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Obi-Wan is avoiding him. After more years together in the crèche than Anakin can remember, he likes to think he knows his best friend well enough to be able to read his absences correctly. Sometimes Obi-Wan is just busy. Their schedules don’t always align with Obi-Wan still trying to catch the attention of any master who would have him and Anakin following his own master’s whims more than any curriculum that the Temple masters could set.
They have come a long way in just a few short years from being practically joined at the hip in a way that boarded on attachment. They used to be thick as thieves, always Skywalker-and-Kenobi, never one without the other, but everything changed when Anakin was chosen by Master Qui-Gon at the very young age of 9. He was too excited to move out of the initiate dorms to realize just how far away they were. For the first time since they came to the Temple, Obi-Wan was more than just one door down when they went to sleep at night.
Since then, Anakin has had to learn how to get along without Obi-Wan by his side and just what it means when Obi-Wan chooses to stay away. Annoyance is the most likely culprit, but sometimes sadness shines in Obi-Wan’s eyes when Anakin finally catches up with him. Anger and jealousy aren’t uncommon either even if they aren’t very Jedi-like emotions to feel, and Anakin knows better than to call him out on that.
They aren’t as close as they used to be, and he doesn’t want to push his friend further away by antagonizing him. Anakin might never understand why their relationship has gotten so strained while they wait for Obi-Wan to join him as padawan, but Obi-Wan will always be Anakin’s oldest and closest friend.
Even if it never feels the same again.
Obi-Wan didn’t meet him in the hangar when they came back from the Crucible. Anakin was buzzing with excitement the whole trip back because he couldn’t wait to show off his new lightsaber, but the wind went out of his sails the moment he stepped off the loading ramp and there was no sign of his best friend. It didn’t matter anymore how many hours he had spent designing it in his head if Obi-Wan wasn’t there to share his joy.
Even when he goes looking for Obi-Wan, he can’t find him in any of their usual spots. He isn’t meditating in the Room of a Thousand Fountains or practicing katas in the training halls. Master Nu hasn’t seen him all day in the Archives, and his dormitory is deserted.
Obi-Wan must be avoiding him for some reason that Anakin can’t figure out. It would be a lie to say he doesn’t feel hurt, but even if Anakin could find him to apologize, he wouldn’t even begin to know what to apologize for. They should be celebrating together, maybe by sparring, but celebration is the last thing on Anakin’s mind.
It’s hard to bounce back from such a blatant letdown, and Master Qui-Gon doesn’t comment on his dour mood all evening, but he must notice the way Anakin picks at his food in the refectory with disinterest. On any other day, Anakin would be running off right after to go spend what little free time he has these days with his oldest friend, but he remains quiet and still, and most unusually within his master’s line of sight until they part ways for the night.
He’s half-asleep in bed when he hears his door woosh open. Master Qui-Gon would knock before entering if he had need, so there’s only one person it could be creeping into his room this late. It's not the first time Obi-Wan has done it, in fact, it used to be that Anakin was the one who invaded Obi-Wan's space more often than not, but it stopped being so frequent when Anakin was made a padawan and moved to a room further away in the Temple.
Anakin lifts the sheets to let Obi-Wan in. The cold night air makes him shiver, but Obi-Wan swoops in close to warm him up again. They’re too old to still be doing this. It’s gone from cute to inappropriate enough that a long lecture on attachment would be the least of their worries if they were caught. No one would believe their intentions are innocent when Obi-Wan hides his face in the crook of Anakin’s neck and Anakin closes his arms around Obi-Wan’s waist with only their thin sleep clothes separating them.
And if anyone bothers to ask, they surely won’t believe Anakin when he tells the truth simply because he wishes it weren’t innocent at all. Sometime in the last year or so, he started to think about his best friend in decidedly unfriendly ways, and no matter how hard he tries to stop his heart from beating out of his chest just looking at Obi-Wan, he thinks he might actually die if his feelings were ever thrown out into the open.
