Chapter Text
Anakin Skywalker was a slave. He is free now, but he doesn't even really understand what that means. In nine years of life, almost all the free people he's ever known have been slave masters instead.
He is a youngling with nobody to stand beside him but his mother— also recently freed with so many more years of slavery on her shoulders. They are both in great need of time and healing. They are both in need of safety above all else.
They're both asleep now, mother and son, recovering from a surgery to remove the slave chips placed in their bodies. While the chips were being removed, they asked Estai to look after the controllers— the equivalent of putting their lives in Estai's hands because one button press would kill them— and they're burning in Estai's most secure pocket, even useless as they are now. When they awaken, she's going to ask them if they would do her the great honour of letting her watch as they destroy the damn things.
Beside the pair is Estai's own master— former-master. She's only been knighted two years. His injuries are serious. They've medically induced a coma in the hopes of saving him. It wasn't exactly the easy last mission together they were hoping for.
She takes his hand, wishing he could squeeze it. Instead, it's just limp, no different from the moment he fell unconscious in her arms, bleeding heavily. For a moment, she'd thought he'd died.
"Anakin is strong, Estai," he'd said in his last moments, breaths fast and pained, each word a fight to get out but Master Tholme has always fought hard. "Too strong." She hadn't understood why he was bothering to say it. He was so badly hurt and felt the need to state the obvious? "Don't let them treat him like they treated you."
And then she understood. They'd stood Anakin before the Council just days ago, before they returned to Naboo. The way the councillors had looked at Anakin had been more like they were assessing a threat than a prospective initiate. Estai had been desperate to hide the youngling in her robes, but she is paltry protection. She's spent her entire life on thin ground with the Council. If anything, it's strange to see them look at someone else the way they've always looked at her. "I won't. I promise, Master."
She'll fight on Anakin's behalf, do whatever she must to ensure the Council accepts him into the Jedi Order. She won't allow them to abandon a youngling because they fear what his strength could become. She won't let them assume all he can be is a monster, the way they did her.
The way they do her.
***
They ask Anakin a few questions. Again. Like they did before. His mother, Shmi, is outside, unaware these people who call themselves kind and compassionate are turning their noses up at a child just because he's frightened of a group of people so much bigger than him.
Anakin takes the smallest of steps backwards and she can feel him reaching out to her. His presence in the Force is so incredibly warm, but he's terribly thin and shivering because of it. They gave him extra layers, as many as he's strong enough to wear, but his lips are still turning blue. He's just too small, he can't generate enough heat to rival the twin suns he's used to.
It would comfort him if she reached back, but it wouldn't do him any favours. The Council would see it as an early sign that Anakin leans towards 'unhealthy attachments'— she doesn't know what could possibly be unhealthy about a youngling seeking comfort. Suspicion of attachment to her is possibly the worst way a youngling could commit this particular crime.
It's too late for him anyway. They're going to refuse him. He's too strong and he's too different.
He was raised as a slave with fear and scars and no choice and no rights to a single thing, not even his own body. His sense of the Force is innate. He does things without even realising it's the Force that pulls him that way. He doesn't know how to meditate because slaves work or they sleep, and meditation is neither. He doesn't know how to shield his mind so others can't feel all the emotions swirling in him like a maelstrom, doesn't know how to share his feelings with the Force so it can leave him calm, centred, focussed.
But he's more able to do what the Force asks of him despite his fear than any youngling Estai has ever met. He's grown up with nothing, but is generous anyway. When he first agreed to join the Jedi Order— or at least try— he hadn't even realised Estai and Master Tholme planned to rescue his mother too. He'd been ready to let go of the only love he's ever known because the Force pulled him to where he belonged.
He is everything a Jedi should aspire to be without even an ounce of training.
Too bad the Council decided the moment they met him that he'll never be a Jedi. He could've answered all their questions right, been utterly unafraid despite coming straight from slavery to stand before twelve adults meant to decide his fate, and they'd still turn him away.
