Summary: Obi-Wan and Anakin's early days together involve considerable growing pains, among other things. Written (unofficially) using the "Gamma" prompt from the 1sentenceorder community on LiveJournal. Title comes from "Some Nights" by fun.
Ten Years of This, I'm Not Sure if Anybody Understands
#01 - Air: In the deepest recesses of his heart, Anakin Skywalker always knew that his love for flying, for the wind whipping through his hair and the power of the controls at his fingertips, would turn into something special; even so, he thinks, fingering his brand-new (slightly itchy) Padawan braid, he never allowed himself to set his sights quite this high.
#02 - Apples: "You've never had an apple before?" Obi-Wan queries, but before Anakin can feel too embarrassed, his Master has already cored the fruit and sliced it into neat quadrants for him.
#03 - Beginning: "Pleased to meet ya!" Anakin beams, pumping the other Jedi's hand with an enthusiasm that has softened even the surliest hearts, but Qui-Gon's friend's grip (and his expression) is(/are) lackluster, at best.
#04 - Bugs: "Yes, I suppose you could eat bugs for sustenance if you really had no other options," Obi-Wan concedes, though his distaste for the idea is palpable, and the boy raises his chin smugly in rare victory.
#05 - Coffee: Obi-Wan takes his caf hot and plain, and even though the scalding mouthful that Anakin helps himself to goes right back into the mug, his Master's chiding is affectionate, as is the sympathetic pat on his back.
#06 - Dark: "The boy is dangerous," he hears the shorter Jedi hiss, and it stirs something dark in him that makes him think that, perhaps, it's true.
#07 - Despair: "But Jedi aren't supposed to die," he whispers, not because he hasn't taken Qui-Gon's admonishment to the contrary seriously, but because it has always helped him to talk about his feelings; Obi-Wan, however, looks at him, eyes darkened by the crackling flames of Qui-Gon's funeral pyre, and says nothing.
#08 - Doors: There are many things about Temple life that startles and amazes Anakin, but few so amusing as his awe at doors that open and shut with but a wave of his hand.
#09 - Drink: He laughs when Obi-Wan tells him that he's now expected to drink eight cups of water every day, because that's more than he and his mother together had access to in a week on Tatooine, never mind sanitation, but he learns quickly that his Master is not the type to joke about such things.
#10 - Duty: He wants to come with Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan on Naboo, wants to see what a couple of Jedi lightsabers can do when duty compels them, but Qui-Gon orders him to stay put in the cockpit, and he soon discovers there's a way to both obey his new mentor and acquiesce to a duty of his own.
#11 - Earth: The gardens always leave behind the scent of fertile soil on his garments, but he sits on the ground anyways, cross-legged, opening himself up to the Living Force; admittedly, it's a task made alarmingly easier with Anakin astride him, once the boy's initial excitement over the place (one of Qui-Gon's favorite locations in the Temple, he tells him) has abated somewhat.
#12 - End: Qui-Gon's death feels like the end in so many ways, but as Obi-Wan stares at the squat figure that will soon take up a near permanent residence at his side, he realizes that it was also a beginning.
#13 - Fall: Qui-Gon falls and Obi-Wan thinks that he might, as well, albeit in an entirely different way, and then Qui-Gon reminds him that, in fact, he cannot, because the Force has set him on another path ("you must train the boy").
#14 - Fire: Even though he's standing close enough to the fire for it to lick at the toes of his well-worn boots, the palpable grief swirling around him in what he now knows to be the Force reaches him even through the thin, perfunctory garments he's brought with him from Tatooine, and he shivers and wishes he knew Obi-Wan well enough to burrow into the folds of his cloak.
#15 - Flexible: Anakin's flexibility, as well as his knack for fitting into ridiculously small nooks and crannies, makes him great at hide-and-seek, much to Obi-Wan's frequent chagrin.
#16 - Flying: "Flying is for 'droids," Obi-Wan mutters as he settles heavily into the pilot's seat of the diplomatic two-seater that will take them both to the site of their latest mission, and Anakin wonders, not for the first time, what the Force could possibly have thought to pair them together.
#17 - Food: Obi-Wan is a good cook, and takes obvious pleasure in preparing healthful, satisfying meals for both himself and his Padawan; Anakin knows by now that Jedi should not be prideful, but he feels gratified nonetheless by the faint flush across his Master's face when he tells Obi-Wan, his speech peppered with superlative enthusiasm, how much he loves their most recent supper.
#18 - Foot: In some ways, just remembering how to put one foot in front of the other is about all he feels he's capable of these days; and yet, for every leaden step, there's a energetic nine-year-old who must take two or even three steps to keep up with his, and does so with gusto, and somehow, that makes it easier to keep plodding along.
