The stormtroopers hadn't even left him their bodies to bury.
At first, it was as if they had vanished into thin air. Had they been confiscated? Disposed of in some undisclosed location? Perhaps they had been destroyed by fire, indistinguishable from the smoke rising heavenward from the ransacked shell of the Lars farmhouse. For the space between two heartbeats, Luke Skywalker allowed himself to believe that maybe his aunt and uncle were still alive.
But no, he looked again. And saw the two charred skeletons. They were dead. Dead and gone.
He would have to seek closure elsewhere. There was nothing left for him on Tatooine.
They'd ultimately returned to Ben Kenobi's home in the Jundland Wastes for the night. It would be as safe there as anywhere; the Empire wasn't interested in eccentric old hermits on the edge of civilization. His mind was a benumbed, gray haze, so he didn't remember the trip back, but by the time they'd arrived and brought the droids inside to power down, night had fallen.
Ben pushed him in the direction of a primitive fresher. He relieved himself in the toilet pan and used the amenities he found in a cabinet to scrub the soot and grime off his face and hands. That was easy enough. Just going through the familiar motions.
After emerging from the fresher, Ben maneuvered him into a chair and laid out a bracing meal of thick strained yogurt, pickled vegetables, and bread seasoned with aromatic herbs, along with a pot of strong dark tea. He ate mechanically, obediently, and on some level he knew the food was excellent, but it might as well have been ashes in his mouth.
"Drink," Ben urged, pouring him a generous cup of the tea.
Luke complied without question and drained half of the cup without even looking at it…which turned out to be an extremely bad idea. It tasted terrible. For the first time this evening, he was really focusing on something. He took another tentative sip. And nearly spit it out again. Not an inkling of doubt about it: The water that had been used to make this tea had an unacceptably high concentration of mineral salts and insoluble particulate matter.
Had to be the product of a faulty homestead vaporator unit, Luke decided with the instinctive, self-assured expertise of a boy raised on a working moisture farm. It probably wasn't even entirely safe to drink. Even during the hardest, least productive seasons, they condensed far better water back home. Maybe Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru would allow him to bring—
No.
The cup dropped to the floor and shattered. Luke lurched awkwardly to his feet, overturning the chair as he did so.
"What's wrong?" Ben had risen as well.
"I can't— I've got to get out of here—" His heart was racing. He felt hot and dizzy and nauseous. He couldn't breathe; he needed the cool air of the desert night. "Help me…" he whimpered, but when he tried to speak further, all that came out was a gut-wrenching dry heave. He managed five stumbling steps toward the door before sickness overtook him and his vision went black.
When consciousness returned, the first thing Luke saw was Ben's face hovering above his own. Ben's hand rested lightly on Luke's forehead.
Luke was lying prone on his back in an unfamiliar bed. It was comfortable. Warm. He was confused. How had he gotten here?
"You passed out," Ben said. "Don't try to sit up yet."
Oh, right. Ben must have moved him while he was unconscious. But why had he—?
The rest of the day's horrors returned in a rush. Their bones had crumbled to ash and scattered to the four winds when he had tried to touch them. If there was one thing this miserable dustball didn't need, it was more dust. He was shaking. An uncontrollable, keening wail rose in his throat. "They thought they would be laid to rest beside Uncle Owen's father!"
Ben climbed into bed next to him and gathered Luke into his arms like he were a child who had awoken screaming from a nightmare. That solid, human presence against his body overwhelmed what little was left of his defenses. He began to cry in earnest then, face pressed tightly against Ben's chest, tears soaking the rough, threadbare fabric of Ben's robes. Ben accepted his grief without comment or censure. He rubbed his back, whispered soothing words into his ears, and rocked him gently as his sobs went on and on.
"It doesn't even feel real," Luke whispered when he had the breath to speak again.
"After a tragedy, nothing ever feels real in quite the same way again." Ben paused for a moment, staring off into the distance. Then he turned back to Luke with a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "But you will go on, Luke."
