Update: Nova (9/?)
Saturday, 3 February 2007 13:02![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
curtkenobiTitle: Nova
Author: Curt Kenobi
Summary: Love is a thing that knows no bounds. Even when following through is implausible. And love is painful. Obi-Wan knows this all, and he'll be forced to realise it.
Pairing: Anakin/Obi-Wan and Obi-Wan/Xanatos
Rating: M/R to be safe overall. PG
Genre: AU, Angst, Romance, Action/Adventure
Warnings: my hell...Obi angsting. Obi repressing. All that good build-up, y'know?
Disclaimer: Yeah, if Star Wars was mine, I could rule the world like GL. But, alas, I don't own it, so don't sue. Just call me Christian from Moulin Rouge. I'm naught but a penniless writer. Honestly.
A/N: I’m going to be honest: it’s been a few years since I read Jedi Apprentice, so if I have any of the details off or flat out wrong, either take it as helping the AU aspect, or correct me. :D---a-n-d---i---a-m---a-l-w-a-y-s---r-u-n-n-i-n-g--/--a-n-d---y-o-u---h-a-v-e---y-o-u-r---d-a-r-k---p-l-a-c-e-s---
Chapter Nine: Beneath the Surface
He wanted the memory to stay as it was. All he wanted to remember was that aristocratic face, its inherent cruelty smoothed over as he lay in repose. Those full lips slightly parted as soft breath escaped them, rustling the errant section of midnight hair that fell across his face, a dark slash against the pale luminosity of his skin in the moonlight that slanted across them, hiding the mark that defined him from view.
A different person. A person he could hope to love without guilt.
A charade.
He closed his eyes. Here he was – home. On Coruscant, in the Jedi Temple. In his bed – once the bed of the man he couldn’t get out of his mind.
The man he knew he had wounded deeply.
He was terrified at that fact. Xanatos deCrion didn’t take well to being hurt – and that was exactly what Obi-Wan had done, knowingly. He knew what he had done. Xan had even told him – without words, but still impacting nevertheless – that he would not forgive Obi-Wan’s leaving. Because he hadn’t wanted him to leave. Because Obi-Wan could have stayed.
He still regretted coming back. He knew he shouldn’t, but oh, he did. He left without saying goodbye, face to face – he’d run like a coward, leaving the man he loved – for he did; that was a fact beyond contestation – to wake up in a cold bed, with only the ghost of a memory of his young lover beside him, and a note. Obi-Wan had poured his heart into the few words he had scratched upon the piece of flimsy, but they were still just that – words.
Obi-Wan didn’t fear Xanatos. But he did fear what Xanatos was and could do. What Obi-Wan had enabled.
One day, the Dark Jedi would want atonement. And the only payment for the pain Obi-Wan inflicted, as deemed by someone Dark… Obi-Wan shivered at the thought. It would certainly be far worse than what had actually initially been caused.
He would suffer.
Obi-Wan tossed over to his side, covering his head with his pillow, a literal representation of his current situation. Over his head. He had gotten in over his head. And now…now he was just waiting for the fallout. For the crushing wave to come down on him and hold him under – Xan’s wrath.
It had been two months. No sign…of anything from the Dark Jedi. Just…a void. Their bond that they had formed – despite his resolve not to stir that which was laying thankfully still for the moment – Obi-Wan had tentatively sent out a questing, tentative mental tendril…and met resistance. Xanatos was blocking him purposefully. Good. Obi-Wan would do the same; the bond would lay dormant, and hopefully in time, forgotten.
“Was you trip not as restful as it was meant to be, Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon had inquired upon his apprentice’s return to their shared apartments. The boy looked better, but his eyes were a bit haunted.
“Oh, no, Master. It was fine. Avindal is a remarkable planet.”
“You should expect nothing less from your homeworld, Padawan,” the Master had commented, a little smile flitting across his face. Obi-Wan shook his head.
“The trip was fine, Master,” he continued. “Avindal was beautiful. Just a little…it got a bit under my skin.” Obi-Wan had thrown his pack upon the sofa, sitting down heavily beside it, raking a hand back through his short hair.
