Chapter Text
The shop owner’s oil-blackened hands pull away the tarpaulin, revealing the gleam of metal and the inviting curve of well-worn leather. The man looks up and grins, and Obi-Wan can't help but grin back. There is a silent understanding between the two of them, even though they barely exchange more than a few words each year. A nod and a smile are all that are needed to convey mutual appreciation for the beauty of an object most would consider obsolete.
Later, as night falls over the foothills of the mountains, Obi-Wan sits by the dying embers of a campfire, watching the sky fade from smoky violet to deep cobalt. In the distance a thin strip of grey delineates the horizon, catching the light reflected from the planet's single bright moon. Tomorrow's route will take him to the edge of that ocean, where salt will sting his nostrils as he rides the sandy road that every year seems closer to being eaten up by the water.
It was one of the reasons he first came back here, that ocean. He found a solace riding at its edge, a balm to soften the shards of grief endless sessions of meditation would not remove. He had told himself, back then, that it was the Force he recognised within the seemingly endless mass of water. It was true, to a certain extent. The ocean, like the Force, was powerful, mysterious, and neither threatening nor benevolent, just... present.
But the real reason was nothing so esoteric. It was simply the colour of the water that soothed him, a particular blend of shifting grey and blue that matched exactly a gaze whose absence he felt with physical pain. Qui Gon had been a father figure, a mentor, an anchor. As Jedi they had risked their lives every time they left Coruscant, yet some part of Obi-Wan had never believed his Master could be slain. Obi-Wan knew that grief was a symptom of an attachment he should never have allowed himself in the first place. But that did not make it any less painful. With time he learned that grief is love, and that with one, the other was inevitable. Foolishly, by the time he'd worked that out, it was too late.
Pink-cheeked younglings crowd around him, giggling behind their hands. It's impossible not to laugh with them. They always want to touch him, tug his beard, slide grubby fingers over the curve of his mysterious metal steed. Digging into his bag, Obi-Wan tries to find something to give them. Portions will not do. Then, right at the bottom of his ration pack, his fingers settle on something else, and he pulls out a squashed bar of Anakin's favourite candy, not remembering having put it there in the first place. Soon he has a small-scale riot on his hands.
As is usually the case, the small group of younglings break up and disappear into the scrub land as quickly as they arrived. All save one. This one, an impish-looking girl of about six with a mass of black curly hair and chocolate eyes, takes his hand and insistently pulls him in the direction of a group of small cone-shaped huts. With a backward glance to check his belongings are secure, Obi-Wan lets himself be led along. Inside the hut the girl's family welcome him with smiles and gestures and cups of spicy hot tea.
Later, as he walks back in the fading light to pitch his tent and cook his supper, high on the simplest of experiences, he finds himself wishing there was more time in the life of a Jedi to be with people like this, more opportunities to share small fragments of ordinary lives in the absence of war or danger. And he finds himself thinking, for the fifteenth blasted time that day, how much Anakin would enjoy this.
But Anakin is not here; Obi-Wan makes these trips alone. Anakin doesn't even know where Obi-Wan is, or what he is doing. Obi-Wan has never told him, and Anakin no longer asks.
In the early years coming here had been a welcome escape from the sheer relentlessness of training a boy who stretched Obi-Wan's abilities, together with his patience, every single day. Then war intervened, and shore leave became a dispensable luxury. As months of conflict stretched into years, memories of these trips became distant dreams, hazy and faded compared to a grim reality of blaster fire, horror and death. But now the war is over. They won. The Republic won. Suddenly there is time and space to rest, to relax and to think. Obi-Wan is not sure whether he likes that freedom. Much as he disliked war, fighting it was reassuringly all-consuming, narrowing one's focus to the task in hand. It is easy to uphold the Jedi principle of altruism when every grain of energy, every moment of concentration is needed in the struggle to defeat the enemy, save populations of entire star systems or merely survive until the next day. There is no time to consider your own wants. Your own needs. Your own desires.
The weeks following the trial of Palpatine and the signing of the peace treaty had been difficult for Obi-Wan. It was not so easy to settle back into the day to day life of the Temple, yet everyone seemed to expect him to do just that. Only Anakin could really understand, and therein lay an even bigger problem. But the Council had obviously noticed Obi-Wan's difficulties, because they had practically ordered him to take some time off, away from Coruscant. And even as he protested that it was not necessary, he knew there was only one place he wanted to visit.
So Obi-Wan finds himself here, on this distant planet where very little seems to have changed. And as he watches the stars blink into existence in the darkening sky, the silent emptiness of the night allows no escape from the admission that everything has come full circle.
Because ten years later, here he is, trying to escape from Anakin, all over again.
On the last morning, Obi-Wan rises early, in time to see the first blond streaks of sunlight warm the pale blue sky. He repacks his bag, carefully arranging the contents so that the brown-wrapped parcel containing the physical vestiges of his normal life is near the top for easy retrieval later. All too soon this small escape will be over, and he will swap the battered leather jacket and trousers for tunics and robe, and give himself back to everything that makes him more than simply Obi-Wan. He is – always will be – Jedi. But the rank, the status, Master, General, Council member, are in fact something he has never sought.
