Between Space and Time

By Melanie

 

 

 

 

 

 

He was never quite sure how it happened. One minute he’d been relaxing on his couch (the faux leather one that Jonny had called him a nancy boy for purchasing) chatting up Jude (or rather Jude was chatting him up, bitching about Sienna like that was anything new but since Jude’d had to listen to him bitch about… well everything it only seemed fair) and the next thing he knew he’d been lying on a very uncomfortable bed.

He’d blinked and shook his head and instantly regretted it.

He wondered if he’d possibly imbibed to much liquor or someone had slipped him something, but then he remembered that he’d been alone and he hadn’t been drinking.

Unless someone had slipped something into his tea and he wouldn’t put it past Jude or Jonny to fly in and do exactly that.

He glanced around a room that looked vaguely familiar although he couldn’t remember from where and ran his hand across his chin because it itched.

Damn beard.

He froze.

Because he’d shaved about two minutes after Revenge of the Sith had finished shooting because the damn beard had been driving him insane.

He hated facial hair. And he hated George Lucas for bloody well deciding that Obi-Wan needed to look more mature, older and told him in no uncertain terms that he was to grow it or he would paste something fake and painful to his chin instead.

“So how is he?”

The voice was familiar and Ewan strained to both hear it and determine who it was.

It was answered a moment later when Hayden walked into the room, followed by Sam Jackson and a puppet that looked exactly like Yoda but couldn’t possibly be.

They shot most of Yoda’s scenes separately because they were a bitch to get right, even with all the technology advancements that George had pioneered himself.

“Obi-Wan how do you feel?” Sam gave him a smile that looked forced and Hayden a smile that tried to look reassuring but really didn’t manage it all that well. Yoda had managed to get himself up on the bed beside him and Ewan scowled.

“That’s not my name,” Ewan stated. “And I think you’re all bloody nuts, did Jude put you up to this? Because I’ll so kick his ass.”

“The name you were born with it is,” Yoda patted his hand and Ewan startled back. Because that touch had felt surprising real. Not at all like the puppet that Ewan had touched on his final day of shooting.

“A slight concussion the healer said,” Hayden said, his expression managing to look both worried and scared at the same time.

“We should leave Master Kenobi to his rest,” Yoda said staring into his eyes, he felt a tingling at the back of his neck and a shiver ran down his spine. It felt like someone had just walked over his grave and he wasn’t even superstitious.

Sam and Hayden hurriedly agreed, although not before Hayden squeezed his shoulder.

Then they were gone, door closing behind them and Ewan was left alone with a puppet.

A puppet that had no strings and that was staring at him with all-seeing eyes.

“Out of time and place you have been pulled,” Yoda murmured and Ewan shifted. Glanced down and realized that he was no longer in the boxer and t-shirt that he’d been lounging in.

It was like he was back filming again, tan pants, tan tunic, sash. A look at the bedside table showed a lightsaber lying there, innocuous and innocent. It looked like the one he’d played with on the set.

“I have no clue what you’re talking about,” Ewan said it automatically even though he was getting a really strange, Christ I’m not in Kansas anymore, vibe.

“Curious,” Yoda patted his hand and moved from the bed to the floor in one fluid motion that Ewan didn’t even really see. He was pretty spry for a puppet. “Get some rest you should, tomorrow a long day will be.”

The puppet gave him a nod and then left. Leaving him alone in a room that he still only slightly recognized.

His hand trembled as he reached out for the lightsaber.

This would be the truth then, if it was nothing but a heavy piece of metal then Jude was so getting his ass kicked when Ewan figured out where the hell he was and managed to get home. If it was…

Well that he wasn’t going to think about because it would be insane and he left insane up to Jonny and his fucked up relationship with Angie.

The lightsaber felt heavy in his hand, so far so good, he gave it a good swish and almost fell out of the bed in shock when it swooshed into existence.

The long thin blue blade that was always added in after the fact to get the best special effects hummed quietly.

“I am so fucked.”

 

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He’d handled the lightsaber with delicate hands. Half because he was afraid George would leap out of nowhere and yell April Fools (even though it was nowhere near April and George had strictly forbidden anyone from performing jokes on his live set.)

The other half of him was afraid he’d drop the damn thing and set his bed (with him in it) on fire or cut off his own arm. The last one would be just his luck.

He put the lightsaber back on the little metal table and curled an arm around his pillow. Maybe if he went to sleep he’d wake up on his couch, hopefully not drooling but at this exact moment he wouldn’t even care if he was.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He woke to voices outside his room, he was not on his couch but still in the uncomfortable bed and his spine felt like it had already lodged a formal complaint and was now on strike.

He stretched and yawned and felt a gratifying relief from the pressure on his spine.

“Chancellor Palpatine,” Yoda’s voice rang loudly through the door. “Honored we are that you have come to see Master Kenobi.”

Ewan felt his breath hitch and felt anything but honored. Scared, terrified, very, very worried about his continued sanity.

And Chancellor Palpatine, which meant after the first movie and sometime between the second and third. Which he’d kind of already figured out with Anakin looking more like jailbait than a ten year-old.

“I just wanted to see for myself that Master Kenobi was in good health. He did save my life from a fate worse than death, with young Skywalker’s assistance of course,” the Chancellor’s smooth tones wafted through the still closed door.

He looked for a window to jump out of and found no way out. And also, fuck.

Sometime in the third movie then. Which meant a huge fight with Anakin in which he would get his ass handed to him on a silver platter.

And possibly die. Because sometime soon Anakin Skywalker would go evil and then go murderous and then Ewan would die and really didn’t want to die.

Maybe he could pray a lot and just ask Anakin not to kill him?

He wanted to pace, he wanted to scream. He wanted to be on his fucking couch calling Jude a prat and watching his illegally purchased copy of Revenge of The Sith.

He really didn’t want the door to be opening and Yoda to be hobbling in followed closely by Chancellor Palpatine (also known as the Emperor) and Anakin.

“Master Kenobi,” the Chancellor nodded at him, a truly fake smile plastered on his face. Ewan felt the same shiver that he’d felt the previous night when Yoda had been searching his soul.

He knew of no way to keep the other man from doing whatever it was that he was doing. He wasn’t a Jedi Knight; he only played one on TV.

From the frown that was now attempting to crease his face Ewan figured that Palpatine hadn’t found exactly what he was looking for.

He wondered what the Chancellor would do if he leapt out of his bed and yelled ‘this is the Sith Master that you’ve been searching for. Hide Anakin because he’ll turn him to the Dark Side and they’ll kill us all.’

He’d probably kill him. And make it look like an accident and since he really didn’t want to die he bit his tongue.

“Chancellor Palpatine,” he inclined his head briefly and fought the urge to scratch his chin.

Damn beard anyway.

Palpatine narrowed his eyes and Ewan felt that shiver again. It made him wonder if he was Force-sensitive in this fucked up version of George’s movie reality.

“Your voice sounds different.”

“I’ve a bit of a cold,” Ewan said with an easy smile. He cleared his throat and forced himself to remember that Obi-Wan Kenobi didn’t talk with a Scottish brogue. Somehow he was English.

Hayden, Ewan shook his head and corrected himself. Anakin shot an accusatory glare at Yoda.

“I told you the room was to cold.”

Ewan blinked and thought Yoda might have rolled his eyes if he wasn’t a puppet and if Palpatine hadn’t been standing right there.

“The temperature of the room, within tolerable limits, it is. Master Kenobi, no shrinking violet, is he.”

Ewan didn’t snort, but only just barely.

“But listen to him, the Chancellor is right,” a glance out of the corner of his eye showed Palpatine all but smirking in response. “He sounds weird, and he’s been acting strangely ever since he woke up. You should have let me take him back to our room,” Anakin was working himself into a right snit and Ewan wondered when he’d become such an overprotective mother hen.

Because that surely wasn’t the route that Hayden had taken in the movies.

Petulance and anger and, well, annoying teen-ager stuff was how Hayden had played it.

Yoda raised a hand to cut Anakin off but it was Palpatine who spoke first.

“I have a committee meeting shortly,” he started.

“I’ll walk out with you Chancellor,” and from the look that Anakin shot him Ewan was almost sure he was going to stop a medi-droid and have the room warmed up to what he considered a suitable temperature.

Ewan watched them leave, scowling at the hand that Palpatine rested on Anakin’s shoulder.

“Know something of Chancellor Palpatine you do,” Yoda observed and Ewan froze.

He considered his options carefully, maybe he would have been better off yelling ‘Sith Lord, Sith Lord’ while he had a roomful of witnesses, because if Palpatine had any inkling that Ewan knew his other identity he’d be dead before Anakin even had a chance to turn to the Dark Side and kill him.

“He’s not what he appears,” he finally said and he stared at Yoda and forcibly thought ‘Sith Lord, Sith Lord’ at him.

“Chance to protect your Padawan you have with this knowledge you have gained.”

Ewan snorted. “I’m not your Obi-Wan Kenobi dude. I’m not a Jedi Master or a Knight or a General or any of that shit that you expect from him. I’m an actor not a fighter,” he tossed his head dramatically and crossed his arms over his chest.

Then realized that he’d just called Yoda ‘dude’ and cursed numerous times in front of him.

“You are him and he is you. It is all the same.”

“So what? Does this mean that he’s sitting on my couch drinking tea contemplating the universe?”

“Know this I do not. But a choice you have and one that is most important.”

“I choose not to die, and if I stay here there’s an almost, no there is a 100% chance that I’ll be dead before I figure out what the hell is going on.”

“And Young Skywalker what would you have done about him? He is your Padawan, your Apprentice.”

“And he can kick my ass thoroughly,” Ewan stated decisively.

“Underestimate yourself you do. Inside you Master Kenobi resides still.”

Ewan snorted again. “So what you’re saying is that deep inside me there’s a Jedi Master just itching to break free.”

“Joke you do, serious I am.”

“Look I’m sorry I’ve sent your Obi-Wan off into the wild blue yonder, but you’ve got to realize that this wasn’t an even swap. I don’t know the first thing about being a Jedi Master.”

Except he did. Because he’d played one in three films and he still remembered the lines and the moves and the protocol that George had all but beat into his head.

And Yoda knew all that obviously, because he was staring at him with expressive eyes that said ‘see you finally do’.

“It’s horribly cliché,” he said with resignation bowing his head. “But I hear that amnesia works well in these situations.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan wasn’t sure exactly what Yoda had told the Jedi Council about him, he’d not been privy to the conversation.

He probably should have forced Yoda to at least give him a copy of the script though because from the way that Anakin was treating him like he was going to drop dead at any second Ewan thought maybe the Jedi weren’t quite sure what amnesia was.

Maybe they called it something else and amnesia actually meant he’d be dead in six months in this universe from some incurable disease.

Anakin was being polite and overly solicitous and it was beginning to drive him a little insane.

And to think he’d been so happy to see Anakin when he’d arrived to spring him from the hospital room that a rather stern medi-droid had been holding him captive in.

Now though, standing in the middle of an apartment that had to be Obi-Wan’s from the way that Anakin was watching him with a hopeful expression, Ewan thought maybe he’d have been better off staying in the hospital. Because at least there people expected him to act like he didn’t remember anything.

From the way that Anakin was watching him it seemed like he thought Ewan was going to take one look at the room and go ‘oh my god I remember everything.’

He glanced around the apartment with interest, because it was a lot different than what George had described to him that one time that he’d asked what it would look like.

‘A room, with a cot, now stop fucking around. I’ve got a movie to make,’ was pretty much what George had told him. Except without the profanity, although he’d probably been thinking it.

Obviously the Jedi here didn’t have the same thing against owning possessions that George had wrote into his script, because he didn’t like visit museums in his spare time but the vase-like thing sitting on a wood table in the corner probably would have cost him a cool million.

Idly Ewan wondered if the Jedi got paid and if so how much. There might be a future in this Jedi business provided he didn’t have to fight Anakin or the Emperor or like die.

“Can I get anything for you Master?” Anakin, eyes wide waited on his answer, prepared to run out and get him anything he wanted. It was oddly like being back in Hollywood.

He ran a hand over his chin.

“How ‘bout a razor.”

When he looked up he noticed that Anakin looked properly horrified.

He hadn’t realized the beard was such an important social status thing to the Jedi. He’d thought George had been blowing smoke up his ass and had made him grow it because he looked younger than Hayden without it.

“You can’t shave!” Ewan raised an eyebrow as if to ask ‘and why not’ which Anakin didn’t answer, he just continued to splutter and wave his hands a lot.

Ewan wondered if there was some Italian blood in the background that Anakin didn’t know anything about, then remembered that they were supposedly in another galaxy. Maybe they had some sort of galactic equivalent to Italians?

So he ignored the hand waving and the under-the-breath mumbling and glanced over the apartment that apparently was his while Anakin got it out of his system. The apartment was a bit bigger than he would have thought.

The Jedi must either get their rooms for free or they got a nice salary.

Finally the other man quieted but a look over showed Anakin staring at him with a hopeful expression although it was beginning to give way to worry and sadness and something else that Ewan couldn’t quite put his finger on.

When he turned and pointedly returned the other mans stare Anakin dropped his eyes and toed at the carpet. Nice carpet, he wondered how much Obi-Wan had paid for it or if it had come with the apartment. It would look really nice in his game room at home.

Anakin looked the same but seemed a lot younger than Ewan remembered from the third movie. Maybe he was wrong about where they were?

Except the Chancellor had only been kidnapped once and Anakin and Obi-Wan had only gone after him the one time and yeah Obi-Wan had been knocked out but he’d regained consciousness before the end of the sequence. He remembered it vividly.

Hanging onto Hayden, praying that they’d get it in the one take because he really didn’t want to do this scene more than once.

So maybe the Chancellor had been kidnapped before and George had never mentioned it?

But George was anal about things like that. And it would have been important to the characters development. So if it had happened at some point in his saga George would have at least pulled Ian aside and said ‘look I know he’s the Emperor in the other movies but in these ones he’s just Chancellor Palpatine he gets kidnapped a lot, act like this is an everyday occurrence’.

So honestly he had no clue where they were in the movies and at this point he wondered if they might not even be there. This could be just some delusion. A very vivid delusion, because he remembered the heat from his lightsaber but a delusion nonetheless.

Or he could be unconscious on his couch dying and this was all some figment of his imagination. He hoped Eve at least got it cleaned to get rid of the odor before she shipped it to Jude.

They stood in awkward silence, Ewan staring at Anakin while Anakin avoided his eyes. When he cleared his throat because the silence was beginning to worry him the noise echoed through the apartment like a shot and Anakin’s eyes flew up to meet his.

He was kind of stunned by the emotions he saw there.

Desperation, sadness and he suddenly wanted to apologize for not being Anakin’s Obi-Wan. For not even knowing where Anakin’s Obi-Wan was or if he even still existed.

“I’m sorry,” he winced berated himself silently for not using the filter that kept him from sounding like a moron in front of someone who could kill him with a twist of his hand.

Fortunately he didn’t see murderous rage; he saw confusion and more sadness which honestly might be worse than the rage.

“You probably have other things you’d much rather be doing than baby-sitting your old Master.”

Anakin smiled softly, “You’re not so old Master, besides there isn’t any place I’d rather be then here. Not when you so obviously need me.”

Ewan didn’t snort or roll his eyes even though Anakin sounded earnest and truthful; there was no deceit in the lines of his face but it had to not be true. Because in the third movie Padmé was pregnant and Anakin was splitting his time between her and the Chancellor (Emperor, Sith Lord! Why wasn’t anybody getting that!)

But when he looked he only saw worry, directed at him. Or the him that Anakin thought him to be anyway.

“Surely Senator Amidala would appreciate your presence at her side,” he couldn’t tell Anakin what he knew (you’re married with twins on the way and if you go to the Dark Side of the Force you will most definitely not get to raise them.)

Anakin stared at him for a moment then shook his head as if he thought Obi-Wan was a few fries short of a happy meal. If they even had Happy Meals here.

“Padmé is on Naboo. The Queen requested her presence some seven months ago; she’s not scheduled to return until the Senate reconvenes.”

“Oh,” Ewan dragged a hand through his hair, scratched his chin and idly wondered what the fuck was going on. This was not how the movie progressed and he was drawing complete blanks on how he was supposed to proceed. “The Chancellor then…”

“Are you trying to get rid of me?” Anakin asked suspiciously narrowing his eyes at him.

Great move Ewan, make the young man who already has penchant for violence angry with you when you don’t have a clue how to fight him and live.

He heroically did not take a step back even though Anakin stepped up to him.

“Of course not,” Ewan huffed and stood his ground. “It’s just I don’t see the point of you sitting here waiting for me to remember something. I don’t think it’s going to happen that quickly.”

“You,” Anakin stated pointedly. “Are a pessimist. Besides Yoda said someone should be with you at all times and since I live here I seemed the most logical choice.”

“So you are babysitting me,” Ewan muttered, crossing his arms over his chest and not pouting. “Wait a minute… you live here?”

Anakin threw his hands in the air and muttered something that Ewan didn’t catch under his breath. Possibly it was a swear word.

Then he glared at him before he spun on his heel and moved over to the small black couch that didn’t look so much like a couch as a small black torture device.

“I didn’t think it was possible but you are even more infuriating now then you were when you knew exactly what to do to irritate me.”

“I’m irritating you? You should try being on this side of things,” Ewan grumbled.

If possible Anakin’s glare got harder.

“You didn’t even hit your head that hard.”

 

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The door buzzer thing woke him up. He’d been sleeping in his nice comfortable, very much not a hospital bed but still not the bed that he normally slept in which meant he was still in Oz (or insane but he was going with Oz), when he heard it.

He pushed back the covers, wiped a hand over his mouth and vowed to make somebody tell him why he couldn’t shave if he had to sit on them.

He yawned, felt his jaw crack and realized after a glance out the weird window thing that Anakin had worked for him that it was still dark out.

He stumbled from the room just in time to see Anakin letting Yoda, Mace Windu and two extras that carried lightsabers which meant they were Jedi even though he had no clue who there were.

All five looked perky and awake, obviously morning people while he himself was not a morning person and required at least a cup and a half of coffee in order to make sure he didn’t drown himself in the shower.

He wondered if they had coffee here, or if they called it something else.

“Good morning,” he yawned and stretched and realized suddenly that Jedi could show emotion after all. He couldn’t wait to go home and tell George that he was full of shit, of course George would just have him committed but still.

Mace’s lip quirked before he managed to get himself in check, Yoda visibly cracked a smile which looked slightly disturbing and Anakin laughed, then snorted then managed to turn the whole thing into a cough in under two seconds.

The extra’s both held their hands over their mouths to hide their grins, obviously they weren’t Master Jedi.

He ran a hand over his head and fought to keep the mortification from showing on his face.

He was standing in front of Anakin and Yoda and Mace and two guys that he didn’t know in this universes equivalent of boxer shorts and a t-shirt and he could feel that his hair was almost literally standing up on end.

He suddenly missed the short buzz cut that he’d had in the first movie.

And he suddenly wanted a hole to appear in the nicely carpeted floor so he could fall through it and save anyone the trouble of killing him.

“I…” he glanced at Anakin and he must have been doing a lousy job of hiding his mortification and his panic because Anakin’s expression morphed into something akin to compassion with an edge of worry and his voice was soft when he finally spoke.

“Master, why don’t you go get dressed while I talk with our guests.”

“Right, okay,” and he turned and fled to his room like the coward that he was. The door shut behind him which he thought might have been Anakin’s doing since he’d not even thought about closing it.

The room was almost pitchblack with the door closed and the shade thingies shut and he sat on his bed and tried not to feel sorry for himself.

He was an actor dammit, some people told him that he was a very good actor so why was he having such difficulty with this?

What Yoda was asking him to do, to be Obi-Wan Kenobi, he’d thought he could do that. He had done that in three films and by the time they’d finished filming Revenge of The Sith he’d felt like he’d known Obi-Wan better than he knew himself.

But now… this Obi-Wan was different from the way that Ewan had played him. This Obi-Wan had feelings and emotions and he lived with Anakin who hovered and tried to protect and Ewan didn’t know how to factor all that into the characterization of the Jedi Master that he’d built into his head.

He had to figure out a way though, he had to. Because he couldn’t keep slipping out of character. It would only take that happening once in front of the Chancellor (Emperor, Sith Lord. Is anyone fucking listening to me!!!) and he could foresee him meeting a lightsaber other than his up close and personal.

“Fuck,” he held his head in his hands and breathed. “I want to go home,” said softly and his stomach hurt.

Eve and the girls and Jude and Jonny and Hayden and he’d only been here (real, not real he couldn’t even decide which he’d rather) for at the most two days and his heart ached with missing them.

His family and his friends.

He wondered if he would ever see them again.

 

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They’d locked him in his room.

Undoubtedly that meant they were either talking about him or were afraid that he would try to escape, and he had a feeling that wasn’t just the paranoia talking.

He banged on the door but no one responded, and he couldn’t decide if they were ignoring him or if the rooms were sound proofed. Sound proofing the room seemed kind of silly because what if he sleep walked and played with his lightsaber and set his room on fire. He’d be stuck and dead.

They were probably just ignoring him… or they’d left the apartment while he was trying to overcome his brief moment of despair. He hoped that wouldn’t happen again.

He’d finally motivated himself enough to take the shower and then it had taken him almost ten minutes to figure out how to do just that because there were no knobs just little panels and he’d kept hitting the wrong sequence obviously.

The shower had beeped at him twice and he thought he might have made a long distance phone call at one point since a voice speaking a language he didn’t understand had come out of what he’d thought was a soap dispenser.

He’d been wrong.

After much trial and error he’d figured it out though and it had pleased him an inordinate amount that he hadn’t needed to call for help just to take a shower.

So now he felt clean and refreshed and was clad once more in a tan tunic and tan pants. He felt very boring and would give his right arm (although not literally) for a pair of jeans.

If he was going to be here for the long haul he’d really have to look at inserting some color into Obi-Wan’s wardrobe. He didn’t think he could take walking around in the same exact colors that adorned the floor of the apartment he lived in.

He blamed it on the fact that he’d been so tired and irritated with Anakin for not noticing it the night before.

Black was a nice neutral color, Anakin wore it quite frequently and Mace wore it as well so the Jedi couldn’t find fault with it.

Obi-Wan might if/when he returned. But Ewan figured if push came to shove Obi-Wan, when he returned, could donate the colors he didn’t like to charity and Ewan, while he was here, wouldn’t have to feel like he was fading into the woodwork.

He glanced around the room and wondered how long they were going to keep him in there. He was actually starting to get a little hungry and he could really use a shot of caffeine… or alcohol but he thought it might be too early for that, and he also thought the Jedi didn’t drink.

He noticed his lightsaber was sitting on the little table by his bed when he was almost sure that he’d left it on the dresser thing on the other wall. Sitting next to it was a cup and Ewan picked it up and sniffed it curiously.

It gave off a sort of nutty aroma and was still warm; he took a tiny little sip and hoped that Anakin wouldn’t allow them to poison him. The drink hit his system like a jolt of electricity and he drained the cup in three big gulps and felt ready to battle the day.

Which of course was the exact moment when the door opened and Yoda hobbled slowly in.

“Master Kenobi,” the diminutive green not a puppet nodded at him and stopped in the doorway.

“Master Yoda,” he inclined his head and tried to affect a proper Jedi pose. He saw Anakin appear behind Yoda, Mace was visible in the living room head bent alongside the Jedi that Ewan hadn’t recognized.

“They want to run a few more tests,” Anakin said quietly, he wouldn’t meet Ewan’s eyes and Ewan couldn’t figure out why. Did Anakin want the tests? Not want the tests?

“More tests,” Ewan said numbly. He didn’t want to go back to the healers and have them ask questions he didn’t know the answers for, he didn’t want the medi-droids poking and prodding him and taking more blood then they were leaving with him.

“Just to you know… make sure they’ve found everything that can be found.”

Ewan growled and felt all the lovely energy that he’d had just vanish into thin air.

Anakin looked upset and Yoda didn’t look that pleased either, Ewan was pissed off as all hell and didn’t care who knew it.

He’d thought he wouldn’t have to go back, thought that when Anakin had shown up to take him home that he’d be home until he either went back to his actual home or… well there was no ‘or’ because there was nothing for him to remember.

He wasn’t Obi-Wan Kenobi, and he couldn’t pull memories that didn’t exist out of his ass.

His voice was bitter and angry and he wasn’t a Jedi so he saw no reason to hide what he was feeling.

“Why don’t you all just knock me upside the head and see if we can lose what little is left in there yet.”

 

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He hated this. Hated it with all the fiery passion of a thousand suns.

Tests after more tests, medi-droids with needles and healers with hands that weren’t supposed to feel rough but pushed and pulled him in whichever direction they thought he needed to be.

His head ached and whatever had been in the shot the droids had given him before they’d shoved him into a tiny dark little box flashing purple blue lights had left him terrified and heaving over a metal pan when they’d finally extricated him.

He hadn’t managed to throw up yet and he wondered if he would even feel better if he did.

Anakin hovered in the doorway, his worry a palpable pulse in the room. It was beginning to give him a headache and Ewan was about thirty seconds from asking him to leave him the fuck alone.

He coughed and spat and his stomach rolled around in his chest.

He took a deep breath and regretted it almost instantly when his head throbbed and his stomach finally staged the revolt that it had been looking for.

He blacked out, he wanted his mother who used to cuddle him and hold a wet flannel to his forehead when he was sick.

When he finally came back he was lying on his side, a wet cloth against his lips and Anakin’s hand warm against his forehead.

“Master, master…” softly spoken as the hand stroked sweat soaked hair from his forehead. Ewan had an insane desire to wrap his arms around the younger man and cling to him. Because Anakin was there and warm and gentle like his mother used to be.

“I’m fine,” he managed, coughing again, closing his eyes because suddenly the room seemed unbearably bright and his head throbbed.

“It shouldn’t be affecting him like this,” Anakin’s voice was loud and angry, Ewan wondered why he was shouting since the healer was standing right there.

A groan escaped him despite his best efforts in holding it back. He hoped they were almost done because he didn’t know how much more of this he could take.

He hurt so much, he almost wished they’d knock him the fuck out because it felt like his brain was trying to push its way out of his head by way of his eyes and he really wanted to be unconscious before it succeeded in doing so.

“It’s doing what it’s supposed to,” the Healer stated matter-of-factly.

“Are you even a certified Healer?” Anakin asked his voice laced with sarcasm. “Because you can’t tell me that he’s supposed to be throwing up into a pan or having panic attacks in the Serenity Chamber. This is not normal.”

Serenity Chamber? Ewan wondered what was supposed to be so serene about that box they’d shoved him into.

“If you’d like I can fetch one of the other Healers, but they are going to tell you exactly the same thing that I’ve told you. Whatever is in his system needs to be forced out; the regular treatments that we would prescribe to anyone else will not work on him…”

“Because he’s a Jedi, you’ve already said that,” Ewan could picture Anakin waving his hand dismissively. And from the sigh that he heard the Healer utter that was most likely exactly what he’d done.

“Well we do not have much more to go on, especially since we don’t know what the drug in his system is.”

Ewan frowned internally because he didn’t think he could force facial muscles to cooperate at the moment. He’d been drugged? What the fuck?

“As such there are only two other treatments that can be used. We’ve already ruled out utilizing the Serenity Chamber to assist him in slipping into a Healing Trance because of the panic attack he had while inside…”

“And do you know why? He’s never had that type of reaction to the Chamber before.”

“Master Yoda is looking into some possibilities. The only other option open to us is the purgative we gave him, it seems to be clearing whatever was in his system out but it also is reacting badly to his body chemistry. As soon as it clears his system he should start feeling better almost immediately.”

“And his memory?” Anakin asked and the Healer sighed again.

“As we told you and Master Yoda earlier this morning, we cannot guarantee that Master Kenobi will ever regain his memory.”

Heh… Ewan could have told them that. If anyone had bothered to ask him his opinion on the matter.

You can’t remember what you don’t already know.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The room was unbearably bright and Ewan pressed a hand over his eyes and curled in on himself. He felt better but Christ did the lights need to be that bright?

“You’re not going back to sleep are you?” the voice was amused… Ewan frowned, and familiar.

He opened his eyes slowly, blinked and stared in incomprehension. This couldn’t be good.

“Fuck.”

“Yes I said much the same thing,” a man that could only be… well him… or a him that was still in character as Obi-Wan Kenobi because he wasn’t currently dressed as him, as he was laying there in the boxer and t-shirt that he’d fallen asleep in all those days ago.

Obi-Wan crossed his arms over his chest and eyed him with interest. “Except without the swearing I believe.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

He entered by way of a secret door, robe covering his face and clothes from view.

“Well?” the voice was low and gravelly and it terrified him to the very pits of his soul. He wanted to be anywhere but here delivering this news of failure.

Especially since it shouldn’t have been a failure, the drug had been tested twice and in both cases those that had ingested it had lived but ceased to exist. It has pushed their conscious mind somewhere far away and not allowed it to return.

The body existed in a vegetative state with no idea of what was happening around them.

It had never been tested on a Jedi, because the Jedi were just men. People, some human, some not and it should have played no factor in this assignment.

Obviously he should have found a Jedi to test the drug on before saying that it would work.

“Jedi Master Kenobi still lives,” he managed to get it and wondered if it would be cowardly to run. When he felt the pressure around his throat he thought that might have been the best option. But this man… this thing would have found him anywhere.

“How can this be,” invisible fingers dug into his throat and he knew that if he wasn’t dead when they released him that they would leave bruises.

“I don’t know…” he gasped for air, found none and saw spots dancing in front of his eyes. “Warned you… experimental drug…”

The hand released him and he fell to the ground in an ungraceful pile, hands wrapped around his neck protectively gasping for air.

“You assured me that this…” the voice was sneering though no longer sounded angry. He wondered if he would get a reprieve and possibly a second chance. “This drug would work. That it would make Kenobi no more than a vegetable, with no awareness of those around him…” he curled into a ball as he felt the robes of the other man brush against his face. Felt the warm breath against his neck. “I’ve seen Master Kenobi and he has awareness, he is not a vegetable.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he kissed the hem of the robe, begging forgiveness.

“You know the old adage,” he felt those invisible fingers once more close around his throat, tightening slowly. And he knew that there would be no reprieve, even as he wondered why this man wanted the Jedi gone, if not dead. “If you want something done right, you do it yourself.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin was very impressed with his self-control.

After all he hadn’t struck the Healer down the minute that Obi-Wan had passed out and it would have been well within his rights.

It would have been a moot point when the Healer was terrified of him and doing everything in her power to figure out what had happened.

“Young Skywalker,” Yoda’s voice was disapproving and Anakin knew that he would have to tread carefully if he didn’t want to be thrown and kept out of the room because Yoda thought that he was a threat to Obi-Wan.

He would never hurt Obi-Wan, never.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he kept his voice calm but he himself could hear the snarl and defiance. Yoda was not going to be pleased.

“Ask you to leave I did not,” the door closed behind him and Anakin could feel the Master moving behind him. He was not surprised to glance over and see Yoda hovering next to him although he was surprised to see him staring at Obi-Wan instead of him.

“Do they know anything yet?”

“Running tests still they are.”

Anakin growled, the Healers with their tests and no results were trying what was left of his patience. And without Obi-Wan there to pull him back he was ready to take someone’s head off.

He felt Yoda’s cool hand settle against his bare arm and suddenly he could breathe again. Could step back and look at Obi-Wan’s pale, sweaty face and not want to kill whoever had put him in the bed and incapacitated him so totally that Anakin couldn’t sense him at all.

“It’s like he’s not there,” Anakin said softly and he let his hand move slowly to Obi-Wan’s arm, he wasn’t sure if he was doing it correctly but he smiled softly in relief when he felt the steady beat of his heartbeat under his fingers.

He was also gratified to feel the faint hum of the Force pulsing against his skin through Obi-Wan’s. It was still there, a whispering of the power that Obi-Wan had contained within him, growing stronger every second.

He suddenly, violently wished that Yoda would leave so he could lay his head against Obi-Wan’s chest and rest, to wait for him to awaken and smile at him and look at him like he remembered everything.

“Prepared for the worst we must be,” Yoda intoned quietly. He to laid his hand against Obi-Wan’s skin and Anakin bit back a reflexive snarl at the fact that someone was touching something that he considered his and his alone.