#19 - Grave: There's no grave stone for Qui-Gon, and this bothers Anakin because even the sleemos whose rickety podracers blew up in the middle of a race got commemorated; when Obi-Wan takes him on a walk to show him the small Kuvara tree planted in Qui-Gon's honor in an orchard on Temple grounds, however ("you can watch it grow over the years and eventually bear fruit"), it makes him feel a little bit better.
#20 - Green: Qui-Gon's lightsaber blade is green like the lush grass of Naboo; Anakin admires it longingly before Obi-Wan deactivates it, placing the hilt in a box alongside other things - a poncho, an ornate hair clip, a small, nondescript rock - that Anakin suspects are precious to him, even though they're probably not supposed to be.
#21 - Head: Only the top of the boy's head peeks out from beneath the rumpled cloak that, tossed on the sleep couch, has been reappropriated by Anakin as a blanket; beneath it, light snores accompany gentle rising and sloping movements, and Obi-Wan feels a smile upturn the corners of his mouth.
#22 - Hollow: "You'll never be the Master that Qui-Gon would have been!" he yells, knowing it's a hollow, unfair thing to say the second it leaves his mouth, and Obi-Wan recovers quickly, though there's a miniscule second where Anakin can tell that, in fact, his words have cut the older Jedi deep.
#23 - Honor: It is an honor of the highest order to be deemed worthy of one's Jedi gifts enough to pass along one's teachings to another young Force-user; all the same, however, if Obi-Wan could have waited ten or twenty years more before attempting such a feat, maybe then he'd feel ready for it.
#24 - Hope: Anakin is hopeful that one day he'll be able to make Obi-Wan laugh in breathless delight the way he did when Master Muln told that story about the toast; unfortunately, his Master doesn't seem to find the jokes he's overheard around the cantina near Watto's shop from passing merchants and other miscreants as funny as they all seemed to.
#25 - Light: It eventually comes to light how Anakin's accidental heroics saved an entire planet and countless resources; even so, the boy's expression is modest under all the scrutiny, though Obi-Wan would have to have been blind, deaf, and dumb not to see how brightly the child shines in the Force, golden and proud and equally capable of great good and terrible devastation.
#26 - Lost: Anakin has a lot of questions about how a Jedi goes about making a new lightsaber after the old one gets lost during a fight with Sith Lord, but Obi-Wan is tentative to say anything except to tell him that, when it's his time to journey to Ilum for his crystal, they'll have plenty to talk about.
#27 - Metal: There's something sentient to Anakin about the heaps of scrap metal and spare parts he veritably hoards in his room, and Obi-Wan's not sure he will ever understand it, or the curious boy who claims it speaks to him, but he tries.
#28 - New: The new bead gleams a little as it catches the light, and though it's not part of the brief ceremony's protocol, Obi-Wan barely has time to officially "confer this upon you" before Anakin throws himself into his Master's arms in a fierce attempted hug.
#29 - Old: Obi-Wan seems pretty old at first 'cause he's got a lightsaber and his braid is really long, and then Anakin starts to realize just how much his Master doesn't know, and even Obi-Wan growing a beard seems like a poor mask for just how young he really is.
#30 - Peace: Anakin sleeps fitfully, his dreams likely full of heroic flying and new friends and perhaps a little sadness over not being able to share it all with his mother; Obi-Wan watches him from his own sleep cot, and meditates to find his own semblance of peace.
#31 - Poison: Anakin can carry on all he wants ("I think I've been poisoned, Master!"), but one way or the other, Obi-Wan vows, he's going to eat his vegetables.
#32 - Pretty: Queen Amidala is all pretty, airy fabrics and light at the festival, favoring him with a smile not quite reaching her eyes whose depths overwhelm her scant fourteen years; it's different from the wide grin that she shows to Anakin, though her teeth are pretty too, straight and white.
#33 - Rain: The first time he sees rain on Coruscant has him pressing his small hands to the window in the sitting area in Master Obi-Wan's quarters to peer in wonder at the sky; later, he'll apologize through snuffles for his haste in rushing to stand outside through the worst of it, his clothing almost completely soaked through, and Obi-Wan will just tsk and swaddle him in blankets.
#34 - Regret: "What would have happened to me had that Sith guy found me on Tatooine before Master Qui-Gon did?" he asks, and he regrets it almost immediately upon seeing the stricken look on Obi-Wan's face.
