Star Wars PT- "The Nature of Love" - Obi-Wan Kenobi- G
Title - The Nature of Love
Author - Sealgirl in seal_girl
Fandom - Star Wars (Prequel Trilogy)
Prompt - “O/Q; Want is not enough to break a Jedi’s will”
Word Count - 1020
Rating - G
Summary - Obi-Wan’s thoughts during the battle with Darth Maul in The Phantom Menace.
A/N - Written for the starwarsficfest 3rd July 2008.
The Nature of Love
A moment of peace settled on the ship hanger as the two adversaries faced each other in silence.
Together Obi-Wan Kenobi and Qui-Gon Jinn had faced battle together any number of times. As he stood beside his Master, before the Sith Lord, Obi-Wan shook with fear under his customary cloak of calm. He had never felt fear like this before, so intense and raw. It was like putting his hand in a flame, or swimming in the coldest, blackest depths of a sea. He could barely breathe.
No one had seen a Sith Lord for a thousand years; no one had expected to see a Sith Lord ever again. More than just their two lives rested on the outcome of this battle on the small, insignificant planet of Naboo. The boy Qui-Gon had found, the Chosen One Qui-Gon had said. His fate rested on this too; and so did the fate of the Jedi Order itself; and peace and justice in the galaxy. Obi-Wan’s mind was clouded by thoughts of the future, and the terrible responsibility with which he was suddenly faced.
The two sides for the Force faced each other to do battle to the death for the fate of the universe, or so it seemed. Two Jedi Knights against one Sith Lord.
But they were not two Jedi. Not really. One was a Knight and a Master, it was true, and a man held up by many as the standard to which a Jedi should aspire, but Obi-Wan was just a novice, he hadn’t even passed the Trials.
And before this moment, he had thought himself ready to face any enemy. Never before had the slight pull of his Padawan Braid caused him so much anxiety.
Against a Sith Lord they needed to be so much more. They needed to be strong with the Force, its tool and its Master. He had to focus on the situation at hand, and not worry about the future and all that was at stake, he could virtually hear his Master telling him what he should be doing.
The Force whispered its promise and predictions in his ear, as was his gift. And in the back of his mind, Obi-Wan knew that Qui-Gon would fall at the hand of the Sith Lord. It was a sensation more real than anything else he had ever experienced, and more painful than the thought of a galaxy under the sway of the Dark Side.
He tried to ignore the feeling, telling himself that he shouldn’t be dwelling on the future, but that did nothing to change what he sensed.
Qui-Gon would fall…
And if Qui-Gon fell, everything would change, and everything that Obi-Wan had personally hoped for and anticipated would disintegrate like the restless dream it was.
All the time throughout Obi-Wan’s training, there had been the unspoken promise, maybe nothing more than imaginary hints, that there could be more between them when he was no longer a Padawan, and when he could face Qui-Gon as an equal.
Now before them stood the Sith Lord, as the agent of irrevocable change and destruction, not just of the galaxy, but for all his hopes and dreams.
So they fought above the gaps and narrow walkways of the generator, amid the hum of energy cells and the sharp smell of the arching electricity in the power lines. Blue and green lightsabres of the Jedi crashing and screeching against the double-red blade of the Sith.
Obi-Wan had never felt so close to his Master as in those moments. There was no outward sign of their intimacy, but they fought side by side, and fought as one, with one mind. The battle raged between the two opposing forces, and Obi-Wan felt as though he were inside the eye of a storm with his Master.
Between them, the Force crackled with its own energy, linking them together and they would fight as one, until one of them fell.
Obi-Wan knew it was going to happen. He could sense it, and fear-filled pain ran down his spine. Qui-Gon was going to die…
He could see it as clearly as he could see their opponent; Qui-Gon lying half on his side with a single hole in his torso that went right through him.
The image of his dead Master shook him, and Obi-Wan lost his concentration for a fraction of a second. That was all that the creature of the Dark Side needed, and Obi-Wan fell over the edge of the conduit and away from the battle.
The future seemed to crystallise in that moment. He wanted Qui-Gon to live; Obi-Wan needed him to live, and he had thought that he would do all within his power to change it. But not anything. No, he would not do anything to save his Master.
Obi-Wan may want to change the future, he knew that he did not have that right. He was still a Jedi, after all. There were rules that, as a Jedi, he would not break.
Whatever the Force willed for them, he knew that had to face it standing beside the man he loved more than a brother.
He was far away from the fight, he could hear the sound of battle above him. Unable to help, he forced himself to run back to the higher levels as fast as he could, pushing himself beyond his own endurance, with the baseless hope that his extra exertion would be enough to stop what he had foreseen from happening.
The image still burned in his mind, but it made him all the more determined to reach Qui-Gon in time. He knew how it would feel to see his Master fall. He knew also that soon after he was likely to be dead as well. But that didn’t matter.
But he still ran on to face the future head on.
And, though he knew, and though he wanted to believe he was wrong, and wanted to believe he could change the will of the Force, knew he couldn’t.
After all, want was not enough to break a Jedi’s will.