He got under my skin. In my skin. Avindal did, just a bit – the history – my history. But not just the past, my past – the history I just made with him. A black spot on a shadowy path. What have I done? He had shut away his thoughts, then, binding them down in a mental box, and then relaxing his durasteel shields just a bit, just enough to hopefully reassure Qui-Gon that everything was fine, that he was all right. And it had seemed to work.
It frightened Obi-Wan, this entire situation. It was bad enough that he was still trying to find a balance – something he thought he may never find – in his relationship with Qui-Gon. A comfortableness. He strived to make Qui-Gon forget any failings he may had made with Xanatos, but all along the way, Obi-Wan’s own…defiant…streak had shone through, and his reflection to Qui-Gon, which would always have shades of Xanatos underlying it, would that much more strongly suggest the other apprentice, and all the hurt that went with him. Which made the master that much more wary of him, made him expect that much more of him. And Obi-Wan only wanted Qui-Gon to accept him. Him, Obi-Wan Kenobi.
It wasn’t that simple. And it never would be.
Obi-Wan was not Xanatos…but now – now, part of him actually was. Obi-Wan was claimed to be one of the purest Force-sensitives the Order had ever beheld. And yet, he was cast to the Agri-Corps as a thirteen-year-old – though Obi-Wan did understand that was rather a ploy on Yoda’s part to get Qui-Gon to actually accept him. He had left the Jedi Order temporarily after that, reckless and determined that the cause he was now with was more important than what he was destined and raised to be. He’d been…so young – not naïve, but damned close. He’d watched a girl – who he had deeply respected, dare he say loved – die in his arms, only to later realise that maybe…maybe he could have saved her – had he thought, had he used that training that he had turned his back on. And then, deflated and saddened, he had tried to return “home” – it had been a hard thing to persuade the Council to allow him reinstatement with probation. He had let another apprentice die to save a friend – Bruck Chun’s blood would always be on his hands, whether rightfully or not. He had let his Master’s love die. He had never quite mastered his anger and fear. He failed his training – his Master – in all these ways. And then he went and allied himself, more or less, with the one person that hurt his Master the most.
Some great apprentice you are, Obi-Wan.
Qui-Gon seemed nowadays to rather have forgotten of Obi-Wan’s past transgressions. Like with his apprentice taking his first recuperation holiday on his own, from his first true mission on his own, the master had decided it was time to wipe the slate clean. Obi-Wan’s first solo mission had been a stepping-stone, a give-me – short, brain-numbingly simple. But his second was an actual mission. A sign he was growing up. Was on the path to Knighthood. He would actually be what Qui-Gon had hoped for Xanatos – a shining Jedi Knight.
Obi-Wan realised this. Realised that it made Qui-Gon immensely proud. And he was not going to lose that. He would stop waking up every night with Xanatos deCrion’s Dark name upon his lips. He would forget that time that they shared had ever happened, even if he would rather not. If it meant a part of him died when he bound it away forever, so be it. It was not a memory; it was a lesson. A lesson that to open one’s heart was quite foolish, for love never lead to anything good. Dalliances – fine. But love, true love…was not meant for a Jedi. It only ended in pain. He should have learned that from Qui-Gon and Tahl. But now he had that knowledge for himself. And he would remember it.
Obi-Wan had started to block out his memories of Avindal and Xanatos the night he had returned to Coruscant. It had been two months, and he had bound down everything. Every now and again, he found himself remembering Xanatos – just him sleeping, Obi-Wan’s last view of him. Xanatos innocent. Something he had never known of, but liked to fancy.
It wasn’t wrong to want that, was it? He didn’t want Xanatos anymore. He just…sometimes missed him. Missed what he didn’t know.
And always, he feared what awaited. For it may be still now, but calm always precedes the storm, as the saying goes. Just how far off the storm was, that was the question.
-------------------
(The lyric in the page break is from “Use Me” by Garbage.)
