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“I cannot agree to this,” Qui-Gon’s voice sounded over his head. Obi-Wan clenched his eyes shut and nuzzled in closer, sighing as Qui-Gon threaded fingers through his hair. “He’s not ready, Master Yoda. To leave him now would be - unconscionable.”
“But leave him you must,” Master Yoda croaked. “Ask for you specifically, they have. Take any other, they will not.”
“Then send no one at all!” Qui-Gon cried, prompting a whimper from Obi-Wan as he flung up his hands. Qui-Gon shushed him and resumed petting his hair. Softer, he said, “Surely there’s another solution.”
“The situation has been on hold for months now,” Master Mundi’s voice rang out. “The planet cannot wait much longer, Master Jinn. I know that your duty is to your padawan, but we cannot afford to let the conflict on Juraele continue.”
“He’s not ready-“ Qui-Gon said sharply.
Another Master interrupted him. “More will lose their lives if we do not act.”
Obi-Wan pressed his head harder into Qui-Gon’s ribs.
His Master sighed. “I will continue this conversation later,” he said tightly. “Send me the briefing.”
The light beyond his eyelids dimmed as the hologram switched off.
Obi-Wan did not open his eyes, or move. He knew what Qui-Gon sounded like when he had let others shift his own opinions, strongly held though they may be. His Master was the maverick of the Jedi Order, but he was still part of the Order. He was a good - if unconventional - Jedi.
Obi-Wan knew that. He knew that Qui-Gon would not let people in the Galaxy suffer for the sake of his broken padawan.
But for one miserable moment, Obi-Wan let himself be selfish, and thought of how desperately he didn’t want his Master to leave.
“You need to make this decision, Obi-Wan.”
Qui-Gon’s voice was quiet, but threaded through with steel. Obi-Wan hated it. Hated the sound of it. Hated the conversation, the words, the decisions.
He shoved his head into the pillow in his lap and screamed.
“I know,” Qui-Gon said. He didn’t yell or chastise Obi-Wan, and in some ways it was worse. “But I must go.”
He extricated his face from the pillow, glaring at his master. He grimaced and shook his head.
“And you must decide.” Qui-Gon was unrepentant. “All three offered freely, padawan. You are not imposing on them.”
Obi-Wan scoffed. He was sure they had said that, but -
He knew what he was like, now. How exhausting he was to try and wrangle. Existing exhausted him.
But Qui-Gon was leaving, and with him their carefully built patterns and routines, the delicate dance to keep Obi-Wan from chewing at the bars of the cage of his own brain.
Structure. Routine.
It was something Healer Kyla harped upon and that Obi-Wan hated that he needed. But he needed it. He didn’t - he wasn’t -
He wasn’t the same. Not anymore. He was all jagged edges and missing words and shadows and everyone who came near him cut themselves on the glass.
He didn’t want Qui-Gon to leave. He didn’t want it. He didn’t want to lose their breakfasts or lunches or dinners because Qui-Gon had to watch him to make sure that he actually ate because otherwise he wouldn’t, he’d just shove a ration bar in his pocket and hide it away just in case and if Qui-Gon left then he wouldn’t be safe and he had to be -
Qui-Gon rapped his knuckles against the table. Obi-Wan looked up.
“Stop spiraling,” his Master said. His voice was kinder than the words were. “Three options, Obi-Wan. Master Windu, Master Tholme, or Master Tahl. I need you to choose.”
Obi-Wan shook his head, over and over again, and Qui-Gon sighed.
“The only other option is having you stay in the Halls while I’m gone. We both know you don’t want that.”
Obi-Wan stilled from where he had been rocking side to side.
No. No, he couldn’t -
He had been in the Halls for months when he came back. He couldn’t - not again. Never again.
So he sat back and weighed his options.
Master Tholme was out. Obi-Wan liked him, but he was busy with Quinlan, and with the Shadow business that Obi-Wan wasn’t supposed to know about, and while Obi-Wan was closer to Quinlan now than he had been since leaving it was still -
He didn’t know if he could survive a week with his very loud friend.
So not Master Tholme.
Tahl was -
Well.
He couldn’t talk. She couldn’t see. There were ways to get around that, but if Obi-Wan was too lost in his own head to communicate through tactile sign or writing -
There was only one real option, except it shouldn’t have even been an option, because Master Windu was on the Council and he was busy and he shouldn’t - bother himself with Obi-Wan, but -
He did… like Master Windu. He was - solid. Kind. Not always nice, but always kind. Obi-Wan appreciated that.