(Estai tried to make sure Anakin knew his freedom wasn't dependent on acceptance here, but the boy is so young and so afraid— rightfully so after the life he's led.)
She swore to her master she wouldn't let the Council do this. She swore.
From the moment Anakin rescued them from a coming sandstorm, Tholme was insistent that the boy had to be trained. Estai agrees. But it doesn't matter. The Council are going to refuse him. Even if they accepted him, who would train him? Anybody volunteering would immediately be under suspicion for going after a boy with so much power inside him.
Tholme is the only person she'd trust to take him, but he's in a coma, and too old to keep up with a child like Anakin. Quinlan, Estai's padawan brother, is busy with his dear Padawan Aayla. Bant, her best friend, is far from Temple, taking a month to train with the Medicorps. There's nobody who could-
Anakin steps back again, reaches out again. It's already too late for him, the die is cast, the least she can do is make things easier by offering her own warmth in comfort. Her Force signature wraps around his, weaving a blanket that won't stop his shivering but at least lets him know he doesn't stand here alone.
Estai breathes as the Force settles not against her shoulders the way it so often does, but against her whole back. It's not a tooka, purring or ready to pounce as usual, it's a deep pressure like a hug.
In that moment, the Force couldn't make itself more clear if it cupped her face in ever so gentle hands and shouted. See, this pressure is not just against her back, it's also against Anakin's.
The Force learned a long time ago that, sometimes, even for the most obvious things, Estai needs more than a gentle nudge to find her way. Sometimes pulling her into a Force hug with her soon-to-be padawan is the only way to get the message across.
All that's left is how to make the Council accept her decision to train him, but Estai is a Shadow and that makes her an excellent liar. "Masters, before you make your decision, there is something I left out of my report that I believe you should know."
"Knight Estai, your debrief is confidential, not-"
"I swore to Master Tholme before he-" She thinks of his hand going limp in her grasp and breathes through the swell of emotion. "I swore to him I would train Anakin. If Anakin is not accepted, I will leave the Order and go with him."
It has exactly the impact she intended. Both she and the Force intended, in actual fact, judging by the mischievous tickles in her chest. She might've thought the life energy of the universe would be mature enough not to find Estai gently manipulating her betters quite so funny.
While the High Council are doing all they can to kick Anakin out before he can become a threat, she already is one. The last thing they want is to let her leave. The last thing they want is to let him stay.
One of those things is going to have to come in second. Either way, Anakin will be Estai's padawan.
Anakin turns, looking up at her. His eyes are so big and so blue and so bright. He is so bright in every way. He is bright with wonder and awe and the joy of being free, even as his anxieties try their damnedest to dim him. He could say anything. He could refuse her as a master, he could ask her what it would even mean to be her padawan, he could ask her if she's sure. Anakin is such a kind boy and he's smart enough to notice how hard the Council are trying to get rid of him, he's no doubt worrying nobody will want him.
She wants him. The Force knows their place is together.
Instead of any of that, he just whispers, "I feel it too."
Estai brings him in closer, tucking him against her front and resting her hands on his shoulders as they both stand facing the Council. "Master Che said today that there's no certainty Master Tholme will wake."
Another ripple goes through the Council as what she's really saying registers. One of Anakin's hands lands on hers, comforting her even though her distress is more put on than real. Comas are dangerous, even medically-induced ones, but Master Che is optimistic and Estai is too— the Council don't need to know that though. The Council is more than welcome to think Estai training Anakin may well be the last wish of a man they all deeply respected (even if his association with Estai pitted him against them too often). In their last moments, a Jedi can well be at their closest to the Force. They will take Master Tholme's 'last' words as guidance from it.
Suddenly, keeping Anakin around isn't such an awful idea to the Council. Losing Estai is so much worse in comparison.
"Are we ready to put this to a vote?" Master Windu asks. He's one of few councillors who's friendly with Estai. He, Master Tholme, and Councillor Plo Koon have (more than once) shared tea together to commiserate over what fresh ridiculousness the Council has decided upon to make Estai's life harder. Alas, Councillors Windu and Koon are two in a council of twelve. They aren't even close to a majority and they rarely manage to do her much good. "All in favour of Knight Estai taking Anakin Skywalker as her padawan?"