It was probably a good thing that Obi-Wan was unconscious, he wouldn’t like that Anakin was thinking of him a possession.

“He’s not going to die.”

“Die? No. Not the same man when he wakes will he be.”

He really hated it when Yoda went all cryptic, especially when Obi-Wan wasn’t around to decipher what was being said.

He tried to quell the sense of foreboding that rose up in him at Yoda’s statement. Because any way he thought about it, it sounded like Yoda didn’t believe that Obi-Wan would regain his memories.

And he had to.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan gaped, mouth open, if Jude or Jonny or anyone that he knew had been standing there they would have laughed at him and called him an idiot.

But this wasn’t Jude or Jonny or anyone that he knew, this was him or a version of him that he was currently pretending to be. And Christ he was getting a headache in the hereafter.

“Am I dead?”

The Obi-Wan/Ewan look-a-like rolled his eyes.

“Fortunately no, because then where would we be, hmm?”

“Dead?” Ewan supplied helpfully.

“You’re not dead,” Obi-Wan shook his head and glanced behind him. Ewan peered in the same direction and saw nothing but a bright light that made his eyes hurt.

“Don’t look at it,” Obi-Wan admonished, stepping forward to block his view.

“What the fuck is going on?”

“Well I’m not sure what your story is but I was poisoned.”

“Poisoned?” And realization dawned. The Healer and Anakin talking about something being in his system, the reason for the drugs that they were pumping him full of. “There was something in my… your… our system.”

“It’s working its way out now,” the other man ran his hand thoughtfully over his chin, “we should have been switched back when it happened but…”

“But?” Ewan waited as patiently as he could but Obi-Wan just stared at him serenely like he had all the time in the world. “Look man, I have a fucking family, and friends, and a life… so do you apparently, so tell me what the hell is going on.”

“Besides the fact that we’re not switched back?”

“Yes.”

Obi-Wan sighed and Ewan felt a shiver run down his spine. That didn’t sound like a good sigh, or a sigh of someone who thought it was going to be just a little bit longer. That sounded like the sigh of a man that had no clue what the hell was going on.

“I have no access to my body; once you came here I should have been able to get back…”

“Well what about my body?”

“I have no access to that one either.”

“What do you mean you have no access to my body? If I’m here then you should be there… right?”

“That would be the popular theory,” Obi-Wan smiled wanly and then sat in a graceful motion. “But your physical form will not accept me and my physical form will not accept me and I seem to be stuck here where that,” he nodded his head at the bright light, which seemed to be growing brighter and closer as Ewan lingered and that kind of freaked him out a little, “continues to try and pull me toward it.”

“Well you’re not going,” Ewan yelled. “And I’m not going back, do you have any idea what happens there?”

“No,” Obi-Wan stared at him. “And neither do you. All your preconceived notions of what is going to happen and what will happen, they will do you no good. The world is a different place, different choices were made.”

“I’m not setting myself up to die in your place, I’m sorry.”

“I’ll try and help you, give you new knowledge to take back with you,” Obi-Wan continued not listening to him at all. He cocked his head to one side and narrowed his eyes at him. “There is no guarantee that you will remember any of it though.”

“Look,” Ewan shook a finger at him. “No, and just no… I want to go home.”

“Your home is gone, your life as you knew it is finished. This is the only way.”

“I don’t accept that,” he muttered stubbornly.

“Accept or don’t accept the choice is not up to me.” Ewan glared at him.

You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Ewan muttered dragging a hand through his hair.

“And no more swearing. You’ll be a bad influence on Anakin.”

Ewan snorted.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The room was too bright again, Ewan wondered idly who he had to kill in order to have it shaded.

Just a little bit, not much. Just enough that it didn’t feel like it was piercing his eyeballs while his eyes were still closed, which would be amusing but he didn’t think it would be proper.

“Better?” the voice was soft as the lights dimmed. He hummed and let his eyes fall shut again. Much better, much, much better.

It dawned on him suddenly that he hadn’t actually said anything and wondered how the person in his room had known to turn the lights down. That should be worrisome, but it also had connotations that he really didn’t want to think about just yet.

“Master?” a gentle hand touched his cheek, a sweeping caress of a finger from his ear to his lips. “Obi-Wan open your eyes,” the voice was persuasive, demanding. That struck him as being wrong and he frowned.

That wasn’t his name for one thing. God dammit.

He was still there, here. Manipulative figments of his imagination.

It took a moment, a few breaths before he was able to pry his eyes open again. Anakin stared back at him, a smile forming on his lips.

“How do you feel?”

“My head hurts,” which was actually an understatement. It felt like it was going to explode at any moment, he wondered why Anakin hadn’t just let him sleep. Hadn’t let him keep sleeping until he woke up where he was supposed to be.

“The Healers can’t give you anything for the pain until they determine how the poison got into your system in the first place,” Anakin murmured softly.

“Can they knock me out again then?” he asked plaintively.

That finger that had been resting against his cheek moved to his temple and Ewan felt almost instant relief. He stared at Anakin in awe, he was better than two Tylenol and he wondered if Anakin’s finger would work on a hangover.

“Better?” Ewan nodded slightly, no little jackhammers started up inside his brain so all was good. He smiled, the frowned. He’d thought Anakin had said something about poison which triggered something in the back of his mind that he couldn’t remember.

“Poison?” he asked. Even though he’d known that… had he known that? Everything inside his head felt jumbled and confused.

Anakin nodded and moved closer, his face a hairsbreadth away, Ewan could feel his breath warm against his cheek, he could probably count his eyelashes if he were so inclined.

He thought that he felt lips touching the skin ever so briefly, but Ewan decided that had to be a figment of his imagination.

Because Anakin was straight, sometime, eventually he’d prove it by hooking up with Padmé and having twins that would be his redemption. Even though he didn’t think there was enough time to pull all that off, especially with Palpatine breathing down his neck.

Ewan wondered how Anakin would go evil in this universe without a Padmé Amidala and her unborn children to be the lure.

“They don’t know what it is yet, worthless…” Anakin drew a deep breath and Ewan could see him forcibly trying to relax himself.

“But that’s okay,” he finally said smiling gently. “Because you’re okay now.”

Ewan wasn’t so sure.

 

******************************************************************************

 

When he woke again he was alone in the room and his headache was mostly gone.

He was happy to finally not be in any pain, he was also pleased at the brief reprieve from playing someone that he wasn’t.

Anakin will try and protect you.

He frowned. Rubbed at his head and wondered if this was a sign that the poison he remembered both Anakin and the Healer talking about wasn’t completely gone.

Because hearing voices couldn’t be anything but bad.

You are the most important thing in his life. He’ll do whatever he has to in order to protect you.

He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Obviously if he was hearing voices (his voice at that) something was still quite wrong.

He crossed his arms over his chest and wondered who had undressed him. When last he’d been conscious he’d had on a t-shirt and boxers, his frown deepened.

Because no he hadn’t, he vividly remembered undressing as Anakin watched him with worried eyes.

He’d felt oddly shy, like he should be covering and hiding himself even though he’d been dropping trou in front of people that he had known a less amount of time.

That feeling was possibly some leftover remnant from the movie, he’d played Obi-Wan as someone most likely not very comfortable with sexuality his or anyone else’s; ironically because he’d asked George once if Obi-Wan was a virgin and he’d just stared at him said ‘what do you think?’ and Ewan had just played it exactly the way that he’d been most comfortable.

Obi-Wan had never struck him as a sexual person. He’d devoted his entire life to the Jedi, when would he have had time for romantic liaisons?

Besides Qui-Gon, who’d died and Anakin who was most emphatically straight.

Although there’d been a lot of subtext.

The relationship between Anakin and I is complicated.

And he was hearing that fucking voice again.

He knew exactly what he’d been wearing when they’d come back to the Temple, because he’d felt for the first time in a long time uncomfortable in his own skin.

He could picture it in his mind, a light undershirt thing that had felt as if it had been made of some sort of cotton blend and leggings.

He remembered jokingly wanting to ask Anakin if the leggings made him look fat but Anakin had looked as if his whole world was falling into pieces right before his eyes so Ewan had bit his tongue and not said a word.

But he also remembered wearing the t-shirt and boxers, and that memory was just as vivid. His eyes narrowed as he glared at the ceiling, he also remembered talking to someone who looked exactly like him only in character as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

He wondered what kind of drugs they’d been pumping him full of that caused hallucinations to seem that real.

Then remembered that Anakin had said they couldn’t give him anything else and figured this was a sure sign that he was going insane. That would make a whole lot of sense and copping to that would take less explanation.

“I’m sorry I missed the movie premiere, you see I was in some sort of alternate dimension where I was actually Obi-Wan Kenobi… why are you laughing?”

No one would believe him other than Jude (who would say he did just because he wouldn’t want to side with Eve who would most likely have him committed) and possibly Angie (because he’d thought Angie insane for some time now and she would probably think something like this cool.)

He sighed and tried not to mind that Anakin had disappeared on him. Every other time he’d woke Anakin had been sitting right next to him with a wet cloth and glass full of some citrus tasting liquid. He tried not to take it personally that the one time that he’d been awake for more than five minutes Anakin was no where to be found.

He blinked, stared at the ceiling and realized that the light wasn’t hurting his eyes. Obviously Anakin hadn’t turned the lights back up before he’d departed.

He wondered if the Healers had ever thought about using a dimmer light, one that didn’t cause people to go spontaneously blind the minute they regained consciousness.

The sound of the door creeping open distracted him from writing the memo to the Healers in his head and when he realized that it wasn’t going to be somebody that he recognized he snapped his eyes closed, he wasn’t really up to returning to the part of Obi-Wan Kenobi as played by Ewan McGregor just yet.

He regretted that instantly because now he couldn’t see anything, also he kind of realized that it was sort of stupid.

He should have left his eyes open and summoned his lightsaber to him, even though he had no clue how to use a real one as opposed to one that he’d trained with for the movies.

Possibly once this was over he should have Anakin or someone give him lessons so he didn’t look like a fool.

Soft footsteps crossed the room from the door to his bed and he tried to calm his racing heart.

A soft touch against his arm, the prick of a needle he screamed without making a sound. Calling for the one person he knew with utmost certainty would protect him.

“Anakin!”

 

******************************************************************************

 

“Anakin!”

Anakin dropped his lightsaber; Obi-Wan would have probably dropped to the ground in hysterics if he’d been there.

He spun wildly as he sought the location of the disturbance in the Force. His heart was racing and he felt a terror that he’d not felt in a long time.

He’d come back to the apartment to shower, to change and to attempt to convince himself that Obi-Wan was going to be perfectly fine.

Because Obi-Wan had known him when he opened his eyes, had smiled at him. Had trusted him to care for him.

“Anakin!”

“Obi-Wan,” his eyes widened and he summoned his lightsaber to him with barely a thought and rushed for the door.

“I’m coming.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

“You know this is becoming a bit of a habit. I’m not sure I approve.”

Ewan’s eyes snapped open, because he recognized that voice. Obi-Wan was kneeling beside him smiling with something like amusement.

“It’s not like I planned it,” he retorted sharply, he touched his arm reflexively and was sort of surprised to feel no pain.

“It doesn’t translate over,” Obi-Wan settled beside him, legs crossed hands resting on his knees. He looked almost like he was going to start meditating any moment and Ewan hoped he’d wait until he figured out what the hell was going on.

“You’re sure?”

“If it did I’m not sure where I’d be at the moment,” Obi-Wan stared at him, all seeing eyes boring holes into him. He looked faintly annoyed that Ewan was back even though it was barely visible; Ewan felt much the same way. He’d much rather be anywhere but here… say back in his own body.

“What’s going on with my body by the way?” It was something he’d meant to ask the last time but Obi-Wan had monopolized the conversation.

Ewan scratched his head, a hand reflexively rubbing over his chin. He smiled faintly when he realized that there was no beard. Then frowned when he couldn’t remember exactly what he and Obi-Wan had discussed.

It had been something about Anakin he was sure, and Obi-Wan’s relationship with the boy

“Nothing,”

“Nothing?”

“Well it’s just laying there, on that black thing still.”

“That’s my really expensive leather couch,” Ewan muttered under his breath.

Obi-Wan didn’t appear to hear him, instead his eyes were narrowed as he gazed at something over Ewan’s shoulder. He turned but didn’t see anything. “I think time moves differently in your world.”

“Well that’s good then, because it would be difficult to go back if they pronounced me dead.” Besides the fact that he’d always stated that he wanted to be cremated and he didn’t think he could continue his career as a big pile of dust.

“I think it more likely they’d pronounce you in a coma, though if your Healers are any good they’d put your body in a Bacta tank before things become to dire. Your heart is still beating after all.”

“We don’t have Bacta tanks… wait my heart is still beating? How is that possible?” Ewan asked in surprise.

“The universe is a strange and mysterious place.”

“Wow, you’ve got the cryptic thing down,” Ewan said with mock appreciation. “I think you’ve spent way to much time with Yoda, you need to lay off and take a vacation.”

Obi-Wan smiled gently, “Anakin’s been trying to talk me into that for years.”

Ewan snorted, just because Anakin was going to go evil and kill all the Jedi possibly, sometime in the future somewhere, didn’t mean that he didn’t have good ideas once in a blue moon.

“Maybe you should have listened to him.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin didn’t remember his race to Obi-Wan’s side later. When asked he would never be able to quite recall those minutes between feeling the pain and fear of his Master through the Force and arriving in the corridor leading to the Medical center.

He would remember vividly appearing in the corridor that led to Obi-Wan’s room to find that other Jedi had appeared before him.

Yoda was questioning the female Healer that had been treating Obi-Wan earlier that day, she was wringing her hands and looked scared and pale and just as incompetent as she’d looked when he’d left.

He hadn’t cared.

There were guards at Obi-Wan’s door, two men that looked identical that could only be Clones. They hadn’t allowed Anakin to pass and he’d been seconds from just pulling out his lightsaber and brandishing it in a way that Jedi were not supposed to do in non-combat situations.

It was only by the grace of Mace Windu that he was even allowed in the room. He didn’t like the thought that he might possibly be indebted to the Jedi that hated him the most.

And while he knew that hate was a strong word he also knew that Mace Windu didn’t like him or trust him and had more than one time tried to convince both Yoda and Obi-Wan to cease training him because he was a danger to himself and everyone around him.

Thankfully neither Obi-Wan nor Yoda had listened to him. Because Anakin wasn’t sure what he would have done if Obi-Wan had renounced him.

He entered his Master’s room only to find that he really didn’t want to be there.

Because standing in that room, at that door with another Jedi Master standing behind him he’d felt helpless like he hadn’t felt since he’d been unable to save his mother.

He hated feeling helpless, he hated knowing that nothing he did was going to make Obi-Wan better faster or keep him safe. He, at that moment, wanted to take his Master home, back to their apartment which was keyed for only them and possibly one of the few safe havens that he knew of and hide them way.

He wanted to hold Obi-Wan tightly and glare and snarl at anyone who dared try and take him away from him.

Obi-Wan was his and his alone and he wanted to challenge those that were trying to hurt him to confront him face to face.

Let them try this with someone who was not confined to a bed battling some mysterious poison that had left his mind riddled with empty spaces and his body weak to attack.

He moved into the room when a Healer gestured for him to move out of the way, Mace moved with him and Anakin bit his tongue to ask him why he was there.

Anakin didn’t want him there; and he knew that Obi-Wan wouldn’t want him there either.

His Master didn’t like appearing weak in front of other Council members, this seemed like a liberty that Mace Windu was taking rather than one he was being afforded.

Healers and medi-droids hovered around Obi-Wan’s bed and if Anakin wasn’t so worried that interrupting them would cause Obi-Wan to die on him he might have asked them what was going on.

Why had Obi-Wan called for him, mental voice anguished, ringing with terror?

Where had the Healers been then? Why hadn’t they protected him?

Anakin had trusted them to protect him, he’d left only long enough to return to their apartment to change clothes and use the fresher.

Obviously that had been a mistake, obviously the Healers were incompetent as well as the guards that were supposed to be patrolling the halls.

It gratified him some to see guards standing directly at Obi-Wan’s door but it was a matter of to little to late and he was angered that Obi-Wan had endured yet another attack in a place where he should have been safe.

Once he was able to move Obi-Wan back to their apartments he would request private guards from Chancellor Palpatine.

The Chancellor had told him to come to him if he needed anything. Anakin had brushed it off because the Jedi were not in the habit of asking political leaders for assistance.

But if it meant keeping Obi-Wan safe and healthy and alive… well he’d do almost anything.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan was getting damn tired of waking up in a room that was to bright.

He felt a gentle pressure on his fingers and realized that someone was clutching his hand. He blinked quickly, his eyes felt filled with sand and grime and his vision was blurred, hazy.

The sand and grime feeling was much the same way his eyes felt when he let the guys convince him to go surfing or swimming on the beach.

The blurry vision on the other hand…

“Obi-Wan,” he blinked again, his vision clearing suddenly as he felt a sharp pain jab through his abdomen.

He groaned, bringing his hand still linked with Anakin’s (because that was the voice that had spoken to him, he recognized it now and how he could have ever have thought Anakin Hayden playing a joke was beyond him, because Hayden had never had that possessive ‘you belong to me and only me’ tone) up to his mouth to stifle the sound.

Another sharp pain and he brought his knees up to his chest and rolled to his side as if that could ward off the pain.

He whimpered, or something close and felt like a total and complete wimp.

“Did you get the number of the truck that hit me?” he managed to joke.

Anakin didn’t say anything and when Ewan was able to look up without feeling like he was going to be reenacting the famous ‘alien bursting from crew guys stomach’ scene from the original Alien he noticed the puzzled look on his face.

Right, right… no trucks. Only ships and speeders and little cart things.

It hit him right then that he was on another planet. He couldn’t believe that it hadn’t sunk in before then (of course up to this point he’d thought it was a hallucination brought on by bad cabbage or something so he could probably be excused).

If he was so inclined he could walk outside and climb onto a space ship and go to a different planet.

Jude was so going to piss himself.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He dozed for a while he thought, in between sharp jabbing pains that reminded him of the contractions that Eve’d had when she was in labor and he forcibly did not allow his mind to go there.

Just because he was on another planet and he’d seen non-humans walking around did not mean that he was going to let his mind think of bad, dark things.

“Obi-Wan?” Anakin’s voice was soft and Ewan was proud of him. He’d hung around, held his hand, whispered soft words that Ewan hadn’t understood against his cheek.

The Anakin that Hayden had played would probably have left him alone, maybe.

Possibly.

He probably would have stayed; though Ewan definitely thought he wouldn’t have been holding his hand.

“Anakin?” he acknowledged him. A brief smile crossing the others face. Anakin’s hand came out as if he was going to caress Ewan’s cheek; instead it dropped back to the bed next to Ewan’s own hand when the door opened.

“Master Kenobi, better you look,” Yoda hobbled into the room alone. The door closed behind him but he didn’t move any closer to the bed. Instead he stood in the middle of the room and stared at them.

Anakin looked away, staring down at the bed where their hands were almost but not quite touching, a red tinge on his cheeks.

Ewan thought it adorable that he could still blush but wondered why Anakin was acting like Yoda had caught them doing something they weren’t supposed to be doing instead of just sitting there in silence.

“Chancellor Palpatine, agreed he has to lend Clone troopers to guard Master Kenobi.”

Terror wasn’t quite the appropriate word but Ewan thought it was close enough. ‘Fuck no,’ was on the tip of his tongue but he managed to restrain himself. He’d told the figment of his imagination that he would try to cut back on the cursing in front of Anakin.

Why Obi-Wan was more worried about Anakin learning a few new words instead of the fact that he was teetering on the edge of the Dark Side was beyond him.

Obviously it was something that he as a normal human and not a Jedi Master wouldn’t understand.

Anakin smiled, relief visible on every inch of his face and all Ewan had running through his head was “Order 66” and the extermination of the Jedi as a race.

“Um do I have any say in this?” Ewan raised his hand, Anakin frowned at him and Yoda looked puzzled as to why his hand was in the air.

“Master I’m only concerned about your safety,” Anakin sounded earnest and honest and truthfully just a tad bit scared.

“Yeah so am I,” Ewan muttered under his breath, Anakin looked at him curiously and Ewan hoped he hadn’t heard. He didn’t think they were in a place in their relationship where he felt comfortable explaining what he meant.

Also he was a bit scared and the thought of Clone’s standing guard over him didn’t fill him with warm fuzzy feelings.

Because he didn’t think that they’d be looking out for his best interests.

“I’d rest easier if you had guards around…”

Ewan leaned over, plucked his lightsaber off the metal table and waved it at Anakin. Yoda watched with something that looked like amusement but could have been gas (what did Yoda eat anyway) he couldn’t be sure since he’d never seen that particular expression on the puppets face before so he was kind of at a loss.

“I’m a Jedi right? So why don’t you show me how to use this fucking thing then? So I can protect myself.”

“Master…”

“No,” Ewan crossed his arms over his chest and scowled. “I refuse to be baby-sat like I’m some silly child that can’t take care of himself.”

“Not a child Master Kenobi,” Yoda moved forward, gimmer stick making a clack clack noise on the ground. Unspoken was his, although you are acting like one. “If you feel training you are ready for then once the Healers release you begin we may.”

“I thought you said it was too soon,” Anakin said suspiciously, his fingers brushed against Ewan’s. The movement seemed almost reflexive, normal; Yoda didn’t even blink an eye at the seemingly casual contact between Master and Apprentice.

It was worrisome because Ewan still hadn’t figured out exactly what Obi-Wan’s relationship with Anakin was. He had a feeling that it would become important at some point.

Probably very soon.

“If training Obi-Wan believes he is ready to begin, then begin we will with his training. Memories may surface at activities that he has already accomplished.”

Ewan snorted, because there were no memories to be had. Unless he and Obi-Wan started sharing brain space which he thought was unlikely. Then the conversation sunk in and he frowned.

“Wait a minute are you sending me back to school or something?” Now it was Ewan’s turn to sound suspicious and he could see Anakin visibly biting his lip. Probably to keep from laughing.

“Back to basics,” Yoda nodded, hmming as he tapped his stick against the ground. “A moment with your Master I would like Young Skywalker.”

“I’ll just go…” Anakin glanced over at him and Ewan nodded reassuringly, hiding the confusion he felt fairly well he thought. “I’ll go see when the Healers feel he’ll be ready to be released.”

Anakin patted his hand, the motion lingering for what felt like long moments and then he left the room. Glancing over his shoulder at them before he allowed the door to shut behind him, if it had been anyone else Ewan would have thought he’d be standing on the other side of the door eavesdropping.

Yoda moved forward slowly, pushing himself into the chair that Anakin had vacated leaning close much as Anakin had.

He didn’t touch his hand though; Ewan thought he might freak out if he did.

“The Clones you do not trust,” he stated softly and Ewan felt that tingle down his spine again and knew that Yoda was peering into his soul and his mind once more. “Chancellor Palpatine you do not trust.”

Ewan inclined his head, not saying a word. He didn’t think words were really necessary seeing as how Yoda was just reading his mind and then telling him what he was thinking.

“Young Skywalker does not understand this, protect you is his only desire.”

“It’ll lead him to the Dark Side,” Ewan murmured softly, not able to stop himself from issuing this small warning. Yoda nodded once as if he’d known this all along.

Which he might have, it wouldn’t surprise him.

“Protect him you will, by protecting yourself that much is known.”

“You are going to send me back to school, aren’t you?”

“Teach you to protect your mind, teach you to use your lightsaber, teach you what you need to know,” Yoda stared at him and Ewan felt the tingling cease as Yoda slipped from the chair. He crossed the room slowly, and turned when he reached the door. “Learn you will.”

Ewan sighed as the door closed softly behind Yoda.

“They are sending me back to school. Fuck.”

He hoped the kids wouldn’t make fun of him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“He refused the guards,” the voice was small and quiet, huddled in on itself as it waited for a hand to raise.

“How is this possible?” he snarled, he raised the hand the other was expecting but instead of actual flesh touching flesh he squeezed it and raised his arm and the others body raised in a mirror image.

The Force was a wonderful thing. For rewards, but most of all for punishments.

He left his hand loose, so that the other could talk freely. It also allowed them to think that death wasn’t imminent.

“He seemed to not trust them, Skywalker was disappointed but sent them away. Either he or Master Yoda or one of the others has been with him at all times.”

He twisted his hand and the body fell. Silent, blissful silence.

The Clones had been an ingenious idea and really Anakin had been the one to give it to him.

The younger man had proposed it, fear seeping from every pore of his body, clouding his judgment, asking for help in protecting his beloved Master.

He sneered.

Skywalker would have left Kenobi alone because the Clones were there to protect him, and the Clones would have finally been able to do what he’d not managed to get anyone else to complete successfully.

And the job would have been done neatly and cleanly and they would have disposed of the body if he issued the order.

Anakin would have thought his Master had vanished, run away from him. His anger and pain would have brought him ever closer to the Dark Side of the Force and he would have been there waiting.

He scowled, hand tapping against a window. Kenobi was proving to be much tougher to kill then he’d originally thought.

Obviously he would have to rethink his plans.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan sat on the edge of his bed, every so often he’d get bored and kick his feet and the Healer would glare at him and he would stop.

 

It was like a game.

 

He was supposed to be being released. The Healer had arrived that morning and smiled at him and told him that if the last batch of blood they’d taken (vampires! All of them! He thought he must have single-handedly transfused half his floor by now) came back normal that he could go home.

 

He’d snickered (because home, every time he fell unconscious and went to the bright place he hoped he arrive back home, instead he woke up with Anakin hovering and imminent death looming) and the Healer had looked so concerned that she’d taken more blood and now he felt like a bloody pin cushion.

 

Finally she’d left, vials in hand and told him to use the Fresher.

 

He thought she might have been trying to tell him that he reeked or something but he’d just used it the previous day and it wasn’t like he was doing anything more taxing then walking to the loo when he had to relieve himself.

 

He’d used it because honestly he thought she could totally kick his ass in a fight and when he’d come out the thin cotton pants and shirt he’d been wearing were gone and a nice semi-terry cloth robe was laying folded on the counter by the sink instead.

It disturbed him slightly that someone had been in and out of the loo while he’d been showering and he’d not even known, especially since the glass to the shower was clear.

 

Someone had obviously gotten a free show; it was a good thing he hadn’t been wanking which he did do in the shower sometimes.

 

He’d looked in the mirror, frowned at the beard that looked like it was trying to take over his face and searched futilely for a razor.

 

When he’d looked in every nook and cranny (even the little drawer that didn’t appear to have a bottom) he sighed and promised himself that as soon as he found one he’d lock himself in the loo and do it fast before Anakin could look at him with those big eyes and make him change his mind.

 

Upon exiting the Fresher he found a bundle of clothes on the bed that told him that Anakin had been by and had probably been the one to leave the robe in the loo, that didn’t disturb him as much as it probably should and he didn’t examine the feeling to closely.

 

He did wonder why he hadn’t hung around or at least popped his head in and said ‘hey I’ll be back’.

 

Probably Anakin and Yoda were arguing about what exactly training him was going to entail. Ewan hoped it wasn’t going to be as physical as he thought it might be.

 

He’d figured out why Anakin hadn’t hung around when he’d changed, and sat on the bed and waited for a good two hours before a Healer had arrived with data pad in hand.

 

She’d been touching the screen and glancing at him periodically, probably to make sure he wasn’t sprouting horns or growing a tail while she wasn’t paying attention.

 

Finally she stopped tapping at the data pad screen and looked at him.

 

“You are free to go Master Kenobi,” she sounded disappointed but Ewan wasn’t sure why. Maybe because he hadn’t keeled over dead from the poison?

 

He jumped from the bed; making sure to put an extra bounce in his step just to annoy her, she stared down her nose at him in disapproval, huffed and turned to leave.

 

Anakin opened the door at the same time she reached for it and they nodded coolly at each other.

 

“Master,” Anakin smiled at him.

 

“Anakin,” Ewan returned.

 

“I take it you’re ready to go?” Anakin smirked at him, head tilting to the side and Ewan thought he might be measuring his body temperature, weight and any other vital statistics that Anakin thought important to his continued well-being.

 

Ewan just arched an eyebrow, as if to say ‘why else would I be standing here, fully clothed, smiling’ and waved a hand at the door.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Meditation came easily to him. Go figure.

 

Anakin had dropped him off at school like a good little boy and Ewan had half-expected the younger man to pull out a brown paper bag, pat him on the head and kiss him goodbye.

 

As it was he’d hovered in the doorway for a good five minutes while Ewan had got settled with Yoda.

 

Finally another Jedi had appeared and dragged him; it looked like forcefully, away.

 

Yoda had stared at him as he’d settled in a cross-legged position then had proceeded to talk. Ewan had wondered if Yoda’s meditation technique was to bore others into unconsciousness.

 

Finally Yoda had quieted and Ewan had closed his eyes and found the focus that Yoda had been talking about almost immediately.

 

It was nothing especially hard, he thought about his girls and Jude and of all things Anakin.

 

Anakin had dominated his thoughts Ewan wondered if this was some part of Obi-Wan’s subconscious peeking through.

 

Anakin’s gentleness and protectiveness and possessiveness and that fact that while he’d been lying in a bed wracked with pain Anakin had stayed and watched over him while others might have deserted him.

 

When he finally opened his eyes he found Yoda staring at him, Anakin had returned at some point and was watching him silently from the back of the room.

 

“Nicely done Master Kenobi,” Yoda nodded at him in approval and Ewan felt himself flush with pride, because he’d done it, just him.

 

And then Ewan saw the knowing look on the wrinkled green face staring at him and fought back the urge to swear at him.

 

Yoda rose to his feet and Ewan wondered how long he’d been sitting there immersed in his thoughts of Anakin when the muscles in his legs suddenly cramped.

 

He slowly straightened them out in front of him and stretched, closing his eyes. He felt calm and at peace and he was loathe to lose those feelings. They felt nice and he hadn’t felt them in some time.

 

When he opened his eyes finally, because he didn’t think Anakin would take being ignored to kindly for very much longer, he instead found Anakin lounging on the floor where Yoda had been sitting smiling at him.

 

“Anakin,” Ewan said cautiously because he wasn’t sure he liked that look on Anakin’s face. He’d seen a look like that on Jude’s face once and he’d ended up puking in a toilet for five hours.

 

“Obi-Wan.”

 

“Why do you only call me that when we’re alone?” It wasn’t what he’d been meaning to ask but it was the first thing that came out of his mouth.

 

Anakin smirked at him. “Because you let me,” he let a hand move slowly and it was then that Ewan noticed that there were two human hands in front of him. Not one human hand, one robotic hand.

 

Two human, flesh and blood hands.

 

Did that mean that they hadn’t fought Dooku and had their asses soundly kicked?

 

And then Anakin touched him, laying a hand on his knee, and that thought fled. Because Anakin was touching him… and it felt normal.

 

They stared at each other in silence.

 

Anakin moved first, sitting up straight moving across the floor so he was right next to Ewan, leg touching leg.

 

And when Anakin reached the hand that had been resting on his knee up to cup his face, thumb caressing the skin gently Ewan forgot to breathe.

 

Anakin leaned forward and helplessly Ewan followed suit, their foreheads touching and Ewan closed his eyes and gasped… he could feel the desolation, the sadness rolling off Anakin in waves and he wanted to know the words, the right words that would make things better.

 

Anakin’s emotions crashed over him and Ewan had no protection against them (they’d only had the one meditation class, shielding wasn’t for two more days), they obliterated the calm and peace that had been so hard won while he’d meditated with Yoda and it made him wish that he was Anakin’s Obi-Wan.

 

Because that was who Anakin wanted. Who he needed.

 

He wanted the man that remembered him, not the one that was confused, with no memory of their past, that had to be taught like a child the most basic of Jedi skills.

 

Finally Anakin drew back; Ewan opened his eyes and realized that Anakin was still touching him only now he was staring at him like he could see into Ewan’s soul.

 

Which he probably could since Ewan had no defense at the moment against him.

 

“I want you to remember,” Anakin’s voice was laced with anguish and Ewan closed his eyes against it. He wanted to cry for the heartbreak that Anakin was experiencing.