#35 - Roses: It's a beautiful flower, to be sure, though Obi-Wan is surprised at the depths of Anakin's smitten admiration for Queen Amidala ("it reminds me of her"), deciding that, more than likely, the young woman simply reminds the boy of his mother.
#36 - Secret: "'Kay, I won't tell Obi-Wan, promise, Master," Anakin whispers, and Qui-Gon's shimmery image nods and then disappears.
#37 - Snakes: Obi-Wan thinks that the stray fluff pittins pinched from around and about the Outlander are bad enough, and then Anakin ups the ante by sneaking a small, garden-dwelling (and boot-dwelling, as it happens) serpent back to the Temple.
#38 - Snow: The snowball leaves the boy's small hand with (un)surprising (Force-enhanced) strength, landing, as it was meant to, against the back of his Master's head, and that's the day Anakin learns a valuable lesson about the unrelenting persistance of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
#39 - Solid: The tiny hand grips his own with surprising strength, and Obi-Wan cannot help but use it as a metaphor, however clumsy, for the equally surprising solidarity of his connection with the boy in the Force.
#40 - Spring: Alderaan is a system of eternal springtime, of lush natural beauty and sophisticated civilization elegantly entangled, and though the boy is obviously impressed ("it's kinda like Naboo, Master") and Senator Organa is a(n as usual) charming host, Obi-Wan remembers sitting in the palace's grand dining room alongside another Jedi not so long ago, and feels irritated suddenly that the mild climate does not match his current temperament.
#41 - Stable: None of the attacks on Anakin's immune system during his first months as a Jedi kill him - Obi-Wan suspects that the boy's ridiculous midichlorian count has much to do with his overall stability in spite of having lived in considerable squalor for much of his young life - and he remains in good spirits even as the Healers tirelessly pump him full of medications and other things to supplement his years of poor nutrition, concentrating bravely on his Master's warm, contemplative face and the comforting hand scrubbing through his hair as his arm is swabbed and laden with pinpricks.
#42 - Strange: It's strange to Anakin that Jedi spend so much time sitting around doing nothing, particularly Obi-Wan, who seems to meditate more than he does anything else, but as his Master chides him when he begins flopping about listlessly after 'only' twenty minutes, those who cannot calm themselves well enough to commune regularly with the Force have much more to worry about than being strange.
#43 - Summer: Obi-Wan has never taken to extreme heat or cold terribly easily, but humid, warm climates do not seem to bother Anakin; even the boy's skin turns a deep golden brown, something that will make him look like some sort of sun god when he's older, whereas Obi-Wan must content himself with sporting an inordinate amount of freckles.
#44 - Taboo: Anakin likes Garen Muln because he likes flying a lot and ruffles his hair whenever they see each other and, much to his Master's chagrin, because Garen adds to the boy's repertoire of things to call Obi-Wan; still, the day Garen refers to Obi-Wan as a "Sith killer," Anakin knows it's not something he should ever repeat.
#45 - Ugly: Anakin thinks that the traditional Padawan haircut looks ugly, and even though Obi-Wan prattles at him about tradition and such, he can't wait until the day he can start growing out his mane again.
#46 - War: In the midst of everything - the gauntlet thrown by the Zabrakian Sith Lord that issues in the newest war between Force-users; the Trade Federation drama; even his own annoyance with Qui-Gon over being simultaneously put off and shoved aside - it occurs to Obi-Wan that he's not entirely certain he remembers the boy's name.
#47 - Water: It shocks Anakin how much water is so thoughtlessly wasted at the Temple, whose inhabitants otherwise prides themselveson their austerity; soon, however, Obi-Wan's procurement of a small spaceship toy has him splashing around happily in the bath, though like nearly all children his age, he dislikes extraordinarily having to wash behind his ears.
#48 - Welcome: "Welcome to the Jedi, Anakin Skywalker," Obi-Wan says, and Anakin beams as his Master finishes ceremonially tying off his new braid.
#49 - Winter: Anakin dutifully helps him to build a fire out of parts scavenged from the land where they've been marooned for the evening, and while tonight would be an excellent time to teach the boy an important lesson in allowing the Force to override mere discomforts like inhospital climates, Anakin's teeth are chattering so loudly and his small face looks so very miserable (and cold) that Obi-Wan but sighs and collects him in his arms; through the Force, Anakin radiates gratitude, and, nestled under his Master's chin, they both keep warm.
#50 - Wood: Anakin thinks Obi-Wan's favorite tea tastes a little like wood, but he learns how to make it anyways so that, on the rare occasions when he manages to be the first one awake, he can do for his Master what Obi-Wan did for Qui-Gon for many years.