The vote is an easy majority in Estai and Anakin's favour. She notes the three holdouts for future reference.
It isn't until she's back in her quarters much later that it really hits her. She gave Shmi, Anakin's mother, credits for a meal with her son out on Coruscant, a private celebratory and goodbye meal together. Now, Estai stands in a home meant only for one, knowing she's currently on the active roster for Shadow missions no nine-year-old junior padawan can ever be allowed near, with very little idea how one goes about caring for a youngling.
She takes a deep breath in, remembering her former master's mantra for when a situation grows overwhelming. "Breathe, Padawan-mine," he soothed so many times. Then, when she was ready. "Strategise."
Maybe one of her old Mando'ad contacts can help. Taking on a padawan unexpectedly can't be that different from taking on a foundling. Right? Oh, Master Tholme is going to laugh at her when he wakes up. Not in his wildest dreams did he ever imagine living to see a grandpadawan from her, but she knows he'll still offer her any help he can give. She wishes he were here now to give it.
The Force purrs gently against her shoulder, nuzzling against her neck. Right, yes, focus. Time to make herself padawan-friendly.
***
Anakin comes back from his first day of classes raving. There's the brightest grin she thinks she's ever seen splitting his face.
She tells him about the one-to-one session for reading and writing. "I'm going to be able to read! Then I can look at any book I like and not just ones with pictures!"
"You certainly can," she agrees, stroking a spare hand over his blonde hair while she stirs an easy meal for dinner— one that meets Anakin's food plan so he can gain weight without upsetting his stomach. Anakin leans into the touch like a tooka, pressing in close and scrunching his hands in Estai's robes.
She suspects he had few sources of positive physical contact growing up. Estai remembers being touch-starved herself, once. The itchiness of being touched could feel unbearable at times. And then it became itchiness from not being touched. She still considers herself lucky her friends were so understanding, leaning in when she needed it and pulling away when it got too much.
"Oh! Oh! And did you know that the original Temple sp- spro- the pointy towers are now so low that nobody goes down there anymore?"
"Spires, and I can't say I did," Estai admits. It makes sense of course. Coruscant keeps building up and up and up, their temple must grow with it or be buried. "Did you know that each of the original spires had no less than four exits, and one of them even had seven?"
"Why so many?"
Estai lets her mixing spoon rest on the saucepan handle so she can turn her full attention to her young charge, crouching down closer to his height. "The Jedi now are peacekeepers. We do not go seeking violence. However, long ago, we had an army, the Warriors of Light. Not only did we fight, but we waged wars. This temple was a stronghold, strongholds need good defences, and plenty of escape routes."
"Were you a Warrior of Light?" Anakin asks, eyes glittering. To him, almost everything he learns is something wonderful, something to be awed by. She dreads the day when other students convince him his wonder is 'uncool'.
Estai chuckles, standing up again. "I'm not quite old enough to have seen those days, no."
Anakin frowns. She can almost see the cogs turning in his brain as he considers how long ago it must've been if even Estai wasn't alive back then. "Was Master Tholme?"
"No, he's not old enough either."
Clearly the concept of a time period before even Master Tholme was alive is too much for Anakin's young mind because he immediately changes the subject, blasting her with all the fun facts he's learned about nautolan culture.
He's in a mixture of classes, some padawan, some initiate, and then the one-to-ones. As days pass, he rarely tells her about maths classes because it's all stuff he knows already, whether from manning Watto's junk shop or learning everything he can to be a good pilot. Some days, he'll talk about something in science that was fascinating, others he'll ask her why the other younglings thought it was so confusing— it's obvious energy can't be destroyed, isn't it?
"Some people would say it's obvious that 'one' is spelled with an 'e' on the end." Admittedly, she's not sure which people, but she's sure they're out there somewhere.