He didn’t treat Obi-Wan like he was broken.
Obi-Wan flashed one finger to Qui-Gon, who hummed.
“Master Windu?”
Obi-Wan bobbed his head.
“Alright,” Qui-Gon said, sounding much relieved. “Alright. I’ll comm him, then. Thank you, Obi-Wan. I’ll make sure - I have my notes, of course, but I’ll write out a guide to the routine and how to avoid as much stress as possible - and what time your appointments are, of course, and when to take - oh, and meal planning -“
Qui-Gon got up, still muttering to himself, and walked away.
Obi-Wan watched as he left and tried very much not to feel like he’d just made a horrible mistake.
When he crept out of bed the next morning, intending to sneak into the kitchen and ferret away a ration bar to the stash under his bed, he had to stop in the middle of the corridor. Voices drifted out of the kitchen.
“The documentation is very… thorough,” Master Windu said, his voice even. “Thank you, Qui-Gon.”
“I wrote down as much as I could think of,” Obi-Wan’s Master said, sounding flustered. “If anything goes wrong -“
“I’ll comm you,” Master Windu said. “But really, Qui-Gon, we’ll both be fine. I’ll ensure it.”
Qui-Gon sighed. “I know,” he said quietly. “I just - I cannot fail him again, Mace.”
“You are trying,” Master Windu said gently. “Anyone can see that. I am sorry that you have to go. But I will take care of him, and we will be fine.”
Obi-Wan scuffed his foot against the carpet. The voices paused.
“Come in, Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon called out after another moment.
Obi-Wan stepped into the kitchen, hand braced against the wall for stability. He hadn’t bothered with his crutches - usually didn’t, when he was by himself, because he hated that he needed them and simply wouldn’t use them unless Qui-Gon reminded him - so his knee was a sharp point of pain, his balance off as he favored that leg.
Qui-Gon took him in, no doubt noting the bags under his eyes and the grimace of pain written across his face.
“Sit before you fall over,” his Master said exhaustedly. Obi-Wan complied, not out of obedience, but because his knee was close to collapsing under him. “I know I left your crutches in your room, Obi-Wan. Did they disappear during the night?”
Obi-Wan slouched in the chair, frowning down at the table.
Qui-Gon wasn’t actually waiting for a response. Obi-Wan’s voice had left him months ago, sometime between coming home from Melida/Daan and emerging from his long stay in the Halls.
Healer Che had fretted about damage to his throat from smoke exposure. Healer Kyla had told him it was a trauma response.
Obi-Wan thought it was mostly just the good sense to shut up when all he ever accomplished by speaking was failure.
Healer Kyla told him that was also a trauma response.
He didn’t like Healer Kyla very much right now.
“Qui-Gon and I were just discussing the week,” Master Windu said calmly, as if the previous conversation had never happened. “He needs to leave within the hour, I’m afraid.”
Obi-Wan looked up sharply. It wasn’t even sunrise yet. Qui-Gon couldn’t - he couldn’t leave yet. They hadn’t had breakfast. They needed to -
Qui-Gon caught him by the shoulders as Obi-Wan lurched out of the chair towards him. “I know,” his Master consoled him. “I know, padawan. That’s why Mace is here, so he can have breakfast with you.”
It wasn’t the same.
Obi-Wan only realized he’d started humming, rocking in his Master’s arms when Qui-Gon finally pulled away.
“Five days,” Qui-Gon promised him. “Anything longer than that, and I dump the whole mess on someone else and come home. Five days, Obi-Wan. I promise.”
Five days.
Obi-Wan could survive a lot of things for five days.
Hiding in a sewer. Living as a slave in a deep-sea mine. Being under heavy fire as he held an infant to his chest and tried to hush their cries. Not eating. Not drinking. Not-
“Obi-Wan.”
He dragged his mind away from his memories.
Qui-Gon looked tired. Or sad.
“I have to leave.”
Obi-Wan was - he wasn’t in the kitchen anymore. He was on the couch. How had he - he hadn’t…
Someone squeezed his shoulder. Qui-Gon’s voice was wet. Obi-Wan tried to listen, to respond, but he was lost in the onsalught of his own mind.
“I can’t do this, Mace,” he heard somewhere distant, muffled by the wails of a child and the rattle of the earth above his head as the bombs hit. “I can’t.”