 

He startled when he felt warm lips brush against his, when he opened his eyes Anakin was gone.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin was avoiding him.

 

He’d come to that realization when Anakin hadn’t returned to the apartment by the second night.

 

The first night he’d thought maybe Anakin was a bit uncomfortable over his mini-breakdown in front of Ewan.

 

And then the kiss.

 

Did all Jedi men kiss each other on the lips?

 

He couldn’t remember anything from George that would have led him to that conclusion, although in retrospect he guess he’d kind of always thought the relationship between Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan was a little more friendly then they’d shown on screen (he had half a mind to ask Obi-Wan about it the next time he saw him).

 

When Anakin hadn’t returned by the following morning Ewan started to get a little concerned, he got a lot concerned when a young Padawan of sixteen (was he going to have to regrow the Padawan braid now that they were retraining him?) showed up to escort him to the Jedi Temple for the lesson in Jedi Battle Tactics with Mace Windu.

 

The class was fascinating (George had never really gone into why they did some of what they did and it was nice to know that there was a reason behind it) definitely held his interest for the close to three hours that they’d sat there and listened to the older man speak.

 

During the first hour of the class Mace would have to call attention back to himself as the younglings spent a good portion of the first hour studying him from the corner of their eyes.

 

He wondered who taught them subterfuge and if he would be sharing that class with them as well.

 

He walked to lunch with the younglings since no one had appeared to tell him where to go next, it would have been nice if someone had given him a written schedule complete with directions and possibly a map.

 

He sat at a small table with four younglings that all seemed to have lost their abilities to speak since every attempt to draw them into conversation led to them staring at him with wide eyes.

 

Finally he’d given up and eaten the brightly colored mush on his plate that tasted like turkey with mashed potatoes and gravy that had been forced into a blender.

 

He’d been walking back to the classroom with the younglings when another Padawan had caught him at the door and indicated that he was to follow him.

 

He was led back to the meditation room where Anakin had kissed him and was unsurprised when the Padawan bowed, issued a respectful “Master Kenobi” and walked away.

 

“Master Kenobi,” Yoda’s voice beckoned him and he walked slowly into the room. The small Master was sitting on the floor, the windows were shaded and room was as a result dim.

 

If there had been candles lit he might have been worried about his virtue.

 

“Master Yoda,” Ewan walked into the room, the door closing shut behind him.

 

“Fear I sense in you, confusion,” Yoda indicated that he should sit across from him and Ewan fell into a cross-legged position with much less grace than Obi-Wan would probably have exhibited.

 

“Anakin…” he started, then stopped. Because he wasn’t sure if Yoda was aware of anything that had happened between Obi-Wan and Anakin and if he didn’t know then Ewan didn’t want to be the one to spill the beans and get them both booted out of the Jedi Order.

 

Obi-Wan would figure out a way to destroy him if he managed to lose him his job.

 

“Worried for the boy you are,” Yoda nodded.

 

“He’s not a boy,” Ewan stated, and it wasn’t like what Yoda or the others called Anakin mattered, but if Obi-Wan and Anakin were going to have been in a relationship it worked much better in his head as well as for his continued sanity if Anakin wasn’t the fresh faced boy that Hayden had been back in the second movie.

 

“No,” Yoda agreed. “A youngling he has not been for a number of years.”

 

Yoda peered at him. “A bit of Obi-Wan I sense in you now.”

 

“What do you mean ‘a bit of Obi-Wan you sense in me’?” Ewan asked, eyes narrowed.

 

“Knowledge that only Obi-Wan Kenobi would possess is inside your mind, locked away somehow.”

 

Ewan flashed suddenly on that bright room and Obi-Wan sitting across from him talking. The face that was a mirror image of his only with a beard, looking at times sad and other times joyful.

 

“There is no guarantee that you will remember any of it though.”

 

“He’s been talking to me,” Ewan said slowly with dawning realization. “In my dreams, when I’m unconscious, when I’m…”

 

“Knowledge he gives you, how you use it is for you to determine.”

 

“That’s a great help… can’t you just tell me what he would do in this instance,” Ewan knew he sounded petulant and sort of whiny but he kind of didn’t care.

 

Yoda smiled, it sent shivers down Ewan’s spine.

 

“Go home Master Kenobi.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin had been back to the apartment while he’d been being stared at by younglings and confused by Yoda.

 

His cloak lay over the back of the couch and a half empty cup of that coffee stuff sat on a table.

 

He wasn’t there when Ewan came home though and his absence made the apartment seem large and empty. He wondered when that had happened, when he had come to rely on Anakin being around.

 

He’d sighed, undressed down to his leggings and thin shirt and then wished for Anakin to return for help in getting his boots off.

 

When he finally succeeded in removing them he was on such a positive high that he attempted to battle the kitchen.

 

It looked like something had blown up and he contemplated cleaning it while he munched on some warm bread and sipped from a bottle that he’d found in the cooler.

 

The fluid had a sweet taste and reminded him of orange juice; he tried not to think about that fact that it was blood red.

 

He gave up on Anakin finally when it was dark outside and he’d been sitting in the living room on the couch that wasn’t really as uncomfortable as it looked for what seemed like hours.

 

Anakin would come to him when he was ready.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The apartment was silent and Ewan wasn’t sure what exactly had woken him. He’d been sound asleep and then suddenly he’d been wide awake, heart pounding in his chest.

 

He stared at the ceiling, listened and heard nothing. Even Anakin would have to make noise if he had returned home.

 

Maybe a nightmare?

 

Finally he decided that he would not get back to sleep unless he checked the apartment to make sure everything was where it was supposed to be.

 

He grabbed his lightsaber from the table, even though he had no clue what exactly he’d do with it if he found an intruder… throw it at them?

 

Anakin had been the one that was going to handle his lightsaber training, Ewan wondered if Anakin was MIA because of the kiss or because he didn’t want to teach him how to use the weapon.

 

The door opened with an almost silent ‘snick’ and Ewan stopped dead in his tracks.

 

Anakin had returned.

 

Soft light glowed in the main living room, and Anakin sat in the middle of the floor, legs crossed, hands on his knees, eyes closed.

 

Ewan stood there for a moment just watching the other man, the way the light danced over the angles of his face. He looked sad and tired and Ewan was loathe to force contact between them if Anakin wasn’t ready.

 

“Obi-Wan,” Anakin’s voice was soft, not a whisper but not normal speech and Ewan turned.

 

“I didn’t want to interrupt,” he said apologetically. Anakin smiled ruefully.

 

“You can always interrupt me. Besides my mind is too occupied to really be calm and meditate like I should.”

 

Ewan moved further into the room and Anakin watched him. When he knelt on the floor next to him Anakin’s face went totally guarded and blank.

 

They stared at each other, Anakin not moving a muscle while Ewan tried to figure out why his stomach was tied up in knots.

 

He didn’t move while Ewan studied him.

 

“You’ve been avoiding me,” Ewan finally said softly.

 

“Not intentionally I swear,” Anakin smiled. “Padmé… Senator Amidala returned from Naboo. She requested an audience with you, but since you are…” Anakin didn’t finish. “They sent me to sit with her.”

 

Ewan looked away, not quite understanding the pain in his chest and the twisting of his stomach. It felt somehow like he’d been betrayed in some little way.

 

He felt Anakin’s hand on his chin and looked up to meet his eyes. Anakin’s thumb caressed his cheek, ran over his lips and the breath stalled in his chest again.

 

“You respond to my touch like you remember me… but you don’t remember me… it’s all very frustrating.”

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“No,” Anakin shook his head, bending close. Warm puffs of air danced against his face and Ewan remembered to breathe when he realized that the pain in his chest was because he wasn’t. “You don’t need to be sorry. I should have… it was too soon, I should have waited.”

 

Ewan watched him carefully, the way that Anakin’s eyes showed no visible emotion.

 

That pained him.

 

“We were lovers,” he finally said, all the hints and clues and he wondered why Obi-Wan hadn’t just point blank said ‘oh by the way Anakin is my lover don’t destroy my relationship with him’ instead of telling him ‘The relationship between Anakin and I is complicated’.

 

Well no shit, if he’d known up front he could have handled this all much better.

 

“Yes,” Anakin’s hand tightened against his face.

 

“Why didn’t you…”

 

“Master Yoda thought it was best if you remembered on your own,” the sneer in his voice indicated what Anakin thought of that proclamation.

 

“Wait a minute, Yoda knows?” Ewan’s eyes went wide. He thought the Jedi order had a problem with personal attachments and relationships.

 

Maybe it was because they were both men… or was it okay because they were both Jedi.

 

“Of course he knows, did you really think the fact that we share an apartment still has gone unnoticed?”

 

“Well I thought… you know to save money…” Ewan managed weakly.

 

“The apartments are issued to us as Jedi, we don’t pay for them.”

 

“Oh… that’s nice of them.”

 

Anakin snorted. “It’s the least they can do since they send us out into battle to be killed or worse.”

 

“I’m not really a fan of dying.”

 

Anakin smiled. “And you’re not going to…” he leaned forward and like before Ewan responded. He worried at that, Eve, the girls, Jude… they would all fucking kill him if they were to see him now, leaning forward to be kissed by another man.

 

But even with those thoughts he was helpless to stop his responding.

 

“I’m going to kiss you,” was whispered against his cheek, his eyes closed.

 

“Are you going to run away again?”

 

“No.”

 

And all thoughts of anyone but Anakin flew from his head as Anakin’s lips touched his.

 

Softly, gently he was kissed. His lips parted on a sigh and Anakin’s tongue delved forward and Ewan was helpless to do anything but respond.

 

“Anakin.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

He’d thought things would be awkward between them. The fact that they’d sat on the living room floor making out like a couple of teenagers.

 

Instead he’d woken up to find Anakin in his bed, quite literally wrapped around him, arms and legs locking him into place like Anakin was afraid that he’d take off if he woke first.

 

He’d laid there for long minutes, trying not to think about anything. Because was it infidelity if it happened in an alternate universe where he wasn’t even himself?

 

Thankfully both of them were still both clothed so his proposed infidelity wasn’t even an issue, but the way that Anakin looked at him and kissed him he was pretty sure that it was going to be.

 

And very soon.

 

Still he quite enjoyed the security that he felt with Anakin’s arms wrapped tightly around him.

 

He was relaxing again and thought he might go back to sleep so of course that was when Anakin’s comm had gone off. Anakin had woke with a shot and from the sound of Ki-Adi Mundi’s annoyed voice Ewan had figured out that they were running late.

 

And then they hadn’t had time to be awkward.

 

Anakin had shoved him into the Fresher, handing him a plate of bread and cup of that coffee stuff that he was going to have to find out the name for when he came out.

 

Then they were both dressed and on their way although Ewan’d had to run back to the apartment when he’d realized two hallways away that he’d forgotten his lightsaber.

 

Thankfully Anakin had just bit his tongue and not said anything, but from the glee in his eyes and the half-smile Ewan was sure that he wasn’t ever going to live it down.

 

They’d made a quick jog through the hallways, Ewan was glad Anakin knew exactly where they were going because he was hopelessly lost at this point.

 

A map, with detailed instructions and little ‘You Are Here’ signs would be quite helpful. He’d have to suggest that to Yoda next time he saw him.

 

Finally breathless and over an hour late they stood outside the room where Ki-Adi Mundi was supposed to be teaching Ewan shielding and control.

 

They both stood there, staring at the door with apprehension.

 

“What’s the usual punishment for being late?” Ewan finally asked.

 

“I don’t know,” Anakin shook his head and Ewan looked at him curiously. “You always made sure I was a half hour early for my classes.”

 

“Well… it can’t be that bad right? I mean I’m a Master I wouldn’t be, you know, grounded or taken out back and beaten or anything… right?”

 

The door opened and Ki-Adi Mundi stared down at them with a perturbed expression.

 

“Oh just come in, there will be no beatings or groundings or subsequent essays assigned for your tardiness,” he said with mild exasperation.

 

“Well I’ll just… go,” Anakin waved his hand down the hall avoiding the other Jedi’s curious eyes. “I’ll see you after…” he looked at Ewan and Ewan nodded in return.

 

Anakin made a move that looked like he was going to lean down to kiss him, realized suddenly that they had an observer and instead patted him on the shoulder awkwardly.

 

Then spun on his heel and stalked off.

 

“In a mood today is he?” Ki-Adi managed, he didn’t smile so Ewan wasn’t sure if it was a joke or if he was serious.

 

“It started off well enough I guess.”

 

“I bet it did,” the Jedi said enigmatically ushering Ewan inside.

 

Ewan just stared, because what the fuck?

 

Did everyone know that Obi-Wan and Anakin were fucking like bunnies or something?

 

Way to keep a secret guys.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“Padmé,” Anakin took the young Senator’s hand between his and kissed the top of them. Obi-Wan had beat good manners into him at a young age.

 

“How is he Anakin?” Padmé sounded worried and Anakin tried not to mind that Obi-Wan had a close friendship with this woman.

 

His relationship with Obi-Wan was just as close and they had whole other levels of intimacy that Padmé would never manage to attain… but the fact that she was worried about Obi-Wan irked him nonetheless.

 

It implied a depth of feeling that he would just as soon she not feel for his beloved Master.

 

Of course the fact that she had requested an audience with Obi-Wan and had never mentioned his name and then had seemed disturbed that he’d shown up in Obi-Wan’s steed irritated him as well.

 

He didn’t like the thought that they might be keeping secrets from him. Even though Obi-Wan had never managed to keep secrets from him before… he was tenacious like that. If he felt like something was being hidden he would poke and prod until Obi-Wan gave in and told him what he wanted to know.

 

“He’s still recovering from the last attack,” Anakin said. Padmé moved to sit and Anakin joined her.

 

They’d been friends when he was a child, but as the years had passed she preferred to deal with Obi-Wan more than him and their friendship had soured slightly. It had only been in recent years that they had even been able to talk with each other once more and a lot of that had to do with the fact that Obi-Wan could be stubborn when he wanted to be and had forced them to work out their perceived differences.

 

“When Chancellor Palpatine contacted us and told us what had happened…” she shook her head slightly. “I’m glad that you were here for him.”

 

“I’ll always be here for him,” Anakin stated emphatically. And that would never change; Anakin would only leave his side if Obi-Wan forced him to.

 

Padmé smiled briefly. “I don’t doubt that in the least Annie, you were always the most loyal to him.”

 

“How long are you here for?” he finally changed the subject back to the reason that he’d come back to her apartments.

 

“Just till the end of the week… Anakin I would like to see him before I leave,” she said softly. “He is my friend as well and I worry as much as you do for his health and continued safety.”

 

Anakin stood and paced to the window. Looking out over Coruscant, as a child the sight had always amazed him. The living planet he could remember calling it once.

 

“His memory… whatever the poison was…” he shook his head and stiffened when he felt Padmé’s hand on his back.

 

“Chancellor Palpatine said that the poison that he was subjected to caused amnesia, that he remembered very little, and that was mostly only names and faces.”

 

Anakin closed his eyes.

 

“Does he remember anything else Anakin?”

 

“He remembers some things, generic things that anyone would remember. He remembers Master Yoda and Master Windu and some of the Council members. He remembers me. But the majority of his memory is foggy; things that were, are important are completely lost to him.”

 

He gave a bitter laugh. “He can’t even remember how to wield a lightsaber, can’t shield properly, sometimes his voice is even different. Some of the things that he remembers never even happened.”

 

Anakin could remember the brief flash that he’d gotten of himself and Padmé kissing. It hadn’t been hard to promise Yoda not to peer into Obi-Wan’s mind if those were the images that he was going to be seeing.

 

Things that had never happened but now lived inside his Masters mind.

 

He took a breath, released it and did it again. Trying to calm himself. “But he’s still Obi-Wan; he still feels like Obi-Wan… he’s just a bit… different.”

 

He drew a breath and stiffened his shoulder, the weight that had been Padmé’s hand falling away.

 

“I’m so sorry Anakin,” her voice sounded sad. But she had to know that he believed very few words that actually come from her mouth.

 

“I would still like to see him,” she persisted. “Maybe it will help.”

 

He didn’t trust her, as sure as he knew that Obi-Wan still cared for him, still loved him within the muddled confines of his mind, he did not trust her with his Obi-Wan.

 

His eyes narrowed as he stared at nothing. Because did she really believe that her presence would cause Obi-Wan’s memories to resurface when his own had not?

 

He turned to face her and saw the worry plainly etched on her face. It wasn’t often she allowed her emotions to show, for her to demand this and for her public façade to falter…

 

He wasn’t made of stone.

 

“I’ll see what I can do.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

The apartment was empty when Ewan returned to it. Which honestly was showcasing a bit of a trend that he didn’t really care for.

 

At least this time he hadn’t had to have someone walk him back to it. It had taken him four trips down wrong hallways (and really had anyone thought of numbering the fucking doors?) before he’d found the one that his palm worked on.

 

He shrugged out of the cloak that Anakin had forced around him that morning, even though he wasn’t going outside and it really hadn’t been that cold even if he had planned on it and unclipped the lightsaber that he still didn’t know how to use from his belt and tossed everything into a pile on the couch.

 

Then thought better of it and hung the cloak up on what he assumed were the little hooks for exactly that purpose and placed the lightsaber on the metal table right next to the couch.

 

He sat, decided that he’d rather lay and made himself as comfortable as he could considering his legs hung over the arm of the one side. He closed his eyes and tried to force his body to relax.

 

He hadn’t thought that working on just keeping somebody out of his mind would make him so tired. And there had been moments when he hadn’t even felt Ki-Adi Mundi breach his pathetic defenses which left him to wonder exactly what the Jedi knew about him.

 

What Anakin knew about him.

 

He did the deep breathing exercises that Yoda had recommended and let his mind drift.

 

It worked for maybe ten minutes before he heard the door ‘swish’ open and Anakin’s low amused laugh.

 

He smiled in response and it was a few seconds at most before he felt gentle lips pressed against his own and the weight of Anakin’s body settling down on his.

 

Fingers combed through his hair and if he’d been a cat he would have been purring and arching (well he was kind of arching but he was definitely not purring).

 

They laid there for long minutes, lips moving lazily against each other, neither moving to deepen the kiss.

 

Maybe Anakin could sense the same thing Ewan could. That it was to soon, things were still to uncertain.

 

And while Ewan was okay with the kissing thing, the sex thing was another issue. He thought he should exhaust all his options of getting home first, and if (when) they all failed then he could move into another relationship.

 

There was also the fact that he thought they should at least have an official date before sex commenced, he didn’t want Anakin to think him easy or something.

 

Their lips parted and Ewan remembered that breathing was mandatory while Anakin laid his head on his shoulder. As the bigger person Ewan thought Anakin should be on the bottom so he could lay his head down. But it seemed comforting and Anakin’s weight grounded him in the here and now.

 

He wrapped his arms loosely around Anakin’s shoulders and laid his cheek against Anakin’s hair and once more closed his eyes.

 

“So what did you do today?” he asked suddenly. Then flushed. Because wow, that was very domestic and a little to ‘50’s housewife for his liking.

 

Anakin snickered and Ewan was suddenly glad that Anakin’s head was lying down and he couldn’t see his face, the fact that Anakin could probably sense his embarrassment was bad enough.

 

But he’d thought Anakin was going to return for him once Ki-Adi Mundi was done torturing him. He’d never said that he would but Ewan had thought that since they’d made up and Anakin wasn’t avoiding him anymore that he would have been waiting on the other side of the door.

 

He wondered what had been more important to Anakin then him.

 

“I met with Padmé again at Master Yoda’s behest,” Anakin lifted his head to look at him, Ewan was going for indifference (because really what did it matter that Anakin was meeting with Padmé when he was quite obviously in love with Obi-Wan) but wasn’t sure if he was pulling it off.

 

“She still wants to meet with you.”

 

“Why?” And Ewan was genuinely curious, because he couldn’t remember Padmé and Obi-Wan being all that close of friends.

 

“Because she’s your friend and she cares about you.”

 

Right, not in the movie adaptation, the fact that the two male leads were very obviously gay and in a romantic relationship should have been a dead giveaway.

 

And either Ewan was imagining things or Anakin sounded just a tad bit jealous of Obi-Wan’s friendship with Padmé.

 

Of course if he mentioned that to Anakin it would be vehemently denied.

 

“You don’t like her,” he finally said.

 

“She monopolizes your time when she’s here with issues that any diplomat could handle. She certainly doesn’t need to utilize the Jedi and especially you every single time,” Anakin sounded huffy and annoyed.

 

“She does know about the whole memory thing right?” Because honestly Ewan couldn’t see any reason with missing memories for him to have to sit with her.

 

“Yes she knows,” Anakin rolled his eyes and his hands tightened on Ewan’s arms.

 

“She thinks that maybe seeing her will trigger memories to return.”

 

“Why would seeing her cause that when you didn’t?” Ewan frowned.

 

Because it wasn’t like there were any actual memories to be found but why would the person that he was living with, sleeping with and seeing on a quite regular basis not cause them to return but someone that had been gone for months by Anakin’s own admission do so.

 

Was there something going on here that he didn’t know about?

 

“Because she’s a queen, former. And as such she has special skills that allow her to do things like this,” Ewan stared at him with wide eyes.

 

Because that was amazingly bitchy even for Anakin. Sarcastic and annoyed and it seemed that whatever the relationship had been between Obi-Wan and Padmé… Anakin really hadn’t liked it and was making no attempt to hide the fact.

 

“You don’t have anything to worry about,” he said softly. Because he really didn’t. Obi-Wan had at times when he’d talked about Anakin looked as if the younger man was his entire world and then some.

 

And Ewan himself seemed to have grown almost impossibly attached to him in a just a few short days.

 

“Of course I don’t,” Anakin smirked, and with a movement that Ewan didn’t think quite took into account the law of physics managed to flip them so that Ewan was resting on top of him. Anakin’s legs spread and Ewan was lying right in the V they created staring down at him with just a bit of shock.

 

Anakin was hard and pressed right up against him, hands linked on Ewan’s back, holding him place. And he was only human after all, he could feel his body responding to the heat under him.

 

Fuck, they might be having the sex discussion a bit sooner than he’d planned, and he might not even get the first date either.

 

“Because you’re mine.”

 

They were really going to have to talk about this thinking of people as possessions thing that Anakin was currently doing.

 

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan wasn’t sure this was a good idea. He sure as hell didn’t want to be doing this alone.

 

But Yoda had been very firm, ‘you may not accompany Master Kenobi’, Anakin had been told. Anakin had looked infuriated and Ewan had let one of Padmé’s guards lead him away before he could blow up.

 

He thought Yoda could more than handle himself.

 

And now he stood outside the door, and thought again that this wasn’t a good idea.

 

The guard opened the door and waved him past and he moved awkwardly in. Hands shoved into his robes in a move mimicked from the movies.

 

“Obi-Wan,” her voice was warm, a far cry from the monotone that Natalie had assumed during the movies.

 

Padmé walked towards him, hands outstretched and he was forced to release his from the confines of his robes to allow her to take them. She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek.

 

She stepped back, did not release his hands and eyed him intently.

 

He didn’t fidget but only by sheer willpower.

 

“Well you’re looking well,” she smiled, released one hand and used the other to pull him in the direction of the couch.

 

“Thank you…” he waited for her to sit and once she was comfortable he sat opposite her.

 

“So the reason that I wanted to speak with you,” she began slowly.

 

And she began to talk, and talk, and talk some more. Ewan was required to do nothing more than periodically nod his head to show he was still conscious.

 

He tried not to fidget, sitting on the couch with ramrod straight posture. Trying to look interested in what was being said.

 

So far nothing that Padmé had deigned to discuss seemed important enough to him to warrant a Jedi’s involvement. Granted he was pretty much relying on the fact that the Jedi got involved in only instances of crisis or war, but still…

 

He’d thought that Anakin’s jealousy and possessiveness had taken over his brain, that he didn’t want to share Obi-Wan with anyone that he didn’t explicitly have to be told to share him with. But there was an off chance that maybe he was right about Padmé, that she utilized Obi-Wan and the Jedi when there was no need.

 

He wished he had a watch or that there was a visible clock. So he would know how long he’d been sitting there with what Eve had once called his ‘listening face’ on.

 

She’d made fun of it the first time she’d seen him affect it, she’d burst into laughter and said something in French that he hadn’t caught and had never managed to convince her to repeat.

 

But the ‘listening face’ had served him well.

 

It hit him then that he’d thought of Eve without feeling a wash of homesickness. He hoped it wasn’t a sign that he was forgetting his family; it had only been a few days, at the most a week.

 

He tapped his fingers against his knees lightly and wondered if he’d stayed long enough that he could make polite excuses and leave.

 

Anakin had probably been counting the minutes and was even now most likely pacing outside Padmé’s apartments contemplating eavesdropping by way of the Force or just bursting right in, the only thing stopping him would be the fear of Yoda’s wrath.

 

“I’m sorry to cut our meeting short, but I’m supposed to meet with Master Windu to discuss the physical regimen that Anakin has put in place for me.”

 

If he’d blinked he would have missed it. Utter hatred flitted across her face (quickly, expertly masked) at the mere mention of Anakin’s name.

 

“Of course… I know how important getting back into the swing of things must be for you. You’ll come see me again before I leave,” he inclined his head noncommittally (because over his dead body), Padmé smiled softly and they both stood.

 

He thought it rude to just rush to the door and vacate the premises as quickly as possible so he allowed her to walk him there where she paused.

 

He shifted on his feet uncomfortably and wondered if there was a password or phrase that he needed to utter before she let him leave.

 

She smiled again and reached out to touch his cheek. He stiffened involuntarily.

 

Where Anakin’s touch had felt right, normal, wanted. Padmé’s had him resisting the urge to flinch back. It was unwanted and more than that it felt wrong.

 

She felt wrong.

 

“I’m so glad that you are okay Obi-Wan,” her voice was quiet, and it seemed sincere. But it felt false.

 

She allowed her hand to drift back to cup the back of his head and she urged him towards her. Lips just barely touching his before he managed to throw off the shock and push her away.

 

“What. The. Fuck.” He managed to not scrub a hand over his mouth and ask for soap.

 

A kiss could not have felt any more wrong if it had been Chancellor Palpatine puckering up and telling him to ‘lay one on me big boy’, the image made him shudder and he flinched back from the hand that Padmé was reaching out to him.

 

“It’s okay,” she said fiercely. “Anakin doesn’t know.”

 

He stared at her in shock, because she could not be implying what it sounded like she was implying.

 

Then he turned, managed to get the door open without thinking to deeply about how and fled.

 

Yes it made him a coward.

 

He wasn’t sure how this Anakin would react but movie-verse Anakin would probably kill first and ask for proof of the supposed infidelity later.

 

The guard that had brought him over was waiting on the platform, Ewan wondered if he’d been waiting there the whole time or if he’d been summoned back when he’d fled the apartment.

 

There was no way that Obi-Wan had been having an affair with Padmé. Besides the fact that she was still alive and he kind of got the impression that Obi-Wan couldn’t keep a secret to save his life. When they’d spoke Obi-Wan had only talked of Anakin.

 

He never told you they were lovers. A little voice inside his head whispered.

 

Well he never even mentioned Padmé. He retorted sharply.

 

And now he was arguing with his own internal dialogue.

 

This so couldn’t be good for his continued mental health.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin wasn’t waiting at the landing pad when the speeder arrived at the Jedi Temple. Which in Ewan’s eyes could only be a good thing since he kind of thought that he looked guilty even if he wasn’t sure he had anything to be guilty about, besides the fact that it wasn’t even him that should be feeling guilty in the first place.

 

Obi-Wan had a lot to answer for the next time Ewan got his hands on him.

 

He really just wanted to go to his room, lock the door and kick things until he figured out what the fuck was going on.

 

So of course that meant the universe (who obviously was having a ‘fuck with Ewan McGregor day’) had to send Yoda to fuck up all his plans, the Jedi Master appearing suddenly in front of him blocking his way.

 

“Sent Young Skywalker to spar with Aayla Secura, scaring the younglings he was.”

 

“He’s kind of over protective.”

 

“Mentioned this before you have once or twice,” Yoda looked up at him and Ewan wondered if he should possibly kneel so Yoda didn’t get a crick in his neck.

 

“Your meeting with Senator Amidala went well did it?”

 

“It went okay I guess,” Ewan managed. He did not mention the fact that Padmé had kissed him and was thankful that he’d had at least the one class on proper shielding techniques.

 

He thought that might come in handy. At least people (read Jedi or Sith Lords) would have to dig through innocuous thoughts on where dirty laundry went in order to get to it.

 

“She really didn’t have much to say,” except for that thing where she implied that you were cheating on Anakin, that snarky inner voice whispered silkily. He was definitely not telling Yoda about that though, that was need to know information only, and really until he got to yell at Obi-Wan he wasn’t planning on telling anyone about that.

 

He liked all his limbs right where they were thank you very much.

 

“I’m not sure why I had to be there.”

 

“Asked for you she did, not in the habit of turning down Senators requests for conferences are we. Most certainly not Senators that have the ear of the Chancellor, good terms we wish to remain on with them.”

 

Ewan wondered if that was Yoda’s way of saying that he had pimped Obi-Wan out in order to stay on Padmé’s good side and have her whisper nice things about the Jedi into Chancellor Palpatine’s ear.

 

He hoped that wasn’t the case seeing as how Palpatine was the Sith Lord and wanted nothing more than to destroy the Jedi and all they stood for.

 

“Still think she could have talked to someone else.”

“Tried to send Young Skywalker in your steed we did, would not talk to him other than to ask about you.”

 

“That might be because she hates him.”

 

“You’re back,” Anakin’s voice was filled with relief and happiness at seeing him standing there. If Yoda hadn’t been peering at him curiously or there Ewan had no doubt that Anakin would have been patting him down searching for internal injuries or broken bones.

 

Ewan wondered if he had a test for fidelity and if it would work even though he wasn’t really Obi-Wan just shared similar appearances.

 

“How went your session with Aayla Secura?” Yoda held the top of his walking stick and stared at him intently.

 

“It went okay, she handed me off to Master Windu because she thought my masculinity would be threatened if she kicked my butt too severely, so she let Master Windu do it instead.”

 

“You don’t sound to upset about it?”

 

“Well I was distracted,” Anakin stared at him with heat and Ewan flushed, fighting obviously made Anakin horny.

 

He would have to remember that for future reference.

 

“And he didn’t beat me that badly, if I’d been all there instead of wondering when you’d get back I might have actually beat him for a change.”

 

“You shouldn’t have been distracted worrying about me, I can take care of myself,” Ewan stated firmly. Because he was pretty sure that was what Obi-Wan would have said. Anakin raised an eyebrow at him and both he and Yoda looked doubtful to that prospect.

 

“I can,” he muttered defensively.

 

“I’ll meditate an extra hour tonight in penance, how about that.”

 

“Should make you cook instead.”

 

“Only if you really want to go back to the Healers Ward.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

His resolve to not saying anything to Anakin about the Padmé kissing him thing lasted until they walked into their apartment and Anakin looked at him with raised eyebrows.

 

He broke.

 

Obviously he wouldn’t do well under torture.

 

“Padmé kissed me,” he blurted out.

 

Obviously that hadn’t been what Anakin had been expecting to hear, his eyes narrowed, his hands clenched and he looked absolutely infuriated.

 

Ewan took a few steps back just in case that anger was directed at him.

 

“I didn’t kiss her back,” he felt the need to add. “She insinuated that we’d been fooling around behind your back… we haven’t right? Because I wouldn’t… that would be wrong.”

 

Anakin took a deep breath, unclenched his hands. And then took another deep breath.

 

“Anakin?” Anakin’s silence was beginning to freak him out just a bit. Should he be running for his life?

 

“I’ll kill her,” Anakin muttered softly, Ewan was barely able to hear him. “You have never cheated on me. Padmé has tried this trick one time to many.”

 

Ewan frowned, because what was this, a version of Punk’d in an alternate universe? Whose bright idea was it to Punk the amnesiac Jedi who wouldn’t know it was a joke?

 

When he saw Ashton Kutcher he was kicking his ass just on general principle.

 

Anakin took a step forward. Ewan took a step back and it was like they were dancing, except it wasn’t romantic, Anakin was definitely leading and Ewan was kind of scared of what Anakin would do once he got his hands on him.

