Meeting of Minds [Open to bentheredonethat]

[tarisian_cathar]

He'd said to find him in the jungle; it already seemed a far better option in terms of living space, at least to her - away from the crowd, as it were, free from any number of complications, and far more peaceful. She stopped by the river first, to put cold water on her face, brushing the sweat from the fine fur on her face. She's been too active on these missions, and frankly misses her Jedi armour - not exactly enough to stand up to a lightsaber, but enough to deflect at least a few blaster shots. It moves more easily.

Granted, she could also do with her lightsaber.

Brushing back the fur a bit, she sighed, standing up slowly, stretching her back. What was so strange to her, in this moment, about meeting another Jedi? She was fairly certain that was who she was meeting - despite, or perhaps because of, his cagey manner about being from the same universe.

The vibrosword was strapped to her side, deactivated. Crude, by her standards. But serviceable. She wondered, idly, why she couldn't feel him as she approached the hut - what had made him so good at hiding?

But she approached, and knocked - her own presence in the Force not masked in the slightest.

Comments

[bentheredonethat]

"Correct," he acknowledged with a sad expression. "You'd have thought, with all our supposed joy in the idea of life that we would celebrate it, but instead we slotted such a thing as 'attachment' to be avoided at all cost."

Which in and of itself said something about the state of the Jedi Order, but if it had been the same in her time, perhaps this was something with which the Jedi had always struggled. Such philosophizing had been more Qui-Gon and Dooku's areas.

"Sidious had the final shatterpoint he needed to set his plans in motion. He used the risk of losing Padme in childbirth as the final wedge between Anakin and the Jedi Order.” Initially Obi-Wan had been fuzzy on these details, but again. Ten years of solitude gave a man time to think and Obi-Wan had always been a brilliant tactician. Once he’d mapped the path of what had happened to Shmi Skywalker, the rest had fallen into place.

“Ultimately, Sidious needed Anakin isolated to finish bringing him to his side. Anakin’s attachments to his mother, to Padme and their child, to the Jedi, they all had to be severed in the end.” Once again, the Sith had been playing on both sides of Anakin’s shoulders. Weaving events to destroy all the young man’s connections, while promising Anakin ways to protect them.

And now, Obi-Wan had no where left to go with the story, except back into the nightmare. The words wouldn’t come for the longest time, because these admittances never came easy. He felt his eyes becoming moist and quickly ducked his head, forcing the tears back through a combination of strength of will, and pure self-recrimination.

But when he looked back up, his face was dry and Obi-Wan spoke with calm, direct words.

"When Padme was within a couple weeks of birth when it all came to a head. Apparently, Padme, Bail Organa and some others in Senate were already concerned with how much Executive Power the Senate had been voting to give the Chancellor. I expect Sidious was aware of the rumblings and where they were coming from, he knew he had to move in order to finish consolidating his power.

I was on Geonosi when it all came apart, Master Yoda was on Kashyyyk, Master Plo Koon was on Cato Neimoidia,” the words were spoken in almost a whisper. “Anakin was on Coruscant, and Mace Windu was the senior ranking Council member still on Coruscant.”

Once again, names Juhani would not know, but if he stopped to explain every single actor in this tragedy, they'd be here for day.

"Mace and Anakin were another shatterpoint in all this. Mace and Qui-Gon were often at odds and I feel that some of Mace's animosity towards Qui-Gon, transferred to Anakin. I tried to shield Anakin, as best I could but it was never enough. Anakin had never been comfortable with Mace and Mace never trusted or believed in Anakin.

Oil and water,” he whispered, but that was as far as he would vocalize that thought. A blink and he refocused on her.

“I only know these events through secondhand recounts, mostly from Bail Organa. Mace Windu led the Jedi to capture Counsellor Palpatine under the charge that he was the Sith Lord. There was a confrontation in Palpatine’s office during which Mace Windu and the Jedi masters who had accompanied him were killed. Sidious sent out the order to the clone troopers to turn on the Jedi in the field, before going before the Senate body to announce that the Jedi Order had attempted to stage a military coup and overthrow the government. He branded the Jedi traitors to the Republic and solidified himself as Emperor.”

Obi-Wan paused, went to take a sip of tea, giving her time to absorb all this before he continued with the next part.

