Chapter Text
The jedi pronounce his name wrong.
On Tatooine, people said his name Arn-a-keen. The jedi are too short with it, cleaning it up and stiffening it more, making it sound like one of their names, sanitizing his name like they sanitize everything else about him. They say his name like Anna-Kin, and it sounds wrong in their mouths. He tries to correct his master one night, but Obi Wan just says not everyone has an outer rim accent, and that with proper pronunciation, it should be pronounced Anna-Kin
He's fifteen now, and already regretting his decisions. He isn't free, with the jedi, not in the way he was promised. He still has to call them all master, still has to obey their every rule, most of which are much crueler than the rules in tatooine.
It is human connection Anakin misses most. Between slaves, human connection is all they are allowed. Time spent between people is precious, never knowing when one could be snatched away from another, sold away to some off worlder or beaten to death, lying dead the sun bleached flies that litter the ground. He misses being allowed to have friends, not being told constantly to stay away from people, because to the jedi, connection is weakness, but to the slaves, connection is strength, the only thing that keeps them going.
Another part of that connection is sex. The problem is that on Tatooine, there's no such thing as consent, not for the slaves, and certianly no one banning promiscuity. It didn't happen to Anakin alot, but he remembers the first few times, he was six when the first man pushed him down onto the white tiled floors of the grotty bar he was staying in, rented out by Watto for cash he wouldn't see any of. It happened to his mother a few times too, and other times, when they needed money or medicine, Shmi would go down to the interplanterial port and wait around for some lonely merchant who'd slip her a few quid for a half hour of her time. Though Anakin is relieved he isn't forced to those things any more, he wishes he was allowed to let other people touch him, people his age, really, for that was how it was on tatooine, the slave children would play around with each other, if only to distract them from the cold feel of older hands grabbing at them. With the jedi, it is harder. Anakin has to sneak out, and there are few people willing to sleep with him, even the other padawans say it is forbidden, so he has to leave the temple. The first time his master found out about it, he was so angry he grounded Anakin for six weeks.
The jedi seem to prohibit all kinds of pain medication too. The plants that his mother's friend Abdallah always used to smoke are prohibited, and the white powder that Raya used is illegal on the entire planet. Even the liquor that Ari and Joaquin used to drown their sorrows in is banned for those under 21 across the entire planet, and jedi are completely prohibited from drinking any too. There is laws against selling it to kids, only it's fourteen on Tatooine, and many slave parents gave the children sips younger anyway, to calm them down before different jobs or to help soothe pain. They have proper medicine in the temple, and a white shiny med bay that Anakin somehow always manages to traipse mud into.
Obi - Wan is more sympathetic whenever Anakin has a panic attack, but the other jedi aren't. They say he's too much a liability, a wild card, that at fourteen he should be able to control his emotions better. They say fear is the path to the dark side, that fear is worse than even connection. When Anakin tries to tell them he's always scared, they tell him he's being stupid, there's nothing to be afraid of and he should get over himself and release his fear into the force.
They claim to be tolerant of other world customs, but they don't like it when Anakin prays to the sand guides, doesn't like it when he builds a shrine to Anubis from chicken bones he smuggled out of the cafeteria, said he should leave his gross experiments out of their clean living area. It seems to Anakin that almost anything he does is seen as gross, that the dirt of Tattooine has infected him, stained him and made sure he will never be clean enough for the jedi.
He likes the clones best of all. They seem to understand a little better, they know what it's like to be a prisoner, having to follow orders just to stay alive or avoid a beating. When Anakin uses their names, he is fiercely reprimanded by the jedi council, who claim that it will lead to attachment.
The jedi are naive, Anakin realises as he watches the dull Grey rain pour down outside. They have grown up in clean clothes and polished shoes, obedience not beaten into them but merely chosen. Everyone there has chosen to be there, except it seems, Anakin himself, who was sold there, held against his will in their golden cage.