Author: Curt Kenobi
Summary: Love is a thing that knows no bounds. Even when following through is implausible. And love is painful. Obi-Wan knows this all, and he'll be forced to realise it.
Pairing: Anakin/Obi-Wan and Obi-Wan/Xanatos
Rating: M/R to be safe overall. PG
Genre: AU, Angst, Romance, Action/Adventure
Warnings: my hell...Obi angsting. Obi repressing. All that good build-up, y'know?
Disclaimer: Yeah, if Star Wars was mine, I could rule the world like GL. But, alas, I don't own it, so don't sue. Just call me Christian from Moulin Rouge. I'm naught but a penniless writer. Honestly.
A/N: I’m going to be honest: it’s been a few years since I read Jedi Apprentice, so if I have any of the details off or flat out wrong, either take it as helping the AU aspect, or correct me. :D
Part One: Complicated Relations
Chapter One: Up from the Shattered...
Chapter Two: Forbidden
Chapter Three: Shadows
Chapter Four: Try to Redefine What was Known
Chapter Five: See the Stars Fall
Chapter Six: Wrongs Begin to Right
Chapter Seven: A Moment Timeless Still Must End
Chapter Eight: Resolved
Chapter Nine: Beneath the Surface
He wanted the memory to stay as it was. All he wanted to remember was that aristocratic face, its inherent cruelty smoothed over as he lay in repose. Those full lips slightly parted as soft breath escaped them, rustling the errant section of midnight hair that fell across his face, a dark slash against the pale luminosity of his skin in the moonlight that slanted across them, hiding the mark that defined him from view.
A different person. A person he could hope to love without guilt.
A charade.
He closed his eyes. Here he was – home. On Coruscant, in the Jedi Temple. In his bed – once the bed of the man he couldn’t get out of his mind.
The man he knew he had wounded deeply.
He was terrified at that fact. Xanatos deCrion didn’t take well to being hurt – and that was exactly what Obi-Wan had done, knowingly. He knew what he had done. Xan had even told him – without words, but still impacting nevertheless – that he would not forgive Obi-Wan’s leaving. Because he hadn’t wanted him to leave. Because Obi-Wan could have stayed.
He still regretted coming back. He knew he shouldn’t, but oh, he did. He left without saying goodbye, face to face – he’d run like a coward, leaving the man he loved – for he did; that was a fact beyond contestation – to wake up in a cold bed, with only the ghost of a memory of his young lover beside him, and a note. Obi-Wan had poured his heart into the few words he had scratched upon the piece of flimsy, but they were still just that – words.
Obi-Wan didn’t fear Xanatos. But he did fear what Xanatos was and could do. What Obi-Wan had enabled.
One day, the Dark Jedi would want atonement. And the only payment for the pain Obi-Wan inflicted, as deemed by someone Dark… Obi-Wan shivered at the thought. It would certainly be far worse than what had actually initially been caused.
He would suffer.
Obi-Wan tossed over to his side, covering his head with his pillow, a literal representation of his current situation. Over his head. He had gotten in over his head. And now…now he was just waiting for the fallout. For the crushing wave to come down on him and hold him under – Xan’s wrath.
It had been two months. No sign…of anything from the Dark Jedi. Just…a void. Their bond that they had formed – despite his resolve not to stir that which was laying thankfully still for the moment – Obi-Wan had tentatively sent out a questing, tentative mental tendril…and met resistance. Xanatos was blocking him purposefully. Good. Obi-Wan would do the same; the bond would lay dormant, and hopefully in time, forgotten.
“Was you trip not as restful as it was meant to be, Obi-Wan?” Qui-Gon had inquired upon his apprentice’s return to their shared apartments. The boy looked better, but his eyes were a bit haunted.
“Oh, no, Master. It was fine. Avindal is a remarkable planet.”
“You should expect nothing less from your homeworld, Padawan,” the Master had commented, a little smile flitting across his face. Obi-Wan shook his head.
“The trip was fine, Master,” he continued. “Avindal was beautiful. Just a little…it got a bit under my skin.” Obi-Wan had thrown his pack upon the sofa, sitting down heavily beside it, raking a hand back through his short hair.