“At some point, during all of that, Sidious completed his seduction of Anakin Skywalker. Anakin became Lord Vader at Sidious’ right hand.” How odd. Those two sentences felt almost anti-climatic now. Perhaps hearing Vader state that he had killed Anakin Skywalker had somehow turned things in Obi-Wan’s own psyche.

“Sidious sent Anak… sent Lord Vader to the Jedi Temple, along with the 501st clone trooper regiment with order to kill everyone in the Temple,” the words were spoken with a false sense of detachment, but his eyes told more of the story. The sight of all the little bodies, cut down by a man they had looked too for protection.

“Master Yoda and I returned too late,” he went on to say. “The Temple was burning, everyone was dead, our only next course of action was to try to stop Sidious’ grip on the Republic. Master Yoda went to confront Sidious and I went to confront Anakin.”

How emotionally and mentally compromised he still was, by what had happened, Obi-Wan gave no indication. Though perhaps, from his almost preternatural calm, Juhani could draw her own conclusions.

“I knew that Padme knew where he would go. After I asked her, and she refused to tell me, I watched as she prepared her ship and when she went to depart, I stowed away aboard it. We went to Mustafar. She tried to talk to Anakin …” here things get so blurry for Obi-Wan. At the time it had all been clear, but looking back, trying to grasp a single thread of what happened, felt like trying to grab mercury. It all just … blurred. and again, his eyes suggested he was far, far away.

“Looking back, I don’t know, maybe Padme would have gotten through to him had I not been there." Another guilt he carries. "Maybe she could have helped Anakin throw off the chains of Lord Vader. I have replayed these events so many times; each time just when I am ready to accept that she were right and I was wrong, I know in my heart that Sidious would never have allowed her and the children to live. Not so long as he was alive, and even had Anakin turned back …Sidious defeated Master Yoda, he still held command of the clone troops, the Empire … I just …”

Bantha crap. He was rambling. Obi-Wan stopped himself, visibly forced himself back to the here and the now, took a breath and continued.

“I appeared and Anakin, fractured. He believed ... he insisted Padme were colluding against him and he attacked her. He and I … fought,” such a small word for everything that had happened, but he wasn’t about to try to give her a blow by blow of that battle. “I caused him grave injuries. I believed they were mortal wounds but I … I …” he hadn’t had the courage to step down and deliver a decisive mortal blow. “I couldn’t kill him. Instead, I left him for dead,” Obi-Wan whispered in a voice that wavered.

Again, he struggled back to the present, hands shifting with agitated movement to the nearly empty cup of tea. The fact that he doesn’t take a sip making it clear that he was fretting. Not very Jedi-like.

“I got back to the ship, a droid had gotten Padme aboard the ship, she were in and out of consciousness. We got to a mining station under Alderaan’s control, Bail Organa again giving Yoda and I sanctuary and providing us with the best medical facilities. But even the best … they could find nothing physically wrong with her, yet she was fading.”

Had it been Sidious, again? Had it been a broken heart in the wake of everything that had happened to Anakin and the world around them? Focus Obi-Wan, focus … he grabbed on to the small thread of hope that lay in amongst the wreckage of their lives.

“Padme gave birth to twins. A boy, she named Luke and a girl, she named Leia, and she insisted, in the moment before she died, that there was still good in Anakin." As he said the names, Obi-Wan forced his eyes to focus back on Juhani's face. Looking for any sense of recognition to suggest the other Jedi may have come across Luke or Leia in camp already.

[tarisian_cathar]

She listens to a tale of tragedy and woe that would have brought down nearly anyone - that he is still standing is a testament to the man, quite frankly.

"The young ones," she replies, barely a whisper, in recognition. But she also sets aside her tea, and shifts closer, seating herself on her knees in front of him.

"And I do this for your own good," she said. "Please, understand."

And she reached out to fold her arms around him in a hug. It wasn't very Jedi-like, no. It wasn't Jedi-like to fret. It wasn't Jedi-like to be...anything of what they were. But the thing she'd learned at Revan's side was that it wasn't the council who defined what it was to be a Jedi. It was yourself, and nobody else. And sitting across from her, by her measure, was one of the greatest Jedi the Order had ever, would ever, produce. A man so good that he had endured the end of everything he believed in and served, and still not fallen.

Comfort, care - these were not alien to the Jedi. But the core of what they should be.

"You are a good man, Ben Kenobi," she finished, pulling back. "Hard though I think it is for you to see it right now."