To peace,” he says.

Plo holds up his own glass, which has been poured out of solidarity, though he has been known to take drinks back to his private quarters to drink safely. “To peace.”

They clink glasses and it feels right.

Eventually, all things must end. At forty-eight, Ben contracts an illness while helping a few Jedi Masters explore and archive a set of Sith ruins, though perhaps illness isn’t the right word for it.

The Masters are confronted by what appear to be Sith ghosts, which frankly goes terribly, and Ben expends himself to heal them. Keeping three Masters alive through nothing but the Force long enough to get them to Coruscant is hard enough, but on a planet saturated with the Dark Side, well…

It leaves damage.

All three Masters are able to be treated and returned to full health, but the same cannot be said for Ben, who feels the Dark Side cling to him, like some kind of fungus putting shoots under his skin and decaying him from the inside out. It’s going to take him over or kill him in the process, and he’s never going to reach forty-nine.

Ben can accept that. It’s the longest life he’s ever lived, excepting his original life, and the only one that isn’t violently cut short by soldier or Sith. He finds a perverse sort of mercy in this kind of death, one where he has some control over the time and circumstances. There’s peace to it, this sacrifice in slow motion, as much as it pains everyone around him.

So many people come to speak to him in his quarters, or in the Halls of Healing where the Healers try to push back the Dark Side that’s trapped in him, and it’s only now that Ben realizes just how many lives he’s changed.

He’s taught over two full generations of Jedi. Many of his students are now Masters, or Service Corps, or accomplished diplomats or duelists or archivists with students of their own, besides. He’s respected by the High Council, and the younglings still talk to him about their problems and interests and give him small gifts to try and make him feel better. As his health inexorably deteriorates, Jedi go out of their way to ease his pain, ease the difficulties of daily life that he had once taken for granted. Jedi from all over the galaxy return to the Temple to say their final goodbyes, and in that final month where he lives out of the Halls of Healing, he is never alone.

There’s so much love that it nearly hurts, that Ben can’t even believe they’d do so much for him. He’s never done anything to deserve all of…this.

Anakin’s there by his bedside on the penultimate day.

“You don’t have to do this,” Anakin says through tears. “Obi-Wan, you can’t…you can’t die.”

“Everyone dies, Anakin,” Ben says. “Even stars die.”

“But you, you can’t--!”

Ben grasps Anakin’s hand. “Anakin. I’m glad I was able to be your friend. You’ve grown into such a strong and good man. If there’s only one thing I’m sorry for, it’s that I won’t be able to teach your children.”

Anakin clutches Ben’s bed frame and lets out a wordless sob.

“There are good ways and bad ways to die, Anakin,” Ben says. “I wouldn’t say that I’m enjoying what the Dark Side has done to me and my body, but I’m glad I have the chance to say goodbye. I’ve been surrounded by nothing but people I love, and that’s a mercy I never expected.”

"It’s too soon," Anakin protests.

“It’s always feels too soon,” Ben replies. He pulls Anakin in for a hug. “When I’m gone, promise me you’ll take care of yourself. I don’t want to see you again in the Force until you’re old and gray.”

Anakin sniffs loudly. “I’ll try.”

Ben smiles. “I know you will.”

Anakin stays by his side all that day, and all the next day as all of Ben’s closest friends stand vigil at his side--Plo Koon and Ahsoka right beside Anakin, with everyone else in a ring around his bed--and say their final farewells.

“There is no death, only the Force,” Ben says with a soft smile. “I’ll miss all of you. Try not to join me too soon.”

“Nobody could ever ask for a better friend,” Plo says. “I’m proud, and glad to have known you, Obi-Wan.”

“Thank you,” Ben says. “Thank you for being there. And being here. All of you.”

Anakin furiously wipes his eyes. “Obi-Wan…”

Ben takes his hand and squeezes. “Goodbye.”

The Force is so warm and peaceful and Light and Ben embraces it wholly.

He lets himself go.

Ben wakes in the Initiate dorms at the crack of dawn.