Anakin grimaces but concedes the point. While he loves the idea of learning to read and write, and he's super excited about it all, language seems to be what he struggles with most.
Days become weeks, become his first six months. She's had something of a sharp shift from Shadow work to teaching padawan classes, but she's found her feet (or, there are days when she feels like she has anyway).
She's spent quite some time in the Crèche, more than she has since she was an initiate herself. Learning from the Crèchemasters has helped her a lot with Anakin, and Masters Windu and Plo have never once hesitated to give advice when she's sought it. It's left her much steadier than she was that first day.
Anakin has moved classes a few times to better match his quickly advancing skill level. He's still overjoyed about his freedom to learn and often regales her with tales of his subjects, but there are days when he returns to their shared quarters so quiet that Estai's ears ring.
She grows more and more worried as the quiet days come more and more often. She tries to ask him what makes him sad, but he only snuggles in close to her and tells her it's nothing, he's fine. Sometimes he'll say he misses his mum (Shmi has gone to Alderaan, joining a program for freed people like herself to heal and learn how to be free), and she believes him, but she also knows there's more to it.
Instead, she distracts him from his sadness with jokes and games. Sometimes just the two of them, sometimes with Quin and Aayla. Bant visits often and, even though she's off-duty, always surreptitiously checks on Anakin's health. Someday Anakin will catch on, but he's not the most observant of people.
It's not until the twice-yearly Watching Week comes around that a possible reason for his quiet days begins to dawn on Estai. In Watching Week, padawan classes involving any physical skills have an audience of masters. It's not a tournament, just a normal class, meant for padawan-masters to check good behaviour more than anything else.
Anakin is well-behaved, as are most of the other younglings. She's impressed at how far he's come in his lightsaber classes given how little time he's had in them. But then, they are almost certainly his favourite class.
What worries her is that he's too well-behaved. At first, she thinks he's on his absolute best behaviour because he knows she's watching. It's not too unusual for padawans to act that way. But nobody even tries to talk to him during the class, none of the other younglings say a word his way. While the others group together, watching a demonstration or waiting their turn, Anakin is alone.
She'd hoped Anakin would escape being singled out. Younglings can be unspeakably cruel, yes, but they can also be unspeakably kind. She'd truly hoped, for his sake, he'd face the latter.
She isn't surprised he faced the former.
Is this why you brought us together? she asks the Force. Because we'll understand each other's pain better than anyone else?
The Force is an ache in her throat, a sting behind her eyes, even as it presses warmth against her spine. Comfort and commiseration.
That evening, she makes his favourite of the meals he's been allowed to try recently. His diet is still carefully controlled, but much less so than it was at the start.
"Did you like the class?" he asks as they sit down, finally done thanking her excitedly over and over for making his favourite meal.
"You were excellent," she says, knocking his ankle under the table. "I'm very proud of you, Padawan-mine."
Anakin smiles so wide he has a hard time chewing. "Master Drallig says he thinks I might have a natural incl- inclimination for Djem So."
"Inclination," Estai corrects. "And I suspect he might be right. I'll have to brush up on it."
"You have time. We don't get to learn it until we learn the first level Soresu kata, but all the movements are so small and boring. It actually made Makashi seem alright."
Anakin has far too much energy in his tiny body for the precision of Makashi. Estai learned that the hard way. He was bouncing off the walls after she tried teaching him only the first five steps of her preferred form. Djem So, with its quick shifts between offence and defence and its inclusion of Force-based attacks, will suit him much better. Maybe when teenage angst and growth spurts have him more tired, Makashi and Soresu will be of more interest to him.
"Anakin, I have a question and it's very important to me that you answer this honestly, ok?"
Anakin nods, reluctantly setting his cutlery down so he can be serious rather than scarfing down food. Estai mirrors him.
"Are the other younglings bullying you?"
Anakin's eyes go wide. It's not the kind of surprise that asks 'why would you ever think that?'. It's the kind of surprise that asks 'how did you know?'.
Estai had so hoped she was wrong.