There was a story in that wisdom, maybe several stories, but Luke was too weary and heartsore to want to hear any of them. Actually, he wasn't sure if he'd ever be ready for whatever had exiled a Jedi Master to hateful Tatooine. He began to cry again. Ben held him again, just as he had done before.
Eventually, his cries morphed into huffs of choked laughter. There was an inappropriate, hysterical edge to his mirth, he knew, but who was left to care? Certainly not Aunt Beru, who would have been fastest to chastise him. He pulled back a bit from the embrace so that he could look at Ben's face clearly.
"Oh Gods, do you know what the kids in town would say if they knew I was in bed with Ben Kenobi?" he managed between guffaws.
"Something about the pervert robbing the cradle, I would imagine," Ben said wryly.
That reply stopped Luke's laughter in its tracks. "Wait, you know—?"
"Of course. I'm old, not deaf. But alas, my life is not the exciting HoloNet scandal drama. In fact, you are the first living being, male or otherwise, ever to share this bed with me."
"Oh." Luke shifted uncomfortably. "I'm sorry."
"There's no need to apologize."
"But why—?" Luke's jaw snapped shut with an audible click. He'd just made the connection. It seemed to come from nowhere, but it was suddenly so obvious, as if it had always been there right in front of him and he had only to take notice of it.
"My father— Was he—? Were you—?" He knew exactly what he wanted to ask but wasn't sure how to without giving offense.
Ben seemed to understand regardless. "Ah. Your insight serves you well, Luke. Yes, I loved your father. And more to the point of your question, I was also in love with him. He, however, preferred to consort with others."
Well, that was an awkward revelation. And what was "others" in the plural supposed to mean? Was his father promiscuous…?! Luke rolled onto his side so that Ben would not see him blushing.
"He didn't know what he was missing," Luke mumbled into the pillow, squeezing his eyes shut. It was a silly and stupidly loyal thing to say, but it was, he now realized, nothing less than exactly how he felt about Ben's relentless, unstinting devotion to the memory of the man he loved.
Ben chuckled. "I appreciate the vote of confidence." There was genuine warmth in his voice. Luke felt him rise from the bed and pull the blankets up more securely around Luke's body. "You should focus on getting some rest. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow."
Ben's footsteps were starting to recede from the bedroom.
"Wait, will you stay with me? I don't want to be alone…" At any other time, Luke would have hated how plaintive and childish his voice sounded.
The footsteps halted. Ben returned and sat down on the edge of the bed. He stroked Luke's head. "I promise. Sleep now."
Relief. Safety. Sheer exhaustion was beginning to overtake him at last.
As he drifted off, he murmured, to no one in particular, "I'd settle for halfway real."
"So would I, Luke, so would I."
That was the last thing he remembered Ben saying before dreamless sleep took him.
The victory celebration on the forest moon of Endor.
The spirits of the departed Jedi were all there. Yoda, Ben, and…his father. Anakin Skywalker. Calm, benevolent presences, watching with approbation. They did not attempt to speak with Luke or anyone else, but they lingered on the edges of his field of vision all night.
As dawn approached and the remaining revelers staggered away to find a place to sleep it all off, Luke saw Ben one last time. He was with Anakin, in the middle of a large clearing on the forest floor. They stood face to face, frozen in time, so close that their bodies were nearly—but not quite—touching. Ben reached up with a hand to comb Anakin's unruly curls away from his eyes. A sweet, almost bashful smile bloomed on Anakin's handsome face. He leaned in and pressed his mouth against Ben's, and they embraced each other passionately. As the kiss went on and on, threads of luminous energy twined sinuously together until they looked like a single entity in the Force.
A beautiful moment. Transcendent. Eternal. Then the first rays of the morning sun broke through the canopy of foliage to touch them, and they were gone. It was as if they had been absorbed back into the light.
I'd settle for halfway real.
Luke's heart soared higher than the stars.
END