“I have him,” a deeper voice responded. “You have my vow, Qui-Gon. Do what you must.”
A door opened. Closed.
Hands against his face.
“Come back to me, child.”
Obi-Wan opened his eyes to Master Windu’s kind face.
He stared at him, for a long moment, before reality kicked back in and he shrunk away mortified.
Master Windu looked unbothered, but Obi-Wan knew how much of an annoyance he could be.
“It’s just past six,” Master Windu said instead of reprimanding Obi-Wan. “Breakfast will be at eight. Do you want to try and sleep some more, or stay out here?”
Obi-Wan glanced away, eyes tracing the outline of the painting on the far wall.
He woke up at three am on the dot. Every day.
Qui-Gon didn’t know that, though. Qui-Gon thought he slept right up until breakfast, because Obi-Wan would crawl back into bed and pretend to be asleep so Qui-Gon didn’t worry.
Qui-Gon worried anyway, of course, but Obi-Wan was trying.
He pointed at the couch.
Master Windu smiled. “Alright then,” he said simply. “Natural History channel?”
Obi-Wan’s nod was enough of an answer. The holoscreen flickered to life.
He curled up and watched as the narrator started talking about varactyls.
Living with Master Windu, Obi-Wan decided, was -
It wasn’t good.
It wasn’t terrible.
It just… was.
He had slotted himself into Obi-Wan’s life with only minor hiccups. They had breakfast together in the morning. Master Windu laid out his medications and his cup of muja juice to wash them down with, and Obi-Wan took them.
Mornings were spent working on his remedial classwork in the living room, books and datapads scrawled out across the carpet. Obi-Wan sat on the floor, most of the time. Having his leg stretched out made his knee hurt less, and he felt safer being able to see the door and all of the windows. He was so behind in his classes, but ever so slowly he was chipping away at the work.
He had tried to rejoin the classes normally. Perhaps a week or so after being released from the Halls. They had told him it would give him a sense of normalcy back.
They still hadn’t gotten the scuff marks off the ceiling from where he’d thrown a desk with the Force during his meltdown.
So Obi-Wan sat on the floor, and did his classwork. Mace sat at the couch and typed away at his datapad.
He took two breaks. The first one was to go to the window, stick his head outside, and stare at the bird-nest on the windowsill below them. The eggs had not yet hatched. Obi-Wan had a chart of when they should hatch. The parent birds cared for the eggs militantly, and Obi-Wan watched.
The second break was to go into his room and scream into a pillow. Sometimes he punched his mattress. Or tore paper apart. Or bit himself.
He wasn’t supposed to do the last thing, but if he didn’t leave marks nobody needed to know.
Then it was time for lunch.
He ate the same thing for breakfast and dinner everyday. Lunch, however, was cursed.
They wanted to broaden his options. So he had his usual vegetable mush and fruit and bantha nuggets, but there was a fourth compartment that held something he’d be expected to try.
The first day Master Windu was there it was grapes. The second, mashed tubers.
He normally ate a bite and gave up.
After lunch he had appointments.
Therapy with Healer Kyla on Centaxday and Zhellday. Physical therapy for his knee with Healer Lyra on Primeday and Taungsday. Saber training with Master Drallig on Benduday.
(Sometimes he didn’t make it to any of them, but he tried to go.)
Obi-Wan had fought to be let back into ‘saber training. He had made a slideshow about it. He still couldn’t do much, not with his bad knee, but he put on his brace and did slow katas and felt the warmth of his kyber in his hand, and sometimes that was enough.
Other times he snuck out at night to the salles and fought against a training droid until his mind was quiet and all he could feel was pain.
If he didn’t have an appointment, Qui-Gon sometimes took him to the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Sometimes he saw his friends. Most often Obi-Wan didn’t feel safe enough to leave his bed, and Qui-Gon sat with him as Obi-Wan tried to push his head through Qui-Gon’s ribs to hide within them.
None of those things could happen this week. Not with Qui-Gon gone. Obi-Wan had therapy with Healer Kyla the first day, and spent the second curled up in bed with a holocast playing.
After that was dinner, of course. Obi-Wan ate. He took more medication. Master Windu sat with him on the couch, watching another documentary, until it was time for bed.
He took more medication right before bed. He wouldn’t sleep, otherwise. Or, worse - he would sleep, and he’d have nightmares the whole time, and wake up half of the Temple with his psychic screaming.