"I-" He hesitates, biting down on his lip. "I don't think it's bullying," he says. "They don't hurt me."
Estai would've noticed if he was coming to their rooms with bruises. But there are more kinds of hurts than physical ones. "Alright." She isn't sure she believes him, but she knows he believes it and saying he's wrong will make this harder, not easier. "What do they do?"
Anakin hums, slouching smaller in his chair. "In my lightsaber classes- When I do something wrong, you correct me and it feels nice. When they correct me, they're mean. And when I do something right, they won't talk to me."
Estai breathes until she can speak without her voice cracking. "That must be very lonely."
Anakin shrugs. "I guess. Master Drallig tells them off for it a lot. He spoke to their masters once but it just made them angry because they thought I got them in trouble. They kept calling me a rat."
Nothing worse than being seen as a snitch. Still, it's nice to know Master Drallig was willing to act on Anakin's behalf, even if it backfired somewhat. "What about other classes?"
"History and culture classes are really nice." Estai can't help but note his classmates in those are all younger than him. "Nobody likes me in meditation because I make it harder for everyone. Bruck says I'm like a fat bantha in the Force: loud, slow, and in everybody's way."
"Clearly, Padawan Chun has never met a real bantha." A bantha on Tatooine's sand dunes is the best way to travel quietly. They can eat up distances faster than anyone ever realises and all while ensuring their rider doesn't exhaust themselves under the suns. Plus, the banthas know the places to avoid and the places where black melons can give life-saving hydration. Banthas save lives.
"I tried to tell him that if a bantha is in your way, you're about to get ambushed, but he didn't believe me."
Estai almost laughs. Anakin's right, but it doesn't surprise her that Padawan Chun wasn't interested in listening— whether he believed Anakin or not. "He wouldn't survive Tatooine."
"Nobody here would," Anakin mutters, picking up his cutlery so he can eat some more.
For all the many ways Anakin is different from other Jedi younglings, Estai thinks the biggest difference is the way the initiates here are so deeply cared for all their lives. They're protected from birth to puberty with literally thousands of adults around them ensuring they feel only warmth and love as they grow. In adolescence, they're introduced to danger slowly but surely, under the close guidance of someone with the experience to survive. Even as young knights, they're paired whenever possible.
Anakin was born into slavery, raised under twin suns, only his mother truly and forever with him. He spent every day in danger. It's not only that Anakin is capable of surviving Tatooine while few others in the Order are, it's the fact that he has survived it. It's the fact that he has the scars to prove it— physical and mental.
"Anakin, do you have anyone your age you call a friend?"
Anakin chews his mouthful. His mother taught him good manners so he never speaks with food still in his mouth. Given how diligently he's chewing, she wouldn't be surprised if he's using those manners to buy time before he has to speak. That, in itself, is really all the answer she needs. "Does Aayla count?"
"Aayla is a very good friend, but she's a good few years older than you."
Anakin shrinks smaller again. She has the urge to wrap him in his favourite blanket, the fluffy one that he keeps near the heater during the day so it's lovely and warm at night. He wears the warmest type of Jedi robes (short of cold weather gear) and the weight he's put on definitely helps him stay warm too, but he still gets cold a lot more often than others.
"Ok, thank you for telling me all of this. You've been very brave, being so honest, and I am as proud of that as I am your lightsaber skills."
Anakin's cheeks turn pink. Now, when he shrinks, it's because compliments still take him off-guard. "Proud of honesty?"
Estai nods. "To be honest, especially about something that makes you feel vulnerable or something that you don't want to talk about, is something to be very proud of. Now, finish your dinner. We'll talk later about how to handle the bullying problem without making things worse for you, ok?"
"It's not bullying," he reminds her. "They don't hurt me."
Oh, but they are, and this is something Anakin needs to learn. "They're hurting your soul, Padawan, that's more than enough."