He got under my skin. In my skin. Avindal did, just a bit – the history – my history. But not just the past, my past – the history I just made with him. A black spot on a shadowy path. What have I done? He had shut away his thoughts, then, binding them down in a mental box, and then relaxing his durasteel shields just a bit, just enough to hopefully reassure Qui-Gon that everything was fine, that he was all right. And it had seemed to work.
It frightened Obi-Wan, this entire situation. It was bad enough that he was still trying to find a balance – something he thought he may never find – in his relationship with Qui-Gon. A comfortableness. He strived to make Qui-Gon forget any failings he may had made with Xanatos, but all along the way, Obi-Wan’s own…defiant…streak had shone through, and his reflection to Qui-Gon, which would always have shades of Xanatos underlying it, would that much more strongly suggest the other apprentice, and all the hurt that went with him. Which made the master that much more wary of him, made him expect that much more of him. And Obi-Wan only wanted Qui-Gon to accept him. Him, Obi-Wan Kenobi.
It wasn’t that simple. And it never would be.
Obi-Wan was not Xanatos…but now – now, part of him actually was. Obi-Wan was claimed to be one of the purest Force-sensitives the Order had ever beheld. And yet, he was cast to the Agri-Corps as a thirteen-year-old – though Obi-Wan did understand that was rather a ploy on Yoda’s part to get Qui-Gon to actually accept him. He had left the Jedi Order temporarily after that, reckless and determined that the cause he was now with was more important than what he was destined and raised to be. He’d been…so young – not naïve, but damned close. He’d watched a girl – who he had deeply respected, dare he say loved – die in his arms, only to later realise that maybe…maybe he could have saved her – had he thought, had he used that training that he had turned his back on. And then, deflated and saddened, he had tried to return “home” – it had been a hard thing to persuade the Council to allow him reinstatement with probation. He had let another apprentice die to save a friend – Bruck Chun’s blood would always be on his hands, whether rightfully or not. He had let his Master’s love die. He had never quite mastered his anger and fear. He failed his training – his Master – in all these ways. And then he went and allied himself, more or less, with the one person that hurt his Master the most.
Some great apprentice you are, Obi-Wan.
Qui-Gon seemed nowadays to rather have forgotten of Obi-Wan’s past transgressions. Like with his apprentice taking his first recuperation holiday on his own, from his first true mission on his own, the master had decided it was time to wipe the slate clean. Obi-Wan’s first solo mission had been a stepping-stone, a give-me – short, brain-numbingly simple. But his second was an actual mission. A sign he was growing up. Was on the path to Knighthood. He would actually be what Qui-Gon had hoped for Xanatos – a shining Jedi Knight.
Obi-Wan realised this. Realised that it made Qui-Gon immensely proud. And he was not going to lose that. He would stop waking up every night with Xanatos deCrion’s Dark name upon his lips. He would forget that time that they shared had ever happened, even if he would rather not. If it meant a part of him died when he bound it away forever, so be it. It was not a memory; it was a lesson. A lesson that to open one’s heart was quite foolish, for love never lead to anything good. Dalliances – fine. But love, true love…was not meant for a Jedi. It only ended in pain. He should have learned that from Qui-Gon and Tahl. But now he had that knowledge for himself. And he would remember it.
Obi-Wan had started to block out his memories of Avindal and Xanatos the night he had returned to Coruscant. It had been two months, and he had bound down everything. Every now and again, he found himself remembering Xanatos – just him sleeping, Obi-Wan’s last view of him. Xanatos innocent. Something he had never known of, but liked to fancy.
It wasn’t wrong to want that, was it? He didn’t want Xanatos anymore. He just…sometimes missed him. Missed what he didn’t know.
And always, he feared what awaited. For it may be still now, but calm always precedes the storm, as the saying goes. Just how far off the storm was, that was the question.
(The lyric in the page break is from “Use Me” by Garbage.)
--> To Chapter Ten: "Distinguished"