 

It was three steps back before Ewan hit the wall and could go no further. Anakin kept moving forward until he was well within his bubble of personal space.

 

There was anger still visible on his face although Ewan didn’t think it was directed towards him.

 

“You would never cheat on me and if someone tried to take you away from me I would destroy them so totally that there would be no proof that they even existed.”

 

Ewan’s eyes widened. “That’s not very… uh… Jedi of you.”

 

Anakin smiled thinly. “Yoda told me once that I would make a poor Jedi. That I allowed emotions to rule me,” he pulled Ewan into him, hands tight against his hips and he thought that he might end up with bruises.

 

Better bruises than missing limbs he supposed.

 

“You’re mine,” Anakin whispered against his lips. “I dare anyone to try and take you from me.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

The little cabinet in the fresher had three different bottles with three different types of pills.

 

None of them were labeled (and really who had unlabeled bottles of drugs in their medicine cabinet anymore?) and he wasn’t sure if he really wanted to play Russian roulette with his life just to get Obi-Wan to answer some questions.

 

Or possibly go home.

 

Ewan stared at all of them and wondered if he could convince Anakin to just knock him upside the head without telling him why.

 

Finally he just dropped two of each into his hand and stared at them. The white ones looked sort of like Tylenol so he dropped them back into the bottle they’d come from.

 

Green or blue.

 

Blue or green.

 

He hmmed to himself and heard Anakin moving around in the bedroom that it appeared they were now sharing. He wouldn’t be alone for much longer, the threat to their relationship had caused Anakin to not be able to go more than ten minutes without making sure he knew where Obi-Wan was.

 

The fact that he was in a bathroom that had only one entrance did not seem to factor into the equation for him.

 

The green was a pretty shade but the blue ones just looked more peaceful and he popped them into his mouth before he could change his mind.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The first clue that there was something wrong?

 

The fact that no one spoke some quirky comment about him being back again.

 

The bright room was less bright and more neutral tones when he finally opened his eyes.

 

He blinked quickly, sat up and did not find Obi-Wan sitting cross-legged beside him.

 

Did not see him at all.

 

Oh this couldn’t be good.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin had tried to dissuade him from meeting with her the second time. Had all but ordered him not to go, had threatened to lock him in their rooms which was just mean since Ewan might have got the doors at Padmé’s to open for him but he’d had no luck with the ones in their apartment.

 

Possibly Anakin had keyed them so they wouldn’t work for him but he didn’t like to think like that, in case of an emergency that would be bad.

 

Ewan didn’t like being told what he could or couldn’t do. He was an adult and he could make his own decisions (even if sometimes they were really wrong decisions) and he had decided that he was going to confront Padmé.

 

Anakin had then dragged Yoda into it, quite literally and Yoda had told him not to go as well but had said ‘the choice ultimately is yours and yours alone’, and even though Ewan knew in his gut (since he hadn’t got to see Obi-Wan to confirm it that was what he went with and his gut was very rarely wrong except when it came to Jude and that didn’t count since Jude wasn’t there) that Anakin was right, that there had been no affair he still wanted proof.

 

So he went.

 

He wanted to get Padmé to admit that she was a lying scheming bitch who had never touched a hair on Obi-Wan Kenobi’s head let alone anywhere else on his body.

 

He wanted Padmé to look him in the eye and try and pull another fast one on him.

 

So that he could point a finger at her and call her a liar to her face, take her to task for doing this to someone who had no memory so had no way to refute it.

 

And it wasn’t as if he really thought that Padmé would tell him the truth. This Padmé was so different from the version that Natalie had played that they might as well have been two different characters.

 

All in all he would have preferred to deal with Natalie’s Padmé; at least she would only have been mooning over Anakin and hiding a pregnancy not very well.

 

Unfortunately he was dealing with this Padmé, she ushered him in, smiling the whole time. Hand touching his back and he tried not to stiffen in reflex.

 

Not able to completely shake the foreboding that he felt. This Force stuff was a pain in the ass, how did anyone get anything done if they were always having bad feelings?

 

But she was just a girl, half his size and if came to it he was pretty damn sure he could take her.

 

“I wasn’t sure that you would come back,” she waited for the droid to serve the beverages and then waved it away. She handed a cup over to him and he held it between his hands.

 

He hadn’t wanted to come back, but with Obi-Wan having not appeared in the bright room (and he really hoped that Obi-Wan had managed to get himself into Ewan’s body and not sucked into the bright light, then he hoped that Obi-Wan wasn’t fucking his life up as completely as Ewan was fucking Obi-Wan’s up) this was the only other way to find out exactly what had happened here.

 

“Anakin didn’t want me to,” he said finally.

 

“Anakin,” Padmé’s face turned ugly and he looked away. “He’s a child; I don’t understand how you could have chosen him.”

 

He stared at her and reached out with all the fledgling Force that he could muster, he had no idea how to use it. For all intents and purposes he was starting at the very beginning like the younglings that stared at him in the hallways.

 

Padmé’s hatred of Anakin rolled off her, so severe that Ewan had to look away to break the contact and draw a shaky breath to try and steady himself.

 

He took a sip of the tea, closed his eyes and wished this meeting was over. Wished that he was back at the apartment that was beginning to feel like home with Anakin hovering over him being overprotective and possessive and sweet at turns.

 

He stood, walked to the window and wondered what Padmé expected him to say when she maligned so bitterly the person that he loved and depended on the most in this fucked up universe.

 

He touched a hand to the window and his breath hitched as he felt numbness spread quickly through his body.

 

He turned and stared at Padmé in horror as she rose to her feet.

 

He stumbled back a step, back hitting the glass hard and the glass dropped from fingers he could no longer feel. His tongue felt thick and unruly.

 

“What have you done?” he gasped. His stomach hurt and he couldn’t concentrate. Anakin, oh god Anakin.

 

He slipped down the glass, landing in an undignified heap on the floor, watching her approach him ever so slowly.

 

“Shh,” she murmured softly, running a hand over his head, gripping his hair and roughly pulling his head back. His neck exposed and the droid that she had dismissed earlier was by her side once again.

 

How had he missed that?

 

She plucked something from between the droids fingers and ever so slowly snapped it around his neck, letting his head fall forward.

 

He felt empty, lonely. Like some part of him was missing.

 

“My dear, dear Obi-Wan,” she kissed his cheek and he gasped for breath. Fighting to find some part of the Force that he had just moments ago had access to.

 

“Why?”

 

“I’m doing what you’ve always told me to do, I’m taking what is mine and I’m going to protect it,” she pressed her lips against his and he mercifully slipped into darkness.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The summons to Yoda couldn’t have come at a better time Anakin decided. Because he was about three seconds from hopping into a speeder and sitting outside Padmé’s door until Obi-Wan emerged.

 

Safe and sound and no longer worried about the fact that he might have cheated on him.

 

Anakin wanted to hit Padmé. He really wanted to do worse than that but Obi-Wan would never allow it, any of it. He would say that she was crazy and needed their help and forgiveness, not their anger and then he would frown at him disapprovingly and Anakin would have to beg forgiveness when it was her fault because she was forever trying to take what wasn’t hers.

 

If she would just learn to keep her hands to herself…

 

“Master Yoda,” Anakin called and he felt the nudge against his mind that was Yoda telling him to come in.

 

It surprised him to see Chancellor Palpatine sitting across from Yoda, cross-legged on the floor. Hands on his knees.

 

It was an odd look, something he’d never seen and really, truthfully hoped to never see again.

 

“Young Skywalker,” the Chancellor nodded a welcome at him.

 

“Have a seat you will,” and Yoda waved him to the floor near them.

 

“Is there something going on?” Anakin eased into position and looked from one to the other.

 

Because Chancellor Palpatine had never visited the Jedi Temple. Not once in his recollection, he’d been to the Healers Wards yes, but never walked the extra steps to enter the Temple itself.

 

And he hadn’t even thought that the Chancellor and Yoda had exchanged more than five words since Palpatine had become Chancellor.

 

“Just discussing Master Kenobi and Senator Amidala we were,” Yoda inclined a head towards Chancellor Palpatine and Anakin glanced at him.

 

The Chancellor was looking at neither of them. Staring instead at the floor and Anakin wondered for what reason he had come to them.

 

Padmé was a close associate of the Chancellor’s he’d thought, friends in some small measure. If he was concerned about her Anakin would have thought he would meet directly with her.

 

“Master Kenobi is meeting with Senator Amidala as we speak,” Anakin tried to keep the anger that he felt at that woman from his voice. From the way Yoda was looking at him it appeared he’d not even come close to succeeding.

 

He could not help feeling justified in his anger. Obi-Wan was his to protect and shelter, as much as he would allow anyway.

 

The fact that he had been emotionally reeling from what she’d said to him, so worried that he had in some small way wronged Anakin and didn’t remember it.

 

Well that meant Anakin wasn’t doing his job. He should never have allowed the first meeting, although it was possible that she would have appealed directly to the Jedi to meet with Obi-Wan instead.

 

“Are you sure it was wise to allow them to meet unattended?” the Chancellor’s voice was soft and his eyes finally left the ground to meet Yoda’s.

 

Anakin wondered why the Chancellor was avoiding looking at him. He’d thought they were friends, when Obi-Wan had been unconscious in the Healers Ward the Chancellor had made time for him every day so he had someone to talk over his fears with.

 

“Master Kenobi, very stubborn he is,” Yoda finally said.

 

“Why are you worried…” he never got to finish the question, his breath rushed from his body as the Chancellor looked over to meet his eyes and he felt the Force flare in him.

 

“You’re a Jedi,” he breathed.

 

“Not a word you will speak of this,” Yoda commanded. “Not to anyone, not even your Master Kenobi. Things are muddled enough in his head.”

 

“Why?” Anakin didn’t like feeling bewildered. He liked even less the feeling that he’d been used in some way.

 

“The Dark Side of the Force, growing stronger it is. Clouding judgment, masking intents.”

 

“Causing my guards to make unwise decisions,” the Chancellor muttered.

 

“You think the Dark Side has something to do with why Obi-Wan was attacked?” he asked it bluntly and he used the name he was most attached to. There was no longer a need for pretense in this room; they both knew exactly what his relationship with Obi-Wan was.

 

They had probably discussed it behind his back.

 

“Yes. Senator Amidala is involved somehow although we’ve yet to determine in what capacity.”

 

“Do you think she was the one that poisoned him?” Anakin’s eyes narrowed and his voice was angry and he was already envisioning her excruciatingly painful death if she had been the one.

 

“No…” the Chancellor locked eyes with Yoda once more.

 

“What know you of the Sith Young Skywalker?” Yoda asked the question but the Chancellor was the one that looked at him awaiting his response.

 

“Just what you and Obi-Wan have told me. There is one Master and one Apprentice. Obi-Wan killed one though no one is sure which he destroyed.”

 

“We know now that Master Kenobi destroyed the Apprentice.”

 

“How?” Anakin asked, not sure if he truly wanted the answer.

 

“Because all of our intelligence indicates that Darth Maul’s Master was Count Dooku.”

 

“Count Dooku,” Anakin laughed, waiting for the others to do so as well. They didn’t. “That’s a joke right? Because I thought the Sith went after power, Dooku didn’t seem very powerful to me.”

 

“Powerful enough to almost destroy you and your Master,” the Chancellor said quietly. “He would have if Master Yoda had not intervened.”

 

“No joke is this Young Skywalker, Count Dooku is the Sith Lord that looking for we have,” Yoda frowned at him, Chancellor Palpatine tapped his fingers against his knees, seemed to realize what he was doing and linked his hands together to stop the movement.

 

“And do we know who his new apprentice is?”

 

“Yes, but it appears that they may have split. Their goals are not the same. Dooku seems to be trying to destroy Master Kenobi for reasons known only to him. While his apprentice has appeared to have returned to the light…”

 

“Trying to protect him he is. Using whatever means are available,” Yoda looked at him gravely.

 

“Who?” Anakin stared at Yoda, willing the name to come to him. Willing Yoda to not say the name that he was sure was going to spill forth.

 

Then he willed Yoda to invent a way to go back into time so he could lock Obi-Wan into their room and throw away the key.

 

Obi-Wan who was an ever present presence in the back of his mind, the presence that he checked first thing in the morning even though he was lying beside him and checked last thing at night even though he was lying beside him.

 

“Anakin.”

 

The voice screamed clearly in his mind through the Force, the Chancellor and Yoda heard it as well he could see, Yoda came swiftly to his feet at a speed that Anakin hadn’t seen him move at in years.

 

The Chancellor closed his eyes like he was attempting to latch onto Obi-Wan’s Force signature and reel him in.

 

Then he felt the fear, the pain, a flicker in the link between them.

 

And then he was gone.

 

A tear ran unnoticed down his cheek at the sense of loss and then he was in motion. Obi-Wan had last been at Padmé’s.

 

Was probably still there.

 

That’s where he would go, that’s where he would find his beloved safe and unharmed and that’s where he would annihilate her.

 

He had promised Obi-Wan that if anyone tried to take him away that he would destroy them… and he would.

 

Both of them. Because he knew who Padmé was helping and he would be damned if they would succeed.

 

Obi-Wan was his and his alone.

 

By walking away all others had long ago given up rights to him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The room was dark when he woke. That in itself was unusual. Normally it was so bright it gave him a headache now it was so dark he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face.

 

He thought momentarily of complaining, because damn… couldn’t they find a happy medium somewhere?

 

He tried to turn on his side and found himself unable to move his left leg.

 

He lifted his head, peering blearily into the dark as he wiggled his leg to confirm that yes; it was still there (just because Anakin had all his limbs didn’t mean that Ewan wanted to start losing them in his place) and then heard the distinct noise of metal hitting metal.

 

He let his head drop back down onto the pillow and groaned. Then winced because that thing that Padmé had fastened around his neck right before he’d passed out was digging into his skin.

 

He scrabbled at it with his fingers; he could just barely pull it away from his skin without choking himself.

 

He knew what it was, he hadn’t read very many of the books but he knew a Force-inhibiting collar when he felt one keeping him from touching something that he’d grown quite used to.

 

He wondered how Obi-Wan was coping in a world where there was no Force just movies about it.

 

He was optimistically hoping that was where Obi-Wan had disappeared to because the alternative just didn’t bear thinking about.

 

He sighed and tried to remember if there had been anything useful in the books that he’d read that would tell him how to get the collar off.

 

He was pretty sure that even if he had a bobby pin that it wouldn’t work, and that was even if he could remember how to pick a lock. It had been years he might have lost his touch.

 

He scratched his chin, and wondered why Padmé had restrained him by the leg instead of chaining up his arms.

 

The door opened suddenly and he blinked at the sudden light. Two figures stood in the doorway, one small and petite that could only be Padmé (he silently groaned because he really wasn’t up to dealing with her right yet, he didn’t even have an escape plan put together) and a taller figure, obviously male that stood directly in the light so he couldn’t make out a face.

 

It was probably going to end up being someone he knew (he was really hoping for it to be someone other than Chancellor Palpatine).

 

Because if he really had to die he would prefer it be by Anakin’s hand not by the creepy Emperor in the making.

 

“You’re awake,” Padmé sounded pleased and he squinted as she walked toward him.

 

He cringed back as far as he could (which wasn’t far, damn ankle chain) when she sat on the bed beside him and he knew his face was a mixture of revulsion and loathing when she leaned down to stroke his cheek.

 

Even without the Force she still felt wrong and he couldn’t figure out why.

 

“Padmé,” the other scolded softly and Ewan frowned. The voice sounded familiar, to familiar and he strained again to make out a face. Wracked his brain trying to put a name to the face.

 

Padmé sighed, touched his cheek once more and stood.

 

“I’ll just leave you two alone to get reacquainted shall I,” she smiled briefly, touched the others arm and left. The door closing behind her shrouding the room in dark once more.

 

He felt the shift of air as the other moved across the room and it felt like his heart was just going to leap out of his damned chest as he waited for him to do something.

 

Say something.

 

The thin mattress dipped as he sat on the bed beside him and Ewan near jumped out of his skin, certainly his entire body tensed up expecting a blow, torture, something horrendous and painful. He was a man he could take it.

 

He didn’t know how to react when he felt soft hands touch his ankle.

 

Releasing the restraint and Ewan drew his legs to his chest and scurried into the corner of the bed.

 

A low chuckle and he frowned. He so knew that chuckle, he’d heard it on more than one occasion as the owner of it had told dirty jokes about sheep herders.

 

“Oh my dear young Padawan,” a gentle hand came out to cup his cheek tilting his head up so his eyes could meet a dead mans. “You should know that I would never hurt you or allow any harm to come to you.”

 

Ewan just blinked.

 

Not quite understanding how Qui-Gon Jinn who had fucking died in his arms in the first movie was sitting on the bed smiling at him like this was an every day occurrence.

 

The dead coming back to life, sitting down and having conversations with him.

 

Obviously he was still unconscious.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin paced outside the Jedi Council chambers. Patience was really not his strong suit, especially when his Master was missing.

 

Padmé’s apartments had been empty; Anakin had wanted to break every priceless belonging there in anger, because of Obi-Wan there had been no sign.

 

Anakin knew that Obi-Wan had been there though, knew that something horrible had happened from the cloak dropped by the window, by the cup laying broken next to it.

 

Yoda had taken samples to have tested and they had come back some drug that could not be determined.

 

He continued pacing.

 

Ten steps down, ten steps back, every so often he would glare at the door. They were wasting valuable time, every moment they spent here was more time for Padmé and Qui-Gon to make good their escape.

 

He knew he should be sitting calmly in one of the seats, knew that if Obi-Wan had been by his side he would have forced Anakin down in one of the chairs to wait for the Council to decide their fate.

 

Except Obi-Wan would have been inside the closed Council chambers if he’d been there, which he wasn’t because Padmé had stolen him away.

 

And now the Council discussed in their safe little chamber whether someone would be going after them and if so whether Anakin would be accompanying them.

 

There was no doubt in Anakin’s mind that he was going after Obi-Wan, either with the Council’s blessing or without it.

 

He’d ‘borrow’ a ship if he had to.

 

Because leaving Obi-Wan within Padmé and Qui-Gon’s hands any longer than was strictly needed was unacceptable.

 

With just one meeting Padmé had managed to cause Obi-Wan to question his own loyalty to Anakin, with the second she’d managed to kidnap him, separate him from the Force and reunite him with Qui-Gon Jinn.

 

And with as muddled and confused as Obi-Wan’s memories currently were there was a chance he would welcome Qui-Gon back with open arms, not remembering that the man had betrayed and abandoned him and that in a moment of weakness Obi-Wan himself had swore to destroy him.

 

“Jedi Knight Skywalker,” the door the Council Chamber opened and he was summoned in. The door closed behind him and he let his gaze travel between Master Yoda and Master Windu.

 

The room was empty with the exception of those two.

 

He tried to avoid looking directly at the seat where Obi-Wan would normally be ensconced but his eyes were drawn there involuntarily despite his best efforts.

 

His heart clenched at seeing it empty, he wanted to scream at the unfairness of it.

 

He tried to wait patiently for the decision. Obi-Wan would have been serene and calm, Anakin was not Obi-Wan no matter how hard he sometimes tried to emulate him.

 

“Well?” he finally burst and was almost immediately cowed by a stern look from Mace Windu, Obi-Wan would hear about his disrespect when he returned he had no doubt. Yoda just appeared amused.

 

“Go after Master Kenobi we will,” Yoda stated calmly.

 

Anakin closed his eyes and felt some of the tension in his body release.

 

Soon, he promised Obi-Wan even though he knew the other could not hear him. I’ll find you soon.

 

“When do we leave?”

 

“Not quite yet,” Yoda looked over at Master Windu who had his hands steepled in front of his face and was studying Anakin intently.

 

“We’re wasting time; every second we delay you are allowing them to get farther and farther away.”

 

“Calm yourself Skywalker,” Mace Windu reprimanded him sharply. Anakin drew a breath and released it, trying to project an outward image of calmness when he most certainly wasn’t anywhere near attaining that emotion.

 

“The other decision to be made is whether accompany Master Windu you will. Not helping your cause with your outbursts,” Yoda frowned at him.

 

“The boy is a liability we cannot afford,” Master Windu said decisively. Anakin bit his tongue to keep from snapping that he was far from a boy.

 

“You won’t rescue him without me,” Anakin said confidently, Master Windu raised an eyebrow in response.

 

“Explain your reasoning you will,” Yoda motioned.

 

“You know how confused my Master has been, memories of events that have not transpired he vividly recalls. Things that did transpire he does not. With the exception of myself and Master Yoda, he does not trust anyone; he’s even been suspicious of Chancellor Palpatine who has done nothing but try and assist him since he was originally poisoned. Since you are not sending Master Yoda on this mission…”

 

“Go to confront Count Dooku I do,” Yoda nodded. “Master Windu will lead the mission to recover Master Kenobi from Qui-Gon Jinn and Senator Amidala.”

 

“Then you’ll need me there. With what he’s been through over the last week, he will not trust easily someone who appears to rescue him, even if he is a Jedi,” Anakin locked eyes with Master Windu and hoped he would understand what was being said.

 

Obi-Wan did not trust anyone, there were times when he did not even trust Anakin, there were moments when he was terrified of him and backed away.

 

And now Obi-Wan had been taken, separated from the Force and forced into a reunion with someone who had betrayed him so completely that there had been moments early in his training where Anakin had worried that Obi-Wan would give up and abandon him like Qui-Gon had abandoned Obi-Wan.

 

Mace Windu inclined his head in a motion of agreement although the expression on his face was sour; he was obviously anything but pleased to have to take him along.

 

“Good, Knight Skywalker to accompany Master Windu then. Let us hope that we are all successful in our endeavors,” Yoda nodded once, the decision made.

 

“Chancellor Palpatine, foresight to place trackers on all Naboo ships. Hurry you must before change ships they do.”

 

Yoda handed a small black box to Mace Windu, Anakin watched, fingers itching to snatch it from his hands and find some way to boost the signal.

 

“May the Force be with you both,” Yoda intoned quietly.

 

“You as well Master Yoda,” Mace Windu glanced at Anakin then back at Yoda and sighed.

 

Still not pleased to have Obi-Wan’s wayward former Padawan along most likely.

 

Anakin didn’t care, if in the end it led him to Obi-Wan… well he would play nice with just about anyone.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan jerked away from the hand on his face and practically flew across the room.

 

Qui-Gon looked amused, but Ewan had seen enough bad horror movies to know that the dead coming back to life was anything but good.

 

He liked his brain exactly where it was, in his head.

 

“I’m not going to hurt you Obi-Wan, why would I have gone to all this trouble just to harm you,” Qui-Gon’s voice was gentle, coaxing and he crooked his finger at Ewan, patting the bed beside him.

 

Ewan stayed exactly where he was.

 

“Of course you’re not going to hurt me, you’re dead after all.”

 

Qui-Gon frowned. “What nonsense has Yoda been spouting off at you now?”

 

Ewan narrowed his eyes. Because wow, Liam had never had that level of animosity in his voice when in character discussing Yoda.

 

Things were just too weird in this whacked out universe and he was getting tired of having to second guess himself.

 

Who to trust, who not to trust.

 

At this point he was strictly at trusting only Anakin, at least Anakin was only obsessively possessive, he hadn’t poisoned him and drugged him and kidnapped him. What the fuck was up with that anyway.

 

“You are dead, you died in my fucking arms,” Ewan said tiredly. He leaned heavily against the wall and tried not to appear like it was the only thing keeping him from falling flat on his ass.

 

“I did no such thing,” Qui-Gon scowled, stood and moved swiftly toward him. And the only reason Ewan didn’t dart across the room to get away from him was because he was pretty sure if he took two steps he was going to end up flat on his face instead of his ass.

 

Qui-Gon’s hands were gentle as he propelled him across the room back to the bed; Ewan sank down onto it and rolled away from him.

 

He was tired of feeling overwhelmed by people who were totally out of character, he was tired of not knowing what his actual relationships with these people were, by reappearances of characters that were dead and he really wished George would just yell cut and they could start all over again.

 

Plus his vision was blurring with little dots and he felt kind of nauseous.

 

He wanted people to stop drugging him, and he wanted someone to remove the sign that was obviously on his back that said that it was okay to do so.

 

He raised a hand to pull ineffectually at the collar around his neck. It hurt, more than just the pain of having it on, but the pain of knowing that it was preventing him from accessing the Force which he’d become quite accustomed to over the last week.

 

“Take this off,” he muttered petulantly. He sounded like one of his girls in a right snit. He didn’t care.

 

Qui-Gon ran his hand over the collar, his finger dragging along the skin of his neck.

 

“I’ll remove it,” Ewan relaxed slightly, eyes closing. “When I’m sure you will not try and escape.”

 

Ewan scowled. Prick, he thought before he let the darkness take him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“What have you managed to get me into this time?” Obi-Wan’s voice was such a wonderful sound to hear that it was all he could do not to hug him.

 

“Where the fuck were you?” Ewan growled, he rolled onto his side and managed to sit upright with much effort.

 

Obi-Wan was a goddamned liar, pain didn’t translate over his aching limbs.

 

“I managed to gain access to your body,” Obi-Wan said with bewilderment. “Why?”

 

“Well next time fucking warn me alright?! Padmé fucking told me that you guys were fucking around on Anakin and then when I went back to confront her she drugged me and kidnapped me and put some godforsaken collar around my neck that keeps from touching the Force, which honestly I didn’t think I’d mind but I’d gotten fucking used to it! Then I wake up and Qui-Gon Jinn who ironically is supposed to be fucking dead is there like this is normal and, and…”

 

Obi-Wan’s face had been draining of all color as Ewan ranted. But he turned a truly brilliant shade of irate red when Qui-Gon’s name was mentioned.

 

And now Ewan was confused, because Qui-Gon was supposed to be Obi-Wan’s Master, the guy that had taught him all about being a Jedi, the guy whose death prompted Obi-Wan to take Anakin as his Padawan to fulfill a promise made as Qui-Gon lay dying in his arms.

 

“Qui-Gon is where you are now?” Obi-Wan’s voice was low and dangerous and Ewan wondered what the hell was going on.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Anakin?”

 

“Back on Coruscant probably, he wasn’t with me when I met with Padmé and she drugged and kidnapped me.”

 

“Listen to me very carefully,” Obi-Wan enunciated very clearly. “I need you to remember this when you wake up, do you understand?”

 

Ewan threw him his very best ‘I’m not a moron’ look that caused Obi-Wan to snort which just proved that however long Obi-Wan had been awake in his body it had been to long because that snort was one that Jude was prone to.

 

“Do not trust Qui-Gon Jinn. Do you understand me?”

“Don’t trust Qui-Gon Jinn,” Ewan repeated, nodding his head. “Why? Isn’t he, wasn’t he your Master?”

 

“Qui-Gon Jinn was everything to me, then he abandoned me, the only reason I even became a Knight and was able to take Anakin on as my Padawan was because Master Yoda approved me for my trials.”

 

“Oh,” Ewan frowned, his eyes widened as understanding dawned. Well this was truly a fucked up universe wasn’t it.

 

“Do you have my, your lightsaber?” Obi-Wan asked.

 

Ewan shook his head. “It was gone when I came to, but hey at least I’m not chained to the bed anymore.”

 

Obi-Wan closed his eyes and took a deep breath, like Ewan was trying his patience or something.

 

“So you and Qui-Gon?” Ewan asked when his eyes finally opened again.

 

“It doesn’t matter,” his counterpart shook his head. “None of that matters anymore.”

 

“Right.”

 

“I’m going to assume you’re on a ship,” Obi-Wan said softly. He didn’t seem to require a response from Ewan but he nodded anyway. “You need to get off it as soon as possible.”

 

Ewan stared at him in disbelief. “I don’t know if you’re aware of it but my world and your world, are two very different worlds. I wasn’t weaned from my mums tits knowing how to fly a space ship.”

 

“It’s very easy; most of the controls are marked.”

 

“Can’t we just wait for Anakin to come rescue us?”

 

Obi-Wan looked scandalized. “Most certainly not. If he has to rescue us we’ll never live it down. Best we do it ourselves.”

 

Ewan looked doubtful. “I hope you realize that if your body dies while attempting this impossible act that I’m going to want mine back.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Qui-Gon was a bit more touchy-feely than Liam had probably ever thought of playing him.

 

Whenever he visited Ewan’s dark little cell (which was often) he touched him, reverently, softly, like he was some precious possession that he’d only recently had returned to him.

 

He had to hope that Anakin wouldn’t raise his eyebrow and force him to spill his guts again.

 

Even though there was no kiss to be freaked out about, there might have been but Ewan had figured out what was going on and turned his head in the knick of time.

 

Qui-Gon had seemed quite put out that the kiss had landed on his ear but he hadn’t tried again.

 

Ewan could look quite fearsome when he wanted to. Ironically he’d learned the ‘don’t fuck with me’ glare from Angie. He’d have to remember to thank her when he managed to return, maybe he’d send her Jonny gift-wrapped. Put them all out of their misery.

 

Do not trust Qui-Gon Jinn.

 

It would have helped if Obi-Wan had been a bit more forthcoming with the details on why he shouldn’t trust Qui-Gon other than ‘he abandoned me’.

 

Qui-Gon was Obi-Wan’s Master, if there should have been one person that Obi-Wan trusted beyond a shadow of a doubt it should have been Qui-Gon.

 

Instead he was being told to not trust him, to take his life in his own hands and escape as soon as possible.

 

Obviously something had happened, something that had caused Qui-Gon Jinn to abandon his Padawan, to abandon the boy that he would have chosen over his Padawan, although he wondered if in this whacked out world if that was still the case.

 

Had Qui-Gon stood before the Jedi Council and insisted that he be allowed to teach Anakin?

 

Or had the split happened even before then.

 

What about Darth Maul? Had Obi-Wan still defeated him, had there even been a Darth Maul for him to battle?

 

He made a mental note to force Obi-Wan to spill his guts, he wanted a list in alphabetical order of who was a good guy, who was a bad guy, who was dead, who was alive.

 

He wanted to be prepared so he could figure out who the next person to drug him and/or kidnap him was going to end being so he could prevent it from happening.

 

Do not trust Qui-Gon Jinn.

 

Yeah that was real fucking helpful.

 

Ewan drew his legs up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He stared at the door and contemplated how he was going to make good his escape.

 

His lightsaber was hanging next to Qui-Gon’s on his belt, he’d seen them tangling together the last time Qui-Gon had visited him.

 

He wondered if that was Qui-Gon’s way of taunting him with the fact that he was less than a Jedi right now.

 

No Force, no lightsaber.

 

Equals no Jedi Master.

 

He’d already surveyed the tiny little cell he was encased in for possible weapons. There were none, everything was bolted down tightly like they were afraid that their prisoners would escape and attempt to take the bunk with them.

 

And it was bloody small; if he stood and reached out both arms at the same time he could touch the walls. He wondered if the room was shrinking because it hadn’t seemed that small when he’d first woke in it.

 

Maybe he was developing some latent claustrophobia?

 

He sighed, rubbed a hand across his face, picked at the collar.

 

He hated it, the skin on his neck felt overly sensitive and he wanted the damn thing off now.

 

He laid his head against his knees and wondered who his next visitor would be. They typically took turns, and they appeared to be playing some demented version of bad cop; not so bad, but still not good cop.

 

He’d had no difficulty deciding who was who in that scenario.

 

Padmé was the bad cop, continually reattaching the leg iron so that he couldn’t sit on the opposite side of the room as her, forcing him to sit on the bed with her snuggled up close right next to him. She forewent holding his hand because he’d scratched her the last time she’d tried it, she tried it again he was not above biting her.

 

Qui-Gon was obviously playing the role of not so bad, still not good cop, removing the leg iron when he came in. Massaging his ankle, speaking softly of the past like he could coax memories free if he just told enough stories. Refusing to take off the collar because if he did so ‘you’ll hurt yourself, I’m only protecting you from making a decision that you would end up regretting’.

 

He was pretty sure that Qui-Gon’s idea of what he would regret was vastly different than Ewan’s, or even Obi-Wan’s at this point.

 

Plus he was tired of having to bite his tongue to keep from telling him that no amount of stories was going to make him remember a life he hadn’t lived, but could he tell him what he’d done that was so horrible that Obi-Wan didn’t want him anywhere around him.