Obi-Wan can never know the truth. Everything would change if he found out, and Anakin would never be allowed to hold him like this again. Anakin would be expelled from the Order, and just the thought of never getting to see Obi-Wan again is enough to make his stomach twist up in knots.
Here they are safe, shielded underneath the covers from reality in their own little world. It’s so nice to bask in Obi-Wan’s presence again, unimpeded by the fear of someone wrenching them apart, that he almost misses when Obi-Wan begins to mumble questions softly into his ear.
“Do you think knights and masters ever think about their crèchemates? Do they look back on those old friends fondly, or do they end up letting the memories of them just fade away?”
“Dunno,” Anakin says, his heart caught in his throat. “I never really thought about it. I guess I could ask my master. He’s kinda old.”
Obi-Wan shakes his head. “It’s not important. I just…”
Something’s wrong. It’s bigger than just Obi-Wan avoiding him, but Anakin doesn’t have the slightest clue what it is. Obi-Wan likes to take on mountains of work all by himself just to prove that he can do it, and he’ll shirk off all of Anakin’s attempts to help. And there’s so much distance between them that he doesn’t think Obi-Wan will answer if he asks to share, but Anakin has to try.
He can’t stop reaching across that chasm that’s grown between them, because the moment he does, that’s when their friendship will be well and truly dead, and Anakin won’t be the one to kill it.
“What is it?”
Obi-Wan shuffles impossibly closer, his socked feet tangling with Anakin’s bare ones. There’s no part of them that isn’t touching, and Anakin feels his cheeks heat. “I won’t ever forget you. No matter what happens, no matter how much time passes, I’ll always think about you.”
Anakin looks down at Obi-Wan’s wide blue eyes reflecting the dim lights pooling from below his door, his heart beating faster and louder in his chest. The temptation to lean down, to brush their lips together, passes through his mind, but it’s gone before he can ruin everything once and for all.
“I won’t forget you either.” He smiles, even though there’s no way Obi-Wan can see it. “I promise.”
With no response other than an absent-minded hum, Obi-Wan reaches between them and strokes along Anakin’s padawan braid, fingering slowly at both merit beads. Obi-Wan had congratulated him before for achieving them so young, but the words had rung hollow, and he hadn’t looked Anakin in the eye. Jealousy is a sore spot for Obi-Wan, and no amount of telling him he’ll have his own soon enough would make him happy.
Anakin has no idea if being chosen by a master will make Obi-Wan happy, or just more miserable with new mountains to climb, but if anyone deserves the chance at happiness, it’s Obi-Wan.
When Anakin wakes up the next morning, Obi-Wan is gone. Not just from Anakin’s bed, but from the Temple entirely. Reassigned to the AgriCorps on Bandomeer because of a lie from stupid Bruck Chun. And no matter how much Anakin rages at the injustice of it, he’s told to let go. To move on with his apprenticeship, and not concern himself with the path Obi-Wan must follow.
“We are not to know,” Master Yoda tells him with a solemn face.
“We are to do,” Anakin finishes.
But he never forgets.
He made a promise.
Life as a padawan can be lonely. In theory, the Order is one big happy family, but when your skill far outpaces that of your peers, it can be hard to keep friends, so Anakin doesn’t. With his eyes set on becoming the youngest knight in the history of the Jedi, he devotes himself completely to his training, and the years march on.
Anakin grows in body, mind, and skill. He no longer sees that terrified three-year-old slave boy staring at him in the mirror, fresh to the strange, pristine world of the Jedi Temple, and he tells himself that the cold creeping in at night is only the temperature of his room and not the loss he feels in his soul. There’s nothing he can do but move forward and become the Jedi he is meant to be.
Master Qui-Gon at last recommends him for the Trials before any of his agemates are close to being considered, and the Council permits Anakin to prepare for them. Weeks of rigorous studying, meditating, and training pass, but Anakin is ready. He will be a powerful and wise knight, but there is one last mission to undertake.