Anakin's cutlery rests on his plate again. His lips purse together. He may not be chewing food anymore, but he's certainly chewing something over in his mind. "There's already so much wrong with me that they pick at," he says, quiet and oh, so small. "I don't want them to think I'm so weak that what they say hurts."
Of course it hurts. Those kids know it hurts, whether he reacts or not. His reactions or lack thereof may be what makes hurting him fun or boring, but it won't stop them saying the words. It won't stop him hurting.
Keeping her head down, letting them do what they liked to her without even a word of protest, it never saved Estai when she was in Anakin's shoes. There's no reason to believe it will save him either— no matter how she might wish it would. "Anakin, I don't imagine I ever told you before but, when I was your age, I was bullied too."
"But-But you're so wizard!"
Estai smiles at her dear padawan, knowing such words are not handed out lightly. 'Wizard' is Anakin's highest compliment.
"You're great at everything! You can talk fancy, and-and you helped beat that monster on Naboo, and you- and you made the plan to save everyone there! And you've been teaching me so well and you're a great cook and- How could anyone bully you?"
He's such a sweet boy, her little Anakin. Kind, to a fault. But, all those things he speaks of, she could've done all that at five years old, and she still would've been bullied. The things her bullies had against her had nothing to do with her abilities. "Because before I became who I am now, I was a youngling like you. I didn't have the skill to beat a Sith, I could barely beat my classmates. I couldn't think of a world-saving strategy, I could barely do hyperspace calculations. Truth be told, I still struggle with hyperspace calculations, it's why I'm one of few Jedi who never takes a shuttle without an astromech aboard to check my work. Nobody is great at everything, Anakin, not even me."
Anakin practically scowls at her, whole face screwing up dramatically. "But- No, you-"
"Yes, me. There's nothing wrong with you, and you're not weak," she promises. Anakin opens his mouth to argue. "If you are, then I must be too."
His mouth snaps shut.
"The other younglings have decided they don't like you so they hold you up against an impossible standard— perfection— so they can find the maximum number of things to pick on you for. Perfection is an ideal, it's unattainable."
"But Master Windu-"
"Once told me that a man, who turned out to be abusing his padawan, would never do such a thing."
Anakin blinks at her, visibly trying to reconcile a mistake that grave with the man he swears doesn't scare him. "Master Yoda?" he tries.
"Trained that very man."
Anakin slumps back in his seat, staring at the wall far behind Estai. It might be a bit much for Anakin to have his heroes taken from him when he's still so young, but he won't ever give himself a healthy goal to reach for if he spends his life comparing himself to people he's put on a pedestal. "Master Quin?"
Estai doesn't swallow back a snort in time. "I know a lot of people who believe he's too easily swayed by his emotions."
"Master..." He pauses, trying hard to think of others who are 'wizard' too, "Nu?"
"Regularly falls asleep at her desk."
"No!" Anakin exclaims, hitting his hands against the table in pure shock.
"Yes." Estai actually caught the Jedi's head archivist napping under a table once, but that is going to be a secret between them for a very long time. "Nobody's perfect, Anakin. We can't even manage perfectly efficient power storage for droids and you think we can do perfect people?"
"So much of the movement is inefficient too— depending on the droid," Anakin grumbles out, his deep knowledge and passion for droids shining through, even in this dim conversation. "I tried to make C3PO move better, but I went too far and made him worse in other ways."
There's definitely a moral in there somewhere, she thinks. Someday, he may well puzzle it out. "You, Anakin Skywalker, are still at the start of your journey," she tells him, tapping his nose just to see him smile. "You will grow to be great at many things, if you wish to be. Or excellent at one thing. Or somewhat decent at too many things to count. Every moment in your life, every decision you make, every decision made around you, it will shape the person you become and the future you make. You are infinite possibility, just like I was. The other younglings may not see that yet, but they'll come to eat their words in time, don't you worry."
"But I won't be perfect?"
She shakes her head, tempted to come around the table and hug him close, but they still have a meal to eat, and it's very important Anakin finishes it. No skipped meals until he's completely finished the starvation recovery diet. "No, and that's just how you should be."