 

Inquiring minds wanted to know.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Mace Windu had him meditating again.

 

Not even Obi-Wan had forced him to meditate this much.

 

Part of Mace’s theory was that even though the Force connected them all together, as Obi-Wan had been his Master and there had at one point been a training bond between them, that Anakin would have an easier time plucking Obi-Wan’s Force signature out of thin air.

 

Anakin knew that it was fruitless though, knew that some large, black wall (not of their making) had separated him from his Master. From Obi-Wan.

 

And no matter how long or how deep his meditation cycles went he could not break through.

 

Could not feel his Master at all through the bond that had connected them for over half his life.

 

And while he waited and meditated and worried his anger at Padmé and Qui-Gon grew.

 

Without his Master there, without Obi-Wan’s calm demeanor it festered within him.

 

He had horrible, wonderful visions of torturing Padmé. Of tormenting Qui-Gon Jinn by separating him from the Force, all manners of the Force. Both light and dark.

 

An especially vicious vision had Qui-Gon on his knees, begging for release from his suffering while Anakin kissed and bit at Obi-Wan’s sweet lips.

 

Which of course was something that Obi-Wan wouldn’t allow.

 

The torture or the public display of affection.

 

Obi-Wan didn’t like being treated like a possession and Anakin had no doubt that when he regained his full memories (which Anakin had no doubt he would) he would be in for a long, tiresome lecture on how he wasn’t a belonging or a toy or most of all that he wasn’t a possession.

 

He actually didn’t think he’d mind the lecture because that would mean he had his Obi-Wan back.

 

The one who loved and adored him and most of all wasn’t afraid of him.

 

But first they had to find him and his would be kidnappers/protectors.

 

Anakin let himself be caught up in a vision of plucking Padmé’s hair, strand by strand, from her head. Leaving her cowering on the floor as bald as Mace Windu who was now staring at him with narrowed eyes and a pursed mouth.

 

Anakin stared at him in return. He would not apologize for thoughts that were his own.

 

Padmé and Qui-Gon needed to pay. They needed to be made to suffer like he had.

 

“You are teetering very close to the edge of the Dark Side. You fall over that ledge and I will not hesitate to destroy you,” Mace’s voice was calm and very matter of fact. Like they were discussing the weather. Or the theory of the Force against weather dynamics.

 

Anakin smiled thinly in return. “My thoughts are my own, they hurt no one.”

 

“Do you believe Master Kenobi would believe that? He believes you to be a good, honorable Jedi. I would hate to see him disappointed in his condition.”

 

Anakin drew a breath, attempted to release his anger and his hatred into the Force. Of all the things that Mace Windu could have said, reminding him that Obi-Wan wouldn’t approve was the best.

 

Obi-Wan would never stand by and allow him to take his anger out on Qui-Gon or Padmé. He would insist they needed help, he would probably attend sessions with the Mind Healers to make sure they got it.

 

And sometimes Anakin hated that Obi-Wan cared and took care of everybody else and always seemed to place himself last.

 

Mace nodded once in satisfaction and turned to leave.

 

“We’ve managed to lock onto the Tracker signal that Chancellor Palpatine supplied us with. We should catch up with them in less than a day.”

 

He walked out the door, Anakin came to his feet smoothly and followed. Hoping the path that they were following was the correct one to lead him to Obi-Wan.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Escape came on a bright and sunny day.

 

At least Ewan thought it was bright and sunny (it had to be bright and sunny somewhere in the fucking universe after all) he couldn’t really tell as his tiny cell (which was shrinking and that wasn’t him just going crazy either) had no windows and actually very little lighting.

 

He wondered if the ship had paid its electric bills or if it was Qui-Gon and Padmé’s idea of mood lighting.

 

He’d made two subsequent trips to that bright place where Obi-Wan was no longer hanging out. Ewan made a mental note to ask him how his girls were, how Jude was, how The Island premiere had gone.

 

It amused him that Obi-Wan might have had to walk the red carpet pretending to be him.

 

He wanted to be on the red carpet, he’d really like to be in a restaurant. He’d even take fast food at this point he was so tired of gruel. He wondered if that was how Qui-Gon and Padmé proposed to break him, by feeding him horrid food.

 

It was the same thing every day, the same routine every day.

 

Except for the day he escaped.

 

The guard had arrived as usual, that hadn’t been different. What had been different was the fact that the guard had set the tray down on the floor and left.

 

Usually the guard would stand in the doorway, legs shoulder width apart, arms crossed over his chest watching him eat something that could only be called food on a good day, if you gave it the benefit of the doubt and didn’t look at it or taste it in any way.

 

But this day, the glorious day of his escape the guard had left. He’d shut the door behind him but beggars couldn’t be choosers and to say he’d been shocked would have been an understatement.

 

He contemplated eating for about half a microsecond.

 

Decided that really if he was going to die he’d rather it be on an empty stomach.

 

He dumped everything on the floor, kept the tray (which was metal of some sort and would probably hurt if he hit someone upside the head with it) and the fork (because the tongs were sharp and would most definitely hurt if he stabbed someone with it).

 

When the guard returned (adjusting his pants as if he’d just gotten lucky or used the loo) he was ready.

 

The door opened and Ewan swung the tray, connected with his guards head and watched him drop like a sack of potatoes.

 

He spared a half a second to wince, because hell that had to have hurt.

 

Then he was off. Dropping the tray to the floor with a loud clatter and clutching the fork in one hand.

 

Then dropped the fork because really that was just stupid, a fork against a blaster, he’d be dead with a gaping chest wound before he could even lunge at anyone.

 

He ran as quietly as he could, ducking into corners when he saw guards and it was like he was filming a scene from the movie. Except this had never been in the movie.

 

Also... unless some of these guards were blind they had to have seen him.

 

All the time he ran and hid and thought about stupid movie scenarios he was trying not to wonder if the ship was big enough to house other ships.

 

He could multi-task when his life was in danger it seemed. His agent, his assistant and his publicist would be thrilled he was sure.

 

He decided that he wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. If the guards were blatantly looking the other way (like that one that had just stared at him, shook his head and walked in the opposite direction as the way he’d been originally been headed) then he wasn’t going to complain.

 

And the ship had to be big enough for at least one other ship. Because Qui-Gon hadn’t appeared out of thin air after all. Ewan decided that Qui-Gon would surely have been detected by the Jedi on Coruscant (he was thinking positively here and not reminding himself of the fact that the Emperor had been under the Jedi’s nose the whole time and had been none the wiser) either Padmé’s ship had docked with Qui-Gon’s or vice versa.

 

No alarm had been sounded so either the guards were continuing to look the other way or his escape really hadn’t been noticed. And really he hoped to be off the ship by the time that happened.

 

Which was looking less and less likely as he moved down corridor after corridor having no clue where he was going.

 

It would help if one of the guards that was busy not seeing him would at least point him in the right direction.

 

It was highly ironic, and really he had expected nothing less… he found the landing bay at the same exact moment that the alarm sounded.

 

Fate was a sonofabitch and really, truly hated him.

 

There was a small spaceship in the landing bay, but Ewan didn’t think that one of his girls could fit into it, hell he didn’t think Kenny could fit into it and he’d fit into Artoo’s robot body for years and if they couldn’t fit into there was no way in hell that he could.

 

He was short yes, but he wasn’t that short and it was a damn good thing that this hadn’t happened to Hayden because he’d be stuck on the ship for sure.

 

A guard shouting at him to stop got him moving toward the breadbox and he moved with grim determination.

 

He would fit in the damn thing if he had to bend himself fucking in half.

 

It really was like a gift from god that Qui-Gon and Padmé seemed to not want to hurt him.

 

That feeling lasted until a guard shot at him, and while the guards it seemed were incapable of hitting a barn with a mile high bulls-eye and a handicap, he still thought that being hit by a blaster shot might hurt.

 

And that was only if the wound didn’t kill him.

 

He clambered into the cockpit; it was a bit larger than expected on the inside but not by much.

 

Reminded himself quite forcibly that he was not claustrophobic and then called Obi-Wan a fucking liar.

 

“It’s very easy; most of the controls are marked.”

 

Bull, fucking, shit.

 

He punched buttons, pulled at controls. He tried not to think that this was the absolute stupidest thing that he’d ever done and that was counting that thing with Jude and Jonny that they had sworn to never speak of ever again.

 

He managed to get the canopy to close and moved a short distance, but before he could pat himself on the back the ship came to a shuddering halt.

 

“Obi-Wan get out of there right now,” Qui-Gon yelled. Ewan ignored him, or tried to anyway. He was pretty sure that he wasn’t moving because Qui-Gon didn’t want him to move.

 

He punched a few more buttons and felt a bit of fear at the sight of Qui-Gon stalking toward the ship with an ‘I will punish you within an inch of your life’ expression.

 

A guard slammed into the other man, the whole time looking horrified at what he was doing, had done and the little ship began moving again.

 

Then he was in space, there was no one following him, no one shooting at him… just him, his tiny breadbox of a ship and the collar that he’d not managed to get off.

 

This really was the stupidest thing he’d ever done.

 

He wanted to cry and laugh, but mostly just cry.

 

Because he was in space, flying a spaceship. It was beautiful and lovely and he wanted to share it with everyone that he loved.

 

But then he remembered that he had no idea where he was or how to get home and he was pretty sure that he was going to die and no one was going to find him.

 

Also it seemed he had turned into the stereotypical guy.

 

He was lost and he absolutely refused to stop and ask for directions.

 

Obi-Wan had swore they could do this on their own, so he would.

 

And when he died he’d go haunt the moron that had thought this was a good idea.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They’d rendered the ship unable to move but from the looks of the landing bay Anakin thought that possibly hull integrity had already been compromised and the ship wasn’t going anywhere anyway.

 

They were still cautious when they departed their own ship. You could never be to cautious Obi-Wan had drilled into his head, he’d never really understood why Anakin continually rushed into crisis situations head first without checking the severity of it first.

 

Anakin had his lightsaber out as did Mace Windu. The guards that Chancellor Palpatine had forced on them had blasters drawn.

 

The feeling in the landing bay was subdued, quiet.

 

There were feelings of distress and Anakin glanced over at Mace to see that he was looking around with a pinched expression.

 

Obviously he wasn’t the only one that felt the disturbance.

 

The guards stiffened when the doors to the landing bay opened. Qui-Gon Jinn with Padmé by his side sweeping in looking as if they were royalty.

 

Anakin wanted to cut Qui-Gon in half with his lightsaber and gouge out Padmé’s eyes with his bare hands.

 

Mace glared at him and Anakin felt the Force equivalent of a smack upside his head.

 

Qui-Gon stopped directly in front of them, Padmé standing off to one side. Anakin clenched his lightsaber tighter and tried to bury the feelings of hatred and anger.

 

Qui-Gon stared at him, a brief smile crossing his lips.

 

“Qui-Gon Jinn,” Mace said, his voice tightly controlled in a way that Anakin had heard quite a few times the first few years that Obi-Wan had taken him on as his Padawan.

 

He was pretty sure that Obi-Wan had learned that voice directly from Mace Windu.

 

Because that was the ‘lecture’ voice.

 

Anakin hated that voice, typically he’d done something horribly wrong or misguided in Obi-Wan’s eyes to get that voice and the subsequent lecture.

 

Mace Windu on the other hand had never needed for him to do something wrong in order to use that voice on him.

 

“Mace Windu,” Qui-Gon had his hands shoved up into his sleeves, he looked calm and serene and Anakin was only held back by his promise to Master Yoda to allow Mace Windu first opportunity to diffuse the situation.

 

He still couldn’t feel Obi-Wan.

 

“Where is Master Kenobi?” Mace finally came to the whole reason they were here.

 

Anakin frowned when he saw an expression of fear dart across Qui-Gon’s face, quickly banished. Not quickly enough though because Anakin had seen it as had Mace Windu.

 

Qui-Gon remained silent, Padmé a silent shadow at his side.

 

Anakin broke, his Master was somewhere on this ship, locked away from the Force and him and everything that he knew.

 

It took two steps forward and he was directly in front of Qui-Gon staring him in the face, he was hit with the idle thought that he’d thought him taller when he’d first met him.

 

He’d thought Qui-Gon utterly fantastic, larger than life and incapable of making the decisions that he’d made.

 

Oh how the mighty had fallen.

 

“Where is he?” he snarled. Mace Windu stood behind him, and Anakin thought that he felt a wave of reassurance and calm, which had to be a mistake because Mace would take him aside and reprimand him for losing control before he’d stand beside him.

 

Qui-Gon just stared at him, an appraising look his only answer.

 

“Where. Is. He?” he repeated, slowly. Enunciating each word. He allowed his hand to clench tighter around his lightsaber, allowed the other to clench into a fist because it was better than reaching out and placing the hand around Qui-Gon’s neck and squeezing the life out of him like he wanted to.

 

He hadn’t forgotten Mace Windu’s threat to kill him if he became a threat to himself or those around him and Anakin was pretty positive that if he got himself killed that Obi-Wan would find a way to resurrect him just so he could kill him himself.

 

He could be contrary that way.

 

Qui-Gon continued to remain silent, just studying him with that appraising eye that Anakin really didn’t care for in the least.

 

Padmé was the one that finally broke the silence. Her voice very quiet, very hushed.

 

Very scared.

 

And her words caused his heart to stutter.

 

“He escaped in Qui-Gon Jinn’s ship, half a day ago.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Space the final frontier.

 

Ewan rubbed at his forehead, he had a bit of a headache coming on. All those Star Trek episodes that he’d watched and now all he really wanted to do was string William Shatner and his ilk up by their fingertips for making him think space travel was cool

 

Of course, when he’d watched the shows and had fantasized about being a space captain he’d been thinking more along the lines of a ship he could move around in, pretty aliens to have sex with and Jude and Jonny to watch his back.

 

He didn’t think he’d ever thought about the fact that space was vast and if you didn’t know where you were going or have a navigator who knew where he was going, that you were almost positive to end up lost and/or dead.

He stared at the labels under the controls and willed them to make sense.

 

Because they weren’t making any, and they hadn’t for the entire length of time that he’d been glaring at them.

 

… most of the controls are marked.

 

Ewan snorted, because yeah they were marked. Just not in English or any other language that Ewan could speak or read.

 

There was one in particular that was worrisome to him and that was the one that he couldn’t decide was reading fuel or air but either way he knew he was in deep, deep shit.

 

He was either going to end up floating in the middle of nowhere and starving to death or he was going to end up suffocating and floating in the middle of nowhere.

 

And he wasn’t sure but he thought both of them would be painful and neither had been on his top ten list of activities to do before he died.

 

Also he was kind of tired but he was afraid that if he fell asleep he’d never wake up again. And while Obi-Wan had seemed calm and together being stuck in that half way point, bright room place Ewan figured he wouldn’t be able to pull it off.

 

He rubbed at his eyes, trying not to think about how much they ached and how especially fucking bored he was on top of the being tired.

 

God really hated him and Ewan couldn’t for the life of him figure out why that was. He’d not done anything especially deserving of this sort of wrath.

 

He couldn’t remember ever really thinking about it when he was an adult, but when he’d been a mere child he’d gone through a very long space/astronaut phase and he’d always kind of figured that being in space in a spaceship would be kind of exciting…

 

It wasn’t, it was boring and the scenery was only interesting for like the first couple of hours.

 

To keep himself awake he’d resorted to reciting the dialogue from all three prequels. He’d even included the special effect noises and hummed portions of the soundtrack.

 

He’d started with The Phantom Menace, trying to determine at what exact moment the movie veered from what had happened in this increasingly odd universe.

 

Obviously they’d found Anakin, so that was still the same.

 

But he’d yet to figure out where exactly Qui-Gon had abandoned Obi-Wan.

 

Had it been in front of the Jedi Council? Had Qui-Gon repudiated Obi-Wan and taken Anakin as his Padawan in spite of Yoda and Mace Windu’s disapproval?

 

But that couldn’t be the case because Anakin had been Obi-Wan’s apprentice and there had obviously been no deathbed promise made for Obi-Wan to feel obligated to train the boy.

 

It made his brain hurt, because Qui-Gon, the way that Liam had played him, wouldn’t have abandoned Obi-Wan Ewan didn’t think.

 

He would have waited for Obi-Wan to take his trials and would have taken Anakin after.

 

He hoped.

 

But things were already so different in this universe.

 

Padmé seemed to have a few screws loose, who was to say that Qui-Gon Jinn didn’t have just as many.

 

So he’d given up on trying to figure out where exactly the movie had diverged and instead had begun reciting The Attack of the Clones to keep himself awake, chuckling to himself because wow, George had some cheesy dialogue going on.

 

He tried to remember if he’d thought it was this cheesy when they’d been filming and decided that he’d been so excited about the fact that he was pretty much playing a young Alec Guinness that he really hadn’t minded.

 

He giggled (obviously due to oxygen deprivation) when he muttered Anakin and Padmé’s lines, because here they would have much rather killed each other than professed their undying love for each other.

 

Of course there was also Obi-Wan’s lines professing his love for Anakin and he wondered if George had known that the words all spoken together like they were, were going to make it sound like Obi-Wan and Anakin had been having a much deeper ‘relationship’ than they what was shown on screen.

 

He rubbed his face and closed his eyes. Only resting them, he mumbled to himself.

 

And he didn’t care if Anakin picked on him for the rest of his life and that Obi-Wan would be pissed because he hadn’t managed to rescue himself (he’d got off the fucking ship on his own that should get him some points or something) he wanted Anakin to show up right fucking now.

 

“Anakin.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

The room felt like Obi-Wan.

 

Warm, familiar and Anakin wrapped the feelings around him. Because even with Obi-Wan being separated from the Force he could pick up faint traces of his Force signature all around him and it was reassuring.

 

He spared a moment to glare at Qui-Gon Jinn, the former Jedi was sitting cross-legged across from him, the room was tiny.

 

Obi-Wan would have hated being confined to it, he liked wide open spaces. Anakin was sure there was a story there somewhere that had not yet been shared with him.

 

In the doorway Mace Windu stood, lightsaber out and ready. Anakin wasn’t sure if he was there to make sure Qui-Gon didn’t try to escape or to make sure that Anakin didn’t try to kill him.

 

Padmé had been returned to her room where guards, her own guards at that, had been stationed to make sure she didn’t try to plot something else that would ultimately place Obi-Wan in danger.

 

Anakin wasn’t taking anything for granted at this point; one of her guards was outside her door and one of the Chancellors guards had been assigned to stand beside them.

 

“You’ve grown up,” Qui-Gon smiled at him.

 

“Time has a habit of continuing to plod along even when you get betrayed by someone you trust,” Anakin growled.

 

“I didn’t betray you Anakin,” Qui-Gon looked almost wistful, Anakin didn’t need to look at the door to see that Mace was paying very close attention. “Someone just made me open my eyes and see what was right in front of me.”

 

“I was right in front of you, as was Obi-Wan and the Jedi and the people of Naboo that were depending on you to help free them.”

 

“There was no freedom,” Qui-Gon said absently, he rubbed at a mark on the floor. “There was only death… my death.”

 

“So instead you chose to let your Padawan fight a Sith alone,” Mace Windu said forcefully.

 

“I knew Obi-Wan could defeat him,” Qui-Gon locked eyes with Anakin, something in them pleading with Anakin to understand.

 

Anakin didn’t care.

 

He just knew that Obi-Wan had faced Darth Maul alone when he should have had his Master beside him, behind him, watching his back as he fought, protecting him when he went down. “I knew that he would train you.”

 

Anakin looked away, hands on his knees he closed his eyes.

 

He always found it easier to meditate when Obi-Wan was there, because Obi-Wan was his calm, his center. Since Obi-Wan wasn’t there this room that smelled like him and felt like him was the next best thing.

 

He took a deep breath and prayed for guidance. Prayed for something to lead him to Obi-Wan.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“You worry me,” Ewan wanted to laugh, instead he opened his eyes and saw Obi-Wan sitting next to him a wry expression on his face.

 

“I worry you?” Ewan muttered. “Who do you think got us in the situation in the first place?!”

 

Obi-Wan arched an eyebrow at him and Ewan growled.

 

“You’re the one that got poisoned,” Ewan grumbled. “I was just laying there on my couch listening to Jude bitch about Sienna and then I’m here.”

 

“And why do you think that is?” Obi-Wan asked grimly. “This happened not just because of my poisoning; you were only able to be pulled into my body because something was wrong with yours.”

 

Ewan blinked at him, “I’m not dead am I?”

 

“No, your friend Jude came by, found you and called for help,” Obi-Wan tilted his head. “When I woke up in your body you were in the Healers Ward.”

 

“Hospital,” Ewan corrected. “I’m… there’s something wrong with me?”

 

“Not any longer, your Healers said something about an allergic reaction to something that you ate or drank. We were actually released a little bit ago. I’d actually just returned to your home, your Jude made me lay down for a nap and here we are.”

 

Ewan rubbed his head.

 

“You didn’t think to mention the last time we were here that I was in a fucking hospital?”

 

“You had enough to worry about; you didn’t need to worry about something that inconsequential.”

 

“I still think you could have mentioned it, ‘Ewan I woke up and your body was in the hospital’. Its not that fucking hard, it’s only like eleven words, it would have taken a mere second to spit it out. But no, instead I get lectures on escaping on a spaceship that I can’t fly instead of waiting for someone to come help us.”

 

“We can not begin to rely on Anakin to always be there.”

 

“Why not? What’s so wrong about leaning on someone and allowing them to help and take care of you?”

 

“Because we are Jedi…”

 

Ewan snorted. “Because we’re Jedi,” Ewan mimicked sarcastically. “Need I remind you that you are in a relationship with Anakin. Isn’t that supposed to be against your precious Jedi code or something?”

 

Obi-Wan looked at him blankly. “I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.”

 

“The Jedi code, you know the one,” Obi-Wan continued to stare blankly at him, Ewan wondered if this to was different. Maybe they didn’t have a Jedi Code here?” The one about having no emotional entanglements.”

 

The not understanding look that Obi-Wan was sporting was very disconcerting, Ewan didn’t like it. “There is nothing in any of our laws that says that we cannot be together, that we cannot be in a relationship and love and care for each other.”

 

“But…” Ewan stared at him, he was almost positive that it had been in the movies, that Anakin and Padmé’s relationship and subsequent marriage had been against everything in the Jedi’s Code.

 

Then he forcibly reminded himself that he wasn’t in the movies that he had filmed (Qui-Gon being alive and Padmé being insane the notable differences between the universe he knew and this one that only matched it because of the names of the characters involved) he was in some sort of alternate fucked up dimension.

 

Someone really needed to give him a cliff notes version of what this universe expected him to be and how it expected him to behave.

 

“Then why?” he asked in a bewildered voice, because if Anakin and Obi-wan could be open and upfront about their relationship why weren’t they.

 

Why wouldn’t Obi-Wan allow the other man to help him, take care of him?

 

“Anakin is a very possessive lover.”

 

“Really I hadn’t noticed,” Ewan rolled his eyes. Obi-Wan ignored him; he was getting to be really good at that.

 

“If Anakin had his way we would no longer be in the field, we would be sitting safely ensconced in a plastic box that could cause no harm or injury,” Obi-Wan eyed at him. Possibly he was aware that Ewan had pretty much been letting Anakin do whatever he deemed necessary. “You cannot allow him to take over our relationship. We take care of ourselves to prove to him and to us that we are still able to.”

 

“But you hide your relationship,” Ewan stated evenly. And he knew this was the truth. Anakin had always pulled away, not touched him or kissed him when there was someone in the vicinity.

 

“We do not; we just choose not to flaunt it,” Obi-Wan ran a hand over his beard. “If people knew that we were in a relationship there might possibly be a fear that we will choose to protect each other instead of protecting those that we are sent to protect.”

 

They stared at each other.

 

“So you did manage to escape Qui-Gon Jinn?” he finally asked.

 

Ewan nodded slowly. “There’s just one little problem with that.”

 

Obi-Wan eyed him expectantly.

 

“Well I can’t fly the ship for one thing, so that was kind of stupid. I also have no clue where I am. The controls are marked but not in any language that I can read. I still have that collar thing on… and…”

 

Obi-Wan had been paling slowly as Ewan spoke. “And?”

 

“Well I think I’m almost out of either fuel or air,” Ewan dragged a hand through his hair. “I can’t read the controls so I’m not sure which.”

 

Obi-Wan closed his eyes, and the world around them… that bright place quivered.

 

Ewan wondered briefly if Obi-Wan was doing that, but then Obi-Wan’s eyes snapped open and he knew it wasn’t him.

 

Ewan wrapped his arms around himself. It felt like someone was walking over his grave which he really hoped wasn’t the case.

 

Obi-Wan stared over his shoulder, eyes wide in shock and that made Ewan shiver. He didn’t like the look of shock on Obi-Wan’s face and Ewan turned slowly to see what he was looking at.

 

His own eyes widening at the sight before them.

 

“What the…?”

 

Anakin sat in the middle of the floor a short distance from them, cross-legged, eyes closed. Form hazy and see through. He looked like a ghost.

 

He shouldn’t be here.

 

Obi-Wan moved slightly and suddenly he was crouching right next to where Ewan was still sitting.

 

Anakin’s eyes opened slowly and widened and he mouthed Obi-Wan’s name, Ewan tried not to mind that Anakin’s first thought was of Obi-Wan, because that was who Anakin thought he was. That was who Anakin wanted.

 

It shouldn’t have hurt and he definitely shouldn’t have felt jealous because he was Obi-Wan while he was in that universe; and it was probably insane but just once he wanted to hear Anakin speak his name.

 

His true name.

 

“Anakin.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Meditating in the same room with Qui-Gon Jinn was not an experience that Anakin wanted to repeat any time soon.

Mace had decided that as the two closest people to Obi-Wan, his former Master and his former Padawan, that together the two of them might have a chance to break through the collar inhibiting his connection to the Force.

Anakin did not like that Qui-Gon was there, that Mace Windu had acknowledged that once upon a time Qui-Gon had been important to Obi-Wan. He didn’t want to remember that Qui-Gon had, at one time, had a training bond with his Obi-Wan, identical to the one that Obi-Wan and he had shared.

He personally liked to think that his bond with Obi-Wan had been deeper, longer lasting than the one that Qui-Gon had shared with him.

Because his had never been severed by force. Yoda had never sat across from him and personally shredded each strand of their bond.

He had done things right, in the correct order. In the way that Qui-Gon had denied Obi-Wan by disappearing.

Obi-Wan had gone from Padawan to Jedi Knight all because he had struck down a Sith. He hadn’t thought he’d been ready for the change, though he would only admit that to Anakin years later when Anakin himself had told him that he didn’t think he was ready for his trials.

But the whole of the Jedi Council had been in attendance insisting that killing a Sith whether it be the Apprentice or the Master was a suitable trial and Obi-Wan had finally relented.

So Yoda had cut his braid and the others had nodded approvingly, though days later they would be shaking their heads in disapproval when Obi-Wan stood before them insisting on taking Anakin as his Padawan.

Anakin on the other hand had done everything in the order that Obi-Wan had set out.

He’d gone from Padawan to his trials to Jedi Knight with his Master by his side the entire time lending him his strength and knowledge. Obi-Wan had cut his braid and smiled so brightly at him, tears in his eyes and he’d known that as much as Obi-Wan wanted to destroy Qui-Gon that he had missed having his own Master at his graduation from Padawan to Knight.

He drew a deep breath.

He couldn’t relax. His eyes kept wanting to snap open so he could glare at the other man, he wanted to run his lightsaber through the other man. He wanted Qui-Gon to bleed and scream in pain for the damage that he’d caused.

But he couldn’t.

Mostly because the subsequent lecture from Obi-Wan would be hours long and they’d already spent more then enough time apart.

Then there was the fact that Mace Windu had made them give up their lightsabers.

Placing them just out of arms reach, they could use the Force to summon them of course but by that time the other would have seen the intent and be armed as well and Mace Windu would have cut off both their hands for being so childish.

He closed allowed his hands to unclench, and relaxed his body. Another breath and he realized that he was breathing in sync with Qui-Gon. He wanted to stop, to change the rhythm and force the other man to yield to him.

It was the silence that forced him to realize that something had happened. He could feel Qui-Gon in the back of his mind, piggy-backing on his link with Obi-Wan.

It felt odd and unnatural and Anakin truly did not care for the feeling.

*Flash*

Obi-Wan, head cocked at an odd angle, no helmet. Eyes closed.

He looked so tired, so pale and Anakin squashed his fear and anger, refused to lend credence to Qui-Gon’s and focused instead his attention on the gauges trying to determine where exactly Obi-Wan was.

*Flash*

His eyes were closed and Anakin frowned. He should have at least heard Qui-Gon’s breathing, as much as he didn’t want to acknowledge it.

He blinked, blinked again and turned his head expecting to see Qui-Gon staring down at him.

Instead he saw two men, Obi-Wan in a crouch, and another man, another Obi-Wan except he was beardless had shorter hair and looked a few years younger than Obi-Wan.

They both stared at him in something akin to shock.

“Obi-Wan,” he knew he spoke but he couldn’t hear the words. Could hear Qui-Gon muttering the same ones in his mind.

In return they both mouthed his name, his Obi-Wan and the other Obi-Wan.

He wondered if he was somewhere inside Obi-Wan’s mind and the man with no beard and the young face was his Obi-Wan with no memory.

Because his clean shaven appearance would certainly explain why Obi-Wan had asked for a razor.

“Can I get anything for you Master?”

“How ‘bout a razor.”

He’d been shocked when confronted with that request.

Because with Obi-Wan not remembering anything that they’d meant to each other he’d thought it wise to not mention that he liked the way that Obi-Wan’s beard felt against his skin, that Obi-Wan himself liked it because it hid the fact that he was so much younger than many of the Masters that were his contemporaries.

He thought the first might have made Obi-Wan even more uncomfortable then he had been at the time, and with no memory he wouldn’t have cared about the latter.

*Flash*

Obi-Wan’s head lolled to the left and back to the right and Anakin wanted to reach out to support him, to hold him, to keep him safe.

But he couldn’t.

If he could find a way that wouldn’t cause Obi-Wan to string him up by his toes he would keep Obi-Wan at the Jedi Temple forever.

Somewhere that he would be safe. Where people wouldn’t keep trying to take him away.

He focused his attention on the gauges again, making a note of the amount of fuel Obi-Wan had, eyeing the stars, looking for a constellation that looked familiar so he could pinpoint where Obi-Wan was floating.

Because that was what he was doing. Just floating.

*Flash*

Anakin’s eyes snapped open at the same exact time that Qui-Gon Jinn’s did.

They spoke at the same time.

“I know where he is.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin paced in agitation. It would take a day to get to Obi-Wan and that was unacceptable. He’d wanted to go to the engine room, to make a few ‘modifications’ that would probably not be approved but would cause the ship to move a bit faster and there was only a 30% chance that it would cause the ship to explode so he wasn’t sure why Mace Windu had forbidden him to do so.

Anything that got them to Obi-Wan faster was acceptable in his mind.

Because he vividly remembered the gauges on Obi-Wan’s ship and knew that Obi-Wan barely had a half a day left, he would be out of fuel and once he was out of fuel he would be out of air.

He growled and neither Mace Windu nor Qui-Gon looked over at him. They were leaning over star charts trying to find someone, anyone, that was closer to where Obi-Wan was then them.

Someone who wasn’t a Separatist or that they just couldn’t trust to turn Obi-Wan directly over to them.

It bothered him just a little that Mace was allowing Qui-Gon to assist him while he’d pretty much told Anakin to sit down and twiddle his thumbs while Obi-Wan might even at that moment be taking his last breaths.

Anakin stalked towards them, his fury wafting out behind him.

“This is taking to long,” he snarled.

Mace arched an eyebrow that seemed to say ‘you’re treading a fine line boy,’ Anakin sneered at him.

He was tired of being the good little boy waiting for his Master to be returned to him. He’d played that role enough when he was a youngling and assignments that were deemed too dangerous for him to accompany Obi-Wan had forced him to remain behind at the Temple.

He’d hated it, he’d hated any prolonged, totally unnecessary separation that kept him from his Master and he’d especially hated the ones that brought his Master back to him barely alive and thus keeping him from him any longer.