But then, Obi-Wan has very rarely sought anything.
Perhaps that's because the only thing he's ever really wanted is something he apparently cannot have.
He slings a leg over the saddle of the bike, smiling in satisfaction as the engine responds loudly to the twist of his gloved hand. Sun warm on his back, he settles into the ride, and as the miles of smooth dirt road glide steadily beneath his wheels his thoughts drift over the route back to the ramshackle town that constitutes the start and end point of his journey. In the past he has always taken the ocean road, skirting as close as he can to the white froth of breaking waves. Now, almost on a whim, he decides to try something different.
When he reaches the point where the road forks, he stops for a moment of two to gaze out over the ocean. Then, after murmuring a farewell, he turns away from it, towards the desert.
The dunes rise like small mountains at either side of the road, and Obi-Wan has to concentrate on his balance, ready at any moment to adjust his weight at the first sink of his wheels into a soft patch. It's intimidating, but there's a great satisfaction in the challenge, and a sense of accomplishment when his wheels eventually find the beginnings of the old paved road that will lead him out of the wilderness.
He sits back in the saddle and enjoys the beauty of the last stretch of the ride through the desert: the strong shadows cast by the soft, sculpted dunes, the ridges of red and pink rock amongst yellow, even the bleached-white bones of animals lying like driftwood on the sand. The wind has blown here across the heat of the plains and the air is warm on his face, drying his lips.
Eventually, up ahead, a familiar splash of greenery rises from the orange horizon and upon reaching it, he stops under the shade of a tree and takes the opportunity to fill his canteen from the small stone well that mines the precious water supply. He rubs the sand off his face with the back of his hand, feeling the scratch on his skin.
I hate sand, Master. It gets everywhere…
Damn fool Kenobi , he mutters under his breath as he takes a swig of the cool water. He is well aware that, when he had mentioned he would be going away again, Anakin was waiting, this time, to be invited. When Anakin was a teenager he used to openly tease Obi-Wan about these trips, trying to goad him into revealing where he was going. But war has changed both of them. His former Padawan may still call him Master but they are no longer teacher and learner; Anakin has long surpassed Obi-Wan's abilities, and proved himself again and again. Obi-Wan may be sixteen years older than Anakin but they have become men together, and they are equals, now, in every way. And although Anakin knows exactly how to aggravate, annoy, exasperate and irritate Obi-Wan, if he so chooses, it is not so much a battle of wills any more, but an affectionate antagonism, now, well-worn and reassuring. Obi-Wan wouldn't have it any other way.
So when he called at Anakin's quarters to say goodbye, Obi-Wan had not failed to notice the tiny twinge of incomprehension and rejection on Anakin's face, and had hated the emptiness of the Force that concealed Anakin's disappointment. Obi-Wan would have preferred it if Anakin had just pestered him about it, because then it wouldn't be so obvious how much it meant.
Obi-Wan wonders what it would have felt like to just tell him, right then. To just say those words.
But, of course, he hadn't. Because even though, romantic old fool that he is, they might beat in his heart every day, those particular words don't fit very easily between Don't think you can come in here and eat through my groceries just because I'm away and Try not to wind up Master Windu any more than is strictly necessary.
It would be easier to say those words to a complete stranger than his closest friend. But Obi-Wan doesn't love a complete stranger. Isn't in love with a complete stranger. And even if there was a chance Anakin might love him back, it wouldn't matter. Obi-Wan simply cannot say those words. It is forbidden. He is not allowed to feel that way.
Is too afraid to feel that way, again.
And so Obi-Wan keeps his secret, hidden under layers of mock-disapproval, stoicism and conformity. Every time Anakin sprawls against him, long-limbed and sleepy, and so damn physically needy , Obi-Wan pats his shoulder stiffly, and frowns. Every time Anakin comes to Obi-Wan's quarters late at night, half-drunk and lamenting the sorrow of some romantic entanglement that he should at least attempt to keep a secret, Obi-Wan evades his predatory gaze, murmurs weakly that the Code is there for a reason, and ducks the lips that try to stumble onto his.
The sun is still blazing high in the sky as Obi-Wan rides the final sweeping curve of road towards the town, measuring the remainder of his time here in every turn of his wheels. He counts down the minutes before he has to return to a life where every day, he has to lie. Later, as the blue planet shrinks below his starfighter, and the stars stretch his path into hyperspace, Obi-Wan lets himself consider, for just a brief moment, the possibility of bringing Anakin here, next year.
Then he quickly squashes the sentimental thought, and tries to banish it from his mind. There is no way he could risk it, just the two of them, away from their responsibilities, away from the Council, away from the Code. He wonders if he could concoct some miserable half-truth that would both satisfy Anakin and put him off, a field trip to collect botanical samples on Bepsin, for example, or vacation to commune with the natives of Hoth. Yes, that might work.
It will have to work, because he could never bring Anakin here.
He just couldn't.
Could he?