That had been.
Embarrassing.
It was a small life, but it was his. His life. His routine. They added things in slowly, so his brain didn’t throw a fit about it. It tried to throw one anyways, but he mostly managed to keep it under control.
It was harder with Master Windu there, but not awful.
The third day was the same, until it wasn’t.
“That’s it,” Healer Lyra said sharply. Obi-Wan paused, his bad leg poised in the air above the step. “We’re done.”
Obi-Wan sagged with relief as he dragged his leg back down. The stairs were the worst part about physical therapy, and he had woken up that morning dreading the afternoon and the pain that would follow.
Healer Lyra crept closer, fur bristling. “You’re not normally in this much pain,” she said, voice worried. “You’re leaking, dear.”
Obi-Wan grimaced and shored up his shields. He was leaking, he realized with no small amount of mortification. The pain had sneaked through him and started to ooze out of the cracks in his fragmented mind, shedding pain-worry-fear into the Force around him.
Healer Lyra held out a hand. “Let’s get you sitting down,” she said softly. Obi-Wan took her hand, and pressed his eyes shut tightly as gravity shifted around him, the Force cradling him gently until he was settled back down in the padded chair by the door to the therapy space. Healer Lyra had special training to lift her patients with the Force, to help with physical therapy.
It was always a weird sensation. But better than him falling. Again.
He opened his eyes and peered up at Healer Lyra’s expression.
“I think we’re done for the session, actually,” she said after a moment of studying him. “Take some painkillers once you get back to your quarters. I’ll comm Master Windu to come pick you up early.”
Obi-Wan grumbled, the noise barely audible. Lyra lifted a furred-eyebrow.
“Oh?” She said lightly. “Do you want to push through the pain, damage your knee further, and then end up back in physical therapy when you have osteoarthritis at the age of twenty-five?”
Obi-Wan squinted at her.
“Didn’t think so,” she said under her breath as she pulled her comm out. “Master Windu? This is Healer - oh, you’re not Master Windu.”
She paused for a second. “I have Padawan Kenobi here, we need to finish up the session early - no, he’s fine, just - yes, I’ll hold.” She scowled at the device.
“Emergency Council meeting,” she said, fingers tapping against the vivid blue case on her comm. “The Senior Padawan on duty is trying to get through to him.”
Obi-Wan felt his stomach curdled.
Council meetings were important. Master Windu shouldn’t be interrupted.
Silently, he tapped against the chair.
Healer Lyra blinked. “Obi-Wan?”
He pointed to himself, and then mimed walking, ignoring the dread building up in his chest at communicating directly with someone. He could just walk back by himself. He wasn’t a youngling.
Healer Lyra’s eyes narrowed. “Obi-Wan,” she said, voice gentled more than it should be according to her expression, “Remember what happened last time?”
Obi-Wan pasted on his most innocent look.
Healer Lyra dragged a hand down her face. “Look,” she said, “I can just walk you back myself, I’m not going to let you - hold on.” She put the comm back up to her ear and turned around. “Yes, I’m here. Did you talk to him? I need to - no, it’s not an emergency, but Master Windu is staying with him for the week - yes, I know that Padawan Kenobi is fifteen, his age was never in question - Padawan Stolas, mind your tone -“
By the time that she turned back to the chair, Obi-Wan was already gone.
He made it halfway back to the quarters before the need to go somewhere else stole his senses.
This happened, sometimes. Healer Kyla said it was because he felt trapped. And he did. Feel trapped. Sometimes.
Most of the time. Maybe.
It was - silly. But he never - he never went places, anymore. He rarely left the Temple. Qui-Gon followed him everywhere. And that wasn’t bad, because Obi-Wan’s brain was made up of trenches and sewers and bombings, but he was trapped and sometimes he needed to go.
Just - go.
So he went.
His crutches tapped out an uneven staccato as he made his way through corridor after corridor, not bothering to check where he was or where he was heading. He’d end up somewhere eventually, and that was where he would be.
His mind was quiet when this happened. Not panic, not really. Not fear. Just walking. Pain, somewhere distant in his body, but it wasn’t important. He was going somewhere. He was getting out.
He blinked, and he was in a turbolift, gut swooping as he descended.
Another blink and he was in a hallway, old tiles creaking under his feet.
An unused storage room in his peripheral vision as he walked past.
Empty apartments. Old meditation rooms.