And it had only gotten worse when they moved from Master, Padawan to Master, Jedi Knight and Obi-Wan had finally consented to be his lover.

Obi-Wan had a long list of acceptable and unacceptable ways that he should react in particular situations and while he was well aware that he was in the unacceptable range of things at this point he didn’t care.

Obi-Wan was missing and hurting and possibly dying and that to Anakin was unacceptable. So Obi-Wan would just have to accept that in some situations Obi-Wan was more important to him then the image that he presented.

He always had been.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan didn’t like waking up with his chest hurting and his eyes burning. He’d hoped that by the time he woke that Anakin would have rescued him and he’d be lying on some nice soft bed with Anakin curled around him and Ewan could explain that he had split personalities and that Anakin should really call him Ewan from that point on.

He tried to raise his hand to rub at his eyes and while his arm did move to do so it worried him that it seemed so slow.

And the muscles in his arms hurt and he hadn’t even done anything particularly strenuous.

The ship jerked suddenly then, his eyes snapping wide open and he wished the fucking ship had a seat belt when his head slammed into the roof of the cockpit. He hoped he didn’t end up with a concussion from this, with no Hospital Emergency Room or Jedi Healers Ward on his horizon that would be a very bad thing.

Or possibly this was, he tilted his head up and saw a ship, bigger than the one that he’d escaped from so obviously not Padmé and Qui-Gon recapturing him.

Maybe Anakin? Though the butterflies in his stomach didn’t seem to think so.

He was such a fucking idiot.

He should have stayed on the ship with Padmé and Qui-Gon. Let Qui-Gon continue to tell him things he didn’t know and let Padmé continue trying to touch him inappropriately.

Anakin would have found him by now if he’d been on the ship still.

This must be what a tractor beam felt like and he decided that it was a bit choppier and more erratic then what George had put in his movies.

The little suicide box of a ship dropped suddenly into a landing bay causing his head to snap forward and if he hadn’t had whiplash or a concussion before it was a sure bet he had one now.

The cockpit opened without him touching anything and two strapping young men lifted him out, not very gently, while he gulped in deep breaths of pure, wonderful oxygen and tried not to mind that they were going to leave bruises that he was going to have to explain to Anakin at some point.

He wasn’t proving that he could take care of himself at all; in fact he was probably proving Anakin’s point, that he should be locked in a padded room where he could do no harm to himself.

They laid him on the ground and it was cool against his back through the fabric of his thin shirt and pants.

He blinked, clearing his vision of spots and then his lungs tried to stop working which caused the spots to return.

Count Dooku, standing above him, lips drawn into a thin line looking more evil than Ewan remembered him looking in the movies.

“You,” Dooku offered him a hand then smiled when Ewan just stared at it in horror. “You are a thorn in my side,” he crouched instead when Ewan refused to take his hand. Ewan trying to shrink away even with a floor being beneath him and guards to his other side preventing him from moving anywhere.

Dooku gripped his chin with strong fingers and Ewan flinched at the pain even as he wondered why the man was studying him like he was some sort of puzzle that he needed to solve.

“What is it about you that causes such devotion,” Dooku squeezed his fingers just a bit and Ewan made a noise of pain low in his throat. “And would that devotion vanish even if I were to succeed in killing you? Or would it make you a martyr instead, causing them to honor your memory?”

“You were the one trying to kill me?” he managed to ask without moving his jaw which Dooku still gripped.

“And I would have succeeded several times, if those hired to do the job weren’t incompetent and utterly stupid, if you didn’t have more luck than strictly necessary for one person and my Apprentice hadn’t gone against my wishes and saved you.”

“Your Apprentice?” Ewan asked numbly. Because Apprentice?

Dooku was supposed to be the Apprentice, not the Master and if he was the Master how the fuck did Chancellor Palpatine fit into all this.

And who the hell was Count Dooku’s Apprentice?

“You’ve met before, my wayward Apprentice and you. I believe you’ve spent some time closeted with him on his ship before you managed to make your way to me. Which of course made my job all that much easier. Because young Skywalker will come after you and Qui-Gon Jinn will come after you and I’ll have both as my Apprentices and you, my dear Obi-Wan Kenobi, my most painful thorn,” Dooku released his head and Ewan let it drop back onto the ground with a thud. “You will be dead.”

“You can only have one Apprentice,” he said quietly though with no conviction. Everything else was different why wouldn’t this be different as well.

“An old wives tale,” Dooku smiled widely and Ewan shivered. Dooku stood, brushing off his robes and affecting the role of congenial host even though as far as Ewan knew congenial hosts weren’t supposed to be plotting to kill you at the earliest possible convenience.

“I do hope you enjoy your stay on my ship, I’ll try to make it as pleasant as possible for you before I kill you.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

So he was a prisoner again. It was starting to piss him off, just once things should go right for him.

 

Instead he was left wondering if Obi-Wan was a member of some sort of frequent abduction club, some sort of ‘be abducted twice a year and get a free vacation to the destination planet of your choice, be poisoned and get a free upgrade to first class.’

 

Of course Obi-Wan would probably give those vacations away to charity, not Ewan though. He’d pack a tiny bathing suit and watch Anakin prance around naked on some beach somewhere.

 

Obi-Wan needed to live a little and if he could only do it while Ewan was in his body oh well.

 

Besides Obi-Wan had said that Anakin had been trying to get him to take a vacation for years, so really it was just time for one.

 

Of course all that was dependent on Ewan managing to not actually get himself killed before he managed to get himself rescued.

 

At least his cell was a step up from the one that Qui-Gon and Padmé had ensconced him within.

 

All silk and satin and rich velvets.

 

It looked like something that Padmé would like which then led him to wonder if Padmé had been working with Count Dooku as well.

 

Which then forced him to remember that Qui-Gon had been working with Dooku and had taken it a step further and was also the Sith Apprentice.

 

Qui-Gon was a Sith.

 

Obviously Dooku hadn’t been talking out his ass in the second movie.

 

He wondered if Obi-Wan had known or if this was going to have to be something that he broke gently to the other man.

 

Of course Obi-Wan would probably just tell him to kill Qui-Gon, because Sith and Betrayer and it was the right thing to do.

 

He really just wanted to go home now. He hoped that Obi-Wan wasn’t making a wreck of his life like he was making a wreck of Obi-Wan’s.

 

If he was fucking up this badly he sort of wanted to believe that Obi-Wan was fucking up as well. Because it didn’t feel right that he kept getting kidnapped and poisoned and had just generally been having a rotten turn of luck while Obi-Wan might be sitting on his deck drinking an ale and watching the sunset with his girls and Jude having a grand old time.

 

He realized suddenly, with separate pangs of guilt and despair, that he hadn’t even really thought about his girls in over a day yet Anakin had never been far from his thoughts.

 

He consoled himself by reminding himself that Anakin was here and an immediate concern, seeing how a Sith Master was trying to lure him to the Dark Side of the Force using Ewan as bait strictly for that purpose and his girls were being well taken care of by Eve and Obi-Wan (who seemed a bit terrified of them) and Jude (who Obi-Wan spoke of more than his girls and Ewan tried to think about why that was) and were safe and sound where they were.

 

Time seemed to be standing still.

 

He’d had eight meals and unless Dooku was feeding him more frequently than needed, that worked out to three breakfasts, three lunches and two dinners.

 

So where the hell was Anakin?!

 

He certainly was taking his own sweet time.

 

Why hadn’t he flown to his rescue yet?

 

“Because I don’t want him to,” Dooku stood in the doorway. Dinner number three waiting on a tray held in the hands of the droid directly behind him.

 

Dooku deigned to eat dinner with him, telling him in excruciating detail how he was going to destroy him once Anakin and Qui-Gon arrived; it appeared he only waited so they could have the dubious honor of watching.

 

And he wondered why Ewan didn’t have an appetite when he arrived with dinner.

 

He didn’t eat with him any other time; he probably forgot that Ewan was even on the ship until dinner was ready to be served.

 

“Stay out of my fucking head,” Ewan growled.

 

Dooku just smiled in that horribly condescending manner and moved into the room, the droid following at some unseen signal.

 

“I’m not in your head dear boy. You are just that easy to read.”

 

Ewan growled again. Because that had been his whole worry back when he’d thought Chancellor Palpatine was the threat.

 

The fear that his Obi-Wan mask would slip leaving just Ewan in plain sight for all to see.

 

Luckily Dooku hadn’t seemed to know Obi-Wan all that well so he just thought Ewan’s behavior typical of his amnesia/recovery from the poison that he’d had used on him.

 

But others, that knew him better. Like Anakin and Qui-Gon… it was a wonder that someone hadn’t discovered the truth yet.

 

He didn’t count Yoda because Yoda was all-knowing. He was also like his Great-Grandmaster… which if he followed the logic meant that Dooku was his Grandmaster.

 

Shouldn’t he be trying to protect him not itching to kill him?

 

Dooku lounged in the chair that he had designated as his. Ewan tried to sit as far from him as he could and still remain at the table where he could eat comfortably if he so chose to do so.

 

The droid served silently and then faded into the woodwork.

 

Ewan poked at his food, it was better than the mush but he could never completely drown out the fact that he was expecting Dooku to poison him again.

 

“I was thinking we might take off that horrible collar when we’ve finished eating,” Dooku said idly, in a ‘just making conversation’ voice.

 

Ewan’s head snapped up, because was he serious?!

 

“Are you serious?” he asked suspiciously.

 

“It pains me to see another Force user being blocked from using it by such primitive means.”

 

“Then why did you leave it on for three days?”

 

“I had to make sure that you were going to behave yourself didn’t I. You’ve not tried to escape; I believe that is cause for a reward of some sort.”

 

“So you’re going to remove the collar?” Ewan asked in disbelief. Because could it really be this easy?

 

“Well really, what sort of threat are you while confined to these quarters,” Dooku smiled thinly and Ewan shivered. The smile said that Dooku had thought of all avenues and was only removing the collar because he’d removed any and all ways that may have presented themselves to Ewan to escape his clutches.

 

“You don’t even have your lightsaber,” Dooku laid his fork on the edge of his plate and picked up his wine glass. “Besides…” he raised the glass in a mock toast to Ewan. “You are family after all.”

 

So much for Dooku not digging around in his head.

 

“But you’re still going to kill me.”

 

“It will hurt me to do so,” Dooku touched his chest, a mocking look of sadness on his face. “But it truly is the only way to obtain my goals.”

 

“If you kill me, Anakin and Qui-Gon will kill you in return and then where will you be?”

 

“Well if I kill you yes, but I won’t be killing you. Pulling the strings yes, watching yes, but to be the one to actually do the deed. No,” Dooku sounded almost disappointed at the thought that he wasn’t going to be the one to end his life and Ewan lost what little appetite he’d had when the food had been put down and pushed his plate away.

 

“Done eating?” Dooku nodded at the droid and it came forward to begin removing the remains of their meal. “Let’s take that troublesome collar off you, shall we?”

 

“Why don’t you just leave it on? I mean what’s the point if you’re just going to kill me anyway,” Ewan muttered bitterly.

 

“Well how do you think young Skywalker and Qui-Gon Jinn are going to find you?” Dooku touched the back of his neck, fingers pressing on the collar and his skin and Ewan fought every urge to skitter away.

 

Having Dooku touch him was worse than having Padmé touch him.

 

He wouldn’t have thought it possible.

 

He felt the Force flooding through him before the collar even fell totally away. He was relieved he was sitting because the feelings and emotions that raced through him would have driven him to his knees otherwise.

 

Almost without thinking he found and pulled that thin link that led him to Anakin.

 

Fear and pain and anger flooding him in response.

 

Anakin was scared and then suddenly pleased as he realized that it was Ewan’s presence he was feeling through the Force.

 

He tried to send a warning, tried to tell Anakin to not come for him (and not just because he didn’t want to die, though that was a big reason) but Dooku clamped a hand down on his shoulder and suddenly he couldn’t sense Anakin any longer.

 

“Now, now Obi-Wan. Don’t make me decide that I’ve made the wrong decision and place the collar back on you. Neither one of us will enjoy that.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

He was pacing again. Anakin was getting tired of pacing; he would rather be doing something productive that would lead to the recovery of Obi-Wan so he could stop having to be polite to Qui-Gon Jinn.

 

Although maybe that was a moot point as it seemed that Mace Windu had already decided to cease being polite to the former Jedi Master.

 

They were now arguing about a ship that was in range of where they supposed Obi-Wan’s shuttle to be and whether or not they should be trying to contact it to help in the recovery of Obi-Wan.

 

Anakin thought not, as did Mace Windu (which bothered him a little but not as much as having to agree with Qui-Gon would have), Qui-Gon on the other hand thought that anything that got Obi-Wan back quicker was worth taking the risk.

 

Anakin thought Qui-Gon was a fool and on top of that a fool that had possibly lost touch with the Force.

 

Because that ship, the one that Qui-Gon was pointing at and trying to make convincing arguments to contact, felt wrong.

 

And not just wrong in a way that meant Separatists or bounty hunters or smugglers. But wrong in a way that signaled to Anakin that they didn’t want that ship being anywhere near Obi-Wan because they might not see him again. And if they did he would not be in one piece.

 

He had made a half a mind up to just go gag Qui-Gon, then tell Mace to do whatever he deemed necessary but to do something now because he was tired of waiting and if forced to do so for much longer he would take things into his own hands, when he felt the surge.

 

His knees buckled and he went down, hard. At the console Mace Windu and Qui-Gon Jinn were no better off.

 

Both clutching the edge of it like it was the only thing keeping them from joining Anakin on the floor.

 

And then he felt it. The briefest touch of Obi-Wan’s mind against his and it was like a breath of fresh air, like drinking a glass of cool, clean water after living on a ship for months at a time.

 

Anakin suddenly felt hope like he hadn’t felt in years.  Because Obi-Wan was back, his Master was free of that damnable collar and was once again a strong, familiar presence within the Force and his mind.

 

Then he felt the fear, felt Obi-Wan pushing at him to stay away and there was no way in seven hells that he was going to do that… and then Obi-Wan was gone.

 

Thought not totally, just dimmed like someone had suddenly thrown a dimmer switch and turned his Force presence down.

 

He looked up to meet Mace Windu’s eyes; it did not make him feel any better to see the Jedi Master looked just as confused as he felt.

 

But Qui-Gon Jinn looked horrified. Scared. And for just a moment, a brief second Anakin himself felt that terror, before he locked it away and pushed himself back to his feet.

 

“What do you know?” he asked it steadily, and Qui-Gon just stared at him in incomprehension. Like he’d never seen Anakin before, then his face cleared and went blank, unreadable.

 

“That was the wrong ship to ask for assistance,” he conceded, speaking to Mace but staring at Anakin. Mace narrowed his eyes, much in the same manner that Anakin himself currently was.

 

“What do you know?” Anakin repeated himself. Because Qui-Gon knew something. Knew who that ship belonged to and just what was happening to Obi-Wan as they were speaking.

 

Qui-Gon remained silent just staring and it was beginning to irritate him, another second and he was pulling his lightsaber and wielding it to get the answers he wanted. Mace Windu and the Dark Side of the Force be damned.

 

“Answer the boy Qui-Gon Jinn,” Mace straightened his posture and Anakin had never seen him so foreboding. Not even when he was lecturing Anakin on some folly or lecturing Obi-Wan for allowing it.

 

Qui-Gon closed his eyes and Anakin shivered slightly, even though there was no noticeable breeze.

 

Obi-Wan was frightened.

 

And suddenly he didn’t want Qui-Gon to respond at all, wanted him to remain silent and not speak the words that he knew were coming.

 

“Count Dooku has him.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

The ship was very obviously damaged. No visible signs of life and Count Dooku glanced over at the technician manning the controls sweeping the ship and waited for the life sign readings.

 

He really should have just had them destroy it. He wasn’t exactly sure what had stayed his hand and made him wait.

 

It was possible he would regret that decision later.

 

He’d thought about bringing the ship on board to have it thoroughly searched, but he had not even finished that thought before he decided that was not a wise idea.

 

He thought he had Obi-Wan firmly under his control; his only way of ensuring that his prisoner remained his prisoner was to limit his movements.

 

He only had to extend his senses the tiniest bit to feel Obi-Wan’s anger, his hatred. He had been contemplating not destroying him at all, he was powerful with his anger and there was that niggling bit of doubt that told him that Anakin would be easier to control and keep under control with Obi-Wan still alive.

 

And Obi-Wan had managed to keep himself alive despite Dooku’s best efforts to kill him; there was no one else that could lay claim to that fact.

 

He was talented with a lightsaber and without his memories he was easy to throw off balance. His only faith seemed to be in Anakin and the Jedi as a whole. Keeping him alive made so much more sense.

 

But he was also a thorn in his side because Anakin would swear loyalty to Obi-Wan before he’d swear loyalty to Dooku, though if Obi-Wan had sworn loyalty to him than Anakin would follow suit he was sure.

 

Keeping Obi-Wan alive seemed to be the only way to ensure that his goals were met.

 

“There are no life signs present on board the ship,” the technician spoke clearly. He looked over at Dooku awaiting his instructions.

 

Dooku himself stared at the viewing screen. The ship was familiar, but he had disabled Obi-Wan’s so that it couldn’t fly even if he got to it, no sense handing him another ship that might possibly work and allowing him to escape that way.

 

“Destroy it.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan realized suddenly that the walls weren’t soundproof when a loud booming noise caused him to leap from his bed.

 

He wasn’t sure where he planned on going. The door was locked, he couldn’t get out. It was noise to know though, that if there was a battle he would be able to hear every sound of it.

 

He sat back down on the edge of the bed and rubbed at his temples. He had a headache now, a pounding one and he wondered if Count Dooku or one of the droids would be able to figure out what he wanted if he asked for a Tylenol.

 

Anakin was a steady presence in the back of his mind. Calm and reassuring. It was comforting.

 

Or would have been if Ewan didn’t know that every step closer he got to Ewan was another step closer to the Dark Side and Ewan’s subsequent death.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Obi-Wan was scared, Anakin didn’t like knowing that. Didn’t like feeling it either.

 

Obi-Wan had never been scared, or if he had he had never allowed Anakin to see it. Now Anakin had a front row seat because every time he reached out to check and make sure Obi-Wan was still there he felt that fear.

 

And it wasn’t himself he was scared for, or at least not all for himself.

 

He was scared for Anakin and while Anakin knew it was very likely that they were walking into a trap as long as the trap got him on the same ship as Obi-Wan he would deal with it.

 

And Qui-Gon who was trying the last of his patience.

 

He also knew now why Qui-Gon had kept his robes tight around his body; he had been hiding the fact that he had Obi-Wan’s lightsaber hanging next to his on his belt.

 

He’d seen a glimpse of it when Qui-Gon had been distracted by something Mace Windu was saying and had allowed his robes to fall open. He’d closed them in a hurry but not before Anakin had seen.

 

“We’ll be in range of Count Dooku’s ship in a little more than an hour,” Mace kept his voice light and Anakin wondered if he was trying not to spook him.

 

Anakin nodded, eyes locked on Qui-Gon. There was no way he was letting the other man out of his sight until his had Obi-Wan’s lightsaber back.

 

“He’s not going anywhere,” Mace followed his gaze to where Qui-Gon was bent over a console staring at star maps, then returned his attention to Anakin.

 

“He has Obi-Wan’s lightsaber,” Anakin murmured quietly, Mace’s eyes snapped back to Qui-Gon.

 

“You’re sure?”

 

“I think I know what Obi-Wan’s lightsaber looks like,” and he did.

 

It was the same lightsaber that Obi-Wan had let him hold when he took him as his Padawan and explained the duties and responsibilities of a Jedi. Anakin could remember looking up at him with bright eyes and thinking that he wanted to be Obi-Wan when he grew up.

 

It was the same lightsaber that Obi-Wan had placed into his hands when he’d innocently asked just weeks into his training what the difference between a real lightsaber and training lightsaber was. It had been the weight and the knowledge that the lightsaber that he held in his hands could take life, as well as protect it.

 

That same lightsaber hung on Qui-Gon’s belt and Anakin wanted it back.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan was lying on his bed. He was bored out of his mind and would give anything for a book or a TV or a lousy script to read.

 

He wondered if Obi-Wan had been to any auditions or signed for anything or if he was taking an extended break from acting.

 

He kind of hoped for the extended break himself because he was fearful of what kind of taste Obi-Wan would have in prospective movies. Ewan himself had a tried and true way of deciding what he worked on and contrary to popular belief it had nothing to do with whether or not he could show off the family jewels on the big screen.

 

That was almost always a fluke

 

If he could read the script from beginning to end without wanting to gouge out his eyes with a rusty spoon he was almost sure to sign for it. Of course that didn’t work so well when you started filming and then rewrites started coming in and the new script ended up being something that made you want to gouge out your eyes with your bare hands.

 

That had happened twice in a row, so now if he liked a script he let Jude and Eve read it and if they managed to agree on it then he signed. Because Jude and Eve didn’t agree on anything, ever, except that he was sometimes a prick. But they both, sometimes, had impeccable taste in scripts for people other than themselves.

 

That hadn’t worked with Star Wars though; he’d not let either of them read the script for The Phantom Menace because he hadn’t wanted them to tell him it was crap and to turn it down.

 

Which they would have, he knew them. Jude, after the first movie, had come right out and told him that he could have done much better. But the lure of Star Wars and George Lucas and Obi-Wan Kenobi had been too great.

 

He’d been weak. Because the minute he’d been offered the part he hadn’t cared if it was good or bad. He was playing Obi-Wan fucking Kenobi, people would remember him for that for years.

 

It was a bit different now that he was actually being Obi-Wan Kenobi and people were trying to kill him.

 

He was still bored though. Who knew impending death could be this boring.

 

He tapped his fingers against the bed and wondered if he should change his clothes and clean up. He wondered who Dooku was going to get to kill him.

 

He wondered who was staring at him.

 

He sat up slowly. He could feel someone’s eyes on him. Could feel someone watching him and he looked around the room.

 

He was alone; the door made the ‘snick’ sound when it opened and it was still firmly closed. He stood and walked to the center of the room turning in a circle.

 

Up high on one wall he could see the grate for some sort of ventilation shaft; he’d never noticed it there before. In the first movie Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon Jinn had climbed into something similar to escape the Trade Federation ship.

 

He walked closer to it, standing on tiptoes trying to pretend he was taller than he actually was, so he could peer into it.

 

He’d just decided that he needed a chair in order to be able to see anything and had turned to grab one of the ones from the table in the center of the room when the grate came flying off the wall.

 

He ducked and it barely missed taking his head off, landing on the floor in front of him with a soft clatter.

 

“What the hell?” he whipped around.

 

Yoda was shimmying down the wall, Ewan just gaped at him.

 

“Master Kenobi,” Yoda nodded. “Still in one piece I’m glad to see you.”

 

Ewan still stared at him in disbelief. Because where the fuck had Yoda come from? Had he been on the ship this whole time?

 

“Best to leave now while we still have the chance,” Yoda motioned to the hole in Ewan’s wall.

 

“Where did you come from?” Ewan finally managed as Yoda pushed at his legs to get him moving in the general direction that he wanted him.

 

“Came by ship, boarded while Count Dooku and his crew were distracted by my ship.”

 

Ewan stopped. “Then how are we getting off this ship if your ship has been destroyed?”

 

Yoda pushed at his knees with his little stick and Ewan began moving again, then turned and went back for the chair.

 

Yoda might be able to manipulate the Force enough to fly into the hole but Ewan hadn’t even figured out a way to tell Anakin that he was walking into a trap so he needed a bit of help.

 

“Master Windu and Knight Skywalker are enroute with Qui-Gon Jinn.”

 

“Yeah, right into a trap that I’m the bait for.”

 

“Know this they do, still come they do.”

 

Yoda climbed the wall and Ewan watched with a bit of awe. He wondered if he would be able to do that someday.

 

“Much re-training you still need,” Yoda nodded. Ewan shook his head because obviously Dooku wasn’t the only one digging around in his head.

 

“I’m not going back to the school with the kids,” Ewan climbed onto the chair and jumped just enough to latch onto the edge of the hole. Yoda and the Force managed to pull him up and in. He scooted forward and Yoda did some wavy hand thing that pulled the grate back into place and pushed the chair back over to the table.

 

“That is so cool,” he couldn’t help himself. He was a fan boy. When he got out of this he was so getting an autographed picture of Yoda to hang on his wall.

 

“The younglings liked you,” Yoda led the way, walking upright while Ewan pulled himself along on his stomach. His arms were going to get a great workout.

 

“They stared at me; the ones at lunch wouldn’t even talk to me.”

 

“A bit nervous they were, to have a Jedi of your reputation among them. Better they will be when you return.”

 

Ewan made a noncommittal noise in response. “It would have been nice if I could have had just one class on how to use my lightsaber.”

 

“First class I think will be on how to not lose it.”

 

Ewan scowled. Yoda was a bit of a smart ass, he wouldn’t have known.

 

Also, “I didn’t lose my lightsaber. I was drugged and Qui-Gon took it from me while I was unconscious, that can’t be my fault.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Following Yoda through the tunnel maze of ventilation shafts was not Ewan’s idea of a fun time. Ironically he would much rather be sitting back in his lavish cell waiting for Count Dooku to arrive and tell him it was time to die.

 

And it wasn’t because he wanted to die.

 

He didn’t. He really didn’t.

 

He at least wanted to live long enough to actually go home.

 

What he didn’t want to be was crawling through shafts there were designed for someone Yoda’s size to traverse, not Ewan’s.

 

His arms hurt, it was becoming more and more apparent that no one obviously cleaned the ventilation shafts because he was sweaty and he felt grimy and he could have sworn he had just shoved his hand in some kind of animal droppings.

 

He didn’t stop to look. Mostly because he was afraid he would lose Yoda, but also because the droppings had been quite large, about the size of his hand.

 

He really didn’t want to run the risk of actually meeting the creature that had made them.

 

At least not unless he had a blaster or lightsaber in his hand and knew how to use it to defend themselves.

 

“Are we there yet?” he grumbled. He knew he sounded whiny, knew he sounded like an impatient child.

 

He didn’t care.

 

Besides Yoda ignored him anyway, continuing to walk as upright as Yoda got. He had a good inch of space left above him, if he so chose he could probably stand up totally straight.

 

Ewan on the other hand would have had to have been cut off at the waist in order to do that. And he still wouldn’t have been able to walk (with the not having any legs thing) so his arms would still have hurt.

 

“This kind of sucks you know.”

 

“Quiet you must be unless you want Count Dooku to know where we are,” Yoda reprimanded him softly.

 

Ewan froze, he hadn’t even thought about that. About the fact that they were still on a ship with a psychotic Sith Master that was bound and determined to kill him once Anakin and Qui-Gon arrived.

 

“Fuck,” he muttered. He raised a hand to run it through his hair and realized a split second before he would have touched his head that his hands were filthy and kind of stunk and lowered it back to the ground.

 

He would have sold his soul for a shower (though not literally), he at the very least wanted a wet flannel, some soap and somewhere private to scrub himself down. He wished hard for the days of personal assistants instead he got Yoda who quite definitely did not fit the bill.

 

Also he would now have to scrub his brain for years in order to rid himself of the sudden image of Yoda in a low cut blouse leaning over and offering him a coffee.

 

Yoda stopped, turning to him, opening his mouth to say something. Possibly getting ready to reprimand him for his overactive imagination and it was on the tip of his tongue to utter ‘hey man you can block me out easier than I can keep you out.’

 

He didn’t get to hear what Yoda had turned to say, because the ventilation shaft made an ominous heaving motion under and around them, then made a loud screeching noise and Ewan didn’t even have time to think or react before he was plummeting to the ground.

 

Hitting it hard on his shoulder and hip and fuck that hurt.

 

“Master Kenobi,” Dooku stood above him looking pissed off as all hell and Ewan winced. This wasn’t going to go well at all. Dooku might just pull his lightsaber now and save himself the trouble of keeping Ewan around to wait on Anakin and Qui-Gon’s arrival.

 

He rolled onto his back and tried to not look as pathetic and grimy as he felt. He could handle this, he’d fucking did the road trip with Charley after all and it hadn’t been like showers and cleanliness had been their utmost priority then.

 

His shoulder ached and it felt like he’d landed on something really quite wrong, hopefully he hadn’t broken something that would require his arm be amputated.

 

Although Count Dooku might do it just so Ewan could no longer hold a lightsaber.

 

“Obviously I have underestimated you,” Dooku crossed his arms over his chest and eyed him with an interest that left Ewan feeling a bit wary.

 

Hadn’t they already done the ‘Dooku tries to tempt Obi-Wan to the Dark Side’ thing?

 

But then Dooku was the Master and he had Qui-Gon as his apprentice so maybe that fight had been just that.

 

A fight.

 

He idly wondered where Chancellor Palpatine fit into all this. Was he a good guy, a bad guy? Was Ewan going to have to apologize to him for internally besmirching his good name when he returned to Coruscant?

 

“Flush the ventilation shafts,” Dooku removed his gaze from Ewan to stare up at the hole that had been made in the ceiling when Ewan had fallen.

 

He felt like he should be apologizing and offering to pay for damages, but he bit his tongue and didn’t say a word.

 

Did he know that Yoda was on the ship or was he just guessing that Ewan (with his rather limited Force knowledge) had to have had help in order to get out of his room?

 

Dooku leaned down as one of his ever-attentive soldiers ran off to do his bidding.

 

He gripped Ewan around the arms and pulled him to his feet, wiping his hands on his cloak and making a face that blatantly showed his distaste for the state of Ewan’s clothes and cleanliness.

 

Ewan scowled in response.

 

He knew he was filthy, he knew he smelled, he knew he had animal shit of some sort on his hand, but that was no reason for people to get all hoity-toity on him because he wasn’t the cleanest person in the room.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin couldn’t help smiling.

 

Obi-Wan was all sorts of annoyed and it radiated through the Force like a beacon.

 

Besides the fact that it was leading them closer and closer to Obi-Wan it was also serving to make Anakin pleased.

 

One because it proved that Obi-Wan was still alive, but also because Anakin liked Obi-Wan annoyed.

 

Because then he got to make him un-annoyed and he really liked the process involved in that.

 

Typically it involved sex, which Anakin was never averse to but when Obi-Wan was annoyed, he tended to be less dominant, he tended to let Anakin take the lead. He let his responses be coaxed from him with gentle hands and even gentler kisses.

 

It led to Obi-Wan being sweet and compliant.

 

And he wasn’t that way very often. He was older, wiser, sometimes more mature and all that meant that he felt he needed to be the one leading, that it was expected of him to be the leader. That it was expected that Anakin would follow his directions (whether it be in the field or in their bedroom) and Anakin almost always did so with pleasure.

 

Anakin liked Obi-Wan dominant and self-assured, but he also rather liked the opportunities to lead himself, even if they were few and far between.

 

Mace was leaning over a monitor, finger tracing along it. Anakin wasn’t sure what he was looking for, wasn’t sure that Mace would even tell him if he asked.

 

It was a toss up which of them were annoying him more.

 

Anakin or Qui-Gon.

 

Right now Anakin was banking even credits on Qui-Gon, primarily because Mace had sent him from the control room with a guard but he’d allowed Anakin to stay.

 

“What are you looking for?” he finally asked. Leaning over the monitor and staring at the ship, the one Obi-Wan was on and the one, which if Qui-Gon could be trusted, was Dooku’s ship.

 

Mace remained silent for long moments and Anakin waited for the inevitable ‘please remove Knight Skywalker from the Control Room’.

 

“I’m looking for Master Yoda’s ship,” Mace finally returned quietly, he never looked up from the monitor.

 

“Master Yoda?” Anakin frowned.

 

“He was going after Count Dooku, chances are that he’s somewhere in the vicinity of the Dooku’s ship even now.”

 

Anakin peered at the monitor, he’d forgotten with the reintroduction of Qui-Gon and Padmé that Yoda had been in pursuit of Count Dooku while Anakin and Mace Windu had been in pursuit of Obi-Wan and by extension Qui-Gon Jinn and Padmé.

 

“Do you think he’s on the ship with Obi-Wan and Count Dooku?”

