Author: Bimo

E-mail: [email protected]

Rating: G

Title: Shadows

Time Period: Prequels

Characters: Obi-Wan, Anakin

Summary: Obi-Wan's feelings during his first days as Anakin's new master

Disclaimer: All characters owned by George Lucas.

SHADOWS

by Bimo  ([email protected])

As the door opens a beam of light falls into your chamber. You are already asleep. A small, pillow-clutching body curled up in a bed built for a grown-up. Only your head peeps out from under the blankets.

I had hoped to find you still awake, Anakin.

Whoever arranged these quarters for our arrival has also been kind enough to provide us with food supplies. Searching the kitchen shelves for something that you might like I ended up with milk and some kind of biscuits that have a spicy-sweet, strangely comforting smell.

The plate and the glass that I carry were meant as amends. Please believe me, I didn't want our first day on this planet to end in nothing but quarrel and anger, I only noticed that you were shivering. Out there on the balcony, you looked freezing and exhausted. When I urged you to quit staring into the evening skies and to return back into the warmth, I didn't intend to punish you or to teach you a lesson. It simply happened because I was worried.

I didn't realize that you had reasons for your gaze. An understandable pine for the home you were used to, a boy's natural yearn for his mother. How do I know where to draw the line between Anakin Skywalker, the highly talented Padawan and Anakin Skywalker, the nine-year old child?

We are only a few steps apart, in this tiny room. I could easily touch your shoulder or whisper your name. But if I disturbed your sleep right at this moment, you would probably just feel offended. Just like you were offended and angry with me, when I had to summon whatever authority I posses, only to make you finally obey.

I know Qui-Gon would have chosen a different path, one that would have been wiser. But I wasn't able to follow it, though it lay before me, so easy and simple. All I had to do was to spread my own robe over your shoulders. Share the warmth of my body, talk to you, and console you until your shivers and loneliness finally cease. Padawan, come closer. You must be freezing…

But closeness has never been easy for me.

That I'm fully aware of my failings makes them all the more painful. I feel like crying though I know that I must not. After the last month's chaos you need peace and stability. Not a master who cannot hide his grief and despair until he is out of your room.

With every single breath I miss Qui-Gon.

You can't know this yet, but apart from the all-pervasive, all-nourishing Force the relationship between Master and Padawan is the most intimate, most meaningful bond that a Jedi will ever possess. We are supposed to choose each other mutually, one soul completing the other, teaching it how to understand, how to learn and to grow.

You, however, are a promise to a dead man. Regardless how much I hope that I could be wrong, Anakin, the flicker in your eyes is divulging. You have already discovered what secret is lying between us. The bitter truth we don't speak of, since even the silent knowledge hurts more than we can possibly bear.

If my master were still with us, I'd probably not even deign to look at you in my haughtiness. But his ashes have been carried away by the winds and rivers of Naboo. I cradled his dying body as it lay outstretched on the floor. During his last moments his thoughts were with you, Anakin. You are Qui-Gon's legacy and at the same time my trial.

I am not ready to face you. When I dreamed of the future, the images arising were that of an adventurous young knight travelling the galaxy. Or an older, hopefully wiser Obi-Wan in the temple crèche. Instead of focussing on a single individual Padawan, I always pictured myself surrounded by a whole crowd of younglings, telling them of the Force's true greatness and beauty, guiding them carefully through their first meditations.

Doing this demands a wider, more abstract kind of love. One that seems to be so much easier for me, Ani, than everything you need and deserve. I can only cling to the faith that we'll  find our own way as time passes. If only I knew where to begin.

Would you like me to leave the plate at your bedside? I'm afraid the milk won't stay fresh overnight, but tomorrow you would wake up by the smell of biscuits and see that I'm trying. Oh Padawan, please forgive me. I'm doing my best.