Neither he nor his master expects it, but they respect the wishes of the Council all the same. While Anakin hasn’t been on a mission for some time, he fits into the unpredictable nature like a well-fitted glove.
As he trawls around a busy droid factory alone, something feels amiss. It’s not the first time he’s had to come to his master’s rescue, but the message he receives is unnerving. A former Jedi, Qui-Gon’s own old master himself, is at the center of some nefarious plot. Whatever the truth is, they can figure it out later. After they put a few star systems between them and this droid army.
But all his years of training can’t prepare him for what else awaits him.
“I was hoping you would come.”
Anakin spins around, and his world shatters.
A vision of white, gauzy flowing robes and shoulder-length flaxen waves stands before him. The years aren’t enough to erase his fondest memories, ones that he has worried over in the dead of night like a missing tooth and that ache so much more. He knows those moles, the divot in that chin. But the golden eyes that stare back at him belong to a stranger with a familiar name.
“Obi-Wan?”
“It’s been a long time, Skywalker.”
His polished white knee-high boots make no sound as he stalks closer, but the Force vibrates in warning, and Anakin is torn between readying his lightsaber for a fight and pulling Obi-Wan into a fierce hug. It's only been six years, but it may as well have been a lifetime without Obi-Wan by his side. No more late nights sneaking around the Temple, avoiding getting caught as they pretended they were off on some grand adventure. No more competitions over the stupidest of things, like which would be the last one standing on one foot or who could hold their breath for longer underwater.
The piece of him that has been missing for so long is finally right there with him, at the worst possible time for a reunion.
“It is you,” Anakin says with barely concealed wonder leaking into his voice. How he wants to act is at odds with how he knows he should act, and so he stands his ground, taking in every detail of the man before him and waiting for a sign that more would be welcome. “You’re here.”
Obi-Wan stops just out of arm’s length. It should kill any desire Anakin has to hold him close, but of course it doesn’t. Nothing could when it’s all he’s wanted since Obi-Wan snuck away from his room in the middle of the night all those years ago. Master Qui-Gon says that denying yourself such childish desires is a part of growing up and learning to let go, and maybe that’s true. But then must be something wrong with Anakin if the time spent apart only made the ache in his heart worse.
“I thought about you every day since we parted. I’ve dreamed of this moment. But now that it’s here, now that you’re here, I don’t understand how.” Anakin shakes his head, never once taking his eyes off what might very well be an illusion if not for the way the Force told him how very real this all was. “Obi-Wan, why are you here?”
Obi-Wan’s lips draw up, but there’s no joy in his smile, only a cruelty that Anakin has never seen from him before. “Don’t tell me I need to spell it out for you. I thought you were smart enough to figure it out on your own.”
He knows. Of course he does. Anakin just wants him to deny it, to say that it’s all a misunderstanding. He wants Obi-Wan to have a plausible excuse because the facts are indisputable.
Count Dooku is here. He’s kidnapped Qui-Gon, proof that he hasn’t simply left the Jedi Order but has gone to the dark side. He’s gathered powerful allies together for a meeting he doesn’t want representatives from the Republic to know about, likely on account of the army they are building.
And Obi-Wan is here in the middle of it all.
All it will take is a flimsy excuse. Anakin will gladly grasp it with both hands, but Obi-Wan won’t give even the illusion of denial, not even to spare Anakin the heartbreak. That more than anything proves it.
Anakin clenches the hilt of his saber tight. His blood pounds in his ears as his heart races faster and faster, all the words he should have said years ago tasting of ash in his mouth. It’s too late to say them now.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Don’t worry.” From places unknown, the Sith wearing his old friend’s face pulls out the burnished gold hilt of a lightsaber and ignites it, bathing himself in an eerie crimson glow. “You won’t.”