 

He hoped he was, hoped that he wouldn’t have to explain to Obi-Wan once they got him back safe and sound that Yoda had been lost in the act of trying to save him.

 

Obi-Wan would blame himself if that came to pass.

 

“We can only hope. There are no beacons, either friend or foe anywhere near Count Dooku’s ship currently.”

 

Anakin nodded. Stared at the small symbol that marked Dooku’s ship on the monitor and opened his awareness just a bit more.

 

He could feel, sense Obi-Wan. He should be able to do the same with Master Yoda, especially if they were on the same ship.

 

“It didn’t work,” Mace continued staring down at the screen. “There was no disturbance so I don’t believe Master Yoda to be dead but…”

 

“It’s like he’s not there,” Anakin squinted at the screen.

 

It was very curious. And undoubtedly once they managed to retrieve Obi-Wan and Yoda reappeared from wherever his current position was, he would have some rambling explanation that made sense to only a quarter of the Jedi as to why that had happened.

 

“When are you planning on getting Obi-Wan’s lightsaber back from Qui-Gon?”

 

Anakin changed the subject to something near and dear him. He hated the fact that Qui-Gon had Obi-Wan’s lightsaber dangling on his belt like some sort of obscene trophy.

 

Mace looked up at him. Narrowed his eyes and studied him closely.

 

Anakin tried to appear calm and collected. Mace might allow Qui-Gon to keep the lightsaber until they got Obi-Wan back if Anakin let any of his emotions show on his face.

 

Or ran to strike Qui-Gon down in his room.

 

As long as Qui-Gon drew his lightsaber first it would be a fair fight.

 

Mace sighed and shifted slightly. Pulling something from the confines of his robes. Laying it directly in the middle of the screen, over where Dooku’s ship was currently located.

 

Obi-Wan’s lightsaber.

 

Anakin smiled.

 

“Try and keep him from losing it again,” Mace chided quietly as Anakin reached out to take it. Holding the familiar weight within his hands. He knew Obi-Wan’s lightsaber almost as well as he knew his own.

 

He’d modeled the one he currently used from Obi-Wan’s. He’d spent hours spent studying it, making just slight differences only because it would be confusing if they were identical, he’d added his own flourishes to make it his own.

 

Obi-Wan had blushed the first time he’d shown him the finished saber. It had been his second one, the first lost in marshy swamps on some planet that Anakin couldn’t remember the name of but, though he was sure Obi-Wan would have known the name as well as the coordinates and the names of all the species upon it.

 

That showing of the second lightsaber had also been the first time that Anakin had managed to coax his first kiss from his Master.

 

It would be the last one though, the one to tide him over for years while Obi-Wan held him off with speeches that consisted of variations of the same theme: ‘you are to young’ and ‘you can’t know what you want’. The one that had kept him focused in the same direction had been the one that he didn’t think Obi-Wan had meant to make.

 

The infamous ‘if you still feel this way when you are no longer my Padawan…’

 

When that time had come Anakin had felt the same; he’d let the emotions become a part of him until it felt like he’d always loved Obi-Wan.

 

Which he had.

 

He’d loved him as a father when he’d been a youngling with no parents, loved him as a brother when Obi-Wan had finally let himself be a teacher and friend. Had loved him with the rest of his heart when Obi-Wan had let himself be open and free and smiled at him as if he was the only person on Coruscant that mattered to him.

 

The night after his trials Anakin had gone to him with no fear and if Obi-Wan had been surprised he had not shown it, he’d opened his door and his room and his heart and Anakin had managed somehow to keep it.

 

He’d been patient while Obi-Wan buried memories of Qui-Gon Jinn and let Anakin firmly entrench himself within those places that only Qui-Gon had been allowed.

 

He stared at the lightsaber in his hands. So similar, yet so different from his own. Infused with Obi-Wan’s strength of character and mind and his simple presence.

 

Anakin knew suddenly, without a shadow of a doubt that Obi-Wan would be returned to him.

 

Anakin smiled.

 

******************************************************************************

 

He really hadn’t managed to get the escaping thing down yet. Obviously he was doing some quite wrong.

 

Or maybe it wasn’t the escaping thing he was having problems with… it was the staying free once he managed to gain his freedom that he was having a trouble keeping hold of.

 

Dooku had led him back to his nice cell like he was a child, Ewan’d had the brief, horror-stricken thought that Dooku might try and punish him like one as well.

 

He wasn’t up to being smacked around. His hip ached, his shoulder throbbed and he had a bit of a headache as well.

 

All in all this particular day had just sucked. Starting out on a high note with the Yoda appearing to break him out of his prison but then it had just gone down hill once he’d managed to get into the ventilation shaft.

 

Dooku had pushed him into his room, glared at him as if the look alone would manage to incinerate him (it didn’t but Ewan had been feeling a bit warm by the time Dooku had looked away) and had then grudgingly grumbled that he would send back someone to look at his injuries before he’d stalked away his cape billowing out behind him.

 

Ewan wasn’t sure why he was bothering.

 

Especially if the game plan was to still kill him.

 

A Healer had arrived, two hulking men ambling into the room behind him.

 

The Healer had poked and prodded and Ewan had managed to not ask why he was working for someone who killed people.

 

He figured he got his answer when the Healer began poking and prodding. Asking him ‘does this hurt?’ ‘how about this?’ all the while pushing on his sore hip and his even sorer shoulder.

 

Obviously the Healer was a sadist of some sort. Probably got his kicks treating people without painkillers and jerked off to the sound of their agonized groans and screams (though Ewan didn’t scream, he was a grown man after all and had a bit of willpower) at night.

 

And it wasn’t his fault he passed out, he consoled himself with, the Healer had obviously been trying to accomplish that all along. What with the pushing and prodding and the bending off his arm back far enough that Ewan swore he hadn’t even been trying to see if Ewan was hurt, he’d been trying to see if he could snap it of its joint by hand power alone.

 

Except now he wouldn’t know if the Healer had done more harm then good, wouldn’t know if some crucial decision had been made and he’d go back to one arm and half a hip.

 

He wouldn’t know until he woke up, because at the moment he was stuck in that bright room that was his and Obi-Wan’s normal meeting place.

 

Ewan wondered if this bright place was in his mind or in Obi-Wan’s.

 

Obi-Wan wasn’t there. It was Ewan and Ewan alone and he was bored out of his ever-loving mind.

 

He wondered what Obi-Wan had done to pass the time. Had he just sat in the middle of the space meditating?

 

Ewan glanced around, there didn’t appear to be any walls and that bright light that had been encroaching on Obi-Wan’s space when he’d first been trapped in the in-between place was gone. Obi-Wan could have at least left him a board game or something.

 

At the very least a sheet of paper on which he could play tic-tac-toe against himself.

 

Ewan settled comfortably on the floor, legs crossed, hands linked between his legs. He felt an odd prickling against the back of his neck and Obi-Wan seemed to shimmer into existence, lying on his side on the floor in front of him.

 

Ewan couldn’t recall ever seeing the Jedi Master that relaxed… and sleeping. Normally Ewan arrived after him and found Obi-Wan staring down at him with the same expression of bemusement that he was sure Obi-Wan was going to see on his face once his eyes opened.

 

Right now they were still closed, eyes moving rapidly under the closed lids, Ewan wondered if he was dreaming of Anakin.

 

He wasn’t sure if Obi-Wan just woke up or if he had felt Ewan staring at him, either way his eyes opened slowly and he stretched idly. Scratching at his stomach, hand pausing as it came into contact with clothing.

 

Ewan didn’t want to know why Obi-Wan was scratching at his stomach as if he were sure there was going to be nothing between him and the fingers doing the scratching.

 

He was equally sure he didn’t want to know if Obi-Wan had been naked with anybody.

 

They’d been each other for almost two weeks now, if Obi-Wan had managed to have sex while Ewan had only managed to get himself dragged from one end of the universe to the other with a only a bit of heavy petting to tide him over he was going to be extremely pissed off.

 

If he could figure out who to complain to about that he would.

 

He jerked suddenly, awareness flooding the features of his face and he turned his head quickly to focus on Ewan.

 

They stared at each other silently. Each it seemed reluctant to break the silence. It was like something had changed with Ewan arriving first, like that simple fact had thrown something integral between them off balance and now the plain they had once stood on was shifting and neither were certain of how to stabilize themselves.

 

Ewan bit his tongue to keep from asking who Obi-Wan was fucking. Tried to remember that he slept in the nude and had for years. Of course Obi-Wan would be naked. He tried not to think about the fact that it was most likely Eve, she thought Obi-Wan was him and he’d wanted to be able to be angry without feeling like a hypocrite… but he couldn’t, because whatever Obi-Wan had been doing in his life, in Obi-Wan’s he’d been kissing Anakin.

 

And enjoying it. Craving it.

 

Maybe Curt Wild was right and everyone was just a bit gay.

 

Then he really tried not to remember that Obi-Wan hadn’t mentioned Eve once in the conversations they’d had, though Jude had been brought up numerous times.

 

Jude was his best mate, he would not take advantage of him while he was sick and so obviously not himself.

 

“So I got rescued by Yoda,” Ewan finally said, at a loss to say anything else. His voice was soft, though it still seemed to echo within the bright room with no walls. Ewan had a fantastic thought that this room would allow him to walk and walk without ever running into an obstruction or falling off the edge. Because, he suddenly realized, this wasn’t a room it was the Force somehow.

 

And if questioned he didn’t think he would be able to explain how he knew that with such conviction.

 

“That’s good,” Obi-Wan’s voice was just as soft. Their voices were still different though Obi-Wan’s now rang with a bit of Scottish burr to it and Ewan tried to determine how he would have picked it up.

 

TV? Old home movies?

 

As long as Obi-Wan didn’t find the box hidden in the secret hidey in the back of his closet they would be good. And Jonny and Jude would have no reason to hunt him down and murder him in his sleep as they’d threatened for so many years.

 

He’d sworn on a bible and a crucifix that he’d destroyed it. If they found out he’d lied… well Jonny would set Angie on him and that wouldn’t be pretty. But it was the only proof that he had that the night had actually happened and had not been a hallucination brought on by bad fish or something.

 

Besides the fact that it was a work of art and he was inclined to not destroy works of art unless held at knife or gun point and threatened with imminent death.

 

“But then the ventilation shaft collapsed and I pretty much fell at Count Dooku’s feet so now I’m a prisoner again.”

 

Obi-Wan stared at him. An expression on his face like he couldn’t decide between laughing hysterically or sobbing openly.

 

“You’re going to get me killed aren’t you,” Obi-Wan ran a hand over his beard, studying Ewan                   carefully.

 

“Well it’s not like I asked to be captured again you know,” Ewan retorted with just a shade of anger. He’d like to see Obi-Wan do any better with people left and right poisoning and kidnapping and threatening to murder him without a by-your-leave.

 

This most certainly wasn’t his idea of a fun time. He would much rather be sitting on his sofa, watching the telly, laughing at Jude or reading to his girls.

 

He certainly didn’t want to die.

 

The bright room shook suddenly, the force of tremor knocking both of them to their backs.

 

“What the…” Ewan rolled onto his side, a movement mirrored by Obi-Wan and they looked around, searching for the reason.

 

“It was a tremor in the Force,” Obi-Wan said with confusion layering every word.

 

“But what would…” Ewan never got to finish the sentence, suddenly his vision hazed and his hearing faded, he could tell Obi-Wan was still talking only because his lips were moving though he couldn’t hear a word, he looked frantic and scared and Ewan himself could relate because he was terrified that something really bad had happened.

 

He blinked and the bright room faded leaving him lying on his back in his lavish cell as the ship around him trembled.

 

He heard a loud boom, a high pitched screeching sound and he was suddenly pitched from the bed to the floor in one fell swoop.

 

It didn’t hurt and he didn’t appear to be missing any limbs or vital organs (he would insist on x-rays later only to make sure that the Healer hadn’t absconded with any internal organs, he’d heard that old urban legend, he certainly didn’t want to be living proof of it).

 

He rolled to his side and watched in wonder as his cell door opened all by itself.

 

Only half way, but open nonetheless.

 

Well what did you know… maybe the fates were going to be generous to him because of the freaky ‘falling through the ventilation shaft’ thing.

 

Or maybe God was just fucking with him.

 

Either way he eased out the door, looked both ways and satisfied that there was no one around he took off down the hallway at a brisk jog.

 

First things first… he needed a weapon. Preferably one he could use but at this point he wasn’t going to be picky.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin could feel Obi-Wan’s presence on the ship, still alive.

 

Mace had directed the gunners to shoot at the engines, to immobilize the ship. Dooku’s gunners had fired retaliatory shots a split second later.

 

They’d exchanged fire for minutes, before the gunners managed to destroy the guns on both sides and now Dooku’s ship was still.

 

No shots fired, though the gunners fired a final one over the nose of the ship just to be sure.

 

Anakin glanced over at where Mace was leaning over a monitor. He wondered what they were waiting for. Obi-Wan was on that ship, possibly Master Yoda as well. But still they stood there doing nothing.

 

Anakin hoped that Mace Windu was not waiting for Count Dooku to throw up a white flag and admit defeat, Anakin thought that highly unlikely at this point.

 

“Are we waiting for something in particular?” Anakin finally asked. Luckily Mace didn’t appear to take offense, normally at the sight of his impatience he would get a lecture, then someone (Mace most likely) would tell Obi-Wan and he’d get another lecture.

 

It had gotten slightly better when he was made a Jedi Knight but not by much. And half of him still thought that Mace Windu had purposefully waited for those moments when Anakin made a mess of things, when his control was at its weakest (typically when Obi-Wan had been sent away without him) just so he could point a finger and remind everyone that he was right and Anakin was not fit to be a Jedi.

 

“No,” Mace touched the screen gently and it went blank. He stared at it for a moment longer and Anakin suddenly realized that Mace was still searching for a sign of Yoda’s presence.

 

Anakin clenched his hands into fists when two guards entered, Qui-Gon trailing them and another two guards entering behind him.

 

“What’s he doing here?” Anakin managed to ask without growling. It was an accomplishment, Obi-Wan would be proud he was sure.

 

“We’re taking him with us,” Mace swung his cloak around his shoulders, not allowing Anakin to catch his eye as he busied himself with fastening it. Running a hand over his belt to make sure that his lightsaber was still there, Anakin did the same.

 

Just to be sure.

 

His lightsaber, Obi-Wan’s dangling from his belt next to it.

 

Anakin ran fingers down Obi-Wan’s lightsaber. It reassured him as much as Obi-Wan’s emotions flooding to him through the Force did that there was an end in sight.

 

By the end of the day Obi-Wan would be back by his side as he belonged.

 

Most likely fighting Anakin and insisting that Qui-Gon needed help and instead of a death sentence. He’d probably set the sessions up himself and insist they all three attend so that they could move on.

 

“Why?”

 

Qui-Gon turned to him, face an emotionless mask.

 

“Because he doesn’t trust me on the ship by myself.”

 

“What about Padmé?”

 

“I don’t trust her by herself either, but I’m less concerned with her ability to escape the Qui-Gon Jinn’s,” Mace stated as he walked towards the door. Anakin turning to follow, Qui-Gon grudgingly following them both.

 

“If you do anything to jeopardize…” Anakin began.

 

“I tried to protect Obi-Wan, I wouldn’t have done all this just to betray him now,” Qui-Gon said tiredly. “By taking Obi-Wan from Coruscant I most likely signed my own death sentence. My Master does not forgive those trespasses lightly.”

 

Anakin didn’t look at him, didn’t want to find him sincere and have to decide whether or not to help Obi-Wan with his former Master’s therapy. He found it easier to remain stoic and silent and not make a decision either way.

 

He’d have to make it soon enough, he preferred to do it after Obi-Wan had been rescued, because Qui-Gon would most likely do something new to earn Anakin’s anger and he could return to feeling hatred and pity for the man.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Dooku scowled at the clone that was even now shrinking back from him.

 

“What do you mean he escaped?” he snarled.

 

The clone stammered an apology even as Dooku waved a hand and sent him flying against the wall, where he crumpled and was still.

 

His comrades remained silent, each bent to the task they’d been working on.

 

Two more clones appeared in the doorway to his silent summons. Standing at the ready, neither looked at their fallen compatriot.

 

He snarled at them, Anakin Skywalker and Qui-Gon Jinn were finally here; his plans hadn’t changed although he was even now questioning the wisdom of destroying the other Jedi in order to gain Skywalker’s allegiance and Qui-Gon’s continued loyalty.

 

Obviously there was more to Obi-Wan Kenobi then originally met the eye and Dooku hated puzzles. Hated not knowing something.

 

He had not yet decided if he would put off killing Kenobi until he could determine why all of his plans up to this point had failed, and now it seemed he was running out of time.

 

“Find him; search the whole ship room by room if you need to. But find him,” he turned to the view screen. A small shuttle was making its way to the ship, he wanted to shoot it down but was unable to because the ships weapons had all overloaded. He turned as they were leaving.

 

“I want him alive.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Dooku’s guards were kind of freaking him out. He wondered if they had access to the Force and then decided that was nonsense.

 

They were clones. The clone soldiers didn’t have access to the Force they were bred to be fighters and followers.

 

They still seemed to have an uncanny ability to determine exactly where he was hiding though, probably Dooku was sitting in some nice, swank office telling them exactly where to search for him next.

 

Luckily he had managed to squeak by them so far but his luck, it seemed, was bound and determined not to hold out.

 

He wondered if deer felt this way when they were being hunted.

 

All of the doors to every room he’d passed were half open. Electric failure of some sort Ewan had decided. Then decided he didn’t care, because if the doors were open he could duck into a room provided that the guards didn’t try and search the room that he was currently hiding in.

 

The ship wasn’t moving any longer, Ewan wasn’t sure exactly how he had determined that. But I wasn’t moving and there had been one final screeching noise and then everything was silent.

 

Two guards turned down his hallway and he dodged into a dark room, no lights with the exception of the ones from the hallway. He stayed in the shadows and crept along the wall.

 

The guards slowed, peering into the room and Ewan bumped, hard into a large unmovable object.

 

He didn’t swear, didn’t make a sound and the object itself looked to be bolted to the floor because he hadn’t managed to disturb anything on its top.

 

The guards peered around the room and Ewan shrank against the wall and tried to think invisible thoughts.

 

Finally the guards turned and left and Ewan breathed a sigh of relief though it was not audible.

 

He ran a hand over the thing he’d run into, found it to be a little higher than waist high and almost jumped when his hand encountered something metal.

 

He leaned down, closer so he was barely a nose width away and his eyes widened.

 

There were three lightsabers on the thing. He allowed his hand to drift over them a smile coming to his face.

 

Well he’d been looking for a weapon, he would really have rather it had been a blaster so he could stand a fair distance away but at this point he’d take what he could get.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The lightsaber had called to him. Not as loudly as the one Qui-Gon Jinn had taken from him while he’d been drugged and restrained and locked away from the Force, but still it had called.

 

The blade was a pale green when he activated it, reminiscent of Qui-Gon’s though if he remembered correctly Qui-Gon Jinn’s had been a darker green then the pale green that he saw before him.

 

At least it wasn’t pink.

 

He shut it down, no sense in just broadcasting to the guards where he was after all. He kept it in his hand though, gripping it tightly.

 

He had a weapon. He had the training and he could remember Nick being impressed by how fast he’d picked up the footwork and the techniques. If he could remember them and actually be able to fight a battle without it being choreographed out for him from beginning to end he’d be good to go.

 

He could improvise he thought. It shouldn’t be that hard.

 

******************************************************************************

 

The ship shuddered and jerked as Mace set it down in the landing bay. Anakin smothered a smirk in the co-pilots seat, he could have managed a much smoother landing, it gratified him to know that he was obviously much better at flying than Mace Windu.

 

Anakin stood, ignoring Qui-Gon as he brushed past him. Mace followed and Qui-Gon with a heavy sigh followed him.

 

At the door Anakin was halted by Mace’s hand on his shoulder. He turned, his displeasure at being stopped evident on his face, only to find Mace staring at Qui-Gon.

 

Obi-Wan was close, his presence pushing at the edges of his awareness and Anakin was anxious to get off the ship and go to him, find him safe and take him home. Far away from those that would attempt to take him away.

 

“I don’t need to tell you that if you have any thoughts of turning on us that I will not hesitate to strike you down,” Mace glanced over at Anakin. “And I know that Knight Skywalker would relish the opportunity to do so.”

 

“I am only here to help,” Qui-Gon’s voice was soft but forceful, and his eyes did not meet Mace’s but locked on Anakin’s as if he thought that Anakin was the one that needed to know that, to be persuaded by it.

 

Anakin still did not care. Maybe after he had Obi-Wan back, safe and unharmed he might consider it. But as it stood now Qui-Gon was the enemy, a Sith and Anakin questioned the wisdom at allowing him onto the ship with his Master.

 

His loyalty might only be guaranteed by the threat against Obi-Wan’s life, but if Count Dooku changed his mind and decided to not harm Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon might not continue to side with them.

 

And that just did not bear thinking about.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan was avoiding the clones. In so much as he could avoid them, because they were still doing that freaky thing where they seemed to know where he was and what he was doing.

 

It was really beginning to annoy him.

 

He suddenly wished for Padmé’s guards, the ones that had blatantly looked the other way while he’d been making his escape.

 

He was holding out on finding on Dooku, doing that meant not getting caught by the clones, that would be so much easier if the clones weren’t actively looking for him.

 

Besides the fact that if the clones found him, well he was sure there would be a fight (because he wasn’t returning to being a prisoner with meek acceptance, he was fucking tired of being a prisoner) and if there was a fight there was a very high probability (like 100% really) that he would lose and then he would be a prisoner again and he really didn’t want to be a prisoner again.

 

He was fucking tired of being locked up. He was tired of having to have Anakin or Yoda (or any other random Jedi who happened to be wandering past when he got himself in trouble) rescue him. Just for once he wanted to rescue himself.

 

Even if that mean dying (which he also really didn’t want to do and if the choice was between dying and letting Anakin rescue him, well he’d put a fucking neon sign over his head and wait for Anakin to show up.)

 

The clones turned down the hallway he was darting through and he in turn managed to squeeze his ass through a door that Yoda probably wouldn’t have been able to squeeze through. But Ewan had determination on his side.

 

His back pressed against a wall, lightsaber clutched in his hand, he tried to think calm, soothing thoughts to calm both his breathing and his racing heart.

 

Meditation was a real bitch when you didn’t have a dim room, a calm Master Yoda leading you and that wacky incense scent that he still hadn’t been able to put a name to yet.

 

One of the guards peered through the crack in the door, shined a light and then after a brief conversation where it was determined that ‘Master Kenobi wouldn’t have been able to get access’ (suckers!) the guards moved on.

 

Ewan breathed a sigh of relief and sagged, allowing the wall to support him for a brief moment. Even though if he mentioned it to Obi-Wan he would surely say that it was against some rule or another and that they should only lean against fucking air or something.

 

He glanced around and wondered if he could just hide in this room until Anakin or Dooku located him.

 

He smiled and laughed softly. Trying to not think that it was pretty close to hysterical laughter.

 

Because this was obviously fate, kismet. He didn’t want to kill anyone but it seemed he was meant to go into battle fully armed with both a blaster and a lightsaber, because he was standing in the middle of what could only be the ships armory.

 

He found a blaster quick enough, found a holster belt that hung low on his hips and he insanely felt kind of like a cowboy for about a minute.

 

All he needed was a ten gallon hat, a dusty street and someone’s honor to defend.

 

Anakin’s would do in a pinch he supposed.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin was hard pressed to force back the urge to laugh, Obi-Wan was all happy and bubbly, like a kid in a candy store and he wondered what had brought on that reaction.

 

A glance back showed Qui-Gon looking much put-upon; he had been silent since they had left the tiny ship that they had used to land in the landing bay of Count Dooku’s.

 

Anakin didn’t care about Qui-Gon’s feelings at the moment, right now all his energy was focused on Obi-Wan.

 

In front of him Mace Windu led the way. Anakin was sure that he had no clue where he was going, he was equally sure that the other Jedi was doing something similar to what Anakin was.

 

Allowing Obi-Wan’s emotions to lead them toward where he was, because wherever Obi-Wan was located Anakin was almost positive that they would find Count Dooku.

 

And then they would fight and then Anakin would take Obi-Wan home and this whole mess would finally be over.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan kept the lightsaber in one hand, the other just touching the blaster. It felt uncomfortable to walk with something strapped to his hip like this. He was almost glad that the Jedi hadn’t used them in the films.

 

It kept throwing his center of gravity off, though he did like the bit of a swagger that he had to have in order to keep the belt from shifting too much on his hips.

 

He frowned when he walked into the landing bay. That wasn’t where he’d wanted to go; he’d wanted to go to wherever Count Dooku was hiding himself. He wanted this over and he wanted to go home.

 

He wanted to not have to die and not have to kill anyone.

 

Was that to much to ask?

 

“Master Kenobi,” his back stiffened and he turned slowly, lightsaber still gripped in his hand.

 

“Count Dooku,” Ewan kept his voice calm, his breathing as even and level as he could considering that he was scared to death and thought that death was just around the corner.

 

“I see you found the spare lightsabers,” Dooku nodded to his hand and Ewan glanced at the lightsaber he was clutching.

 

“Well you left them laying about and all, and since Qui-Gon took mine…”

 

Dooku smiled thinly, waved a hand and the door closed behind him. Sealing them both into the landing bay.

 

There was a small ship behind Ewan, he hadn’t even noticed it when he’d first entered. There was no way that he’d make it to it before Dooku made it to him. Or stopped him.

 

He allowed his senses to stretch out and felt Anakin and Mace Windu and Qui-Gon Jinn on the ship.

 

“They came to rescue you,” Dooku’s face contorted in anger. “They will of course be too late.”

 

Dooku’s blade swooshed into existence. A pale red blade slashing in the air directly in front of Ewan.

 

He winced. This was the Sith that had cost Anakin his arm, had injured Obi-Wan and had fought Yoda to a draw.

 

This was the Sith that Anakin had killed, beheading him while the Chancellor urged him on… except that hadn’t happened here, yet. And it wouldn’t because the Chancellor was not the Sith Lord, Dooku was.

 

He was getting a headache and now probably wasn’t the greatest time for that.

 

Ewan held the lightsaber out in front of him, double gripped for better control and the pale green blade hummed before him.

 

They stood there for long moments, lightsabers at the ready, neither moving. Then Dooku feinted to the left and Ewan met his blade head on and they fought.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin stopped, his heart pounded in his chest. Fear so great that he thought it might swamp him in its murky depths.

 

A sound akin to whine echoed through the hall, it took Anakin a moment to realize that it had come from his own throat.

 

In front of him Mace Windu stood, eyes closed, hand braced against a wall.

 

Behind him Qui-Gon uttered a silent prayer and hung his head in defeat. Staring at the floor.

 

“Obi-Wan fights Count Dooku,” he said softly.

 

Anakin closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then reopened them with grim determination. He squared his shoulders and pushed past Mace Windu to lead the way.

 

They had come this far, he would not allow it to end this way.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan stumbled, lightsaber barely coming up in time to stop the downward slash of Dooku’s blade.

 

He was tired, he ached and with every passing moment Dooku was sapping a bit more of his strength and energy and gaining every bit of ground that Ewan was losing.

 

He ducked two blows, rolled into a somersault and managed to put a few feet between them for a long ten seconds.

 

It wasn’t near long enough to regain his equilibrium.

 

His lightsaber snapped up, seemingly of its own accord, just in time, to stop the next slash of Dooku’s.

 

He might not want to kill anyone, but it had become quite apparent that Dooku didn’t have the same issue.

 

Also this fighting without choreography thing was for the birds, he didn’t know Dooku’s style, couldn’t envision where and when the next blow would come from.

 

And then he needn’t have worried.

 

The next blow had him on his knees, the one after that had his borrowed lightsaber clattering to the ground a distance from him.

 

He didn’t even look at it; instead his eyes were intently focused on Dooku’s. Because he knew without a shadow of a doubt that the other was waiting for him to beg, to plead for him to spare his life and he wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

 

He could feel Anakin’s fear and pain, could feel his desperation and panic as they got ever closer.

 

They would not be in time.

 

He took a deep breath, released it and sent calm and peace all through out the Force. To Anakin, to Mace Windu and Qui-Gon who were equally panicked.

 

He knew what he had to do.

 

“I think it is time to do away with my most troublesome thorn,” Dooku touched his chin lightly, a mocking smile on his face. “I will make it quick for you though, since you have been such a formidable foe.”

 

Ewan let his hand rest on the blaster, fingers moving restlessly along it as he waited for Dooku to move.

 

Hands sweeping up in a wide arc, Ewan pulled the blaster in just milli-seconds. The trigger was touchy, it took only the most gentle of motions to activate it and Dooku stopped. Mid swing to look down in horror.

 

“What have you done?” Lightsaber still above his head and Ewan tossed the blaster aside and skittered back. Just far enough that even if Dooku completed his move it would not touch him.

 

“I’m not quite ready to die just yet,” Ewan said softly, he let the English accent falter. His voice his own for just one brief second. Dooku stared at him in incomprehension.

 

Then his lightsaber fell from his hand, and Dooku himself fell to his knees. Crumpling in almost slow motion.

 

Ewan stared at the unmoving body; it felt unreal, surreal to him. He’d just killed someone and all he could think was it had looked more realistic in the movies.

 

He wondered if he was in shock and then determined that if he was in shock he wouldn’t be questioning if he was in shock.

 

His hands were numb and he realized that he was trembling.

 

He tried to feel remorse for the fact that he had just killed a man. But he’d been justified in it hadn’t he? Dooku had tried to kill or have him killed numerous times, this was just Ewan finally growing a set of balls and defending himself.

 

In any manner that he could, it probably wasn’t right that a Jedi had used a blaster instead of a lightsaber to down his opponent, but he would take victory in any manner that he could.

 

The door to the landing bay opened, a grate from the ventilation shaft dropped free. It all seemed unbearably loud and Ewan raised shaking hands to press them over his ears to drown it all out.

 

He needed a moment to get his thoughts in order, right now they were racing all over the place, refusing to settle anywhere in particular except on the fact that he’d just killed someone.

 

His hands were stopped in mid raise by Anakin suddenly appearing in front of him, kneeling. Anakin’s hands ran over him anxiously, worriedly, checking for injuries, broken bones, missing limbs. Ewan could feel the touch of someone’s Force signature, though he couldn’t place whose, over his mind and he raised a brick wall high and thick almost without thinking about it.

 

The whole while he just stared at the body, the one that Qui-Gon now stood over silently, head bowed.

 

“Master. Obi-Wan,” Anakin’s hand cupped his face forcing him to look at him. To see him. Yoda hovered behind him and Mace Windu stood directly behind Qui-Gon.

 

“I killed him,” Ewan said softly, Anakin made a sound in his throat and leaned his forehead against Ewan’s. Ewan closed his eyes and let Anakin pull him into a tight embrace, his own arms moved seconds later to clutch just as tightly to Anakin.

 

“No choice you were given,” Yoda touched Ewan’s back, a whisper of a touch and then it was gone. Though the calm and peace that Ewan had sent into the Force was now being pushed at him from all directions.

 

He laid his head against Anakin’s shoulder.

 

He had killed someone. Even if provoked with threats against his own life didn’t that still make him a murderer?

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan didn’t know how much more if this he could stand.

All the noise and the talking and people wanting to know how he felt, mixed in with Anakin hovering all solicitous (which okay he really didn’t mind) and Yoda continually stopping by his room to pat him on the back and tell him it was okay that he’d just murdered someone.

It was so not okay that he’d murdered someone and besides the fact that if this world were even near normal he should be sitting in a cold, dank cell making special friends with his new cell mate while getting ready to hand in a murder by self-defense plea, he also should have been returned home.

Because he’d done the task that he’d obviously been sent to this place to do, he’d killed Count Dooku, he had blood on his hands now and he should have gone to sleep and woken at home.

He’d been all ready for that, he’d buried the grief and forced himself to sleep and instead of waking in his own bed, in his own universe, he’d woken in this whacked out one with Anakin’s worried face staring down at him.

He’d wanted to cry, but he was a man, a manly man and he could handle this.