He was deep, now.
The Temple weighed upon his shoulders.
He stopped, not because the need to wander was satisfied, but because one moment he was stepping down a staircase, and the next he was falling -
Something snapped.
And the world
went
dark -
His eyes opened.
Faint light from somewhere far away. Dimmed. He was -
Where was he. He didn’t -
Obi-Wan groaned as he sat up, cradling his wrist close to his chest. The pain was fire. He was burning.
He couldn’t burn. He had to -
Cerasi. Nield. The kids. He had to - to protect them. He couldn’t -
He must have fallen down one of the traps. Kriff, how much of an idiot could he be. Did his knee give out again? Stupid piece of crap -
Obi-Wan bit into his lip and tasted blood as he looked down at his wrist. It was broken. He could tell. The pain was - one clue. The way it was twisted was another.
This was bad. This was so bad. That was his - his saber hand -
No.
No, not his saber hand. He wasn’t a Jedi anymore.
His blaster hand, then.
… that was quite possibly worse.
Obi-Wan chewed on his lip idly as he tried to push the pain away, but there was no success to be found. Already, tears were pricking at the corners of his eyes, and he could feel the sobs building up in his chest. But he needed to - he needed to be quiet. They couldn’t find him here. It wouldn’t be safe, not when he couldn’t pick up his blaster and defend himself -
His blaster. His - where was it. It had been - on his belt, but now it was -
He wasn’t wearing a belt. Where -
His clothes, they were -
Robes?
No, that wasn’t - he didn’t wear those anymore. He had torn his to make slings months ago. So how could he be - how could he -
Obi-Wan blinked, and the room shook in his vision as the tears threatened to fall.
Someone was yelling in the distance.
He had to hide. He had to - he had to -
His knee gave out as he tried to stand, and Obi-Wan curled up where he had fallen, wrist cradled to his chest, knee now warring with his hand to take the spot of what hurt more.
The yelling was getting closer. Obi-Wan couldn’t run. He couldn’t hide. He couldn’t - he had to - he couldn’t -
“Obi-Wan!”
The words finally filtered in, and Obi-Wan stilled.
No one knew that name here.
“Obi-Wan -“
A tall figure - an Elder - rounded the corner, and Obi-Wan’s mind whited out with fear.
His wail was closer to a scream.
But.
(Obi-Wan trusted him.)
(Obi-Wan knew him.)
(Obi-Wan had woken up that morning and eaten oatmeal with him.)
(He felt like home. Like the Temple, in its purest form.)
Quiet rose up to greet him.
Calm seeped through him.
The Force swirled around him, and Obi-Wan knew.
“M-master Win-du,” he gasped out, as the tears started to fall. “I didn’t - I’m sorry, I didn’t -“
The words spilled out, incoherent. He hadn’t spoken in months. His throat hurt. But he couldn’t stop them.
“I’m s-sorry,” he wailed. “I j-just - I had to, to go - and then I- I fell, please, I’m sorry -“
“It’s alright.”
Master Windu’s voice rested around him, as familiar as a worn blanket.
“I’m here. I have you. It’s alright.”
He crouched down, and gathered Obi-Wan up in his arms as if he was no more than a youngling. “I have you, Obi-Wan. I promise.”
Obi-Wan turned his head into his cloak and cried.
Later:
The bitterness of his rescue medication on his tongue. A warm mug in his lap, cupped by his good hand. The stickiness of a bacta cast around his wrist. The pressure of the brace around his knee. Warm blankets piled on top of him.
A comm perched in front of him.
Qui-Gon’s warm voice.
“I hear you got into some trouble,” his Master said gently.
Obi-Wan blinked, eyelids dragging down, down, down.
“But Mace will take care of you. He found you, padawan. You’ll be alright.”
Obi-Wan hummed somewhere outside of his body.
A chuckle, behind him.
“I’m not sure how much of this conversation he’ll even remember,” Master Windu said, voice light. “I have him, Qui-Gon. Stop your fretting.”
Qui-Gon scoffed. “As if I’d want to, even if I could.”
A pause, as Obi-Wan yawned.
Then, softer, “I finished the negotiations. I’ll be home soon, Obi-Wan.”
Obi-Wan felt a smile creep across his face.
Qui-Gon’s voice felt like the warmest hug. “Home to you.”
In the space between one breath and the next, sleep came and stole Obi-Wan away into the blissful solace of rest.