So every time he went to sleep he begged the gods or fate or whoever was taking such a firm fucking hand on his destiny to send him back to his girls and Jude and Eve. Instead he woke in the same place every morning.

It was quite possible that he was never going to go home. That he was here for the long haul and Obi-Wan was in his world for the duration and Christ was he even going to have a life or a career to go back to when he returned?

Because Obi-Wan was going to return to his world, eventually, with an over protective Anakin that never let him out of his sight.

Anakin’s hovering was beginning to drive him insane.

Of course maybe he was already insane and all of this was a figment of his imagination. He’d wake up in a padded white room with Eve and Jude standing in the doorway chatting with a doctor and he wouldn’t be able to get to them because of the straight jacket and the drugs. They’d look at him with pity in their eyes as he drooled on himself and then they’d leave and the door would shut and lock behind them and that would be that.

“Master,” Anakin’s voice was soft, it seemed he never left but Ewan knew (he wasn’t sure how) that the minute he went to sleep that Anakin went to talk over his fears with Yoda and that he returned before he woke. Ewan wasn’t sure when the other man even slept and it was possible from the dark bags under his eyes that Anakin wasn’t sleeping at all.

He hoped that wasn’t because of him. Because if it was that was unacceptable.

Ewan opened his eyes and found Anakin staring at him, the same worried expression that never seemed to leave his face and he had to wonder what Anakin thought of his Master being so deeply traumatized by killing someone.

Obi-Wan hadn’t even been close to Count Dooku, Ewan’d had no relationship at all with him barring the captor/prisoner one. There should be no reason that Ewan felt like this.

And he couldn’t help but wonder, did the sight of his visible pain make Anakin think Obi-Wan weak now, did he think him not worthy of his love and devotion any longer?

Ewan couldn’t say he would blame him if Anakin chose to pull away.

“I’ll love you until we’re as old as Master Yoda, and you are most certainly not weak,” Anakin said firmly and Ewan closed his eyes.

Even the tiny shields that he managed to keep in place around Yoda and Mace Windu shattered around Anakin. Like they realized that Anakin couldn’t, shouldn’t be kept out of his mind for any reason.

“I’m tired,” Ewan said softly. There was something hard and painful buried in his throat. It hurt to breath and he could feel tears prickling behind his closed eyelids.

“I know,” Anakin pressed a kiss to each eye, another to the tip of his nose and then a soft, chaste one against his lips.

Ewan wasn’t sure how he could bear to touch him, the murderer.

Anakin didn’t say anything more, just wrapped his arms tightly around him and rolled onto his back. Ewan held himself stiffly for a second before relaxing into the warm body below his, burying his face in that space between Anakin’s shoulder and neck that seemed to fit him perfectly.

Anakin’s hand stroked across his back gently. Smooth, even strokes. They made him feel sleepy even though he must have slept for days on end already.

Having Anakin there, warm and touching him without distaste was like a balm to his tortured soul.

“Why do I care?” he asked.

“Because you’re a good person,” Anakin said softly. Ewan felt his throat convulse, and he wanted to scream that he wasn’t, he’d killed someone. Even as badly as Dooku had wanted to kill him, had he deserved to die? Hadn’t there been something else that he could have done?

And he knew that there wasn’t. If he’d shown mercy at the end, Dooku would have laughed in his face and slit his throat while Anakin watched.

“Its okay,” Anakin whispered into his hair and Ewan felt the first tear escape his closed eyes. He blinked furiously trying to quell them.

He didn’t want to cry, didn’t want to sob and scream and rage against the unfairness of this.

He hadn’t wanted to kill anyone; he’d only wanted to survive.

“It’s okay,” Anakin soothed, hands rubbing his back as Ewan cried quietly into his skin.

He didn’t know how to tell him that it wasn’t okay, that it seemed that Anakin was stuck with this fragmented version of his Obi-Wan and that they should probably figure out what the fuck they were going to do.

Instead he said nothing and sobbed into his shoulder, the tears coming freely now, seemingly out of Ewan’s control. He was soaking Anakin’s shirt in the process and he sniffled and hiccupped.

He called himself a prissy bitch to get it over with.

It was what Jude would have done if he’d been there after all.

******************************************************************************

Anakin was at a loss as to how to handle Obi-Wan falling into tiny pieces against him.

Yoda had advised him to be patient, Mace Windu had advised him to get Obi-Wan to open up to him, Qui-Gon had told him that maybe Anakin wasn’t the right person to handle Obi-Wan in the state he was in and maybe Qui-Gon himself should do it.

Anakin had snarled at him to mind his own business and offered to put him out of his misery. If Qui-Gon took that as a murder threat that wasn’t his fault was it? It wasn’t like he’d actually said the words.

Obi-Wan had killed people before with just the slightest bit of remorse (they were after all Jedi and even the death of an enemy was a loss felt keenly) he didn’t understand why Obi-Wan was acting as if he’d killed his best friend.

Yoda had been the one to remind him that without his memories Obi-Wan wouldn’t remember a life lived during wartime, that Obi-Wan would likely have to learn how to deal with the loss of life (even an enemy’s loss of life) all over again.

And as such that was the only reason that he’d gone to see Qui-Gon in the first place.

Qui-Gon had been Obi-Wan’s Master; as such he would have been by Obi-Wan’s side the first time he was forced to take a life. Anakin had only wanted to know how Obi-Wan had reacted to that first instance.

So he could compare it to how he was reacting now.

Qui-Gon had been silent for a long time and Anakin had been forced to consider the possibility that Obi-Wan might have not taken a life as Qui-Gon’s Padawan.

“He cried,” Qui-Gon had said softly. “Not in front of me, not on the field. But after, when we were in our quarters readying for sleep… we’d been given two sleeping rooms, he’d excused himself to go to sleep and shut the door. I heard him, crying, the walls were thin. I didn’t go to him because learning to deal with death is something that all Jedi need to learn how to handle in their own way. When he came out the next morning he was fine.”

Anakin didn’t believe that, he thought that Obi-Wan had conditioned himself to not show that emotion in front of others, even in front of the Master that he should have trusted.

But now he was showing that emotion again, and Anakin wondered if it was because he didn’t know how to hide it.

Anakin didn’t want him to learn how to bury his emotions again, he just wanted Obi-Wan to not act like he was evil personified.

Every being on the ship knew that Obi-Wan had done only what he needed to do in order to survive. Even those that had been loyal to Dooku himself did not consider Obi-Wan in the wrong.

Count Dooku and Obi-Wan had fought, Obi-Wan had won. It had been a fair battle, if you didn’t consider the fact that Obi-Wan had more holes in his memory than actual memories, and Obi-Wan had still won even though he hadn’t remembered how to use the lightsaber or the Force or any of the tricks of the trade that he’d taught Anakin since he was nine.

When they returned to the Temple Anakin was going to go through every lesson that Obi-Wan had ever given him and he was going to return them to his Master.

Obi-Wan stilled against him finally and Anakin knew he was asleep. Maybe this had been the end of Obi-Wan’s grief.

Maybe now things would start getting better. His Obi-Wan would begin healing and they would return to Coruscant together and be all the stronger for it.

He pressed a kiss to the side of Obi-Wan’s head, eyes closing as he cradled the smaller man against him.

It never ceased to amaze him that Obi-Wan carried such power within such a small stature. He physically was the stronger of the two and most of the time he thought his own access to the Force was the stronger as well, but every so often Obi-Wan would sneak up and blindside him.

Leading him to wonder just how much power Obi-Wan chose not to use.

He’d defeated two Sith now, an Apprentice and now a Master. How strong would he be if he chose to use that strength instead of hiding it?

 

******************************************************************************

 

Therapy was exactly how Ewan had always pictured it (except for the fact that it was him actually in it, instead of Jonny who Ewan had always imagined being the one to go mad. He’d sort of pictured him and Jude looking sad and out of sorts, telling Jonny’s shrink ‘we always knew Angie would drive him bonkers, it was just a matter of time really’).

 

Therapy was invasive and annoying and as much as he thought the young Mind Healer was pretty good at what she was being required to do it kind of freaked him out that she looked about sixteen and he’d had to stop himself a good number of times from asking her if she was actually old enough to actually have a job and where exactly she went to school so he could check her references.

 

Obviously things were handled a bit differently here and Anakin and Yoda seemed to think she was doing everything okay so Ewan just sat in his chair and tried to think calm, reassuring, sane thoughts.

 

He rubbed his hand over his chin and eyed the Healer where she sat.

 

They’d been sitting in silence, it was their third session and he’d gone over what had happened with Count Dooku (the murder and he still didn’t understand why he was allowed to walk around with a lightsaber when he should be in jail waiting on a trial or something) and they’d gone over the kidnapping at Padmé’s hands and Qui-Gon’s involvement.

 

They’d even touched on Anakin slightly but Ewan had snarled when she’d gone all moon-eyed and obviously star struck (was this what his fans acted like? Probably so, because while he liked to fool himself into thinking they were a bit more restrained, he thought it highly more likely that thousands of girls had probably made digital snapshots of his private parts and plastered them on their walls to masturbate to) and she’d back pedaled and not brought him up again.

 

“Is there anything else you want to talk about?” she smiled at him with an expression that urged him to spill his deep dark secrets.

 

He pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes instead.

 

“Well then I think we’re done today,” she sounded disappointed and normally Ewan would have commiserated and threw her a bone, but he was beyond caring.

 

He’d been talking for three days about how it felt to kill Count Dooku and he would have thought she would have figured out that he felt lousy about killing the Sith Lord (the glare should have clued her in on that, he thought) but instead she kept going over it second by second like she thought if he talked about it often enough he would be okay with having committed murder.

 

The door slid open as he approached it and he found Mace Windu standing on the other side hand raised.

 

Behind him Qui-Gon Jinn stood, hands shoved into the arms of his robes, eyes locked on Ewan’s now that he’d noticed him.

 

“We were just finishing up,” the Mind Healer came up behind Ewan; she probably had a smile on her face. It wasn’t matched by anyone else’s, because Mace’s face was blank and Qui-Gon looked as if he would rather be anywhere than where he was.

 

“Obi-Wan,” Qui-Gon’s voice was quiet, his expression earnest.

 

“Qui-Gon,” Ewan pulled his robes tighter around him, looking anywhere but at Qui-Gon.

 

Qui-Gon sighed finally and the Mind Healer stepped aside so that he could brush past Ewan and enter the room. Ewan thought there was an inordinate amount of body to body contact and he stepped outside the room to allow the door to close.

 

“Well that went well,” Mace said wryly. Ewan glanced at him in surprise, the other Jedi looked amused, it wasn’t a look that Ewan was familiar with on Mace’s face.

 

Although he had seen it a number of times on Sam’s face, he’d spent a good portion of the third film looking amused and Ewan had thought it might have been because he’d read the dialogue and realized that Obi-Wan and Anakin were one kiss and a shag away from making the Star Wars saga a gay love story instead of a story about good and evil.

 

Ewan frowned, maybe Mace was more like Sam then Ewan had thought. Because it wasn’t like he’d spent a lot of time with Mace Windu, not with Anakin hovering like he was, so it wasn’t like he would have noticed.

 

He released the grip he had on his robes (black ones that Anakin had let him borrow, they were a bit long and dragged on the floor but at least they weren’t brown, also they smelled like Anakin and that was comforting when he felt like he was being interrogated) and shifted idly on his feet.

 

Normally Anakin met him as soon as he was done. He wondered where he was.

 

Well  he could make it back to their rooms on his own, he was an adult after all, possibly it was time he started behaving like one instead of having Anakin lead him to and fro like a child that needed to have his hand held to cross the street.

 

He straightened his shoulder and then realized from the way that Mace was staring at him expectantly that he was waiting for some sort of response to his statement.

 

So he said the first thing that popped into his mind and that was probably a bad thing.

 

“At least no one died.”

 

He winced slightly, though Mace only looked at him with a friendly expression and a smile.

 

The smile itself seemed to overtake his face, all bright white teeth and it looked so odd that Ewan peered at him in confusion. He could count the number of times that Mace Windu had smiled at him on no hands.

 

Maybe he’d been possessed?

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin had a running appointment to meet with Yoda during the times that Obi-Wan was scheduled to speak with the Mind Healers.

 

He thought this due more to the fact that Master Yoda and Master Windu thought that he would stand at the door and eavesdrop on the, for now, private sessions then any need for Anakin to talk about what had happened.

 

Though it seemed that the meetings with Yoda would be ending as starting with the fourth session the Mind Healer had expressed interest in having Anakin present, stating that she thought it might help Obi-Wan relax enough to allow her to help him.

 

That had confused Anakin at first, because to his thinking Obi-Wan was doing so much better. (At least he was no longer sobbing in Anakin’s arms, a broken wreck of the man that Anakin loved.)

 

He’d been steadily regaining his equilibrium since that breakdown. Every day it felt like Anakin was that much closer to having his Master back.

 

So Anakin had been confused as to why no one else saw the progress that Obi-Wan was making, he’d been confused until Yoda had reminded him about Obi-Wan’s memory loss. Reminded him, that yes, Obi-Wan might be getting stronger by the day, but that he was still not whole and that he might never be.

 

“Told you I did, that your Master would not be the same.”

 

“He still loves me,” Anakin said firmly, of that he had no doubt.

 

“Love for your Master, and his for you, never in question was it,” Yoda said, hands folded over the top of his gimmer stick as he stared at Anakin pensively.

 

“Then why?” Anakin narrowed his eyes, because he hated being confused and Yoda lived to confuse them. He thought it might actually be one of the few sources of amusement that the old Jedi had.

 

“Told you before,” Yoda eyed him. “Not the same man your Master will be.”

 

Anakin didn’t like feeling he was missing the point of the conversation.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin wasn’t home when Ewan let himself into the small apartment.

 

He hung the cloak on the wall, hands running carefully down it. He frowned at the dust on the hem and wondered if he should mention it to someone. Obviously housekeeping wasn’t doing a very good job if he could attract that much dust walking from the apartment to the Healers and back again.

 

He stretched slightly, his lightsaber banging against his leg as he twisted. Anakin had returned it to him and probably the only reason that he hadn’t received a lecture on losing it was because Anakin had been afraid of him breaking into tiny pieces again.

 

He sat on the edge of the couch and surveyed the room.

 

He needed to add some of his own personal touches to the apartments. He’d been thinking about it since Anakin had brought him back here.

 

The apartment felt like home, though he thought that had more to do with Anakin’s presence than anything specific within the room. Maybe a print on the wall, something that screamed Ewan instead of Obi-Wan, for some strange reason he wanted to mark his territory and he thought that Anakin might not approve if he just up and pissed in the corner.

 

He settled back, feet (boots and all, because he’d learned to wait for Anakin to take them off, one because it was easier and two because Anakin rubbed his feet once the boots were off) on the little coffee table.

 

Definitely a print, he thought. He’d have Anakin take him somewhere to find one.

 

He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Smiled to himself.

 

He felt comfortable and relaxed, he hoped someone hadn’t drugged him again.

 

******************************************************************************

 

“So?” Obi-Wan’s voice was impatient and Ewan opened his eyes to find the Jedi staring down at him.

 

“We’re back on Coruscant,” Ewan muttered and Obi-Wan visibly relaxed. “I killed Count Dooku.”

 

Obi-Wan tensed again, staring at him in shock.

 

“You… what?” Obi-Wan blinked, expression disbelieving.

 

“I killed Count Dooku,” Ewan pushed himself into a sitting position and wondered why he always seemed to come to in the bright place laying flat on his back even though he hadn’t been flat on his back when he’d obviously fallen asleep.

 

“You… killed Count Dooku,” Obi-Wan seemed to be having trouble with the concept so Ewan remained silent and let him puzzle it out for himself.

 

“By yourself?”

 

Ewan rolled his eyes. “Yes by myself, I’m not a total incompetent you know,” he ignored the snort. “If people hadn’t kept drugging me I wouldn’t have been kidnapped in the first place, so it’s hardly my fault.”

 

“Are you okay?” Obi-Wan asked it softly, hand gentle on his arm and Ewan glanced over at him. Every one kept asking him that, Anakin, Mace Windu, Yoda, Qui-Gon.

 

Even Bail Organa had appeared (looking nothing like Jimmy Smits which had kind of surprised him) to ask him how he was doing. Anakin had snarled at him and the Alderaan Senator hadn’t stayed long.

 

He’d wanted to scream, he’d vowed to hit the next person who asked him that.

 

But the question seemed sincere coming from Obi-Wan, from himself, he could see no deceit on the face that was identical to his and he knew that Obi-Wan actually cared about how he was handling the fact that he’d killed someone.

 

This might be the one person that would understand how Ewan felt.

 

“I’ll…” but he couldn’t bring himself to tell him that he’d been weak, that he’d broken down and sobbed on Anakin like a child. Couldn’t tell him that he had nightmares where Dooku tortured and killed him and Ewan had never had the opportunity to escape. “I’ll be fine.”

 

Obi-Wan smiled at him kindly. Quite obviously didn’t believe him but also didn’t call him on it. Just let him have what remained of his honor.

 

Ewan appreciated it, truly he did.

 

“We’re never switching back… are we?” he asked softly. Because if it was going to be done he would have thought it would have happened by now.

 

He should have gone home and Anakin should have had his Obi-Wan returned to him. Instead they were still living each others lives.

 

Obi-Wan shook his head, he looked as sad as Ewan felt. The thought of not seeing his girls, of not seeing Jude or Jonny or any of the others, it hurt.

 

Obi-Wan had to be hurting just as much. No Anakin or his friends.

 

“It doesn’t appear so.”

 

Ewan closed his eyes, maybe it was time to start planning his life out again.

 

He wondered if Anakin would think Obi-Wan insane if he decided to try his hand at theater.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Obi-Wan was sleeping on the couch when Anakin appeared at the apartment. He’d arrived moments after Obi-Wan’s session with the Mind Healer had been scheduled to end only to find Mace Windu sitting calmly outside the door.

 

Which meant that Qui-Gon Jinn was within and he’d been about thirty seconds from knocking the door down at the thought of Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon in the same room before Mace Windu had told him that Obi-Wan had been released from his appointment early and had headed in the direction of their apartment.

 

Anakin had arrived there, giving only a cursory glance at the colorful swag of string that was hanging from their door that Obi-Wan had insisted on so he could find the door to their apartment.

 

Anakin hadn’t thought it that hard, it was the fourth door on the right. How difficult was that?

 

He hung his cloak up, pushing his sleeves up as he walked over to the couch.

 

Obi-Wan didn’t move, didn’t make a sound. Just steady breathing that indicated sleep uninterrupted by nightmares.

 

He carefully perched on the couch beside him, fingers stroking down the side of Obi-Wan’s face gently.

 

He didn’t want to disturb him but if he allowed him to continue to sleep the way that he was he would end up with a sore neck and while Anakin loved to touch him and would massage every single ache away he would rather Obi-Wan sleep in a manner that didn’t necessitate that prior to their actually going to bed.

 

He gently pushed and prodded him, settling himself on the couch and then aligning Obi-Wan’s body with his so that he was cushioning the older man. Obi-Wan’s head on his shoulder and Anakin pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

 

Obi-Wan sighed, arm resting over his chest and continued to sleep.

 

Maybe a nap was the perfect thing.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Ewan was once more going to classes, and though the younglings didn’t stare at him with quite the same amount of awe they still treated him as if he was some sort of celebrity. It was a bit disconcerting and he tried to not let it get to him.

Anakin had insisted on training him on how to use a lightsaber, even though the danger was over and Dooku was dead and Qui-Gon was in Jedi Custody.

‘You still need to know how to protect yourself as a Jedi,’ Anakin had insisted in a tone that brooked no argument.

Of course of all the classes that Yoda and Anakin were forcing him to undertake Ewan had thought that the lightsaber training would have been the easiest so he’d relented easily.

Because he’d known how to do this. He’d trained for months with Hayden, perfecting and honing the skills he needed before they even began thinking about shooting the sequences.

Just the first two minutes they’d been in the training room together had been enough to indicate that Anakin?

Was going to be quite a bit different to train with then Hayden had been.

For one thing he was a lot more serious.

And then there was the fact that Anakin was more Nick then Hayden. He was relentless in his quest to make sure that Ewan knew exactly what he was doing and why he was doing it and he had absolutely no qualms about knocking Ewan on his ass to make sure he learned it and remembered it.

There’d been an hour long lecture (that Anakin had never finished because he’d stopped and flushed in the middle of it) on proper lightsaber safety protocols before he’d even been allowed to pick up his lightsaber, which had been just plain weird because he’d been wearing it strapped to his belt for weeks with no comments about safety stuff being spouted off at him.

The lecture itself had been fascinating and he’d been listening with rapt interest until Anakin had stopped talking; that was the only excuse he had for why it had taken that long for Ewan to realize that Anakin had been most likely quoting a speech Obi-Wan had forced Anakin to listen to word for word.

And then there was also the fact that they were using real lightsabers instead of sticks and metal rods. Anakin had stopped short at chopping off a limb a number of times.

Ewan would have called for training sabers if he didn’t think that Anakin wouldn’t give him a lecture on how real men didn’t use training sabers and if they were careful and paid attention they wouldn’t hurt each other.

It did not escape Ewan’s notice that Anakin was damned good even if he was holding back, it was probably a fucking good thing that Anakin hadn’t gone evil because there was no way in hell Ewan would have been able to beat him.

Ewan bent over panting, he’d thought he was in shape but after two hours of whirling and fighting and dodging Anakin’s long armed (unfair advantage!) reaches he was decidedly glad that Dooku was dead and there was no one alive to issue that dreaded ‘Order 66’.

He made a mental note to apologize to Chancellor Palpatine for internally besmirching his good name, he’d not gotten to do that yet and he was only half sure that Palpatine was avoiding him in general.

“Obi-Wan?” Anakin sounded worried, if course if Ewan took to many breaths at one moment it caused Anakin to worry. It was beginning to get tiresome.

“Fine,” he wheezed, “I’m just… fine…” he waved a hand in Anakin’s general direction and stumbled a few steps away. Falling onto his back and staring up at the ceiling. “I’ll just rest for a moment,” he stated decisively. “Carry on without me.”

A look over at him showed Anakin smiling down at him with fondness. Finally he shook his head, sheathed his blade and hooked his saber to his belt before settling cross-legged next to Ewan’s prone body.

“Maybe we should start you on some exercises to build up your endurance,” Anakin mused.

“My endurance is just fine,” Ewan muttered, a glance over showed Anakin grinning at him impishly.

Anakin leaned over him, ran a finger down the side of his face. Ewan shivered.

“I’m sure it is,” Anakin moved, in one of those motions that told Ewan he was using Force stuff that Ewan hadn’t yet managed to gain access to, and was suddenly straddling Ewan’s body.

Hands on either side of his head. Ewan just stared up at him.

“We’re in a training room,” he reminded him in case Anakin had forgotten they weren’t in the privacy of their own apartment, his voice was kind of breathy and soft and he didn’t recognize it at first.

“Yes we are,” Anakin agreed his face a bare fraction of an inch away, Ewan could feel the warm puffs of air as Anakin breathed against his lips. A single movement and they would be kissing.

“The door isn’t locked,” Ewan murmured and he let his hands move so they rested high on Anakin’s legs.

“I tried to seduce you in this very room once,” Anakin said softly, dropping slightly so that Ewan could feel the weight of his body.

“Tried?”

“You told me I was too young, reminded me that if I was serious that you would only allow that to happen once I was no longer your Padawan,” Anakin kissed his cheek, tongue darting out to taste the skin.

Ewan shivered again.

“Once I was knighted you allowed me to seduce you in our rooms, sometimes on the ships that we used to move from mission to mission. But never in this room.”

“Are you going to now?”

Anakin smiled.

“What do you think?”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Obi-Wan had managed to convince him to wait until they’d returned to the apartment to seduce him. They’d been kissing and touching and almost the second that he’d touched bare skin Obi-Wan had put a halt to things, hands against his shoulders pushing him away.

Anakin had been on the way to being angry, then he’d looked at him. Really looked down at Obi-Wan and saw him. His beloved Master with flushed skin and swollen lips, with a dazed look in his eyes and breath coming in pants and he’d taken a deep breath and centered himself in the Force.

Then he’d let Obi-Wan remind him that they had an apartment.

That they had a home that was theirs, that had a door that locked and comm. units that could be disabled and it hadn’t taken much for Anakin to pull him to his feet and out the door.

Because as much as he wanted to seduce Obi-Wan in this room, in the last place where Obi-Wan had spurned his advances before he became a Knight… well he also wanted somewhere where they could be alone together.

Where he could strip him bare and touch him and taste him to his hearts content without worrying if someone was going to walk in on them.

Obi-Wan had flushed harder, face redder than Anakin had ever seen it before and he’d wondered if he was projecting through the Force at the other Jedi.

It had hit him suddenly, like a wall slamming into his face, that for Obi-Wan, still without most of his memories, that this would be their first time.

Again.

He’d touched his cheek and smiled. He would make it good this time, none of the fumbling, hasty movements that had been their original first time together.

Then he’d been young and foolish and hadn’t had a clue what he was doing, he hadn’t been alone in that because, for that matter Obi-Wan hadn’t known what he was doing either.

They’d learned together, they’d learned each others bodies and weak spots and hot spots and now Anakin was older and wiser and he knew exactly what turned Obi-Wan into a gibbering pile of mush.

In this one particular instance he had the advantage, and he was also most definitely not afraid to utilize that knowledge to get the outcome he desired.

It had been a quick jog back to the apartment, his hand tight around Obi-Wan’s wrist as he led the way.

Everyone they passed had to know what was going on, Anakin wasn’t shielding all that well and Obi-Wan hadn’t managed to rid himself of the seemingly perpetual blush.

He barely spared a glance at the colorful contraption still hanging on their door and once the door shut behind them he turned to Obi-Wan with purposeful hands.

Which brought them to where they were, standing in the middle of their main room with Obi-Wan’s hands in his and he was suddenly unsure and nervous, more nervous then he’d been the first time they’d made love and he wouldn’t have thought that possible.

There was a gentle, sweet smile on Obi-Wan’s face and he leaned down to kiss him. A soft touch of their lips and Obi-Wan’s hands moved to his waist, working at his belt with nimble fingers. Allowing it to drop to the floor as he pulled on the light tunic that Anakin had been wearing for their training session, he shivered when he felt Obi-Wan’s fingers against his skin.

And realized that Obi-Wan was slowly, steadily undressing him yet he hadn’t made any progress on undressing Obi-Wan.

He remedied that quickly, keeping his touch as gentle and light as Obi-Wan’s he pulled his shirt over his head, dropping it on the ground before reclaiming Obi-Wan’s lips.

Kissing Obi-Wan was one of his favorite pastimes, because he put everything he was in his kisses.

Obi-Wan’s kisses made him believe that he was loved and adored and worshipped by alternating degrees.

He pulled at the pants that Obi-Wan was wearing, loose in the waist and managed without even thinking about it to get them undone and began shoving them down his hips.

Obi-Wan shivered, broke away and gasped and moaned. Neck arching back and Anakin relinquished his lips to attack his neck.

He marked easily, tomorrow there would be love bites on his neck that everyone would see and everyone would know and be reminded that Obi-Wan was his.

He’d forgotten, over the weeks when they’d been just touching and kissing fully clothed that Obi-Wan loved to be touched.

“Anakin,” his name came from somewhere deep within Obi-Wan’s throat, a deep, resonating sound and Anakin bit down on the juncture between his shoulder and his neck. Obi-Wan’s fingers dug into his skin and he moaned.

“I love you,” he murmured breathlessly against Obi-Wan’s skin. He could feel a slight pulse of happiness and Obi-Wan lifted his head, stared into his eyes.

“I love you too,” Obi-Wan said quietly, so softly, like he was afraid if he spoke any louder that it would ruin the moment.

They smiled at each other.

“There should be a bed,” Obi-Wan stated. “Because I’m old and I don’t think my back will take it.”

Anakin laughed, a sudden shock of sound and Obi-Wan’s smile deepened.

“You are not old, you are just perfect,” he said, leaning his face into the touch of Obi-Wan’s hand against his cheek.

He smiled softly.

And blinked, and then narrowed his eyes.

For a second, just a fraction of one, another face had hovered and wavered over Obi-Wan’s.

The clean-shaven, younger looking Obi-Wan that he’d seen when he’d been meditating and trying to find where Obi-Wan was being held.

That hazy, plane where two Obi-Wan’s, identical yet not had stared at him in incomprehension.

And he had the sudden insane urge to ask the man in his arms what his name was.

He buried it and touched his lips against Obi-Wan’s forehead.

This was his Obi-Wan, no matter what he looked like or acted like or had memories of… this was his Obi-Wan now.

And Anakin was keeping him.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Anakin was sleeping, curled up behind him, arm wrapped possessively around his chest.

Ewan stroked his arm and stared at the wall.

He’d had sex with men before. That thing that Jude and Jonny swore didn’t happen, that had been sex.

He’d known he’d enjoyed it, known it was something that given the opportunity, with the partners that he’d had, that he felt comfortable and safe with, that he would have done it again.

But he hadn’t really been given a chance to think about it after the first time, not with all the denial coming from Jude and Jonny. So he’d hid the tape and he’d buried the feelings and he’d moved on.

Because Jude and Jonny had both hooked up with women that kind of scared Ewan to be honest, and while Sadie would have just cut of his dick (which he was quite attached to and truly didn’t want to lose) because she still, to this day thought of Jude as her own private property, Angie on the other hand…

If she’d ever got wind of what had happened between the three of them he was sure he would have had a knife in his back regardless of the fact that it had happened before she even met Jonny.

Either that or she would have offered to watch. With Angie you could never be sure on any given day how she would respond to the same situation.

He pillowed his head on his arm and leaned back against Anakin’s body. His chest was warm against his back; if he moved just right he could feel that Anakin was hard again.

Anakin’s lips moved against the back of his shoulder and Ewan closed his eyes.

Time to sleep, because when Anakin woke he was pretty sure that they were only leaving the bed to use the Fresher and to get sustenance.

He honestly didn’t have any problem with that.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Obi-Wan was staring at him when he opened his eyes, just sitting there, silent. It was quite unnerving.

And as a result he sat up in a hurry.

Because Obi-Wan was never silent. Normally when he arrived first he was waiting for Ewan with a sarcastic quip on his tongue about how Ewan was going to get him killed.

It only took a second, and one long look to realize that something was quite wrong.

Obi-Wan was sitting there staring at him with a pair of boxer shorts and a t-shirt and a clean-shaven face.

Not even a hint of stubble.

“Oh this can not be a good thing,” Ewan muttered.

Because his chin itched and he clenched his hands into fists and determinedly did not run his hand across his face or look down to see what he was wearing.

“I think that this is the Force’s way of saying that we are where we are going to remain,” Obi-Wan said quietly. “At least for the time being.”

Ewan closed his eyes, drew his knees up to his chest and rested his chin on his tan pants.

“Is Anakin okay?” Obi-Wan asked.

Ewan smiled, opened his eyes and looked over at the other man who was sitting there looking like him.

Exactly like him and it was beginning to freak him out. Maybe if he just didn’t look at him?

“He’s fine; he’s teaching me how to use a lightsaber.”

“Don’t cut off an arm.”

Ewan laughed.

“My girls?” and Ewan felt a lump in his throat at the thought of not seeing his girls again. Of not seeing his family, or Jude or Jonny or any of his friends.

Of not being able to govern where his career went and he hoped that Obi-Wan had good instincts because he didn’t think his agent was just going to up and let him retire.

Obi-Wan touched his arm gently; smiled at him reassuringly in a way that said that he hadn’t given up on finding a way to get home so neither should Ewan.

“Jude and I took them to the zoo,” he started as Ewan got comfortable.

He pointedly didn’t ask why Jude was accompanying Obi-Wan and the girls to the zoo, instead of Eve. He thought he was better off not knowing at this point even though it was on the tip of his tongue to ask if his marriage was still intact or if Obi-Wan had managed to obliterate it in one gay swoop.

“Clara really likes the penguins; she’s drawn at least six pictures and has insisted that they all need to be put on the cooler… Esther thinks that elephants are the most fascinating thing she’s ever seen… she wants one for her birthday…”

Ewan smiled, lay on his side, propped his head on his arm, closed his eyes and listened to Obi-Wan tell him about his family.